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Erie Canal

(Encyclopedia)Erie Canal, artificial waterway, c.360 mi (580 km) long; connecting New York City with the Great Lakes via the Hudson River. Locks were built to overcome the 571-ft (174-m) difference between the leve...

Vanderbilt, Cornelius

(Encyclopedia)Vanderbilt, Cornelius, 1794–1877, American railroad magnate, b. Staten Island, N.Y. As a boy he ferried freight and passengers from Staten Island to Manhattan, and he soon gained control of most of ...

Jersey City

(Encyclopedia)Jersey City, city (1990 pop. 228,537), seat of Hudson co., NE N.J., a port on a peninsula formed by the Hudson and Hackensack rivers and Upper New York Bay, opposite lower Manhattan; settled before 16...

Locofocos

(Encyclopedia)Locofocos lōˌkōfōˈkōz [key], name given in derision to the members of a faction that split off from the Democratic party in New York in 1835. Tension had been growing between radical Democrats, ...

Dance Theatre of Harlem

(Encyclopedia)Dance Theatre of Harlem, the first black classical ballet company. The group was founded in Harlem, New York City, by Arthur Mitchell, then of the New York City Ballet, the first African-American prin...

commercial revolution

(Encyclopedia)commercial revolution, in European history, a fundamental change in the quantity and scope of commerce. In the later Middle Ages steady economic expansion had seen the rise of towns and the advent of ...

Reid, Whitelaw

(Encyclopedia)Reid, Whitelaw, 1837–1912, American journalist and diplomat, b. near Xenia, Ohio. His distinguished correspondence during the Civil War for the Cincinnati Gazette led Horace Greeley to make him mana...

Lae

(Encyclopedia)Lae läˈē, lī [key], town (1990 pop. 88,172), Papua New Guinea, on NE New Guinea island, at the head of the Huon Gulf. Lae is an important administrative and commercial center. Founded in 1927 to s...

Knickerbocker

(Encyclopedia)Knickerbocker nĭkˈərbŏkˌər [key], term used almost synonymously with the adjective “Dutch” in respect to Dutch families and customs and the Dutch region of early New York state. A History of...

Kermadec Islands

(Encyclopedia)Kermadec Islands kərmădˈĕk [key], almost uninhabited, active volcanic group (c.13 sq mi/34 sq km), South Pacific, 450 mi (720 km) NE of New Zealand, of which they are a dependency. Raoul, or Sunda...