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Underground Railroad

(Encyclopedia)Underground Railroad, in U.S. history, loosely organized system for helping fugitive slaves escape to Canada or to areas of safety in free states. It was run by local groups of Northern abolitionists,...

Hartford

(Encyclopedia)Hartford. <1> City (2020 pop. 121,054), state capital, Hartford co., central Conn., on the west bank of the Connecticut River; settled as Newtown ...

Camus, Albert

(Encyclopedia)Camus, Albert älbĕrˈ kämüˈ [key], 1913–60, French writer, b. Mondovi (now Dréan). Camus was one of the most important authors and thinkers of the 20th cent. While a philosophy student at the ...

Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron

(Encyclopedia)Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron tĕnˈĭsən [key], 1809–92, English poet. The most famous poet of the Victorian age, he was a profound spokesman for the ideas and values of his times. Tenny...

Irving, Washington

(Encyclopedia)Irving, Washington, 1783–1859, American author and diplomat, b. New York City. Irving was one of the first Americans to be recognized abroad as a man of letters, and he was a literary idol at home. ...

Portland, cities, United States

(Encyclopedia)Portland. 1 City (1990 pop. 64,358), seat of Cumberland co., SW Maine, situated on a small peninsula and adjacent land, with a large, deepwater harbor on Casco Bay; settled c.1632, set off from Falmou...

income tax

(Encyclopedia)income tax, assessment levied upon individual or corporate incomes. Although personal incomes were occasionally taxed in medieval Italian cities, the income tax is essentially a modern form of taxatio...

fairy

(Encyclopedia)fairy, in folklore, one of a variety of supernatural beings endowed with the powers of magic and enchantment. Belief in fairies has existed from earliest times, and literatures all over the world have...

Wesley, John

(Encyclopedia)Wesley, John, 1703–91, English evangelical preacher, founder of Methodism, b. Epworth, Lincolnshire. After his conversion, Wesley became involved in evangelistic work, in the course of which he is...

semantics

(Encyclopedia)semantics [Gr.,=significant] in general, the study of the relationship between words and meanings. The empirical study of word meanings and sentence meanings in existing languages is a branch of lingu...