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rococo, in music

(Encyclopedia)rococo, in music, 18th-century reaction against the baroque style. Less formal and grandiose in structure, it was a graceful rather than a profound style, more hedonistic than venturesome. Extreme man...

Pinckney, Thomas

(Encyclopedia)Pinckney, Thomas, 1750–1828, American political leader and diplomat, b. Charleston, S.C.; brother of C. C. Pinckney and cousin of Charles Pinckney. At the outbreak of the American Revolution he join...

Reed, Thomas Brackett

(Encyclopedia)Reed, Thomas Brackett, 1839–1902, American legislator, b. Portland, Maine. A lawyer, he served in the state assembly (1868–69) and state senate (1870) and became (1870–73) state attorney general...

Standish, Miles

(Encyclopedia)Standish, Miles or Myles, c.1584–1656, American colonist, b. England. After serving as a soldier for a number of years, Standish accompanied the Pilgrims to America on the Mayflower (1620) and was r...

Stone, Harlan Fiske

(Encyclopedia)Stone, Harlan Fiske, 1872–1946, American jurist, 12th chief justice of the United States (1941–46), b. Chesterfield, N.H. A graduate (1898) of Columbia Univ. law school, he was admitted (1899) to ...

Fermat, Pierre de

(Encyclopedia)Fermat, Pierre de pyĕr də fĕrmäˈ [key], 1601–65, French mathematician. A magistrate whose avocation was mathematics, Fermat is known as a founder of modern number theory and probability theory....

Haywood, William Dudley

(Encyclopedia)Haywood, William Dudley, 1869–1928, American labor leader, known as Big Bill Haywood, b. Salt Lake City, Utah. He began work as a miner at 15 years of age. In 1896 he joined the newly organized West...

Andersen, Hans Christian

(Encyclopedia)Andersen, Hans Christian, 1805–75, Danish poet, novelist, and writer of fairy tales. Born to an illiterate washerwoman and reared in poverty, he left Odense at 14 for Copenhagen, where he lived with...

Jolliet, Louis

(Encyclopedia)Jolliet or Joliet, Louis both: jōˈlēĕtˌ, jōˌlēĕtˈ, Fr. lwē zhôlyāˈ [key], 1645–1700, French explorer, joint discoverer with Jacques Marquette of the upper Mississippi River, b. Quebec ...

Kafka, Franz

(Encyclopedia)Kafka, Franz fränts käfˈkä [key], 1883–1924, German-language novelist, b. Prague. Along with Joyce, Kafka is perhaps the most influential of 20th-century writers. From a middle-class Jewish fami...