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Burnett, Frances Eliza Hodgson

(Encyclopedia)Burnett, Frances Eliza Hodgson bərnĕtˈ [key], 1849–1924, American author, b. Manchester, England. In 1865 she went to Knoxville, Tenn., with her family. She wrote several adult novels, but is fam...

Butler, Samuel, 1612–80, English poet and satirist

(Encyclopedia)Butler, Samuel, 1612–80, English poet and satirist. During the Puritan Revolution he served Sir Samuel Luke, a noted officer of Cromwell. After the restoration of Charles II, he wrote his famous moc...

agnosticism

(Encyclopedia)agnosticism ăgnŏsˈtĭsĭzəm [key], form of skepticism that holds that the existence of God cannot be logically proved or disproved. Among prominent agnostics have been Auguste Comte, Herbert Spenc...

Braun, Eva

(Encyclopedia)Braun, Eva āˈvä broun [key], 1912–45, mistress and later wife of the German dictator Adolf Hitler. She was a shop assistant to a Nazi photographer, through whom she met Hitler. She entered his ho...

Caraway, Hattie Wyatt

(Encyclopedia)Caraway, Hattie Wyatt kărˈəwāˌ [key], 1878–1950, U.S. senator (1932–45), b. near Bakerville, Tenn. In 1932 she was appointed to fill the unexpired Senate term from Arkansas of her late husban...

Sybaris

(Encyclopedia)Sybaris sĭbˈərĭs [key], ancient city of Magna Graecia, S Italy, in Bruttium, on the Gulf of Tarentum (now Taranto). It was founded in 720 b.c. by Achaeans and people from Argolis, the Troezenians....

White, William

(Encyclopedia)White, William, 1748–1836, American Episcopal bishop, b. Philadelphia, grad. College of Philadelphia (now Univ. of Pennsylvania), 1765. He was ordained in England in 1772, returning to become assist...

Walafrid Strabo

(Encyclopedia)Walafrid Strabo (Walafrid the Squinter), c.809–849, German scholar, b. Swabia. Educated at the abbey of Reichenau, he wrote, at 18, a Latin verse account of a journey to the hereafter, Visio Wettini...

Woods, Robert Archey

(Encyclopedia)Woods, Robert Archey, 1865–1925, American social worker, b. Pittsburgh, grad. Amherst, 1886. After six months at Toynbee Hall, London, he helped found (1891) the South End House, Boston, which he he...

Bale, John

(Encyclopedia)Bale, John, 1495–1563, English dramatist and clergyman. An ardent proponent of the Reformation, he used the stage as a vehicle for his views. His most famous play, King John (written c.1535), shows ...