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Tesla, Nikola

(Encyclopedia)Tesla, Nikola tĕsˈlə [key], 1856–1943, American electrician and inventor, b. Croatia (then an Austrian province). An ethnic Serb, he immigrated to the United States in 1884, worked for a short pe...

Lynd, Robert Staughton

(Encyclopedia)Lynd, Robert Staughton, 1892–1970, American sociologist, b. New Albany, Ind.; grad. Princeton (B.A., 1914), Ph.D. Columbia, 1931. He taught at Columbia for 30 years (1931–61). With his wife, Helen...

Hicks, Elias

(Encyclopedia)Hicks, Elias, 1748–1830, American Quaker preacher, b. Hempstead, N.Y. He worked on his Long Island farm between his preaching tours, which established his reputation as one of the most able Quaker p...

Harper, Ida Husted

(Encyclopedia)Harper, Ida Husted, 1851–1931, American woman suffragist. Allied with the woman-suffrage movement from 1898, she became the official reporter and historian of the National American Woman Suffrage As...

Seaver, Tom

(Encyclopedia)Seaver, Tom (George Thomas Seaver), 1944–2020, American baseball pitcher and sportscaster, b. Fresno, Calif. During his career (1967–86), he won a total of 311 games for the New York Mets, Cincinn...

Austin, Alfred

(Encyclopedia)Austin, Alfred, 1835–1913, English author, b. Leeds. Originally trained for a legal career, he eventually turned to writing and politics. From 1883–95 he edited the National Review. Although in 18...

Tappan, Lewis

(Encyclopedia)Tappan, Lewis, 1788–1873, American abolitionist, b. Northampton, Mass. He became a partner in his brother Arthur's New York mercantile house in 1828 and in 1841 founded the first agency for rating c...

Taylor, Bert Leston

(Encyclopedia)Taylor, Bert Leston, 1866–1921, American newspaper columnist, b. Goshen, Mass. He worked for a number of newspapers before establishing his column, “A Line o' Type or Two,” signed B. L. T., ...

Billings, Josh

(Encyclopedia)Billings, Josh, pseud. of Henry Wheeler Shaw, 1818–85, American humorist and lecturer, b. Lanesboro, Mass. After a roving life as farmer, explorer, and coal miner, he settled in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., ...

Bliss, Daniel

(Encyclopedia)Bliss, Daniel, 1823–1916, American missionary, b. Franklin co., Vt., founder of Syrian Protestant College (now the American Univ. of Beirut) in Lebanon. He went to Syria in 1855, returning in 1862 t...