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Penn Central Company

(Encyclopedia)Penn Central Company, former U.S. transportation company, formed in 1968 by the merger of the New York Central RR and the Pennsylvania RR. By the early 1970s the railroad was bankrupt; in 1976 the U.S...

Royal Shakespeare Company

(Encyclopedia)Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC), a British repertory theater. The company, established in 1960, was based on the earlier Shakespeare Memorial Theatre at Stratford-upon-Avon. It is a national theater s...

Russian American Company

(Encyclopedia)Russian American Company, colonial trading company, chartered by Czar Paul I in 1799. The charter granted the merchant-dominated company monopoly trading privileges in Russian America, which included ...

Mackay, John William

(Encyclopedia)Mackay, John William măkˈē [key], 1831–1902, American financier, b. Dublin, Ireland. He immigrated to the United States in 1840. In 1859 he joined the rush to Nevada, where silver had been discov...

Ordinance of 1787

(Encyclopedia)Ordinance of 1787, adopted by the Congress of Confederation for the government of the Western territories ceded to the United States by the states. It created the Northwest Territory and is frequently...

Latin Monetary Union

(Encyclopedia)Latin Monetary Union. In 1865, France, Belgium, Italy, and Switzerland (joined in 1868 by Greece) agreed to regulate their national currencies on a uniform basis, thus making it freely interchangeable...

Constitutional Union party

(Encyclopedia)Constitutional Union party, in U.S. history, formed when the conflict between North and South broke down the older parties. The Constitutional Union group, composed of former Whigs and remnants of the...

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