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Hooker, Sir William Jackson

(Encyclopedia)Hooker, Sir William Jackson, 1785–1865, English botanist. A leading authority of his time on ferns, he formed a famous herbarium and built up the Glasgow Garden and the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew....

Downing, Andrew Jackson

(Encyclopedia)Downing, Andrew Jackson, 1815–52, American horticulturist, rural architect, and landscape gardener, b. Newburgh, N.Y. With his brother Charles Downing, 1802–85, he took over the operation of the n...

Williams, John, English missionary

(Encyclopedia)Williams, John, 1796–1839, English missionary, called the Apostle of Polynesia. Under the London Missionary Society he went (1817) to the Society Islands. He discovered Rarotonga in 1823 and founded...

Williams, Venus Ebone Starr

(Encyclopedia)Williams, Venus Ebone Starr, 1980–, b. Lynwood, Calif., and Serena Jameka Williams, 1981–, b. Saginaw, Mich., African-American tennis players. Coached by their father, Richard, both sisters turned...

Young, Andrew Jackson, Jr.

(Encyclopedia)Young, Andrew Jackson, Jr., 1932–, African-American leader, clergyman, and public official, b. New Orleans. He was a leading civil-rights activist in the 1960s and, as a Democrat from Georgia, serve...

Williams, William, American political leader

(Encyclopedia)Williams, William, 1731–1811, political leader in the American Revolution, signer of the Declaration of Independence, b. Lebanon, Conn. He served in the French and Indian War and held many public of...

Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park

(Encyclopedia)Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park, 117 acres (47 hectares), central Ky., near Hodgenville; est. 1916. Abraham Lincoln was born in a log cabin in this area on Feb. 12, 1809. The exact...

Ward, Barbara Mary, Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth

(Encyclopedia)Ward, Barbara Mary, Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth, 1914–81, British writer. Educated at the Sorbonne and at Oxford, she joined the staff of the Economist in 1939 and became foreign editor in 1940. F...

Crenshaw, Kimberlé Williams

(Encyclopedia)Crenshaw, Kimberlé, 1959–, American legal scholar and critical race theorist, b. Canton, Ohio, J.D. Harvard University, 1984. An influential writer o...

Warner, Sylvia Townsend

(Encyclopedia)Warner, Sylvia Townsend, 1893–1978, English novelist and poet. Her first published work was poetry, The Espalier (1925), but she became more generally known with two novels of gentle fantasy, Lolly ...