Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Franck, César Auguste

(Encyclopedia)Franck, César Auguste sāzärˈ ōgüstˈ fräNk [key], 1822–90, Belgian-French composer and organist. He studied at the conservatories of Liège and Paris, taking prizes in piano, composition, and...

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

(Encyclopedia)Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), officially the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, independent U.S. government agency responsible for most of the federal oversight and enforcement of...

Shadwell, Thomas

(Encyclopedia)Shadwell, Thomas, 1642?–1692, English dramatist and poet. His plays, written in the tradition of Jonson's comedy of humours, are distinguished for their realistic pictures of London life and for the...

Lane, Franklin Knight

(Encyclopedia)Lane, Franklin Knight, 1864–1921, U.S. Secretary of the Interior (1913–20), b. near Charlottetown, P.E.I., Canada. Raised in California, he later studied law and practiced in San Francisco, where ...

Perkins School for the Blind

(Encyclopedia)Perkins School for the Blind, at Watertown, Mass.; chartered 1829, opened 1832 in South Boston as the New England Asylum for the Blind, with Samuel G. Howe as its director; moved 1912. From 1877 to 19...

Cromwell, Thomas, earl of Essex

(Encyclopedia)Cromwell, Thomas, earl of Essex, 1485?–1540, English statesman. While a young man he lived abroad as a soldier, accountant, and merchant, and on his return (c.1512) to England he engaged in the wool...

Charles VIII, king of France

(Encyclopedia)Charles VIII, 1470–98, king of France (1483–98), son and successor of Louis XI. He first reigned under the regency of his sister Anne de Beaujeu. After his marriage (1491) to Anne of Brittany, he ...

Fronde

(Encyclopedia)Fronde frôNd [key], 1648–53, series of outbreaks during the minority of King Louis XIV, caused by the efforts of the Parlement of Paris (the chief judiciary body) to limit the growing authority of ...

Morrow, Dwight Whitney

(Encyclopedia)Morrow, Dwight Whitney, 1873–1931, American banker and diplomat, b. Huntington, W.Va. He practiced law in New York City and entered (1914) the banking house of J. P. Morgan & Company. After the ...

McGill University

(Encyclopedia)McGill University, at Montreal, Que., Canada; coeducational; chartered 1821, opened 1829. It was named for James McGill, who left a bequest to establish it. Its real development dates from 1855 when J...