Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

205 results found

Dred Scott Case

(Encyclopedia)Dred Scott Case, argued before the U.S. Supreme Court in 1856–57. It involved the then bitterly contested issue of the status of slavery in the federal territories. In 1834, Dred Scott, a black slav...

Ascham, Roger

(Encyclopedia)Ascham, Roger ăsˈkəm [key], 1515–68, English humanist and scholar, b. Yorkshire. Ascham was a major intellectual figure of the early Tudor period. His Toxophilus (1545), an essay on archery, prov...

Beaumont, William

(Encyclopedia)Beaumont, William, 1785–1853, American physician, b. Lebanon, Conn. He was privately educated and was licensed (1812) to practice in Vermont. His Experiments and Observations on the Gastric Juice an...

Mudd, Samuel Alexander

(Encyclopedia)Mudd, Samuel Alexander, 1833–83, Maryland physician and Confederate sympathizer who on April 15, 1865, set the broken left leg of Lincoln's fleeing assassin, John Wilkes Booth. Mudd was accused of a...

Naidu, Sarojini

(Encyclopedia)Naidu, Sarojini sərōˈjĭnē nīˈdo͞o [key], 1879–1949, Indian poet and political leader. Born Sarojini Chattopadhyay, she was educated in Madras (now Chennai) and at King's College, London, and...

Madden, John Earl

(Encyclopedia)Madden, John Earl, 1936-2021, American football coach and broadcaster, b. Austin, Mn., Cal. Polytechic, San Luis Obispo (B.S., 1959; M.S., 1961). Madden...

Kelley, Hall Jackson

(Encyclopedia)Kelley, Hall Jackson, 1790–1874, American propagandist for the settlement of Oregon, b. Northwood, N.H. A schoolmaster in Boston (1818–23) and later a railroad surveyor in Maine, he founded (1829)...

Cooper, Thomas

(Encyclopedia)Cooper, Thomas, 1759–1839, American scientist, educator, and political philosopher, b. London, educated at Oxford. His important works include Political Essays (1799); the appendixes to the Memoirs ...

Raeburn, Sir Henry

(Encyclopedia)Raeburn, Sir Henry rāˈbərn [key], 1756–1823, Scottish portrait painter, b. near Edinburgh. He was apprenticed to a goldsmith at 15 and he showed considerable talent. In 1784 he went to London and...

Spock, Benjamin McLane

(Encyclopedia)Spock, Benjamin McLane, 1903–98, American author and pediatrician, b. New Haven, Conn., educ. Yale (B.A., 1925) and Columbia Univ. College of Physicians and Surgeons (M.D., 1929). In 1946, Dr. Spock...

Browse by Subject