Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Higginson, Thomas Wentworth

(Encyclopedia)Higginson, Thomas Wentworth, 1823–1911, American author, b. Cambridge, Mass. A Unitarian minister, he was a leader in the abolitionist movement and was a member of a group that backed John Brown's a...

Ives, Charles

(Encyclopedia)Ives, Charles īvz [key], 1874–1954, American composer and organist, b. Danbury, Conn., grad. Yale, 1898; pupil of Dudley Buck and Horatio Parker. He was an organist (1893–1904) in churches in Con...

Ellison, Ralph

(Encyclopedia)Ellison, Ralph (Ralph Waldo Ellison), 1914–94, African-American author, b. Oklahoma City, studied Tuskegee Institute (now Tuskegee Univ.). Originally a trumpet player and aspiring composer, he moved...

Grimké, Angelina Emily

(Encyclopedia)Grimké, Angelina Emily grĭmˈkē [key], 1805–79, American abolitionist and advocate of women's rights, b. Charleston, S.C. Converted to the Quaker faith by her elder sister Sarah Moore Grimké, sh...

Kahlo, Frida

(Encyclopedia)Kahlo, Frida frēˈdä käˈlō [key], 1907–54, Mexican painter, b. Coyoacán as Magdalena Carmen Frieda Kahlo y Calderón. As a result of an accident at age 15, Kahlo turned her attention from a me...

Stradivari, Antonio

(Encyclopedia)Stradivari, Antonio ăntōˈnēəs strădĭvârˈēəs [key], 1644–1737, Italian violin maker of Cremona; pupil of Niccolò Amati. He was apprenticed to Amati c.1658 and may have remained with him u...

Suárez, Francisco

(Encyclopedia)Suárez, Francisco fränthēsˈkō swäˈrāth [key], 1548–1617, Spanish Jesuit philosopher, b. Granada. He studied at Salamanca and was ordained in 1572. He taught successively at Ávila, Segovia, ...

space-time

(Encyclopedia)space-time, central concept in the theory of relativity that replaces the earlier concepts of space and time as separate absolute entities. In relativity one cannot uniquely distinguish space and time...

Bukowski, Charles

(Encyclopedia)Bukowski, Charles, 1920–94, American underground poet and fiction writer, b. Andernach, Germany. His family immigrated to the United States in 1922, settling in Los Angeles. A hard-drinking unskille...

Bentsen, Lloyd Millard, Jr.

(Encyclopedia)Bentsen, Lloyd Millard, Jr., 1921–2006, American political leader and U.S. secretary of the treasury (1993–94), b. Mission, Tex. He received a law degree from the Univ. of Texas in 1942 and served...