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Wolverhampton

(Encyclopedia)Wolverhampton wo͝olˈvərhămpˌtən [key], city and metropolitan borough (1991 pop. 263,501), W central England, in the Black Country. Wolverhampton is highly industrialized; products include automo...

Ubico, Jorge

(Encyclopedia)Ubico, Jorge hôrˈhā o͞obēˈkō [key], 1878–1946, president of Guatemala (1931–44). An army general, Ubico as president established financial stability and political order. He built an extensi...

Pownall, Thomas

(Encyclopedia)Pownall, Thomas pouˈnəl [key], 1722–1805, English colonial governor in North America. In 1753 he went to New York as secretary to Sir Danvers Osborn, newly appointed governor. Following Osborn's s...

folk song

(Encyclopedia)folk song, music of anonymous composition, transmitted orally. The theory that folk songs were originally group compositions has been modified in recent studies. These assume that the germ of a folk m...

Mutharika, Bingu wa

(Encyclopedia)Mutharika, Bingu wa bēngˈgo͞o wä mo͞otäˈrēkä [key], 1934–2012, Malawian economist and political leader, b. Nyasaland (now Malawi) as Brightson Webster Ryson Thom; he africanized his name du...

skiing

(Encyclopedia)skiing, sport of sliding over snow on skis—long, narrow, flexible runners. Water skiing is a warm-weather sport in which a motor-propelled craft tows a skier through the water. Although its orig...

Du Chaillu, Paul Belloni

(Encyclopedia)Du Chaillu, Paul Belloni pōl bĕlōnēˈ dü shāyüˈ [key], c.1831–1903, French-American explorer in Africa. Born probably in Paris, he spent his youth on the west coast of Africa, where his fath...

Ekholm, Gordon Frederick

(Encyclopedia)Ekholm, Gordon Frederick ĕkˈhōlm [key], 1909–87, American archaeologist, b. St. Paul, Minn., Ph.D. Harvard, 1941. Working with the American Museum of Natural History in New York City after 1937, ...

laurel, in botany

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Sassafras, Sassafras albidum, a member of the laurel family laurel, common name for the Lauraceae, a family of forest trees and shrubs found mainly in tropical SE Asia but also abundant in tro...

Rajshahi

(Encyclopedia)Rajshahi rämˈpo͝or bōäˈlēä [key], city (1991 pop. 318,000), W central Bangladesh, on the Ganges River. It is the administrative center for a district that produces practically all of the count...