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K'ung Hsiang-hsi

(Encyclopedia)K'ung Hsiang-hsi ko͝ong shyäng-shē [key], 1881–1967, Chinese banker and political leader, educated at Oberlin and at Yale. He deemed himself a direct descendant of Confucius in the 75th generatio...

Tolkien, J. R. R.

(Encyclopedia)Tolkien, J. R. R. (John Ronald Reuel Tolkien) tälˈkēn, tōlˈ– [key], 1892–1973, British novelist, b. South Africa. A fantasy writer and Oxford don, Tolkien wrote The Hobbit (1937), adapted fro...

Seabury, Samuel, American clergyman

(Encyclopedia)Seabury, Samuel, 1729–96, American clergyman, first bishop of the Episcopal Church, b. Connecticut, grad. Yale, 1748. He studied medicine at the Univ. of Edinburgh, then turned to theology and was o...

Clay, Cassius Marcellus

(Encyclopedia)Clay, Cassius Marcellus, 1810–1903, American politician and diplomat, b. Madison co., Ky. Although he came from a slaveholding family, Clay early came to abhor the institution of slavery. In 1845 he...

Darwin, Charles Galton

(Encyclopedia)Darwin, Charles Galton, 1887–1962, English physicist and administrator. Educated at Cambridge, he worked under Ernest Rutherford at Manchester, where he collaborated with H. G. J. Moseley in fundame...

Truth, Sojourner

(Encyclopedia)Truth, Sojourner, c.1797–1883, American abolitionist, a freed slave, originally called Isabella, b. Ulster co., N.Y. Convinced that she heard heavenly...

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden

(Encyclopedia)Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C. Part of the Smithsonian Institution, the museum was designed by Gordon Bunshaft to house 6,000 pieces of the enormous art collection amassed by ...

Doolittle, Hilda

(Encyclopedia)Doolittle, Hilda, pseud. H. D., 1886–1961, American poet, b. Bethlehem, Pa., educated at Bryn Mawr. After 1911 she lived abroad, marrying Richard Aldington in 1913. In England, under the influence o...

Heinlein, Robert Anson MacDonald

(Encyclopedia)Heinlein, Robert Anson MacDonald hīˈlīn [key], 1907–88, American science-fiction writer, b. Butler, Mo. His best-known novel, Stranger in a Strange Land (1961), concerns a young man who is raised...

Busoni, Ferruccio Benvenuto

(Encyclopedia)Busoni, Ferruccio Benvenuto fār-ro͞otˈchō bānvāno͞oˈtō bo͞ozōˈnē [key], 1866–1924, Italian pianist and composer. A child prodigy, he gave a concert in Trieste at the age of eight, which...