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Copley, John Singleton, American portrait painter

(Encyclopedia)Copley, John Singleton kŏpˈlē [key], 1738–1815, American portrait painter, b. Boston. Copley is considered the greatest of the American old masters. He studied with his stepfather, Peter Pelham, ...

Steptoe, Patrick Christopher

(Encyclopedia)Steptoe, Patrick Christopher, 1913–88, British surgeon, M.D. St. George Hospital Medical School, Univ. of London, 1939. Steptoe worked at Oldham General Hospital from 1951 to 1980, when he and Briti...

W and Z particles

(Encyclopedia)W and Z particles, elementary particles that mediate, or carry, the fundamental force associated with weak interactions. The discovery of the W and Z particles at CERN near Geneva, Switzerland, in the...

Monitor and Merrimack

(Encyclopedia)Monitor and Merrimack, two American warships that fought the first engagement between ironclad ships. When, at the beginning of the Civil War, the Union forces abandoned the Norfolk Navy Yard at Ports...

Bingham, Hiram, 1789–1869, American Congregationalist missionary

(Encyclopedia)Bingham, Hiram, 1789–1869, American Congregationalist missionary, b. Bennington, Vt. In 1819 the American Board of Missions sent him, with others, to found the first Protestant mission in the Hawaii...

French and Indian Wars

(Encyclopedia)French and Indian Wars, 1689–1763, the name given by American historians to the North American colonial wars between Great Britain and France in the late 17th and the 18th cent. They were really cam...

Morison, Samuel Eliot

(Encyclopedia)Morison, Samuel Eliot, 1887–1976, American historian, b. Boston. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard in 1912 and began teaching history there in 1915, becoming full professor in 1925 and Jonathan Tru...

Audubon, John James

(Encyclopedia)Audubon, John James ôˈdəbŏn [key], 1785–1851, American ornithologist, b. Les Cayes, Santo Domingo (now Haiti). The illegitimate son of a French sea captain and plantation owner and a Creole cham...

Astor, John Jacob, 1864–1912, American financier

(Encyclopedia)Astor, John Jacob, 1864–1912, American financier, b. Rhinebeck, N.Y.; son of William Backhouse Astor (1829–92). He served in the Spanish-American War. Drowned in the Titanic disaster, he left two ...

Garland, Hamlin

(Encyclopedia)Garland, Hamlin, 1860–1940, American author, b. near West Salem, Wis. He grew up in the Middle Western farmlands, the region he later wrote about in verse, stories, and autobiography. His tales, col...