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Painted Desert

(Encyclopedia)Painted Desert, badlands on the northeastern bank of the Little Colorado River, NE Ariz., stretching c.200 mi (320 km) SE from the Grand Canyon; includes Petrified Forest National Park. Striking bands...

Spencer

(Encyclopedia)Spencer, city (1990 pop. 11,066), seat of Clay co., NW Iowa, on the Little Sioux River; inc. 1880. The city lies in a fertile farm area. Beef is processed, and Spencer's manufactures include work clot...

Priapus

(Encyclopedia)Priapus prīāˈpəs [key], in Greek religion, fertility god of gardens and herds; son of Aphrodite and Dionysus. He was represented as a grotesque little man with an enormous phallus. Priapus was imp...

Charente, river, France

(Encyclopedia)Charente, river, 220 mi (354 km) long, rising near Limoges, W France, and flowing W to the Bay of Biscay. The river flows past Angoulême (the head of navigation), Cognac, Saintes, and Rochefort, and ...

Palmer, Ray

(Encyclopedia)Palmer, Ray, 1808–87, American Congregational clergyman and hymn writer, b. Little Compton, R.I., grad. Yale, 1830. He held pastorates in Bath, Maine (1835–50), and Albany, N.Y. (1850–66). He is...

John Climax, Saint

(Encyclopedia)John Climax, Saint [Gr.,=ladder], d. c.649, Syrian hermit of Mt. Sinai. Little is known of his life, but his guide to the spiritual life in 30 steps, The Ladder of Paradise, was widely read in the Mid...

Faubus, Orval

(Encyclopedia)Faubus, Orval ôrˈvəl fôˈbəs [key], 1910–94, governor of Arkansas (1955–67), b. Combs, Ark. A schoolteacher, he served in World War II and after the war became Arkansas's state highway commis...

Byrd, Richard Evelyn

(Encyclopedia)Byrd, Richard Evelyn, 1888–1957, American aviator and polar explorer, b. Winchester, Va. He took up aviation in 1917, and after World War I he gained great fame in the air. He commanded the naval ai...

Norris, Edwin

(Encyclopedia)Norris, Edwin, 1795–1872, English philologist. Norris wrote a number of articles on little-known languages of Asia and Africa. His most important work was his uncompleted Assyrian Dictionary (3 vol....

Rangpur

(Encyclopedia)Rangpur rŭngˈpoŏr [key], city (1991 pop. 207,000), NW Bangladesh, on the Little Ghaghet River. The administrative center of a tobacco-growing district, Rangpur manufactures cigarettes and cigars an...