Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Du Pont, Samuel Francis

(Encyclopedia)Du Pont, Samuel Francis, 1803–65, American naval officer, b. Bergen Point, N.J.; grandson of Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours. Appointed a midshipman in 1815, he saw his first active duty in the Med...

Lawson, John

(Encyclopedia)Lawson, John, d. 1711, English explorer of North Carolina. He came to the Carolinas in 1700 and within the next few years traveled approximately 1,000 mi (1,600 km) through its unexplored parts. His d...

bobolink

(Encyclopedia)bobolink bŏbˈəlĭngkˌ [key], common name in the N United States and Canada for an American songbird, Dolichonyx oryzivorus, related to the blackbird and the oriole, belonging to the family Icterid...

Calhoun, John Caldwell

(Encyclopedia)Calhoun, John Caldwell kălˌho͞onˈ [key], 1782–1850, American statesman and political philosopher, b. near Abbeville, S.C., grad. Yale, 1804. He was an intellectual giant of political life in his...

Appalachian Mountains

(Encyclopedia)Appalachian Mountains ăpəlāˈchən, –chēən, –lăchˈ– [key], mountain system of E North America, extending in a broad belt c.1,600 mi (2,570 km) SW from the Gaspé Peninsula in Quebec prov....

Great Artesian Basin

(Encyclopedia)Great Artesian Basin, c.670,000 sq mi (1,735,300 sq km), between the Eastern Highlands and the Western Plateau, E central Australia, extending S from the Gulf of Carpentaria, Queensland, to NE South A...

Phillips, Ulrich Bonnell

(Encyclopedia)Phillips, Ulrich Bonnell, 1877–1934, American historian, an authority on the antebellum South, b. La Grange, Ga. After teaching at the Univ. of Wisconsin (1902–8), he was professor of history and ...

Gadsden, Christopher

(Encyclopedia)Gadsden, Christopher gădzˈdən [key], 1724–1805, American Revolutionary leader, b. Charleston, S.C., educated in England. He returned to Charleston (1746) and became a wealthy merchant. At the Sta...

Oratory, Congregation of the

(Encyclopedia)Oratory, Congregation of the [Lat. abbr., Cong. Orat.], in the Roman Catholic Church, founded in 1575, an association of secular priests organized into independent communities according to the rule wr...

Legaré, Hugh Swinton

(Encyclopedia)Legaré, Hugh Swinton ləgrēˈ [key], 1797–1843, American lawyer and public official, b. Charleston, S.C. He was admitted to the bar in 1822, served in the South Carolina legislature (1820–22, 18...