Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Schwerner, Chaney, and Goodman

(Encyclopedia)Schwerner, Chaney, and Goodman, American civil-rights workers in the South during the 1960s. Michael Schwerner (b. 1939) and Andrew Goodman (b. 1943), both white New Yorkers, went to Neshoba co., Miss...

Uruguay , river, South America

(Encyclopedia)Uruguay yo͝oˈrəgwā, gwī, Span. o͞oro͞ogwiˈ, o͞oro͞owīˈ [key], river, c.1,000 mi (1,610 km) long, rising in S Brazil and flowing in an arc W, SW, and S to the Río de la Plata, an estuary; ...

Butler, Nicholas Murray

(Encyclopedia)Butler, Nicholas Murray, 1862–1947, American educator, president of Columbia Univ. (1902–45), b. Elizabeth, N.J., grad. Columbia (B.A., 1882; Ph.D., 1884). Holding a Columbia fellowship, he studie...

Alcobaça

(Encyclopedia)Alcobaça əlko͝obäˈsə [key], town, Leiria dist., W central Portugal, in Estremadura. The town, a fruit processing and textile center, became a center of the Cistercia...

Iowa State University of Science and Technology

(Encyclopedia)Iowa State University of Science and Technology, at Ames, commonly known as Iowa State University; land-grant with state and federal support; coeducational; chartered 1858, opened 1868 as an agricultu...

Thomas, Martha Carey

(Encyclopedia)Thomas, Martha Carey, 1857–1935, American educator and feminist, b. Baltimore, grad. Cornell, 1877, studied at Johns Hopkins and at Leipzig, the Sorbonne, and Zürich (Ph.D., 1882). In 1884 she was ...

Wisconsin v. Yoder

(Encyclopedia)Wisconsin v. Yoder, case decided in 1972 by the U.S. Supreme Court, which held that Amish children could be exempted from compulsory school-attendance beyond the 8th grade; the Amish (see under Mennon...

Rupp, George Erik

(Encyclopedia)Rupp, George Erik, 1942–, American educator and theologian, b. Summit, N.J. He studied in Germany before graduating from Princeton. He earned a B.D. degree from Yale Univ. and a doctorate from Harva...

illiteracy

(Encyclopedia)illiteracy, inability to meet a certain minimum criterion of reading and writing skill. Throughout most of history most people have been illiterate. In feudal society, for example, the ability to re...

Pickens, Andrew

(Encyclopedia)Pickens, Andrew, 1739–1817, American Revolutionary soldier, b. near Paxtang, Pa. He moved (1752) to South Carolina and took part (1761) in frontier warfare against the Cherokee. During the American ...

Browse by Subject