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Baltic provinces

(Encyclopedia)Baltic provinces, historic regions of Courland, Livonia, Estonia, and Ingermanland bordering on the eastern coast of the Baltic Sea. They were conquered by Russia from Sweden in the 18th cent. and mad...

space station

(Encyclopedia)space station or space platform, artificial earth satellite, usually manned, that is placed in a fixed orbit and can serve as a base for astronomical observations; zero-gravity materials processing; s...

Willkie, Wendell Lewis

(Encyclopedia)Willkie, Wendell Lewis, 1892–1944, American industrialist and political leader, b. Elwood, Ind. After graduating from Indiana Univ. law school (1916), he practiced law in Ohio and then New York (192...

Kennan, George Frost

(Encyclopedia)Kennan, George Frost, 1904–2005, U.S. diplomat and historian, b. Milwaukee, Wis., grad. Princeton, 1925. A brilliant strategist and among the most influential and intellectual Americans in the 20th-...

Nureyev, Rudolf

(Encyclopedia)Nureyev, Rudolf no͝orĕˈyĕf [key], 1938–93, Russian ballet dancer, b. near Irkutsk, Siberian USSR (now Russia). Nureyev studied in Ufa and Leningrad (now St. Petersburg), and in 1958 he became a ...

Orthodox Eastern Church

(Encyclopedia)Orthodox Eastern Church, community of Christian churches whose chief strength is in the Middle East and E Europe. Their members number some 300 million worldwide. The Orthodox agree doctrinally in acc...

John Paul II, Saint

(Encyclopedia)John Paul II, Saint 1920–2005, pope (1978–2005), a Pole (b. Wadowice) named Karol Józef Wojtyła; successor of John Paul I. He was the first non-Italian pope elected since the Dutch Adrian VI (15...

Cisalpine Republic

(Encyclopedia)Cisalpine Republic sĭsălˈpīn [key], Italian state created by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1797 by uniting the Transpadane and Cispadane republics, which he had established (1796) N and S of the Po River....

Joffe, Abram

(Encyclopedia)Joffe, Abram əbrämˈ yôˈfyə [key], 1880–1960, Soviet scientist, b. Ukraine, grad. St. Petersburg Technological Institute, 1902. From 1902 to 1906 he worked in Munich as an assistant to W. C. Ro...

Armenia, country, Asia

(Encyclopedia)CE5 Armenia ärmēˈnēə [key], Armenian Hayastan, officially Republic of Armenia, republic (2020 est. pop. 2,963,000), 11,500 sq mi (29,785 sq km), in the S Caucasus....