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Getty, Jean Paul

(Encyclopedia)Getty, Jean Paul, 1892–1976, American business executive, one of the richest men in the world during his life, b. Minneapolis, Minn. He inherited his father's oil business, George F. Getty, Inc., be...

Colbert, Jean Baptiste

(Encyclopedia)Colbert, Jean Baptiste kôlbĕrˈ [key], 1619–83, French statesman. The son of a draper, he was trained in business and was hired by Cardinal Mazarin to look after his financial affairs. On his dea...

Godard, Jean-Luc

(Encyclopedia)Godard, Jean-Luc zhäN-lük gôdärˈ [key], 1930–, French film director and scriptwriter, b. Paris. He wrote criticism for a number of Parisian cinema journals in the early 1950s before embarking o...

Meissonier, Jean Louis Ernest

(Encyclopedia)Meissonier, Jean Louis Ernest zhäN lwē ĕrnĕstˈ māsônyāˈ [key], 1815–91, French genre and military painter. His study of the Dutch masters was evident in his first Salon-exhibited painting, ...

Yersin, Alexandre Émile Jean

(Encyclopedia)Yersin, Alexandre Émile Jean älĕksäNˈdrə āmēlˈ zhän yĕrsăNˈ [key], 1863–1943, French bacteriologist, of Swiss descent. He studied with Pasteur and worked on diphtheria antitoxin with P....

Cook, Sir Joseph

(Encyclopedia)Cook, Sir Joseph, 1860–1947, Australian statesman, b. England. A leader of the Free Trade party, he served as prime minister (1913–14) and later as minister of the navy (1917–21) and high commis...

Béliveau, Jean Arthur

(Encyclopedia)Béliveau, Jean Arthur, 1931–2014, Canadian ice hockey player, b. Trois-Rivières, Québec. He joined the Montreal Canadiens of the National Hockey League in 1953, playing for 18 seasons and becomin...

Muller, Hermann Joseph

(Encyclopedia)Muller, Hermann Joseph mŭlˈər [key], 1890–1967, American geneticist and educator, b. New York City, grad. Columbia (B.A., 1910; Ph.D., 1916). A student of Thomas Hunt Morgan, he taught (1915–18...

Scaliger, Joseph Justus

(Encyclopedia)Scaliger, Joseph Justus skălˈĭjər [key], 1540–1609, French classical scholar. He was the son of Julius Caesar Scaliger, from whom he acquired his early mastery of Latin. He adopted Protestantism...

Basquiat, Jean-Michel

(Encyclopedia)Basquiat, Jean-Michel bäsˌkē-ätˈ [key], 1960–88, American painter, b. Brooklyn, N.Y. Born into a middle-class Haitian and Puerto Rican family, he was a 1980s art star whose rise and fall were r...