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Debs, Eugene Victor

(Encyclopedia)Debs, Eugene Victor, 1855–1926, American Socialist leader, b. Terre Haute, Ind. Leaving high school to work in the railroad shops in Terre Haute, he became a railroad fireman (1871) and organized (1...

Antietam campaign

(Encyclopedia)Antietam campaign ăntēˈtəm [key], Sept., 1862, of the Civil War. After the second battle of Bull Run, Gen. Robert E. Lee crossed the Potomac to invade Maryland and Pennsylvania. At Frederick, Md.,...

Austen, Jane

(Encyclopedia)Austen, Jane ôˈstən [key], 1775–1817, English novelist. The daughter of a clergyman, she spent the first 25 years of her life at “Steventon,” her father's Hampshire vicarage. Here her first n...

Davis, Jefferson

(Encyclopedia)Davis, Jefferson, 1808–89, American statesman, President of the Southern Confederacy, b. Fairview, near Elkton, Ky. His birthday was June 3. Davis took little part in the secession movement until ...

Gibson, John Bannister

(Encyclopedia)Gibson, John Bannister, 1780–1853, American jurist, b. Westover Mills, Pa.; nephew of the American frontiersman John Gibson. He studied law, was unsuccessful in practice, and served (1810–12) with...

Sutherland, George

(Encyclopedia)Sutherland, George, 1862–1942, associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court (1922–38), b. Buckinghamshire, England. He was taken by his family to Springville, Utah from England in 1864. After study...

Leo IV, Byzantine emperor

(Encyclopedia)Leo IV (Leo the Khazar), d. 780, Byzantine emperor (775–80), son and successor of Constantine V. He owed his nickname to his mother, a Khazar princess. Leo tempered the iconoclastic excesses of his ...

Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel (table)

(Encyclopedia)Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel ...

Shostakovich, Dmitri

(Encyclopedia)Shostakovich, Dmitri dyĭmēˈtrē shŏstŏkôˈvĭch [key], 1906–75, Russian composer, b. St. Petersburg. Shostakovich studied at the Leningrad Conservatory (1919–25). The early success of his Fi...

public land

(Encyclopedia)public land, in U.S. history, land owned by the federal government but not reserved for any special purpose, e.g., for a park or a military reservation. Public land is also called land in the public d...