Columbia Encyclopedia

Search results

500 results found

Barron, James

(Encyclopedia)Barron, James, 1768–1851, U.S. naval officer, b. Hampton, Va. Of a seafaring family, he served in the Virginia navy in the Revolution, entered the U.S. navy as a lieutenant in 1798, and held command...

Plymouth Colony

(Encyclopedia)Plymouth Colony, settlement made by the Pilgrims on the coast of Massachusetts in 1620. After several years the colonists could no longer be restrained from settling on the more productive land to t...

SETI

(Encyclopedia)SETI sĕtˈē [key] [Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence], name given to a series of independent programs to detect radio signals from civilizations beyond the solar system. Modern SETI efforts c...

Pontiac's Rebellion

(Encyclopedia)Pontiac's Rebellion, Pontiac's Conspiracy, or Pontiac's War, 1763–66, Native American uprising against the British just after the close of the French and Indian Wars, so called after one of its lea...

Ross, Alexander

(Encyclopedia)Ross, Alexander, 1783–1856, Canadian fur trader and pioneer, b. Scotland. He went to Canada in 1805, taught school in Upper Canada, and in 1810 left for Oregon as a clerk in John Jacob Astor's Pacif...

Hawaii, University of

(Encyclopedia)Hawaii, University of, at Honolulu (Manoa Campus), Hilo, and Pearl City (West Oahu Campus) with additional community college campuses; land-grant and state supported; coeducational; chartered 1907, op...

Brown, Mather

(Encyclopedia)Brown, Mather, 1761–1831, American portrait and historical painter, b. Boston. He studied under Benjamin West in London and continued to work in England. His portraits include those of George IV (Bu...

Thayer, Sylvanus

(Encyclopedia)Thayer, Sylvanus, 1785–1872, American soldier and educator, b. Braintree, Mass., grad. Dartmouth, 1807, and West Point, 1808. During the War of 1812 he served as an engineer, and afterward he was se...

Carr, Eugene Asa

(Encyclopedia)Carr, Eugene Asa, 1830–1910, Union general in the U.S. Civil War, b. Concord, Erie co., N.Y., grad. West Point, 1850. In the Civil War he distinguished himself at Wilson's Creek (1861) and Pea Ridge...

Strauss, Franz Josef

(Encyclopedia)Strauss, Franz Josef shtrous [key], 1915–88, West German political figure, leader of the Christian Social Union. He became prominent in the Bavarian Christian Social Union (the Bavarian wing of the...

Browse by Subject