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Wexford, county, Republic of Ireland

(Encyclopedia)Wexford wĕksˈfərd [key], county (1991 pop. 102,069), 910 sq mi (2,357 sq km), SE Republic of Ireland. The county seat is the port city of Wexford. Most of the land is low and fertile, but on the we...

wilderness

(Encyclopedia)wilderness, land retaining its primeval character with the imprint of humans minimal or unnoticeable. In the United States, the Wilderness Act of 1964 established the National Wilderness Preservation ...

Miami, indigenous people of North America

(Encyclopedia)Miami mīămˈē, –ə [key], group of Native Americans of the Algonquian branch of the Algonquian-Wakashan linguistic stock (see Native American languages). They shared the cultural traits of the Ea...

Ashdown Forest

(Encyclopedia)Ashdown Forest, area of heathland and forest, c.10 sq mi (2,500 ha), East Sussex, SE England, famous as the setting for the Winnie the Pooh books by A. A. Milne. E. H. Shepard's evocative illustration...

Emancipation, Edict of

(Encyclopedia)Emancipation, Edict of, 1861, the mechanism by which Czar Alexander II freed all Russian serfs (one third of the total population). All personal serfdom was abolished, and the peasants were to receive...

actinometer

(Encyclopedia)actinometer ăkˌtənŏmˈətər [key], instrument used to measure the heating power of radiation. Actinometers are used chiefly in meteorology to measure solar radiation as transmitted directly by th...

Guy of Lusignan

(Encyclopedia)Guy of Lusignan lüsēnyäNˈ [key], d. 1194, Latin king of Jerusalem (1186–92) and Cyprus (1192–94), second husband of Sibylla, sister of King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem. In 1183 he was briefly rege...

Tenure of Office Act

(Encyclopedia)Tenure of Office Act, in U.S. history, measure passed on Mar. 2, 1867, by Congress over the veto of President Andrew Johnson; it forbade the President to remove any federal officeholder appointed by a...

Iowa, indigenous people of North America

(Encyclopedia)Iowa īˈəwə, –wāˌ [key], Native North Americans whose language belongs to the Siouan branch of the Hokan-Siouan linguistic stock (see Native American languages); also called the Ioway. They, wi...

Waterloo, city, United States

(Encyclopedia)Waterloo, city (1990 pop. 66,467), seat of Black Hawk co., NE Iowa, on the Cedar River; inc. 1868. Originally a center for sawmills and flour mills, Waterloo is a trade and industrial center in a farm...