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Burns, George

(Encyclopedia)Burns, George, 1896–1996, b. New York City as Nathan Birnbaum, and his wife Gracie Allen, 1906–64, b. San Francisco, American comedy team (1923–58). In vaudeville in the 1920s, on radio (1932–...

Vercors

(Encyclopedia)Vercors vĕrkôrˈ [key], 1902–91, French writer and illustrator, whose original name was Jean Bruller. Vercors served in the French resistance movement and helped to found Les Éditions de Minuit, ...

Weinberger, Jaromir

(Encyclopedia)Weinberger, Jaromir Czech yäˈrômēr wīnˈbĕrgĕr [key], 1896–1967, Czech composer. Weinberger studied at the conservatories of Prague and Leipzig. In 1939, after extensive travels, he settled i...

O'Brien, Fitz-James

(Encyclopedia)O'Brien, Fitz-James, 1828?–1862, Irish-American author and journalist, b. Ireland. He settled in New York in 1852. He is remembered for two of his short stories, “The Diamond Lens” and “The Wo...

soiling

(Encyclopedia)soiling, agricultural practice of feeding green fodder to livestock in the barn or dry lot. It is followed in the United States mostly in the dairy industry in seasons when pastures are short, but in ...

Mojave

(Encyclopedia)Mojave mōhäˈvē [key], river, c.100 mi (160 km) long, rising in the San Bernardino Mts., S Calif., and flowing generally north to disappear in the Mojave Desert. Due to the porous soil and rapid ev...

Wisconsin, river, United States

(Encyclopedia)Wisconsin, river, c.430 mi (690 km) long, rising in the lake district, NE Wis., and flowing generally SW across central Wis. to the Mississippi River near Prairie du Chien. At Portage it is connected ...

Boyoma Falls

(Encyclopedia)Boyoma Falls bōyōˈmə [key], formerly Stanley Falls, seven cataracts on the Lualaba River, extending c.60 mi (100 km) between Kisangani and Ubundu, N central Congo (Kinshasa), central Africa. The f...

Zacchaeus

(Encyclopedia)Zacchaeus or Zaccheus both: zăkēˈəs [key] [Gr.,=Heb. Zaccai], in the New Testament, publican of Jericho, short of stature, who climbed a tree to see Jesus. ...

MacLeod, Alistair

(Encyclopedia)MacLeod, Alistair məkloudˈ [key], 1936–2014, Canadian fiction writer, b. John Alexander Joseph MacLeod, Ph.D. Notre Dame, 1968. He taught at the Univ. of Windsor from the late 1960s until his reti...