Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Ripley, Robert LeRoy, 1890–1949, American cartoonist, b. Santa Rosa, Calif., as Leroy Robert Ripley. The creator of the Believe It or Not! newspaper cartoon, Ripley began his career at 16 as a sport...

(Encyclopedia) Robertson, Sir William Robert, 1860–1933, British field marshal. He enlisted in the army in 1877 and became an officer in 1888. He was in the intelligence department in India (1892–96) and served ...

(Encyclopedia) Radishchev, Aleksandr Nikolayevich əlyĭksänˈdər nyĭkəlīˈəvĭch rədyēshˈchĭf [key], 1749–1802, Russian writer and liberal. Of a noble family, he studied in Leipzig and there came under ...

(Encyclopedia) Raman effect räˈmən [key], appearance of additional lines in the spectrum of monochromatic light that has been scattered by a transparent material medium. The effect was discovered by C. V. Raman i...

(Encyclopedia) Geological Survey, United States, bureau organized in 1879 under the Dept. of the Interior to unify and centralize the work already undertaken by separate surveys under Clarence King, F. V. Hayden, Ge...

(Encyclopedia) part of speech, in traditional English grammar, any one of about eight major classes of words, based on the parts of speech of ancient Greek and Latin. The parts of speech are noun, verb, adjective, a...

(Encyclopedia) Las Vegas läs vāˈgəs [key], city (1990 pop. 258,295), seat of Clark co., S Nev.; inc. 1911. It is the largest city in Nevada and the center of one of the fastest-growing urban areas in the United ...

(Encyclopedia) columnist, the writer of an essay appearing regularly in a newspaper or periodical, usually under a constant heading. Although originally humorous, the column in many cases has supplanted the editoria...

(Encyclopedia) Huxley, Aldous Leonard, 1894–1963, English author; grandson of Thomas Henry Huxley, brother of Sir Julian Huxley, and half-brother of Sir Andrew Huxley. Educated at Eton and Oxford, he traveled wide...

(Encyclopedia) Stevenson, Adlai Ewing, 1900–1965, American statesman, b. Los Angeles; grandson of Adlai Ewing Stevenson (1835–1914). A graduate (1922) of Princeton, he received his law degree from Northwestern U...