Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Fuller, John Frederick Charles, 1878–1966, British soldier. In World War I, he recognized the importance of mechanized warfare and, as general staff officer of the tank corps, planned the stunning t...

(Encyclopedia) divorce, partial or total dissolution of a marriage by the judgment of a court. Partial dissolution is a divorce “from bed and board,” a decree of judicial separation, leaving the parties official...

(Encyclopedia) Art Institute of Chicago, museum and art school, in Grant Park, facing Michigan Ave. It was incorporated in 1879; George Armour was the first president. Since 1893 the Institute has been housed in its...

(Encyclopedia) New Netherland, territory included in a commercial grant by the government of Holland to the Dutch West India Company in 1621. Colonists were settled along the Hudson River region; in 1624 the first p...

(Encyclopedia) Bagehot, Walter băjˈət [key], 1826–77, English social scientist. After working in his father's banking firm, he edited (1860–77) the Economist (which had been founded by his father-in-law) and ...

(Encyclopedia) Calixtus I, Callixtus I, or Callistus I, Saint kəlĭkˈstəs, kəlĭsˈtəs [key], c.160–c.222, pope (217–222), a Roman; successor of St. Zephyrinus. As archdeacon to Zephyrinus he established th...

(Encyclopedia) Croker, Richard, 1841–1922, American politician, head of Tammany Hall from 1886 to 1902, b. Co. Cork, Ireland. He became prominent as Democratic leader of New York City's East Side and as an aide of...

(Encyclopedia) Fort Donelson dŏnˈəlsən [key], Confederate fortification in the Civil War, on the Cumberland River at Dover, Tenn., commanding the river approach to Nashville, Tenn. After capturing Fort Henry, on...

(Encyclopedia) Whiskey Ring, in U.S. history, a group of distillers and public officials who defrauded the federal government of liquor taxes. Soon after the Civil War these taxes were raised very high, in some case...

(Encyclopedia) Wilson, Henry, 1812–75, American politician, Vice President of the United States (1873–75), b. Farmington, N.H. At 21 he legally changed his name from Jeremiah Jones Colbath, and as Henry Wilson h...