Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Palau pälouˈ [key], officially Republic of Palau, independent nation (2015 est. pop. 21,000), c.192 sq mi (497 sq km), W Pacific, in the W Caroline Islands. Belau, the indigenous name for Palau, is ...

(Encyclopedia) United Nations Development Program (UNDP), agency of the United Nations, established in 1965 to unify the operations of the Expanded Program of Technical Assistance and the United Nations Special Fund...

(Encyclopedia) Panama Canal, waterway across the Isthmus of Panama, connecting the Atlantic (by way of the Caribbean Sea) and Pacific oceans, built by the United States (1904–14, on territory leased from the repub...

(Encyclopedia) workers' compensation, payment by employers for some part of the cost of injuries, or in some cases of occupational diseases, received by employees in the course of their work. The degree of responsib...

(Encyclopedia) Mitchell, Keith Claudius, 1946–, Grenadian political leader. Educated in the West Indies and the United States, he taught in Grenada and the United States and then worked as a consultant in Washingt...

(Encyclopedia) Barton, Benjamin Smith, 1766–1815, American physician and botanist, b. Lancaster, Pa., studied at the College of Philadelphia, at Edinburgh, and at Göttingen (M.D., 1789). He taught at the College ...

(Encyclopedia) Habersham, Joseph, 1751–1815, political leader in the American Revolution and U.S. Postmaster General (1795–1801), b. Savannah, Ga.; the son of James Habersham. From the beginning, he was active i...

(Encyclopedia) Arabia ərāˈbēə [key], peninsula (1991 est. pop. 35,000,000), c.1,000,000 sq mi (2,590,000 sq km), SW Asia. It is bordered on the W by the Gulf of Aqaba and the Red Sea, on the S by the Gulf of Ad...

(Encyclopedia) United Church of Canada, Protestant denomination formed in 1925 by the union of the Methodist, Congregational, and Presbyterian churches in Canada. A large number of Presbyterian congregations, howeve...

(Encyclopedia) Netherlands, Austrian and Spanish, that part of the Low Countries that, from 1482 until 1794, remained under the control of the imperial house of Hapsburg. The area corresponds roughly to modern Belgi...