Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Phoenixville fēˈnĭksvĭl [key], borough (1990 pop. 15,066), Chester co., SE Pa., on the Schuylkill River; settled 1720, inc. 1849. Iron deposits in the region led to the early development of an iro...

(Encyclopedia) Brandywine, battle of, in the American Revolution, fought Sept. 11, 1777, along Brandywine Creek. The creek, formed by two small branches in SE Pennsylvania, flows southeast to join, near Wilmington, ...

(Encyclopedia) Hambletonian hămbəltōˈnēən [key], 1849–76, American trotting horse, foaled at Chester, N.Y. Originally owned by Jonas Seely, Hambletonian was bought for little money by Bill Rysdyk and won few...

(Encyclopedia) West, Jerry (Jerome Alan West), 1938–, American basketball player, b. Cheylan, W.Va. One of the game's great shooting guards, he led West Virginia Univ. to the 1959 National Collegiate Athletic Asso...

(Encyclopedia) Coatesville kōtsˈvĭl [key], city (2020 pop. 12,987), Chester co., SE Pa., on Brandywine Creek, ...

(Encyclopedia) Spruance, Raymond Ames spro͞oˈəns [key], 1886–1969, American admiral, b. Baltimore. Commissioned in the navy in 1908, he reached the rank of rear admiral in 1939. In World War II he distinguished...

(Encyclopedia) Guinevere gwĭnˈəvĭrˌ, gwĕnˈ– [key], in Arthurian legend, wife of King Arthur. Her illicit and tragic love for Sir Launcelot, which foreshadowed the downfall of Arthur's kingdom, ends with her...

(Encyclopedia) Morley, Sylvanus Griswold, 1883–1948, American archaeologist, b. Chester, Pa., grad. Harvard, 1908. A specialist in Middle American archaeology and Mayan heiroglyphs, Morley did fieldwork (1909–14...

(Encyclopedia) Kaskaskia kăskăsˈkēə [key], small village, Randolph co., SE Ill., on Kaskaskia island in the Mississippi River where it is joined by the Kaskaskia River. The settlement was established (1703) by ...

(Encyclopedia) Turing test, a procedure to test whether a computer is capable of humanlike thought. As proposed (1950) by the British mathematician Alan Turing, a person (the interrogator) sits with a teletype machi...