Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Mayflower, ship that in 1620 brought the Pilgrims from England to New England. She set out from Southampton in company with the Speedwell, the vessel that had borne some of the English separatists fro...

(Encyclopedia) spire, high, tapering structure crowning a tower and having a general pyramidal outline. The simplest spires were the steeply pitched timber roofs capping Romanesque towers and campaniles. In later Ro...

(Encyclopedia) Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel ...

(Encyclopedia) exploration, travel to a part of the earth that is relatively unknown to the traveler's culture, historically often motivated by a desire for colonization, conquest, or trade. See also space explorati...

(Encyclopedia) Pence, Mike (Michael Richard Pence), 1959–, Vice President of the United States (2017–21), b. Columbus, Ind., grad. Hanover College, 1981, Indiana Univ. law school, 1986. A Republican, he twice ra...

(Encyclopedia) Youth, Isle of, Span. Isla de la Juventud, island and special municipality (1989 est. pop. 71,500), 1,180 sq mi (3,056 sq km), off SW Cuba, from which it is separated by the Batabanó Gulf. Until 1978...

(Encyclopedia) Benalcázar or Belalcázar, Sebastián de sābästyänˈ dā bānälkäˈthär, bāläl– [key], c.1479–1551, Spanish conquistador. After accompanying Columbus on his third voyage (1498), Benalcáz...

(Encyclopedia) Thurber, James, 1894–1961, American humorist, b. Columbus, Ohio, studied at Ohio State Univ. After working on various newspapers he served on the staff of the New Yorker from 1927 to 1933 and was la...

(Encyclopedia)  Reed, Ishmael Scott, 1938- , African-American novelist, poet, and social critic, b. Chattanooga, Tn. When he was a child, Reed’s family moved ...

(Encyclopedia) fraternal orders, organizations whose members are usually bound by oath and who make extensive use of secret ritual in the conduct of their meetings. Most fraternal orders are limited to members of on...