Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) diary [Lat.,=day], a daily record of events and observations. As distinguished from memoir (an account of events placed in perspective by the author long after they have occurred), the diary derives i...

(Encyclopedia) paleontology pāˌlēəntŏlˈəjē [key] [Gr.,= study of early beings], science of the life of past geologic periods based on fossil remains. Knowledge of the existence of fossils dates back at least...

(Encyclopedia) Douglas, Kirk, 1916–2020, American film actor, b. Amsterdam, N.Y., as Issur Danielovitch, later Isadore Demsky. A leading man with a muscular physique and handsome cleft-chin face that made him a na...

(Encyclopedia) Forster, E. M. (Edward Morgan Forster), 1879–1970, English author, one of the most important British novelists of the 20th cent. After graduating from Cambridge, Forster lived in Italy and Greece. D...

(Encyclopedia) Presley, Elvis (Elvis Aaron Presley), 1935–77, American popular singer, b. Tupelo, Miss. Exposed to gospel music from childhoo...

(Encyclopedia) table tennis, game played, usually indoors, by two or four players; it is more or less a miniature form of lawn tennis. It is also called Ping-Pong, after the trade name that a manufacturer adopted (c...

(Encyclopedia) Galbraith, John Kenneth gălˈbrāth [key], 1908–2006, American economist and public official, b. Ontario, Canada, grad. Univ. of Toronto (B.S., 1931), Univ. of California, Berkeley (M.S., 1933; Ph....

(Encyclopedia) Stanley, Sir Henry Morton, 1841–1904, Anglo-American journalist, explorer, and empire builder, b. Denbigh, Wales. He grew up in poverty and came to America as a worker on a ship, which he jumped (18...

(Encyclopedia) ice skating, gliding along an ice surface on keellike runners known as ice skates. The earliest skates (c.9th cent.), made of bone, were found in Sweden. Wooden skates with iron facings appeared in ...

(Encyclopedia) garden city, an ideal, self-contained community of predetermined area and population surrounded by a greenbelt. As formulated by Sir Ebenezer Howard, the garden city was intended to bring together the...