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(Encyclopedia) Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), division of the U.S. Dept. of Justice charged with investigating all violations of federal laws except those assigned to some other federal agency. The FBI has j...
(Encyclopedia) Washington, Booker Taliaferro, 1856–1915, American educator, b. Franklin co., Va. Washington was born into slavery; his mother was a mulatto slave on a plantation, his father a white man whom he nev...
(Encyclopedia) Vanderbilt, Cornelius, 1794–1877, American railroad magnate, b. Staten Island, N.Y. As a boy he ferried freight and passengers from Staten Island to Manhattan, and he soon gained control of most of ...
(Encyclopedia) Wilde, Oscar (Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde), 1854–1900, Irish author and wit, b. Dublin. He is most famous for his sophisticated, brilliantly witty plays, which were the first since the come...
(Encyclopedia) Great Depression, in U.S. history, the severe economic crisis generally considered to have been precipitated by the U.S. stock-market crash of 1929. Although it shared the basic characteristics of oth...
(Encyclopedia) laetrile lāˈətrĭlˌ [key], name given to the chemical amygdalin, a substance derived from an extract of the kernels of many fruits, notably apricots, bitter almonds, and peaches. The idea that lae...
(Encyclopedia) Lead Belly, nickname of Huddie
William Ledbetter, 1885–1949, American singer, b.
Mooringsport, La. While wandering through Louisiana and Texas, he...
(Encyclopedia) Newhouse, Samuel Irving, 1895–1979, American newspaper and magazine publisher, b. New York City as Solomon Neuhaus, known generally as Sam. From 1922 to the 1970s, his Advance Publications acquired ...
(Encyclopedia) Brady, Tom (Thomas Edward Patrick Brady, Jr.), 1977–, American football player, b. San Mateo, Calif. One of the greatest professional quarterbacks of all time, he attended the Univ. of Michigan (199...
(Encyclopedia) Foote, Horton (Albert Horton Foote, Jr.), 1916–2009, American playwright and screenwriter, b. Wharton, Tex. He studied acting and acted in California and New York, and wrote his first one-act play i...