Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Applegate, Jesse, 1811–88, American pioneer in Oregon, b. Kentucky. With his family he moved (1821) to Missouri, and there in 1843 he joined the Great Migration of more than 900 people over the Oreg...

(Encyclopedia) Lovejoy, Arthur Oncken, 1873–1962, American philosopher and intellectual historian, b. Germany, grad. Univ. of California, 1895, M.A. Harvard, 1897. He also studied at the Sorbonne before he began t...

(Encyclopedia) Overland Trail, any of several trails of westward migration in the United States. The term is sometimes used to mean all the trails westward from the Missouri to the Pacific and sometimes for the cent...

(Encyclopedia) herbarium, collection of dried and mounted plant specimens used in systematic botany. To preserve their form and color, plants collected in the field are spread flat in sheets of newsprint and dried, ...

(Encyclopedia) euthanasia yo͞oˌthənāˈzhə [key], either painlessly putting to death or failing to prevent death from natural causes in cases of terminal illness or irreversible coma. The term comes from the Gre...

(Encyclopedia) Colter, John kōlˈtər [key], c.1775–1813, American trapper and guide, b. Virginia. In 1803 he enlisted in the Lewis and Clark expedition and in 1806, on the return trip, was granted a discharge to...

(Encyclopedia) Chouteau sho͞otōˈ [key], family of American fur traders. René Auguste Chouteau, 1749–1829, b. New Orleans, accompanied (1763) his stepfather, Pierre Laclede, on a trading expedition to the Illin...

(Encyclopedia) Fort Bridger State Park, on Blacks Fork of the Green River, SW Wyo. The supply post, founded by U.S. fur trader James Bridger in 1843, was an important station on the Oregon Trail. The Mormons held Fo...

(Encyclopedia) Hawaii, island (2020 pop. 200, 629), 4,037 sq mi (10,456 sq km), largest and southernmost island of the state of Hawaii and coextensive with Hawaii co.;...

(Encyclopedia) Montpelier mŏntpēlˈyər [key], city (1990 pop. 8,247), state capital (since 1805) and seat of Washington co., central Vt., at the junction of the Winooski and North Branch rivers; inc. 1855. The ec...