Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Madeira mədāˈrə [key], river, c.2,100 mi (3,380 km) long, formed by the junction of the Beni and Mamoré rivers on the Bolivia-Brazil border. It flows north along the border for c.60 mi (100 km), ...

(Encyclopedia) Nashville, city (1990 pop. 487,969), state capital, coextensive with Davidson co., central Tenn., on the Cumberland River, in a fertile farm area; inc. as a city 1806, merged with Davidson co. 1963. I...

(Encyclopedia) Conant, James Bryant kōˈnənt [key], 1893–1978, American educator, chemist, and diplomat, b. Dorchester, Mass., grad. Harvard (B.A., 1913; Ph.D., 1916). Except for a brief period in the army (1917...

(Encyclopedia) monitorial system, method of elementary education devised by British educators Joseph Lancaster and Andrew Bell during the 19th cent. to furnish schooling to the underprivileged even under conditions ...

(Encyclopedia)  CE5 Capillarity: Water wets the walls of a capillary tube and thus rises, causing the upper surface, or meniscus, of the liquid to be concave; mercury does not wet the walls of a capillary tube and...

(Encyclopedia) Yousafzai, Malala, 1997–, Pakistani advocate for girls' education. When Islamic militants took control of her native Swat in 2009, she wrote—with the encouragement of her father, an educator—an ...

(Encyclopedia) Shawnee shôˈwənō [key], Native North Americans whose language belongs to the Algonquian branch of the Algonquian-Wakashan linguistic stock (see Native American languages). Their earliest known hom...

(Encyclopedia) Barnard, Henry, 1811–1900, American educator, b. Hartford, Conn., grad. Yale, 1830. He studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1835. As a member (1837–39) of the Connecticut legislature, he ori...

(Encyclopedia) National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), civilian agency of the U.S. federal government with the mission of conducting research and developing operational programs in the areas of space e...

(Encyclopedia) Butler, Nicholas Murray, 1862–1947, American educator, president of Columbia Univ. (1902–45), b. Elizabeth, N.J., grad. Columbia (B.A., 1882; Ph.D., 1884). Holding a Columbia fellowship, he studie...