Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Christian Reformed Church, denomination formed after the secession of a group from the Reformed Church in America in 1857. Colonists from Holland who began settling in Michigan in 1846 generally becam...

(Encyclopedia) Sillitoe, Alan, 1928–2010, English writer, b. Nottingham. The son of an illiterate tannery worker, he grew up in poverty, left school at 14, and was himself a factory worker as a teenager. One of th...

(Encyclopedia) Battle of Britain, in World War II, series of air battles between Great Britain and Germany, fought over Britain from Aug. to Oct., 1940. As a prelude to a planned invasion of England, the German Luft...

(Encyclopedia) Sturm und Drang shto͝orm o͝ont dräng [key] or Storm and Stress, movement in German literature that flourished from c.1770 to c.1784. It takes its name from a play by F. M. von Klinger, Wirrwarr; od...

(Encyclopedia) Vaughan, Henry vôn [key], 1622–95, one of the English metaphysical poets. Born in Breconshire, Wales, he signed himself Silurist, after the ancient inhabitants of that region. After leaving Oxford,...

(Encyclopedia) Bentley, Richard, 1662–1742, English critic and philologist. Generally considered the greatest of English classical scholars, he was also an Anglican clergyman who became (1717) Regius Professor of ...

(Encyclopedia) Wilson, Colin, 1931–2013, English writer, b. Leicester. Born into a working-class family and largely self-educated, Wilson in many of his books exhorts humankind to expand its powers and realize its...

(Encyclopedia) Rosebery, Archibald Philip Primrose, 5th earl of rōzˈbərē [key], 1847–1929, British statesman. He succeeded his grandfather as earl in 1868. A Liberal, Rosebery was undersecretary for home affai...

(Encyclopedia) Schuschnigg, Kurt von ko͝ort fən sho͝oshˈnĭk [key], 1897–1977, Austrian chancellor. He served (1932–34) as minister of justice and education and helped Engelbert Dollfuss repress the Social D...

(Encyclopedia) Porter, Cole, 1891–1964, American composer and lyricist, b. Peru, Ind., grad. Yale, 1913. Porter's witty, sophisticated lyrics and his affecting melodies place him high in the ranks of American comp...