Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) stadium stāˈdēəm [key], racecourse in Greek cities where footraces and other athletic contests took place. The name is the Latin form of the Greek word for a standard of length and originally refe...

(Encyclopedia) Southern Pacific Company, transportation system chartered (1865) in California and later reincorporated in Kentucky (1885) and Delaware (1947). Small railroads—known collectively as the Southern Pac...

(Encyclopedia) Legal Tender cases, lawsuits brought to the U.S. Supreme Court involving the constitutionality of the Legal Tender Act of 1862, which was passed to meet currency needs during the Civil War. The act ha...

(Encyclopedia) Kendall, Amos kĕnˈdəl [key], 1789–1869, American journalist and statesman, b. Dunstable, Middlesex co., Mass. He edited (1816–29) at Frankfort, Ky., the Argus of Western America, one of the mos...

(Encyclopedia) Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, established in 1805, incorporated in 1806. It is supported by private endowment. The academy grew out of a proposal by Charles Willson Peale for an...

(Encyclopedia)  Afrofuturism, artistic and cultural movement that is based on the wedding of African diasporic themes with modern technology and elements of science fiction and fantasy. The term is gener...

(Encyclopedia) Blair, Montgomery, 1813–83, U.S. Postmaster General (1861–64), b. Franklin co., Ky., son of Francis P. Blair (1791–1876). He resigned from the army in 1836 after serving against the Seminole and...

(Encyclopedia) Howe, Julia Ward, 1819–1910, American author and social reformer, b. New York City. Although unhappily married, she assisted her husband, Samuel Gridley Howe, in his philanthropic projects and in ed...

(Encyclopedia) Preble, Edward prĕbˈəl [key], 1761–1807, American naval officer, b. Falmouth (now Portland), Maine. In the American Revolution he ran away from home to serve on a privateer, entered (1779) the Ma...

(Encyclopedia) Townshend Acts, 1767, originated by Charles Townshend and passed by the English Parliament shortly after the repeal of the Stamp Act. They were designed to collect revenue from the colonists in Americ...