Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Hooker, Sir William Jackson, 1785–1865, English botanist. A leading authority of his time on ferns, he formed a famous herbarium and built up the Glasgow Garden and the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew....

(Encyclopedia) Fitzwilliam, Sir William, 1526–99, lord deputy of Ireland. He acquired (1547) land in Ireland by a grant of Edward VI. Although a Protestant, he was loyal to Queen Mary I, and she appointed him keep...

(Encyclopedia) Siemens, Sir William, 1823–83, English electrical engineer, b. Germany; brother of Ernst Werner von Siemens. Originally his name was Carl Wilhelm Siemens. After visiting England to introduce an elec...

(Encyclopedia) Robertson, Sir William Robert, 1860–1933, British field marshal. He enlisted in the army in 1877 and became an officer in 1888. He was in the intelligence department in India (1892–96) and served ...

(Encyclopedia) Borden, Sir Frederick William, 1847–1917, Canadian statesman, b. Cornwallis, N.S. He entered (1874) the Canadian House of Commons as a Liberal and served (1896–1911) as Wilfrid Laurier's minister ...

(Encyclopedia) Dawkins, Sir William Boyd, 1837–1929, English geologist and archaeologist. He was a member (1861–69) of the Geological Survey of Great Britain, curator (1870–90) of the Manchester Museum, and pr...

(Encyclopedia) Johnson, Sir William, 1715–74, British colonial leader in America, b. Co. Meath, Ireland. He settled (1738) in the Mohawk valley, became a merchant, and gained great power among the Mohawk and other...

(Encyclopedia) Ford, Gerald Rudolph, 1913–2006, 38th president of the United States (1974–77), b. Omaha, Nebr. He was originally named Leslie Lynch King, Jr., but his parents were divorced when he was two, and w...

(Encyclopedia) Huggins, Sir William, 1824–1910, English astronomer. Using a spectroscope, he began to study the chemical constitution of stars from the observatory attached to his home in Tulse Hill, London. He pr...

(Encyclopedia) Crookes, Sir William, 1832–1919, English chemist and physicist. After serving at the Radcliffe Observatory, Oxford, and teaching chemistry at Chester Training College, he retired to work in his own ...