Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Smith, Stevie (Margaret Florence Smith), 1902–71, English poet and novelist, b. Hull, Yorkshire. At first unnoticed as a poet, she worked in a London publisher's office until 1953. Steadily gaining ...

(Encyclopedia) wireworm, elongate, cylindrical larva of the click beetle. Most wireworms are hard and brown, but members of some species are soft and whitish. Wireworms live in rotten wood or in the ground and feed ...

(Encyclopedia) Lewis and Harris, island (1985 est. pop. 23,500), 825 sq mi (2,137 sq km), largest and northernmost of the Outer Hebrides, Western Isles council area, NW Scotland, 24 mi (35 km) from the mainland acro...

(Encyclopedia) opposition, in astronomy, alignment of two celestial bodies on opposite sides of the sky as viewed from earth. Opposition of the moon or planets is often determined in reference to the sun. Only the s...

(Encyclopedia)  Sheehan, Neil (Cornelius Mahoney Sheehan), 1936-2021, American journalist, b. Holyoke, Ma. Sheehan was hired by United Press International (UPI) in 19...

(Encyclopedia) schooner sko͞oˈnər [key], sailing vessel, rigged fore-and-aft, with from two to seven masts. Schooners can lie closer to the wind than square-rigged sailing ships, need a smaller crew, and are very...

(Encyclopedia) Connecticut, longest river in New England, 407 mi (655 km) long, rising in the Connecticut Lakes, N N.H., near the Quebec border, and flowing S along the Vt.-N.H. line, then across Mass. and Conn. to ...

(Encyclopedia) Sunda Islands sŭnˈdə [key], mainly in Indonesia, between the South China Sea and the Indian Ocean, comprising the western part of the Malay Archipelago. It includes two main groups: the Greater Sun...

(Encyclopedia) bullfrog, common name of the largest North American frog, Rana catesbeiana. Native to the E United States, this species has been successfully introduced in the West and in other parts of the world. Th...

(Encyclopedia) Eric the Red, fl. 10th cent., Norse chieftain, discoverer and colonizer of Greenland according to the sagas. He left (c.950) Norway with his exiled father and settled in Iceland. A feud resulting in m...