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Biloxi

(Encyclopedia)Biloxi bĭlŭkˈsē [key], city (2020 pop. 49,449), Harrison co., SE Miss., on a peninsula be...

vertical takeoff and landing aircraft

(Encyclopedia)vertical takeoff and landing aircraft (VTOL), craft capable of rising and descending vertically from and to the ground, thus requiring no runway. While a balloon or an airship has obvious VTOL capabil...

Plummer, Christopher

(Encyclopedia) Plummer, Christopher (Arthur Christopher Orme), 1929-2021, Canadian-American actor, b. Toronto, Canada. Raised by his mother, Plummer first aspire...

Pentecost

(Encyclopedia)Pentecost pĕnˈtəkôst [key] [Gr.,=fiftieth], important Jewish and Christian feast. The Jewish feast of Pentecost, in Hebrew Shavuot, the Feast of Weeks, one of the three pilgrimage festivals, arose...

Paracelsus, Philippus Aureolus

(Encyclopedia)Paracelsus, Philippus Aureolus fĭlĭpˈəs ôrēōˈləs părəsĕlˈsəs [key], 1493?–1541, Swiss physician and alchemist. His original name Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim. He traveled widel...

Parry, Sir William Edward

(Encyclopedia)Parry, Sir William Edward păˈrē [key], 1790–1855, British arctic explorer and rear admiral. He entered the navy at 13 and made his first voyage to the Arctic under Sir John Ross in 1818 in search...

oilbird

(Encyclopedia)oilbird, common name for an owllike, cave-dwelling bird, Steatornis caripensis, belonging to the family Steatornithidae. It spends its days in dark caves, maneuvering by means of a batlike sonar devic...

Purcell, Henry

(Encyclopedia)Purcell, Henry pûrˈsəl [key], c.1659–1695, English composer and organist. Often considered England's finest native composer, Purcell combined a great gift for lyrical melody with harmonic inventi...

Balla, Giacomo

(Encyclopedia)Balla, Giacomo, 1871–1958, Italian painter, one of the founders of futurism. He moved from Turin to Rome in his twenties and began painting in a realist style. He travelled (1900) to Paris, where he...

Nauman, Bruce

(Encyclopedia)Nauman, Bruce nouˈmən [key], 1941–, American artist, b. Fort Wayne, Ind., B.A. Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison (1964), M.F.A. Univ. of California, Davis (1966). One of the most innovative and influent...
 

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