Aeschbacher, Hans

Trained as a printer, Aeschbacher taught himself to draw and paint and began sculpting about age 30. His earliest pieces were figurative and were composed mainly from terra-cotta and plaster. By 1945 he was working essentially with stone, and his sculptures became increasingly

Henry, O.

Pseudonym of  William Sydney Porter  American short-story writer whose tales romanticized the commonplace—in particular the life of ordinary people in New York City. His stories expressed the effect of coincidence on character through humour, grim or ironic, and often had surprise endings, a device that became identified with his name and cost him critical

Theatre Guild

A theatrical society founded in New York City in 1918 for the production of high-quality, noncommercial American and foreign plays. The guild, founded by Lawrence Langner (1890–1962), departed from the usual theatre practice in that its board of directors shared the responsibility for choice of plays, management, and production. The first two seasons, which included plays by Jacinto

Melilite

Any member of a series of silicate minerals that consist of calcium silicates of aluminum and magnesium; gehlenite is the aluminous end-member and åkermanite the magnesian end-member. These minerals crystallize from calcium-rich, alkaline magmas and from many artificial melts and blast-furnace slags. They occur in thermally metamorphosed limestones at contact

Bilandic, Michael Anthony

American politician and judge (b. Feb. 13, 1923, Chicago, Ill.—d. Jan. 15, 2002, Chicago), succeeded Richard J. Daley as mayor of Chicago and later served as chief justice of the Illinois Supreme Court. Bilandic had been a corporate lawyer for 28 years and was serving as chairman of Chicago's City Council finance committee by the time Mayor Daley died in his sixth term in office in December 1976. The City

Permafrost, Offshore structures

One of the most active and exciting areas of permafrost engineering is in subsea permafrost. Knowledge of the distribution, type, and water or ice content of subsea permafrost is critical for planning petroleum exploration, locating production structures, burying pipelines, and driving tunnels beneath the seabed. Furthermore, the temperature of the seabed must

Arras

Town, capital of Pas-de-Calais département, Nord-Pas-de-Calais region, former capital of Artois, northern France, on the Scarpe River, southwest of Lille. Of Gallo-Roman origin, it was the chief town (Nemetacum or Nemetocenna) of the Atrebates, one of the last Gallic peoples to surrender to Caesar. The woollen industry dates from the 4th century. The Middle Ages was a period

Juàzeiro

From Juàzeiro southward to Pirapora in Minas Gerais state, the upper course of the

Aerospace Engineering, Aerospace engineering

The use of rocket engines for aircraft propulsion opened a new realm of flight to the aeronautical engineer. Robert H. Goddard, an American, developed, built, and flew the first successful liquid-propellant rocket on March 16, 1926. Goddard proved that flight was possible at speeds greater than the speed of sound and that rockets can work in a vacuum. The major impetus in rocket

Earth Sciences, Properties and structure of the atmosphere

Less than a year after the space age began with the launching of the Soviet Sputnik I in 1957, the U.S. satellite Explorer I was sent into orbit with a Geiger counter for measuring the intensity of cosmic radiation at different levels above the ground. At altitudes around 1,000 kilometres this instrument ceased to function due to saturation by charged particles. This and subsequent

Becque, Henry-françois

Dramatist and critic whose loosely structured plays, based on character and motivation rather than on closely knit plots, provided a healthy challenge to the “well-made plays” that held the stage in his day. Although Becque disliked literary theory and refused identification with any school, he has been remembered as a forerunner of the

Climate, Variations in the distribution of land and sea due to crustal changes

Mountain building, continental uplift, and the drifting of continents have profoundly influenced world climate. They operate on the scale of geologic periods, requiring many millions of years to complete their effects. An example of a climatic change caused by topographic variations is the creation of the cold deep waters of the ocean, which was favoured by such

Switzerland

With political maneuvering for the next general elections--scheduled