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  • John VIII Palaeologus (Byzantine emperor)
    Byzantine emperor who spent his reign appealing to the West for help against the final assaults by the Ottoman Turks on the Byzantine Empire....
  • John VIII Palaiologos (Byzantine emperor)
    Byzantine emperor who spent his reign appealing to the West for help against the final assaults by the Ottoman Turks on the Byzantine Empire....
  • John Ward, Preacher (work by Deland)
    In 1888 she published her first novel, John Ward, Preacher, which deals with religious and social questions after the manner of the British writer Mrs. Humphry Ward. The book stirred public opinion against its supposed irreligion, portraying the irreconcilable and destructive conflict between a Calvinist minister and his wife, who cannot accept the doctrine of eternal damnation....
  • John Wesley Harding (album by Dylan)
    ...together, and recordings from these sessions ultimately became the double album The Basement Tapes (1975). In early 1968 Columbia released a stripped-down album of new Dylan songs titled John Wesley Harding. At least partly because of public curiosity about Dylan’s seclusion, it reached number two on the pop album charts (eight places higher than Bob Dylan’s Great...
  • John, William Edgar (American singer)
    rhythm-and-blues singer of the 1950s whose vocal style anticipated soul music....
  • John William Friso (prince of Orange)
    Dutch prince of Nassau-Dietz and of Orange and stadtholder of the provinces of Friesland and Groningen, whose rejection as stadtholder by five of the seven Dutch provinces in 1702 marked the return to political supremacy of the States General (national assembly)....
  • John X (pope)
    pope from 914 to 928. He was archbishop of Ravenna (c. 905–914) when chosen to succeed Pope Lando about March 914....
  • John XI (pope)
    pope from 931 to late 935 or early 936....
  • John XI Becchus (patriarch of Constantinople)
    Greek Orthodox patriarch of Constantinople (1275–82) and leading Byzantine proponent of reunion between the Greek and Roman churches....
  • John XII (pope)
    pope from 955 to 964....
  • John XIII (pope)
    pope from 965 to 972....
  • John XIV (pope)
    pope from 983 to 984....
  • John XIX (pope [1004-1009])
    pope from 1003 to 1009....
  • John XIX (pope [1024-1032])
    pope from 1024 to 1032....
  • John XV (pope [986-996])
    pope from 985 to 996, who carried out the first solemn canonization in history by papal decree....
  • John (XVI) (antipope [997-998])
    antipope from 997 to 998....
  • John XVI (pope [986-996])
    pope from 985 to 996, who carried out the first solemn canonization in history by papal decree....
  • John (XVII) (pope [1003])
    pope from June to December 1003. Chosen by the patrician John Crescentius III, he succeeded Pope Sylvester II. John was merely a puppet of his relatives the Crescentii, then the most influential family in Rome. He approved an evangelical mission to the Slavs....
  • John XVIII (pope [1004-1009])
    pope from 1003 to 1009....
  • John XX (nonexistent pope)
    nonexistent pope. A confusion in the numbering of popes named John after John XIV resulted because Marianus Scotus and other 11th-century historians mistakenly believed that there had been a pope named John between antipope Boniface VII and the true John XV. Therefore they mistakenly numbered the real popes John XV to XIX as John XVI to XX. These popes have since customarily been renumbered XV to...
  • John XXI (pope)
    pope from 1276 to 1277, one of the most scholarly pontiffs in papal history....
  • John XXII (pope)
    second Avignon pope (reigned 1316–34), who centralized church administration, condemned the Spiritual Franciscans, expanded papal control over the appointment of bishops, and, against Emperor Louis IV, upheld papal authority over imperial elections....
  • John XXIII (pope)
    one of the most popular popes of all times (reigned 1958–63), who inaugurated a new era in the history of the Roman Catholic church by his openness to change (aggiornamento), shown especially in his convoking of the Second Vatican Council. He wrote several socially important encyclicals (most notably Pacem in Ter...
  • John XXIII (antipope)
    schismatic antipope from 1410 to 1415....
  • John Zápolya (king of Hungary)
    king and counterking of Hungary (1526–40) who rebelled against the House of Habsburg....
  • Johne’s disease (livestock disease)
    serious infectious disease caused by Mycobacterium avium paratuberculosis. Although principally a disease of cattle, it can affect sheep, deer, and goats, and it occurs worldwide. Cows may not show signs of the disease for as long as a year after exposure to it....
  • Johnny B. Goode (song by Berry)
    An appropriate tribute to Berry’s centrality to rock and roll came when his song “Johnny B. Goode” was among the pieces of music placed on a copper phonograph record attached to the side of the Voyager 1 satellite, hurtling through outer space, in order to give distant or future civilizations a chance to acquaint themselves with the culture of the planet Earth in the 20th cent...
  • Johnny Belinda (film by Negulesco [1948])
    Other Nominees...
  • Johnny Clegg and Savuka (South African music group)
    ...were segregated, although they still collaborated on occasion; a notable example is Johnny Clegg, a white South African who learned traditional Zulu music and formed the mixed-race bands Juluka and Savuka, both of which had international followings. Township music, a lively form of music that flourished in the townships during the apartheid era, has also been popular within the country and......
  • Johnny Eager (film by LeRoy [1942])
    Other Nominees...
  • Johnny Mnemonic (story by Gibson)
    ...high school in 1967, he traveled to Canada and eventually settled there, earning a B.A. (1977) from the University of British Columbia. Many of Gibson’s early stories, including Johnny Mnemonic (1981; filmed 1995) and Burning Chrome (1982), were published in Omni magazine. With the publication of his first...
  • Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams (work by Plath)
    ...unpublished poems, including Crossing the Water (1971) and Winter Trees (1971), were welcomed by critics and the public alike. Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams, a book of short stories and prose, was published in 1977, and The Collected Poems, which includes many previously unpublished......
  • Johnny Strikes up the Band! (opera by Krenek)
    ...however, he turned to a dissonant, Expressionist style, as in Zwingburg (1924; Dungeon Castle). He gained international success with the opera Jonny Spielt Auf! (1927; Johnny Strikes up the Band!), a work written in an idiom that mixed Expressionist dissonance with jazz influences and strove to reflect modern life in the 1920s. After a period in which he......
  • Johnny Tremain (book by Forbes)
    ...savoured in The Wheel on the School (1954), and especially in the intuitive Journey from Peppermint Street (1968). The historical novel fared less well in America than in England. Johnny Tremain (1943), by Esther Forbes, a beautifully written, richly detailed story of the Revolution, stood out as one of the few high points, as did The Innocent Wayfaring (1943), a......
  • johnny-jump-up (plant)
    The wild pansy, also known as johnny-jump-up, heartsease, and love-in-idleness, has been widely naturalized in North America. The flowers of this form are usually purple and yellow and less than 2 cm (0.8 inch) across....
  • johnnycake (food)
    ...are numerous regional variations of cornbread. The simplest are hoecakes, a mixture of cornmeal, water, and salt, so named because they were originally baked on the flat of a hoe over a wood fire. Johnnycakes and corn pone are somewhat thicker cakes that may have added ingredients such as fat or wheat flour. Spoonbread, a misnomer, actually denotes a cornmeal pudding. The usual Southern......
  • Johnnycake (Maryland, United States)
    village, Baltimore county, north-central Maryland, U.S., a southwestern suburb of Baltimore. It was founded before 1729 and was known as Johnnycake for a local inn specializing in that type of cornbread. The present name, honouring Richard Caton (who had an estate there in the late 18th century), was adopted about 1800. A residential communi...
  • John’s cabbage (plant)
    ...to damp woodlands of North America. Light-greenish mottling on the leaves, suggesting watermarks on paper, gives the genus its name. Notable members of the genus are the 75-cm- (2.5-foot-) tall Virginia waterleaf (Hydrophyllum virginianum), with five- to seven-lobed leaves; it is also called Shawnee salad and John’s cabbage in reference to the edible tender young shoots. The......
  • Johns Hopkins Perceptual Test (psychology)
    ...racial, ethnic, or social groups. Consequently, psychologists have attempted to develop culture-free tests that would more accurately reflect an individual’s native ability. One such test, the Johns Hopkins Perceptual Test, developed by Leon Rosenberg in the early 1960s to measure the intelligence of preschool children, has a child try to match random forms (ordinary geometric forms, suc...
  • Johns Hopkins University (university, Baltimore, Maryland, United States)
    privately controlled institution of higher learning in Baltimore, Md., U.S. Based on the German university model, which emphasized specialized training and research, it opened primarily as a graduate school for men in 1876 with an endowment from Johns Hopkins, a Baltimore merchant. It also provided undergraduate instruction for men. The university, now coeducational...
  • Johns, Hugh (British television sports commentator)
    British television sports commentator who was the voice of ITV’s Midlands regional association football (soccer) broadcasts in the 1960s and ’70s. Between 1963 (when he switched from newspaper journalism to television) and his retirement in 1996, Johns covered an estimated 1,000 football matches, including four World Cup finals....
  • Johns, Hugh Richard Lewis (British television sports commentator)
    British television sports commentator who was the voice of ITV’s Midlands regional association football (soccer) broadcasts in the 1960s and ’70s. Between 1963 (when he switched from newspaper journalism to television) and his retirement in 1996, Johns covered an estimated 1,000 football matches, including four World Cup finals....
  • Johns, Jasper (American painter)
    American painter and graphic artist who is generally associated with the Pop art movement....
  • Johnson (county, Kansas, United States)
    American painter and graphic artist who is generally associated with the Pop art movement.......
  • Johnson (county, Indiana, United States)
    American painter and graphic artist who is generally associated with the Pop art movement..........
  • Johnson & Johnson (American company)
    ...the partnership of Seabury & Johnson to manufacture bandages using a new formula employing India rubber. Eleven years later Johnson left that partnership to form the now well-known company of Johnson & Johnson with his brothers James and Edward. The company became known for its high-quality, inexpensive medical supplies and dressings. Johnson held the title of president from the t...
  • Johnson Act (United States [1934])
    ...Hull was a free-trader, but in July 1933 Roosevelt sent a message to the conference insisting that its main concern must be monetary exchanges, and in January 1934 the United States passed the Johnson Act, forbidding even private loans to countries that had not paid their war debts....
  • Johnson, Albert (American stage designer)
    ...carpentry and tasteful furnishings that were tailored to the mood, atmosphere, and mechanical requirements of the individual play. The Urban style in musical comedy design was replaced by that of Albert Johnson—a style characterized by loose colour and calligraphic line that went well with the sharp revues that prevailed until World War II. In staging musicals, a peculiar division......
  • Johnson, Alexander Boris de Pfeffel (British politician)
    American-born British journalist and Conservative Party politician, who in 2008 became the second elected mayor of London....
  • Johnson, Alexander Bryan (American philosopher and semanticist)
    British-born American philosopher and semanticist who came to the United States as a child of 11 years and made his fortune as a banker in Utica in upstate New York. He also, however, found time to write on a variety of subjects, especially economics, language, and the nature of knowledge....
  • Johnson, Alfred (United States sailor)
    ...Henrietta, owned by the American newspaper publisher James Gordon Bennett, won in 13 days of sailing. The first single-sailor transatlantic voyage was made in a 6-metre boat by Alfred Johnson in 1876 to commemorate the centenary of U.S. independence. The first single-handed race in 1891 was won by the American sailor Si Lawlor. A series of single-handed races, sponsored by......
  • Johnson, Alonzo (American musician)
    prolific black American musician, singer, and songwriter, one of the first major blues and jazz guitarists....
  • Johnson, Amy (English aviator)
    pioneering female aviator who first achieved fame as a result of her attempt to set a record for solo flight from London to Darwin, Australia....
  • Johnson, Andrew (president of United States)
    17th president of the United States (1865–69), who took office upon the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln during the closing months of the American Civil War (1861–65). His lenient Reconstruction policies toward the South embittered the Radical Republicans in Congress and led to his political downfall and to his impeachment, though he wa...
  • Johnson, B. S. (British author)
    ...by a madman; again the old sense of direction (beginning at the beginning and going on to the end) has been liquidated, yet Pale Fire is a true and highly intelligible novel. In England, B.S. Johnson published similar “false-directional” novels, though the influence of Sterne makes them seem accessible, even cozily traditional. One of Johnson’s books is marketed as a...
  • Johnson, Ban (American baseball executive)
    U.S. professional baseball administrator and first president of the American League of Professional Baseball Clubs (1900–27)....
  • Johnson, Ben (American actor)
    ("BEN"), U.S. motion picture actor who worked as a horse wrangler and stuntman before appearing in supporting roles in such films as Shane, One-Eyed Jacks, The Wild Bunch, and The Last Picture Show, for which he won an Academy Award (b. June 13, 1918--d. April 8, 1996)....
  • Johnson, Ben (Canadian athlete)
    ...put aside the moral outrage that characterizes media coverage of and political commentary on this issue. Media personnel tend to focus on the actions of high-profile stars such as Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson and Irish swimmer Michelle Smith, whose Olympic gold medals were stripped away (Johnson) or sadly tarnished by the suspicion of drug use (Smith). Whenever a prominent athlete tests......
  • Johnson, Bernice (American musician and historian)
    African American musician and historian whose work ranged from African spirituals to militant civil rights anthems....
  • Johnson, Bill (American skier)
    On the slopes the U.S. ski team was especially successful. American Bill Johnson captured the first-ever U.S. gold medal in the downhill event. In the men’s slalom twin brothers Phil and Steve Mahre (U.S.) took the gold and silver, respectively. Debbie Armstrong (U.S.) won her first and only international race, capturing gold in the giant slalom. Conspicuously absent from the Alpine events ...
  • Johnson, Blind Willie (American musician)
    African-American gospel singer who performed on Southern streets, noted for the energy and power of his singing and for his ingenious guitar accompaniments....
  • Johnson, Boris (British politician)
    American-born British journalist and Conservative Party politician, who in 2008 became the second elected mayor of London....
  • Johnson, Bunk (American musician)
    black American jazz trumpeter, one of the first musicians to play jazz and a principal figure of the 1940s traditional jazz revival....
  • Johnson, Byron Bancroft (American baseball executive)
    U.S. professional baseball administrator and first president of the American League of Professional Baseball Clubs (1900–27)....
  • Johnson, Caryn Elaine (American actress)
    American comedian, actress, and producer who is known for her work in theatre, film, television, and recordings. An accomplished performer with a wide repertoire, her work ranges from dramatic leading roles to controversial comedic performances....
  • Johnson, Charles (British manufacturer)
    ...Aspdin burned limestone and clay together in a kiln; the clay provided silicon compounds, which when combined with water formed stronger bonds than the calcium compounds of limestone. In the 1830s Charles Johnson, another British cement manufacturer, saw the importance of high-temperature burning of the clay and limestone to a white heat, at which point they begin to fuse. In this period,......
  • Johnson, Charles Anthony (Sarawak raja)
    Sir Charles Anthony Johnson Brooke (b. June 3, 1829, Berrow, Somerset, Eng.—d. May 17, 1917, Cirencester, Gloucestershire), who adopted the surname Brooke, became the second raja. The government of Charles Brooke has been described as a benevolent autocracy. Charles himself had spent much of his life among the Iban people of Sarawak, knew their language, and respected their beliefs and......
  • Johnson, Charles R. (American author)
    ...liberate its significance to today’s African American struggle began with Ishmael Reed’s exuberant Flight to Canada (1976) and extended into the metafiction of philosophical novelist Charles R. Johnson. In Oxherding Tale (1982), Johnson sends his biracial fugitive slave protagonist on a quest for emancipation that he can attain only by extricating himself...
  • Johnson, Charles Spurgeon (American sociologist and editor)
    U.S. sociologist, authority on race relations, and the first black president (1946–56) of Fisk University, Nashville, Tenn. (established in 1867 and long restricted to black students). Earlier he had founded and edited (1923–28) the intellectual magazine Opportunity, a major voice of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s....
  • Johnson City (Tennessee, United States)
    city, Washington county, northeastern Tennessee, U.S. It lies in a valley in the southern Appalachian Mountains, about 100 miles (160 km) northeast of Knoxville and just west of Elizabethton. The area was settled in the 1760s. Originally a part of North Carolina, it was included in the Watauga Association, a form of self-g...
  • Johnson City (Texas, United States)
    city, seat (1890) of Blanco county, south-central Texas, U.S., 40 miles (64 km) west of Austin. The hometown of President Lyndon B. Johnson, it was founded in 1879 by James Polk Johnson, a forebear of the president. Located in the scenic hills of the Pedernales River valley, it is a ranching supply centre and tourist base for the Lyndon B. J...
  • Johnson, Clarence “Kelly” (American engineer)
    ...first U.S. jet, the Bell P-59A Airacomet, made its first flight the following year. It was slower than contemporary piston-engined fighters, but in 1943–44 a small team under Lockheed designer Clarence “Kelly” Johnson developed the P-80 Shooting Star. The P-80 and its British contemporary, the de Havilland Vampire, were the first successful fighters powered by a single......
  • Johnson, Clarence Leonard (American aeronautical engineer)
    highly innovative American aeronautical engineer and designer....
  • Johnson, Colin (Australian author)
    Australian Aboriginal novelist and poet who depicted the struggles of modern Aboriginals to adapt to life in a society dominated by whites....
  • Johnson, Cornelius (English painter)
    Baroque painter, considered the most important native English portraitist of the early 17th century....
  • Johnson, Dennis (British inventor)
    Denis Johnson of London purchased a draisienne and patented an improved model in 1818 as the “pedestrian curricle.” The following year he produced more than 300, and they became commonly known as hobby-horses. They were very expensive, and many buyers were members of the nobility. Caricaturists called the devices “dandy horses,” an...
  • Johnson, Dennis Wayne (American athlete)
    American basketball player who in a 13-year career as an exceptional defensive guard, helped two different teams capture National Basketball Association (NBA) championships. Johnson was drafted by the Seattle SuperSonics in 1976 and was instrumental in their winning the 1979 NBA championship; he was named Most Valuable Player of the finals. After playing three seasons (1980–83) with the Ph...
  • Johnson, Diane (American author and academic)
    American writer and academic, best known for worldly and satiric novels set in California that portray contemporary women in crisis....
  • Johnson, Dr. (English author)
    English critic, biographer, essayist, poet, and lexicographer, regarded as one of the greatest figures of 18th-century life and letters....
  • Johnson, Earl Silas IV (American musician)
    American rhythm-and-blues musician and songwriter (b. Feb. 7, 1934, New Orleans, La.—d. April 17, 2003, New Orleans), played an incandescent guitar and wrote a number of songs that became standards of the genre. His strongest influence and mentor was Guitar Slim, and this influence was apparent in his early recordings, in particular the 1954 song “A Mother’s Love.” In 1...
  • Johnson, Earvin, Jr. (American basketball player)
    American basketball player who led the National Basketball Association (NBA) Los Angeles Lakers to five championships....
  • Johnson, Eliza (American first lady)
    American first lady (1865–69), the wife of Andrew Johnson, 17th president of the United States....
  • Johnson, Emily Pauline (Canadian Indian poet)
    Canadian Indian poet who celebrated the heritage of her people in poems that had immense appeal in her lifetime....
  • Johnson, Esther (British friend of Swift)
    ...1695. At the end of the same month he was appointed vicar of Kilroot, near Belfast. Swift came to intellectual maturity at Moor Park, with Temple’s rich library at his disposal. Here, too, he met Esther Johnson (the future Stella), the daughter of Temple’s widowed housekeeper. In 1692, through Temple’s good offices, Swift received the degree of M.A. at the University of Oxf...
  • Johnson, Eyvind (Swedish author)
    one of the few working-class novelists to bring not only new themes and points of view to Swedish literature but also to experiment with new forms and techniques of the most advanced kind. With Harry Edmund Martinson he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1974....
  • Johnson, Francis Benjamin (American actor)
    ("BEN"), U.S. motion picture actor who worked as a horse wrangler and stuntman before appearing in supporting roles in such films as Shane, One-Eyed Jacks, The Wild Bunch, and The Last Picture Show, for which he won an Academy Award (b. June 13, 1918--d. April 8, 1996)....
  • Johnson, Frank, Jr. (United States jurist)
    American federal judge (b. Oct. 30, 1918, Haleyville, Ala.—d. July 23, 1999, Montgomery, Ala.), made a number of landmark civil rights rulings that helped end segregation in the South. After graduating at the top of his law school class at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, in 1943, he joined the Army, becoming an infantry lieutenant and earning a Bronze Star as a platoon leader in the ...
  • Johnson, Frank Minis, Jr. (United States jurist)
    American federal judge (b. Oct. 30, 1918, Haleyville, Ala.—d. July 23, 1999, Montgomery, Ala.), made a number of landmark civil rights rulings that helped end segregation in the South. After graduating at the top of his law school class at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, in 1943, he joined the Army, becoming an infantry lieutenant and earning a Bronze Star as a platoon leader in the ...
  • Johnson, Georgia Douglas (American author)
    A friend and admirer of Locke, Georgia Douglas Johnson also authored a number of plays in the 1920s and ’30s. Her plays tended to focus on folk experience, often centring on women, but they also protested racial oppression and especially lynching—a common theme in Harlem Renaissance drama by women. Hurston held a position similar to that of Locke about the importance of folk plays, b...
  • Johnson, Gerrard (British artist)
    royal cabinetmaker of Louis XIV-style furniture, who became one of the most fashionable and foremost designers and craftsmen of his time. Apparently the first cabinetmaker to earn individual distinction in England, he became famous for his technique of metal- inlaid furniture and is therefore sometimes called the English Boulle, after the renowned contemporary French cabinetmaker Andr...
  • Johnson, Gisle (Norwegian theologian)
    ...Despite being opposed by some of the clergy and being imprisoned several times for his activities, he and his followers remained within the Church of Norway and influenced it greatly. The work of Gisle Johnson, a theology professor from 1849 to 1873 who combined Lutheran orthodoxy and Pietism, also influenced the clergy and laity and led to the establishment of mission programs....
  • Johnson, Harald Norlin (American scientist)
    U.S. microbiologist and international specialist on such arthropod-borne viral diseases as rabies and encephalitis; while working, 1938-72, for the Rockefeller Foundation, he developed the strain of the rabies virus used in the 1960s vaccine that helped control the disease among dogs in the U.S. (b. March 31, 1907--d. Aug. 28, 1996)....
  • Johnson, Harold Lester (American astronomer)
    ...magnitudes are measured through filters sensitive to light at wavelengths of 360, 420, and 540 nanometres, respectively. This system was introduced in the early 1950s by the American astronomers Harold Lester Johnson and William Wilson Morgan and has largely superseded the less accurate system using the north polar sequence....
  • Johnson, Harry Gordon (Canadian economist)
    Canadian-born economist who managed to synthesize divergent economic viewpoints. He was one of the more important economists of the post-World War II era, with a published output that dwarfed those of his contemporaries and made substantial contributions to the fields of macroeconomics and international trade....
  • Johnson, Hiram Warren (American politician)
    reform governor of California (1911–17) and a U.S. senator for 28 years (1917–45), a Progressive Republican and later a staunch isolationist....
  • Johnson, Ian William (Australian cricket player)
    Australian cricket player who was a reliable, slow off-spin bowler for Victoria and in 45 Test matches for Australia, including 17 as captain (1954-57). Johnson played first-class cricket for Victoria briefly in 1935, but he served as a fighter pilot in World War II before making his Test debut against New Zealand in 1946. In his 11-year career Johnson achieved a Test-career double, scoring 1,000 ...
  • Johnson, Isaac Charles (British engineer)
    ...to portland stone, a limestone used for building in England. Aspdin’s product may well have been too lightly burned to be a true portland cement, and the real prototype was perhaps that produced by Isaac Charles Johnson in southeastern England about 1850. The manufacture of portland cement rapidly spread to other European countries and North America....
  • Johnson, J. J. (American musician)
    American jazz composer and one of the genre’s most influential trombonists....
  • Johnson, Jack (American boxer)
    first black to hold the heavyweight boxing championship of the world....
  • Johnson, James (Scottish author)
    In Edinburgh Burns had met James Johnson, a keen collector of Scottish songs who was bringing out a series of volumes of songs with the music and who enlisted Burns’s help in finding, editing, improving, and rewriting items. Burns was enthusiastic and soon became virtual editor of Johnson’s The Scots Musical Museum. Later, he became involved with a similar project for......
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