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  • Blood Diamond (film by Zwick)
    DiCaprio’s later works include a third collaboration with Scorsese, The Departed (2006), and Blood Diamond (2006). Both films garnered DiCaprio some of the best reviews of his career, and he earned an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of a diamond smuggler in the latter film. In 2008 he starred as a CIA agent hunting down a terrorist on the...
  • blood disease
    any disease of the blood, involving the red blood cells (erythrocytes), white blood cells (leukocytes), or platelets (thrombocytes) or the tissues in which these elements are formed—the bone marrow, lymph nodes...
  • blood doping
    use of substances or techniques that increase the number of circulating red blood cells (erythrocytes) or the oxygen-carrying capacity of blood to improve human performance. Although therapies such as blood transfusion and the administration of drugs to increase red cell production are commonly used in the treatment of diseases ranging from ...
  • blood feud (private war)
    a continuing state of conflict between two groups within a society (typically kinship groups) characterized by violence, usually killings and counterkillings. It exists in many nonliterate communities in which there is an absence of law or a breakdown of legal procedures and in which attempts to redress a grievance in a way that is acceptable ...
  • blood flow (anatomy)
    The rate at which a chemical accumulates in a particular tissue is influenced by the blood flow to that tissue. The well-perfused organs—i.e., organs that receive a rich blood supply relative to organ weight—include major organs like the liver, brain, and kidney. A middle group receives an intermediate blood supply and includes the skeletal muscle and skin. The poorly......
  • blood fluke (flatworm)
    any of certain parasitic flatworms that live in the veins of the host organism. See fluke....
  • blood group
    classification of blood based on inherited differences (polymorphisms) in antigens on the surfaces of the red blood cells (erythrocytes). Inherited differences of white blood cells...
  • Blood Knot, The (work by Fugard)
    ...plays were No-Good Friday and Nongogo (both published in Dimetos and Two Early Plays, 1977), but it was The Blood Knot (1963), produced for stage (1961) and television (1967) in both London and New York City, that established his reputation. The Blood Knot, dealing......
  • blood libel (anti-Semitism)
    the superstitious accusation that Jews ritually sacrifice Christian children at Passover to obtain blood for unleavened bread. It first emerged in medieval Europe in the 12th century and was revived sporadically in eastern and central Europe througho...
  • blood lily (plant)
    any plant of the genus Haemanthus of the family Amaryllidaceae, consisting of about 50 species of ornamental South African herbs. Most species have dense clusters of red flowers and broad, blunt leaves that are grouped at the base of the plant....
  • Blood Meridian (novel by McCarthy)
    McCarthy’s Blood Meridian (1985), a violent frontier tale, was a critical sensation, hailed as his masterpiece. Blood Meridian tells the story of 14-year-old boy who joins a gang of outlaws hunting Native Americans along the U.S.-Mexico border in the 1840s. The group is headed by a malevolent figure called the Judge, who leads the gang through a series of......
  • blood money (sociology)
    compensation paid by an offender (usually a murderer) or his kin group to the kin group of the victim. In many societies blood money functions to prevent the continuation of hostilities in the form of a feud. Some customs allow the injured party the choice of punishing the murder by blood vengeance or by ...
  • Blood of a Poet, The (film by Cocteau)
    Cocteau had enlarged the scope of his work by the creation of his first film, Le Sang d’un poète, a commentary on his own private mythology; the themes that then seemed obscure or shocking seem today less private and more universal because they have appeared in other works. Also in the early 1930s Cocteau wrote what is usually thought to be his greatest play,...
  • Blood on the Sun (film by Lloyd [1945])
    ...Black-and-White: Harry Stradling for The Picture of Dorian GrayCinematography, Color: Leon Shamroy for Leave Her to HeavenArt Direction, Black-and-White: Wiard Ihnen for Blood on the SunArt Direction, Color: Hans Dreier and Ernst Fegte for Frenchman’s CreekMusic Score of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture: Miklos Rozsa for SpellboundScoring of a Musical......
  • Blood on the Tracks (album by Dylan)
    Released in January 1975, Dylan’s next studio album, Blood on the Tracks, was a return to lyrical form. It topped the charts, as did Desire, released one year later. In 1975 and 1976 Dylan barnstormed North America with a gypsylike touring company, announcing shows in radio interviews only hours before appearing. Filmed and recorded, the Rolling Thunder Revue—including ...
  • blood orange (fruit)
    ...some varieties of which are called tangerines (q.v.); and the sour, or Seville, orange, which is less extensively grown. Other varieties include the Jaffa, from Israel; the Maltese, or blood, orange; and the navel, which is usually seedless. The tree of the sweet orange often reaches 6 m (20 feet) and sometimes 10 m. The broad, glossy, evergreen leaves are medium-sized and ovate;......
  • blood plasma (biology)
    the liquid portion of blood. Plasma serves as a transport medium for delivering nutrients to the cells of the various organs of the body and for transporting waste products derived from cellular metabolism to the kidneys, liver, and lungs for excretion. It is also a transport system for blood cells, and it plays a critical ro...
  • blood poisoning (infection)
    infection resulting from the presence of bacteria in the blood (bacteremia). The onset of septicemia is signaled by a high fever, chills, weakness, and excessive sweating, followed by a decrease in blood pressure. The typical microorganisms that produce septicemia, usually gram-n...
  • blood pressure (physiology)
    force originating in the pumping action of the heart, exerted by the blood against the walls of the blood vessels; the stretching of the vessels in response to this force and their subsequent contraction are important in maintaining blood flow through the vascular system....
  • Blood Protection Law (German history)
    ...15, 1935. One, the Reichsbürgergesetz (German: “Law of the Reich Citizen”), deprived Jews of German citizenship, designating them “subjects of the state.” The other, the Gesetz zum Schutze des Deutschen Blutes und der Deutschen Ehre (“Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honour”), usually called simply the Blutschutzgesetz (“B...
  • Blood Purge (German history)
    ...storm troopers served a similar function, and Nazi concentration camps at first interned more Marxists than Jews. Nor were dissident conservatives spared Nazi violence. Hitler’s infamous “Blood Purge” of June 1934, in which Röhm and other SA leaders were summarily executed, also claimed the lives of Kurt von Schleicher, the last chancellor of the Weimar Republic, and...
  • Blood Red (film by Masterson)
    ...arrival, she failed to land any jobs. Her first film role turned up after she was recommended by her older brother, actor Eric Roberts, for a bit part as his on-screen sister in Blood Red (1989), a drama set in the late 1800s; although the film was completed in 1986, its release was delayed for several years. She next made several television appearances before......
  • Blood River (stream, South Africa)
    short stream in KwaZulu-Natal province, South Africa, a tributary of the Buffalo (Mzinyathi) River. The river was the scene of a battle between the Zulu and the Voortrekker Boers on Dec. 16, 1838. The Zulu, under Dingane, were defeated by a Voortrekker commando force...
  • Blood River, Battle of (South African history)
    (Dec. 16, 1838), battle between the Zulu and the Voortrekker Boers on the Ncome River, a tributary of the Buffalo (Mzinyathi) River, in Southern Africa....
  • blood sacrifice
    ...permanent structures and can be as insubstantial as a small marker in a private courtyard. Right relations with the divinities are maintained through prayers, offerings, and sacrifices, especially blood sacrifices. The shedding of blood in ritual sacrifice, which is believed to release the vital force that sustains life, precedes most ceremonies in which blessings are sought from the ancestors....
  • Blood Shot (work by Paretsky)
    ...deals with abortion rights and the medical community, Burn Marks (1990), Guardian Angel (1992), and Tunnel Vision (1994). Many critics considered Paretsky’s best novel to be Blood Shot (1988), which follows V.I.’s search for an old friend’s missing father and her discovery that ruthless chemical company executives are poisoning her childhood neig...
  • Blood Simple (film by Joel and Ethan Coen)
    The brothers garnered much attention in 1984 with Blood Simple, a sleek thriller that they cowrote and financed through private investors. The critical success of the film enabled the brothers to make a deal with an independent production company that granted them complete creative control. The films that followed highlighted the Coens’ versatility and firmly......
  • Blood Sugar Sex Magik (album by Red Hot Chili Peppers)
    ...Their 1989 album, Mother’s Milk, became a surprise hit. The album went gold by early 1990 and was followed by the more successful Blood Sugar Sex Magik (1991), which included the band’s first Top Ten single, Under the Bridge, as well as the Grammy Award-winning Give It......
  • blood tax (Bulgarian history)
    ...were lost. The Bulgarian nobility was destroyed—its members either perished, fled, or accepted Islam and Turkicization—and the peasantry was enserfed to Turkish masters. The “blood tax” took a periodic levy of male children for conversion to Islam and service in the Janissary Corps of the Ottoman army....
  • blood test
    laboratory examination of a sample of blood used to obtain information about its physical and chemical properties. Blood analysis is commonly carried out on a sample of blood drawn from the vein of the arm, the finger, or the earlobe; in some cases, the blood cells of the bone marrow may ...
  • blood transfusion (medical procedure)
    the transfer of blood into the vein of a human or animal recipient. The blood either is taken directly from a donor or is obtained from a blood bank. Blood transfusions are a therapeutic measure used to restore blood or plasma volume after extensive hemorrhage, burns, or trauma; to increase the number and concentration of ...
  • blood transfusion effect
    Since following a blood transfusion some patients become sensitized to the transplantation antigens of the donor, it was expected that prior blood transfusion could only harm the recipient’s prospects for a successful organ graft. Careful analysis of results, however, showed the contrary. Specifically, the results of kidney grafting in patients who had received previous blood transfusions.....
  • blood type
    classification of blood based on inherited differences (polymorphisms) in antigens on the surfaces of the red blood cells (erythrocytes). Inherited differences of white blood cells...
  • blood typing
    classification of blood in terms of distinctive inherited characteristics that are associated with the antigens located on the surface of red blood cells (erythrocytes). The ABO and the Rh blood groups are among those most commonly...
  • blood vascular system (anatomy)
    Blood is circulated through vessels of the blood vascular system. Blood is moved through this system by some form of pump. The simplest pump, or heart, may be no more than a vessel along which a wave of contraction passes to propel the blood. This simple, tubular heart is adequate where low blood pressure and relatively slow circulation rates are sufficient to supply the animal’s metabolic....
  • blood vein (blood vessel)
    in human physiology, any of the vessels that, with four exceptions, carry oxygen-depleted blood to the right upper chamber (atrium) of the heart. The four exceptions—the pulmonary veins—transport oxygenated blood from the lungs to the left upper chamber of the heart. The oxy...
  • blood vessel (anatomy)
    a vessel in the human or animal body in which blood circulates. The vessels that carry blood away from the heart are called arteries, and their very small branches are arterioles. Very small branches that collect the blood from the various organs and parts are called venules, and they unite to form veins, which return the ...
  • blood volume
    Hemorrhage is the most common cause of shock. In the “average American man” (weighing 86 kg, or about 190 pounds) the blood volume is about 78 ml per kilogram (about 6.7 litres [7 quarts] for a man weighing 86 kg), and the loss of any part of this will initiate certain cardiovascular reflexes. Hemorrhage results in a diminished return of venous blood to the heart, the output of......
  • Blood Wedding (play by García Lorca)
    folk tragedy in three acts by Federico García Lorca, published and produced in 1933 as Bodas de sangre. Blood Wedding is the first play in Lorca’s dramatic trilogy; the other two plays are Yerma and The House of Bernarda Alba. The protagonists of Blood Wedding are ordinary women confronting their own passionate natures and rebelli...
  • blood-brain barrier (anatomy)
    ...Most lysosomal storage disorders have no therapy, except for supportive care. The difficulty with most therapies is that they do not enter the brain, because of the presence of the so-called blood-brain barrier. Bone marrow transplantation has been attempted in individuals with lysosomal storage disorders, but overall results have been disappointing. Successful therapy for disorders......
  • blood-clotting protein (biochemistry)
    ...Normal hemostasis is the responsibility of a complex system of three individual components: blood cells (platelets), cells that line the blood vessels (endothelial cells), and blood proteins (blood-clotting proteins). The blood platelet is a nonnucleated cell that circulates in the blood in an inactive, resting form. Endothelial cells line the wall of the blood vessel and inhibit blood......
  • blood-testis barrier (anatomy)
    The body has anatomic or physiological barriers that tend to protect the reproductive system. The so-called placental barrier and the blood-testis barrier impede certain chemicals, although both allow most fat-soluble chemicals to cross. Drugs that are more water-soluble and that possess higher molecular weights tend not to cross either the placental or the blood-testis barrier. In addition, if......
  • bloodfin (fish)
    freshwater fish, a species of characin....
  • bloodflower (plant)
    Common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca) and bloodflower (A. curassavica) often are cultivated as ornamentals. The butterfly weed (A. tuberosa) of North America has bright orange flowers. Hoya carnosa, which is commonly called wax plant because of its waxy white flowers, is often grown indoors as a pot plant. Succulent plants of the family, such as Hoodia and......
  • bloodhound (breed of dog)
    breed of dog unsurpassed by any other in scenting ability and from which most of the scent-hunting hounds have been derived. It was known, although not in its present form, in the Mediterranean area in pre-Christian times. The breed’s name derives from its “blooded,” or purebred, ancestry....
  • Bloodless Revolution (English history)
    in English history, the events of 1688–89 that resulted in the deposition of James II and the accession of his daughter Mary II and her husband, William III, prince of Orange and stadholder of the Netherlands....
  • bloodletting (medical procedure)
    ...referred to as a “leech.” Toward the beginning of the 19th century, a “leech mania” swept through Europe and America, as leeching became incorporated into the practice of bloodletting. Enormous quantities of leeches were used for bleeding—as many as 5 to 6 million being used annually to draw more than 300,000 litres of blood in Parisian hospitals alone. In som...
  • bloodlily (plant)
    any plant of the genus Haemanthus of the family Amaryllidaceae, consisting of about 50 species of ornamental South African herbs. Most species have dense clusters of red flowers and broad, blunt leaves that are grouped at the base of the plant....
  • bloodroot (plant)
    (Sanguinaria canadensis), plant of the poppy family (Papaveraceae), native throughout eastern and midwestern North America. It grows in deciduous woodlands, where it blooms...
  • bloods (book)
    an inexpensive novel of violent adventure or crime that was especially popular in mid-to-late Victorian England. Penny dreadfuls were often issued in eight-page installments. The appellation, like dime novel and shilling shocker, usually connotes rather careless and second-rate writing as well as gory themes. ...
  • Bloodshed and Three Novellas (work by Ozick)
    ...American Jewish family and her search for her renegade father in Europe. It has echoes of Henry James in its juxtaposition of American and European settings. In subsequent books, such as Bloodshed and Three Novellas (1976), Ozick struggled with the idea that the creation of art (a pagan activity) is in direct opposition to principles of Judaism, which forbids the creation of......
  • bloodstone (mineral)
    dark-green variety of the silica mineral chalcedony that has nodules of bright-red jasper distributed throughout its mass. Polished sections therefore show red spots on a dark-green background, and from the resemblance of these to drops of blood it derives its name. Bloodstone was greatly prized in the Middle Ages and was used in sculptures representing flagellation and martyrdom; it later became ...
  • bloodworm (biology)
    any of certain bright red, segmented, aquatic worms of the phylum Annelida. Included are worms of the freshwater genus Tubifex, also known as sludge worms (class Oligochaeta, family Tubificidae), which are used as a tropical-fish food. The marine proboscis worm Glycera (class Polychaeta, family Glyceridae) is sometimes called bloodworm. G. dibranchiata is fo...
  • Bloody Assizes (English history)
    (1685), in English history, the trials conducted in the west of England by the chief justice, George Jeffreys, 1st Baron Jeffreys of Wem, and four other judges after the abortive rebellion (June 1685) of the Duke of Monmouth, illegitimate son of King Charles II, against his Roman Catholic uncle King James II. About 320 persons were hanged and more than 800 tra...
  • Bloody Balfour (prime minister of United Kingdom)
    British statesman who maintained a position of power in the British Conservative Party for 50 years; he was prime minister from 1902 to 1905, and as foreign secretary from 1916 to 1919 he is perhaps best remembered for his World War I statement (the ...
  • Bloody Barkers (American outlaws)
    ...of an outlaw gang of brothers and allies engaged in kidnapping and in payroll, post-office, and bank robberies in the 1920s and ’30s. The activities of the gang, which included her sons, the “Bloody Barkers”—Herman (1894–1927), Arthur, known as “Doc” (1899–1939), and Fred (1902–35)—ranged throughout the midwestern United Stat...
  • Bloody Chamber and Other Stories, The (work by Carter)
    ...immediate access to the realm of the subconscious, was Angela Carter, whose exotic and erotic imagination unrolled most eerily and resplendently in her short-story collection The Bloody Chamber and Other Stories (1979). Jeanette Winterson also wrote in this vein. Having distinguished herself earlier in a realistic mode, as did authors such as Drabble and Pat......
  • Bloody Harlan (Kentucky, United States)
    city, seat of Harlan county, southeastern Kentucky, U.S., in the Cumberland Mountains, on the Clover Fork Cumberland River. It was settled in 1819 by Virginians led by Samuel Howard and was known as Mount Pleasant until renamed in 1912 for Major Silas Harlan, who was killed during the American Revolution at the Battle of Blue Licks (August 1...
  • Bloody Marsh, Battle of (United States history)
    ...of the remains of a fort and surrounding town built by Georgia colony founder James Edward Oglethorpe in 1736 to defend Georgia from the Spanish in Florida. The English defeated the Spanish at the Battle of Bloody Marsh (1742), ending the Spanish threat to Georgia. Troops were withdrawn in 1748, and the town declined and was completely abandoned by 1758. The monument preserves colonial......
  • Bloody Mary (queen of England)
    the first queen to rule England (1553–58) in her own right. She was known as Bloody Mary for her persecution of Protestants in a vain attempt to restore Roman Catholicism in England....
  • Bloody Rosa (Polish-German revolutionary)
    Polish-born German revolutionary and agitator who played a key role in the founding of the Polish Social Democratic Party and the Spartacus League, which grew into the Communist Party of Germany. As a political theoretician Luxemburg developed a humanitarian theory of Marxism, stressing democracy and revolutionary mass action...
  • bloody shirt (United States history)
    in U.S. history, the post-Civil War political strategy of appealing to voters by recalling the passions and hardships of the recent war. This technique of “waving the bloody shirt” was most often employed by Radical Republicans in their efforts to focus public attention on Reconstruction issues still facing the country. Used in the presidential elections of 1868, ...
  • Bloody Sunday (Northern Ireland [1972])
    demonstration in Londonderry (Derry), Northern Ireland, on Sunday, January 30, 1972, by Roman Catholic civil rights supporters that turned violent when British paratroopers opened fire, killing 13 and injuring 14 others (one of the injured later died). Bloody Sunday precipitated an upsur...
  • Bloody Sunday (Russia [1905])
    (January 9 [January 22, New Style], 1905), massacre in St. Petersburg, Russia, of peaceful demonstrators marking the beginning of the violent phase of the Russian Revolution of 1905. At the end of the 19th century, industrial workers in Russia had begun to organize; police agents, eager to prevent the Labour Movement from being dominated by revolutionary influences, formed legal...
  • Bloody Sunday (Ireland [1920])
    In seeking to counter the terrorism of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), the Black and Tans themselves engaged in brutal reprisals. Notably, on “Bloody Sunday,” Nov. 21, 1920, the IRA killed 11 Englishmen suspected of being intelligence agents. The Black and Tans took revenge the same afternoon, attacking spectators at a Gaelic football match in Croke Park, Dublin, killing 12 and......
  • Bloody Week (French history)
    By May 21 Thiers’s forces were ready to strike. In the course of “Bloody Week” (May 21–28), the Communards resisted, street by street, but were pushed back steadily to the heart of Paris. In their desperation, they executed a number of hostages (including the archbishop of Paris) and in the last days set fire to many public buildings, including the Tuileries Palace and ...
  • “Bloody Williamson” (county, Illinois, United States)
    ...international byword for bootleg liquor, gangsterism, and organized crime—epitomized in the notoriety of Al Capone. Downstate Illinois was also notorious as a region of violence. “Bloody Williamson” county was the site of a feud, beginning in 1868, among five families of Tennessee and Kentucky origin. A dispute over a card game in a tavern near Carbondale grew into an......
  • Bloom (Illinois, United States)
    city, Cook county, northeastern Illinois, U.S. It is a suburb of Chicago, about 30 miles (50 km) south of downtown. The city’s name derives from its proximity to Chicago and its elevation, which averages 95 feet (29 metres) above the surrounding area. The site was the intersection of two trails, the Hubbard (from Vincennes, Indiana, t...
  • bloom (metallurgy)
    ...furnaces could not reach the melting temperature of iron, the product was a spongy mass of pasty globules of metal intermingled with a semiliquid slag. This hardly usable product, known as a bloom, may have weighed up to 10 lbs (5 kg). Repeated reheating and hot hammering eliminated much of the slag, creating wrought iron, a much better product. By the 15th century, many bloomeries used......
  • Bloom, Allan (American philosopher and author)
    American philosopher and writer best remembered for his provocative best-seller The Closing of the American Mind: How Higher Education Has Failed Democracy and Impoverished the Souls of Today’s Students (1987). He was also known for his scholarly volumes of interpretive essays and translations of works by Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Plato....
  • Bloom, Allan David (American philosopher and author)
    American philosopher and writer best remembered for his provocative best-seller The Closing of the American Mind: How Higher Education Has Failed Democracy and Impoverished the Souls of Today’s Students (1987). He was also known for his scholarly volumes of interpretive essays and translations of works by Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Plato....
  • bloom casting (metallurgy)
    Different design principles are used for casting strands of different cross sections. Billet casters solidify 80- to 175-millimetre squares or rounds, bloom casters solidify sections of 300 by 400 millimetres, and beam blank casters produce large, dog-bone-like sections that are directly fed into an I-beam or H-beam rolling mill. Huge slab casters solidify sections up to 250 millimetres thick......
  • Bloom, Claire (British actress)
    English dramatic actress noted for her moving portrayals of Shakespearean heroines. She also played on stage, in television, and in motion pictures....
  • Bloom, Harold (American literary critic and author)
    American literary critic known for his innovative interpretations of literary history and of the creation of literature....
  • Bloom, Hyman (American painter)
    March 29, 1913Brinoviski, Latvia, Russian EmpireAug. 26, 2009Nashua, N.H.American painter who was noted for his richly detailed figurative works on mystical themes, though his use of thickly applied bold colours on large canvases also led many to consider him a forerunner of the Abstract Ex...
  • Bloom, Leopold (fictional character)
    fictional character, the Odysseus figure whose wanderings through Dublin during one 24-hour period on June 16, 1904, form the central action of James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922). Bloom is curious, decent, pacific, and somewhat timid. Though he never leaves the streets of Dublin, Bloom is a wanderer like the Greek mythological hero U...
  • bloom, marine (biology)
    dense aquatic population of microscopic photosynthetic organisms produced by an abundance of nutrient salts in surface water, coupled with adequate sunlight for photosynthesis. The microorganisms or the toxic substances that they release may discolour the water, deplete its oxygen content, poison aqua...
  • Bloom, Molly (fictional character)
    one of the three central characters in the novel Ulysses (1922) by James Joyce. The unfaithful wife of Leopold Bloom, Molly makes a derisively mocking parallel to Penelope, the faithful wife of Odysseus (Ulysses) in Homer’s Odyssey. In Episode 18, the last section of the book, Molly ...
  • bloom, water (biology)
    dense aquatic population of microscopic photosynthetic organisms produced by an abundance of nutrient salts in surface water, coupled with adequate sunlight for photosynthesis. The microorganisms or the toxic substances that they release may discolour the water, deplete its oxygen content, poison aqua...
  • Bloomberg LP (American company)
    ...without a job, Bloomberg’s $10 million partnership buyout provided the funding he needed to create Innovative Market Systems, a financial-data service firm, in 1982. Twenty years later, the renamed Bloomberg LP had become a global leader in financial data services. Central to the company’s success was the Bloomberg computer terminal, a comprehensive financial news and information ...
  • Bloomberg, Michael (American businessman and politician)
    American businessman and politician, who founded a financial data-services firm and served as mayor of New York City (2002– )....
  • Bloomberg, Michael Rubens (American businessman and politician)
    American businessman and politician, who founded a financial data-services firm and served as mayor of New York City (2002– )....
  • Bloomer, Amelia Jenks (American social reformer)
    American reformer who campaigned for temperance and women’s rights....
  • Bloomer, Elizabeth Anne (first lady of the United States)
    American first lady (1974–77), the wife of Gerald Ford, 38th president of the United States, and founder of the Betty Ford Center, a facility dedicated to helping people recover from drug and alcohol dependence. She was noted for her strong opinions on public issues and her candour regarding intimate matters....
  • Bloomer Girls (American sports teams)
    ...club in Springfield, Illinois, divided it into two teams, the Blondes and the Brunettes, and charged admission to see them play. In the early 20th century, barnstorming teams known as “Bloomer Girls” were formed in various parts of the United States and took on amateur and semiprofessional teams that included both men and women....
  • bloomers (clothing)
    lower part of a “rational dress” for women advocated by Amelia Jenks Bloomer in 1850. The entire costume consisted of a short jacket, a skirt extending below the knee, and the bloomers, or loose “Turkish” trousers, gathered at the ankles....
  • “Bloomers, The” (work by Sternheim)
    ...were produced from 1911 through 1916, being collectively titled Aus dem bürgerlichen Heldenleben (“From the Lives of Bourgeois Heroes”). The first play, Die Hose (The Underpants), was published and performed in 1911 under the title Der Riese (“The Giant”) because the Berlin police had forbidden the original title on the grounds of g...
  • bloomery furnace (metallurgy)
    ...extracted through the top of the shaft. The final version of this kind of bloomery hearth was the Catalan forge (see figure), which survived in Spain until the 19th century. Another design, the high bloomery furnace, had a taller shaft and evolved into the 3-metre- (10-foot-) high Stückofen, which produced blooms so large they had to be removed through a front opening in the......
  • bloomery process (metallurgy)
    Process for iron smelting. In ancient times, smelting involved creating a bed of red-hot charcoal in a furnace to which iron ore mixed with more charcoal was added. The ore was chemically reduced (see oxidation-reduction), but, because primitive furnaces could not reach the melting temperature of ...
  • Bloomfield (New Jersey, United States)
    township (town), Essex county, northern New Jersey, U.S. It is a northwestern suburb of Newark. Settled in 1660 by Puritans, it was known as Wardsesson (then a ward of Newark) until 1796, when it was renamed for the American Revolutionary general Joseph Bloomfield. During the revolution it served as a supply point for both sides. Large quant...
  • Bloomfield (Connecticut, United States)
    town (township), Hartford county, north-central Connecticut, U.S., just northwest of Hartford. The site, drained by Wash Brook and the Farmington River, was settled about 1660, and the parish of Wintonbury was organized in 1736 from parts of Windsor, Farmingto...
  • Bloomfield Center (Michigan, United States)
    city, Oakland county, southeastern Michigan, U.S. It lies just southeast of Pontiac and northwest of Detroit. The site was settled in 1819 by Amasa Bagley and was known as Bagley’s Corners and Bloomfield Center until the present name was adopted in the 1890s. A f...
  • Bloomfield Hills (Michigan, United States)
    city, Oakland county, southeastern Michigan, U.S. It lies just southeast of Pontiac and northwest of Detroit. The site was settled in 1819 by Amasa Bagley and was known as Bagley’s Corners and Bloomfield Center until the present name was adopted in the 1890s. A f...
  • Bloomfield, Leonard (American linguist)
    American linguist whose book Language (1933) was one of the most important general treatments of linguistic science in the first half of the 20th century and almost alone determined the subsequent course of linguistics in the United States....
  • Bloomfield, Mike (American musician)
    ...used blues material. British rock musicians in the 1960s, especially the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, and John Mayall, were strongly influenced by the blues, as were such American rock musicians as Mike Bloomfield, Paul Butterfield, and the Allman Brothers Band....
  • Bloomfield, Robert (English poet)
    shoemaker-poet who achieved brief fame with poems describing the English countryside....
  • Bloomfieldian linguistics
    ...a number of different classes can fulfill the same function or in which the same class can fulfill many functions. Tagmemics is also known as string constituent analysis and differs, in part, from Bloomfieldian linguistics in that semantic as well as syntactic function is used in identifying tagmemes. Pike later applied tagmemics to matrix of field theory and English rhetoric....
  • Bloomgarden, Kermit (American producer)
    American producer of dramatic and musical plays that were commercially and critically successful....
  • blooming (chemical reaction)
    ...atom of the myoglobin molecule (in this state the molecule is called deoxymyoglobin). Within 30 minutes after exposure to the air, beef slowly turns to a bright cherry-red colour in a process called blooming. Blooming is the result of oxygen binding to the iron atom (in this state the myoglobin molecule is called oxymyoglobin). After several days of exposure to air, the iron atom of myoglobin.....
  • blooming (physics)
    Spatial resolution for surface mapping is limited for several techniques by an intrinsic effect, called blooming, that results from scattering of charged particles in solids. When a beam of highly focused, high-energy charged particles such as electrons strikes a solid and penetrates the surface, the paths of the electrons diverge because of optics and electron scattering. The shape of the area......
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