Ghent
Ghent names 4 different subjects across the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf. Each is set out below.
Ghent gent, an important city in Belgium
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
gent, an important city in Belgium. It is situated on the "lazy" Scheldt, and is divided by numerous canals into twenty-six islands or blocks connected by 270 bridges. Ghent is noted for the manufacture of cotton, linen, thread, ribbon, cutlery, paper, pottery, hosiery, engines, leather, ropes, and beer. It is a busy, thriving industrial and commercial city with a population in 1900 of 160,000. Tourists are interested in the old walls and gates; in the nunneries where exquisite lace is made; in the university and a library of handsome old books and hand illumined manuscripts; in a bell tower with a chime of forty bells; and in the old churches with stained windows and paintings by the masters. The church of St. Michael contains a painting of the Crucifixion by the celebrated Van Dyck. There are several hundred hothouses. Bulbs are raised for florists of both Europe and America. Ghent has the most wonderful floral shows in Europe. The treaty of Ghent which closed the War of 1812 was negotiated here. Ghetto (get'o) The, the Jewish quarter of large cities. The term arose in Italy in connection with the Jewish quarters in the cities of Lombardy and other parts of Italy. In the medieval towns the Jews were compelled to live apart from the Christians. At Cordova the Moslems drove "dogs and Jews" to live outside the city walls. The famous ghetto of Rome was destroyed in 1885 to make room for a new embankment along the Tiber. The largest and most populous ghetto in the world is a down town tenement quarter in New York City. Over a third of a million Hebrew people are packed into houses, many of them unfit for occupancy. They eke out a living largely by working on readymade clothing by the piece.
Ghent WILLIAM JAMES, an American writer and economist
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
WILLIAM JAMES, an American writer and economist, born in Frankfort, Ind., in 1866. He was educated in the public schools and for a time worked as a compositor and proofreader in various cities. He became a regular contributor to magazines and in 1897-1899 was editor of the "American Fabian." He was one of the founders of the Social Reform Club of New York, and was secretary of the Rand School of Social Science from 1906 to 1909. From the latter year to 1911 he was president of this school. He was National executive committeeman of the American Alliance for Labor and Democracy for 1917. He wrote "Our Benevolent Feudalism" (1902); "Mass and Class" (1904); and "Socialism and Success" (1910).
Ghent UNIVERSITY OF, a Flemish university of Belgium
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
UNIVERSITY OF, a Flemish university of Belgium, supported by and under the control of the State. It was founded in 1816 by by King William I of Holland. As a result of the revolution of 1830 the activities of the University were temporarily curtailed, two of its four faculties being suppressed. Its full curriculum, however, was restored in 1835. From time to time special schools have been absorbed and it has now four faculties; philoso phy, science, law, and medicine. The library of the University is especially noteworthy, containing some 400,000 volumes and numerous valuable manuscripts. It is especially strong on the history and literature of the Low Countries. In 1918-1919 there were 1,006 students.
Ghent TREATY OF. A treaty between the United States and Great Britain
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
TREATY OF. A treaty between the United States and Great Britain, concluded at Ghent, Dec. 24, 1814, which terminated the War of 1812.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Aiton's 1910 description of a canal-laced textile town of 160,000 still fits the street plan, but the cotton and linen mills that defined it are gone, replaced by the seaport, steel and chemical works and a university city of roughly 260,000. The biggest reversal is at the university Collier's described in 1921 as "a Flemish university": it actually taught in French until 1930, when it became the first Dutch-language university in Belgium, and it now has some eleven faculties and tens of thousands of students rather than the 1,006 counted in 1918-19. Ghent's greatest treasure, the Van Eyck brothers' altarpiece in St Bavo's, went unmentioned in these accounts; one of its panels, the Just Judges, was stolen in 1934 and has never been found, and the rest was looted by the Nazis and recovered from an Austrian salt mine in 1945. The Treaty of Ghent entry needs no correction at all, and the flower shows survive as the Gentse Floralien.
Written for this edition, 2026.