Ladrones
2 of the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf carry an entry for Ladrones. Both are reproduced below, so you can see where they agree and where they differ.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
or MARI- MARI ANNE ISLANDS, a chain of 17 islands islands in the North Pacific, E. of the Philip- Philippines and the Caroline Islands; area, vere dis about 500 square miles. They were discovered by Magellan in 1521, who gave ho them the name of "Ladrones," it is said, is from the character of their inhabitants, abita the word meaning "thieves." GUAM (q. v.) is the principal island and embraces nearly one-half of the entire area of the group. On June 20, 1898, Captain Glass, of the United States cruiser "Charleston" took possession of the is lands in the name of the United States, and by the peace treaty signed at Paris, Dec. 18, 1898, it was provided that the 43 1944 island of Guam should be ceded to the d to the United States. The remainder of the of the islands, together with the Carolines, Carolines, pain into passed from the possession of Spain into that of Germany, Oct. 1, 1899, in conin conf about sideration of the payment of about $4,187,500.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
la-dronz', a group of islands in the Pacific Ocean about fifteen degrees north of the equator. The group was discovered by Magellan in his voyage of circumnavigation in 1521. He called them the Islands of the Lateen Sails. His crew named them the Ladrones, or Islands of Thieves, on account of the thieving habits of the natives. In 1898 Guam, the largest of these islands, was ceded to the United States . In 1899 Germany bought the remainder from Spain for about $4,000,000. The official name is Marianne Islands, in honor of a Spanish queen. The islands are of volcanic and coral origin. The total area is about 417 square miles. The vegetation is luxuriant, much resembling that of the Philippines. The breadfruit tree, and a cocoanut palm, rice, maize, sugar, tobacco, cotton, and bananas are found. It is said that breadfruit was first seen by white men in the Ladrones. There are only eighty-three white people in the islands. The inhabitants are chiefly Spanish-speaking Tagals from the Philippines.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Both accounts leave the northern islands in German hands, and Collier's still says so in 1921 -- but Japan had seized them in October 1914 and held them under a League of Nations mandate from 1920 until 1944, when American forces took Saipan, Tinian and Guam in some of the bloodiest fighting of the Pacific war. From Tinian in August 1945 the B-29s carrying the atomic bombs flew to Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Guam remains an unincorporated US territory with a large military presence; the northern islands, after decades as part of the US-administered Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, became the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, self-governing under US sovereignty since 1978, its people US citizens since 1986. The insulting name Ladrones, Magellan's crew's word for thieves, has fallen out of use in favour of Marianas, and Aiton's claim that the people are mainly Spanish-speaking Tagals from the Philippines misses the indigenous Chamorros, whose language is still spoken today.
Written for this edition, 2026.