Reading
Reading names 4 different subjects across the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf. Each is set out below.
Reading a city and county-seat of Berks co.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a city and county-seat of Berks co., Pa.; on the Schuylkill river, the Schuylkill canal, and the Pennsylvania, and the Philadelphia and Reading railroads; 54 miles E. of Harrisburg; 58 miles N. W. of Philadelphia. The city is regularly laid out on a site gradually rising to picturesque hills, which not only afford fine scenic views, but give a copious supply of pure water. Here are waterworks owned by the city and costing $1,500,000, 500,000, gas and electric lights, inclined gravity and electric railroads, several National and State banks, and Mineral Springs and Penn's Common parks. The charitable institutions include the Reading, St. Joseph's, and the Homeopathic Medical and Surgical Hospitals, several dispensaries, and a Home for Orphans. The city contains over 60 churches, about 50 school buildings, and public school property valued at over $1,000,000. There are upward of 500 manufacturing establishments. Reading is the seat of the Philadelphia and Reading railroad car and machine shops. The chief manufactures are foundry and machine shop products, iron and steel, stoves, woolen hats, brick and tile, cigars cigarettes, and planing mill products and . Reading was settled in 1748, became a borough in 1783, and a city in 1847. Pop. (1910) 96,071; (1920) 107,784.
Reading EARL OF, RUFUS DANIEL ISAACS
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
EARL OF, RUFUS DANIEL ISAACS, Lord Chief Justice of England. Born in London, 1860, the son of a Jewish fruit dealer, he was edu- EARL OF READING cated in various universities of London, Brussels, and Hanover. After several years of traveling, he finally studied law. Such was his success in the legal profession that in 1898 he became queen's counsel. In 1904 he was elected as a Liberal to the House of Commons. In 1910 he served as solicitor-general and attorney-general. Although accused of having speculated speculated in stock to the prejudice of his official duties, he was made lord chief - justice in 1913 and elevated and massive to the peerage. In 1915 he came to quently associated America to negotiate the Anglo - French posure to light loan, which he successfully accomplished. chemistry, AsS2. Upon the death of the British ambassador at Washington, Earl Reading was commissioned to take his place, where he remained until 1918, when he returned to England to resume his position as lord chief-justice. He was appointed of white-fire. Viceroy of India in 1920.
Reading a parliamentary and municipal borough of England
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a parliamentary and municipal borough of England; capital of the county of Berks; on the Kennet, near its confluence with the Thames; 36 miles W. of London. The town is well built and laid out, and there are an assize hall, the Royal Berkshire hospital, a town hall of recent erection in the Renaissance style, etc. The industrial establishments include a large and celebrated biscuit factory, iron foundries, breweries, corn mills, etc., and there is a considerable agricultural trade. There are interesting remains of a magnificent abbey founded by Henry I., who was buried within its precincts in 1135. Pop. (1917) 82,475.
Reading a city of Massachusetts
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a city of Massachusetts, in Middlesex co. It is on the Boston and Maine railroad. It is chiefly a residential town and has manufactures of organ pipes, carriages, boots and shoes, rubber, games, etc. It has a public library. Pop. (1910) 5,818; (1920) 7,439.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Every one of Collier's four Readings has moved on since 1921. Reading, Pennsylvania, then booming at 107,784 people and home to the Philadelphia and Reading car shops, lost its railroad (the line went bankrupt in 1971 and was folded into Conrail in 1976) and by the 2020 census had fallen back to about 95,000, having drawn national attention in 2011 as the poorest city of its size in the United States. Reading in Berkshire has gone the other way, from 82,475 in 1917 to roughly 175,000 today, a commuter and technology town whose "large and celebrated biscuit factory" — Huntley and Palmers — stopped baking there in the 1970s; a search of the abbey precincts for Henry I's grave, begun in 2015, has still not found him. Rufus Isaacs, newly appointed Viceroy when this was written, served in India to 1926, was made Marquess of Reading, briefly held the Foreign Office in 1931 and died in 1935. Reading, Massachusetts, described here as a city, remains a town governed by town meeting, now with about 25,000 residents.
Written for this edition, 2026.