Whitney
Whitney names 6 different subjects across the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf. Each is set out below.
Whitney ELI, an American inventor
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
ELI, an American inventor; born in Westboro, Mass., Dec. 8, 176 1765; was graduated at Yale College, in 1792, where he he paid his expenses partly by school teaching, partly by mechanical labor. He went to Georgia as a teacher, but finding a generous patron in the widow of General Greene, of the Revolutionary army, he resided on her estate and studied law. The cotton culture at best kind, the "green seed," was limited by this period, especially that of the the slow and difficult work of separating Whitney set to work to remedy this under great disadvantages, for he had to make his own tools; but the reports of his success prompted some lawless people to break into his workshop and steal his machine, and get others made before he coul could secure a patent. He, however, formed a partnership with one Miller in 1793, and went to Connecticut to manufacture cotton gins; but the lawsuits in defense of his rights carried off all his profits and $50,000 voted him by the State of South Carolina. Finally in 1798 he got a Government contract for the manufacture of firearms, and was the first to effect the division of labor by which each part was made separately. He made a fortune by this manufacture, carried out with ingenious machinery at Whitneyville, Conn.; while he received little credit for the perfection of the gin, one of the most important of the whole series of inventions connected with the cotton manufacture. He died in New Haven, Conn., Jan. 8; 1825.
Whitney JOSIAH DWIGHT, an American geologist
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
JOSIAH DWIGHT, an American geologist; born in Northamp ton, Mass., Nov. 23, 1819; was graduated at Yale in 1839, and the year after joined the survey of New Hampshire. The years 1842-1847 he spent in study in Europe, returning to explore, together with J. W. Foster, the Lake Superior region. Their "Synopsis" of the explorations was published in 1849; their "Report" on the geology, 1850-1851. Whitney next spent two years traveling in the States E. of the Mississippi, of which the fruit was "The Metallic Wealth of the United States" (1854). Appointed State chemist and professor in the Iowa State University in 1855, together with James Hall, he issued the "Reports" on its geological survey (1858-1859); and in 1858-1860 took part in the survey of the lead region of the Upper Missouri, publishing, again with Hall, his "Report" (1862). He was appointed State Geologist of California in 1860, and labored on the survey of that State till 1874, publishing in six volumes his "Geological In Survey of California" (1864-1870). 1865 he was appointed to the chair of geology at Harvard, received the LL. D. degree from Yale in 1870, and had the honor of giving his name to one of the highest mountains in the United States. His "Yosemite Guidebook" was published at San Francisco in 1869; his "Contributions to American Geology" in 1880; and his "Studies in Geographical and Topographical Nomenclature," in 1888. He died at Lake Sunapee, N. H., Aug. 18, 1896.
Whitney WILLIAM DWIGHT, an American educator
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
WILLIAM DWIGHT, an American educator; born in Northampton, Mass., Feb. 9, 1827; was graduated at Williams College in 1845; spent some years abroad in study; in 1854 was made Professor of Sanskrit at Yale, in 1870 of comparative philology, holding both positions till death. His writings are authority on all philological questions, and his rank as a Sanskrit scholar is of the first order. From 1849 he was a member of the American Oriental Society, and its president from 1884. His contributions to the "North American Review," the "New Englander," and other periodicals, were numerous and varied. His earliest work was the preparation, in company with Rudolf Roth of Tübingen, of an edition of the "Atharva Veda Sanhita" (Berlin, 1856). Among his other works are: "Language and the Study of Language" (1867); "On Material and Form in Language" (1872); "Darwinism and Language" (1874); "Logical cal Co Consistency in in Views Views of of Language" (1880); "Mixture in Lan guage" (1881); "The Study of Hindoo Grammar and the Study of Sanskrit" (1884); "The Upanishads and their Latest Translation" (1886). He has also written "Compendious German Grammar" (1869); "German Reader in Prose and Verse" (1870); "Essentials of English Grammar" (1877); "Sanskrit Grammar" (1877); and "Practical French Grammar" (1886). Professor Whitney was the superintending editor of the "Century Dictionary" (1889-1891), and assisted in the preparation of "Webster's Dictionary" ary" (1 (1864). 4). He died in New Haven, Conn., June 9, 1894.
Whitney ADELINE DUTTON (TRAIN)
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
ADELINE DUTTON (TRAIN), an American author; born in Boston, Mass., Sept. 15, 1824. Besides writing a great deal for magazines, she published: "Footsteps on the Seas: A Poem" (18) ( 1857); "Mother Goose for Grown Folks" (1860; revised ed. 1882); "The Boys at Chequasset" (1862); "Faith Gartney's Girlhood" (1863); "The Gay- A story of Threads and worthies: "A in Thrustumeria Leslie Goldthwaite's Life" ; Strong's Outings" (1868); "Hitherto: A Yesterdays" (1869); "Real Story of Yeste Folks" (1872); "Pansies" (1872), verse; "The Other Girls" (1873); "Sights and "Bonnyborough" Insights" (1876); (1885); "Homespun Yarns" (1887); and two volumes of poems, "Bird Talk" (1887) and "Daffodils" (1887); "Square Pegs." She died March 20, 1906.
Whitney WILLIAM COLLINS, an American capitalist
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
WILLIAM COLLINS, an American capitalist; born in Conway, Mass., July 15, 1841; was graduated at Yale College in 1863, and at the Harvard Law School in 1865; studied law with Judge Abraham R. Lawrence in New York City, and was there admitted to the bar. He took an active part in the proceedings against the "Tweed Ring"; served as corporation counsel in 1875- 1882; and was Secretary of the Navy in 1885-1889. For many years he was a large financial operator in New York City. He died in New York, Feb. 2, 1904.
Whitney MOUNT, one of the highest mountains of the United States
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
MOUNT, one of the highest mountains of the United States; Sierra Nevada in southern California; height, 14,522 feet.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
Collier's credited Eli Whitney in 1921 with being "the first to effect the division of labor by which each part was made separately"; historians since the 1960s, working from his surviving muskets, have shown the parts were hand-fitted and not truly interchangeable, and that Whitney oversold the system to win and keep his government contract. His gin is now discussed less as a triumph of ingenuity than as the machine that made short-staple cotton profitable and entrenched slavery across the Deep South. Josiah Dwight Whitney's mountain, called here one of the highest in the country, is the highest in the contiguous United States, and its official elevation was revised from 14,494 to 14,505 feet when the vertical datum changed. William Dwight Whitney's "Sanskrit Grammar" of 1877 is the one item on these lists still in everyday working use, reprinted and consulted by students well over a century later; Adeline Whitney's girls' novels, once bestsellers, are now read chiefly by scholars of nineteenth-century domestic fiction.
Written for this edition, 2026.