ranch Large farm for breeding and raising cattle, sheep, or horses. Ranching originated in South America and Mexico in early colonial times, when Spanish settlers introduced cattle and horses and tended them on the pampas. It was an itinerant form of livestock farming: herds were tended on open range, and biannual roundups were held for branding calves and driving mature animals to market. Itinerant ranching reached
Ramses II, upper portion of a granite figure from Thebes, 1250 bc; in the British Museum.
REPRODUCED BY COURTESY OF THE TRUSTEES OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM
Ramses III, detail of the lid of a granite sarcophagus, about 11 87-56 bc; in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge
COURTESY OF THE FITZWILUAM MUSEUM, CAMBRIDGE
© 2006 Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
Rand ► Ranke I 1589
its peak in the 1880s. By the early 20th century, overstocking, quarantine laws, railroad competition, and barbed-wire fences had put an end to cattle drives and open-range farming. Ranching today is nearly all sedentary, but huge ranches still exist.
Rand, Ayn orig. Alice Rosenbaum or Alissa Rosenbaum (b.
Feb. 2, 1905, St. Petersburg, Russia—d. March 6, 1982, New York, N.Y., U.S.) Russian-born U.S. writer. She immigrated to the U.S. in 1926 after graduating from the University of Petrograd and worked as a screenwriter in Hollywood. She won a cult following with two best-selling novels pre¬ senting her belief that all real achievement comes from individual ability and effort, that laissez-faire capitalism is most congenial to the exercise of talent, and that selfishness is a virtue, altruism a vice. In The Foun¬ tainhead (1943), a superior individual transcends traditionalism and con¬ formism. The allegorical Atlas Shrugged (1957) combines science fiction with her political message. She expounded her philosophy, which she called objectivism, in nonfiction works and as editor of two journals and became an icon of radical libertarianism.
RAND Corp. Nonpartisan think tank whose original focus was national security. It grew out of a research-and-development project (its name is a contraction of “research and development”) by Douglas Aircraft Co. for the Army Air Force in 1945. In 1948 it became a private nonprofit cor¬ poration. In the 1960s it expanded its focus to address domestic public- policy issues. Its mission today is to improve policy and decision making through research and analysis. It employs several hundred scholars in many disciplines. Its funding comes from government contracts, chari¬ table foundations, private corporations, and earnings on its endowment. Its headquarters are in Santa Monica, Cal., and it has offices in Washing¬ ton, D.C., New York, and overseas.
Randolph, A(sa) Philip (b. April 15, 1889, Crescent City, Fla., U.S.—d. May 16, 1979, New York, N.Y.) U.S. civil-rights leader. He was the son of a Methodist minister. In 1911 he moved to New York, where he cofounded the journal The Messenger (later Black Worker), in which he called for more positions for African Americans in the war industry and the armed forces. In 1925 he founded the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the first successful African American trade union, and he served as its president until 1968. In 1941 he lobbied Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt to ban racial discrimination in defense industries and federal bureaus. In 1948 he influenced Pres. Harry Truman to bar racial segrega¬ tion in the armed forces. In 1955 he was made a vice president of the newly combined AFL-CIO. In order to combat discrimination in that union, he formed the Negro American Labor Council in 1960.
Randolph, Edmund Jennings (b. Aug. 10, 1753, Willliamsburg, Va.—d. Sept. 12, 1813, Clark county, Va., U.S.) U.S. politician. He helped draft Virginia’s constitution (1776) and served in the Continental Con¬ gress (1779-82). He was a delegate to the Annapolis Convention and the Constitutional Convention, where he presented the Virginia (or large-state) Plan, which influenced the final draft of the Constitution of the United States. As governor of Virginia (1786-88), he effected the state’s ratifi¬ cation of the Constitution. He served as U.S. attorney general (1789-94) and secretary of state (1794-95) but resigned after he was falsely accused of accepting a bribe from the French to influence the U.S. government against Britain. He returned to his law practice and served as chief coun¬ sel for Aaron Burr in his 1807 trial.
Randolph, John (b. June 2, 1773, Prince George county, Va.—d. May 24, 1833, Philadelphia, Pa., U.S.) U.S. politician. In 1799 he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, where he served almost continu¬ ously until 1829. A noted orator, he was a staunch advocate of states' rights and opposed a national bank and federal protective tariffs. A supporter of slavery, he led the resistance to the Missouri Compromise. His denunciation of Henry Clay for his support of the presidential candidacy of John Quincy Adams led to a harmless duel with Clay (1826).
random-access memory See RAM
Random House U.S. publishing company. It was founded by Bennett Cerf and Donald S. Klopfer in 1925. As it grew it published many suc¬ cessful and prestigious writers and gathered under its corporate roof many other firms, including Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. (acquired 1960), Pantheon Books (1961), Ballantine Books (1973), Fawcett Books (1982), and the Crown Publishing Group (1988). It was itself bought several times before becoming in 1998 a part of one of the world’s largest media companies, Bertelsmann AG.
random variable In statistics, a function that can take on either a finite number of values, each with an associated probability, or an infi¬ nite number of values, whose probabilities are summarized by a density function. Used in studying chance events, it is defined so as to account for all possible outcomes of the event. When these are finite (e.g., the number of heads in a three-coin toss), the random variable is called dis¬ crete and the probabilities of the outcomes sum to 1. If the possible out¬ comes are infinite (e.g., the life expectancy of a light bulb), the random variable is called continuous and corresponds to a density function whose integral over the entire range of outcomes equals 1 . Probabilities for spe¬ cific outcomes are determined by summing probabilities (in the discrete case) or by integrating the density function over an interval correspond¬ ing to that outcome (in the continuous case).
range finder Instrument used to measure the distance from the instru¬ ment to a selected point or object. The optical range finder, used chiefly in cameras, consists of an arrangement of lenses and prisms set at each end of a tube. The object’s range is determined by measuring the angles formed by a line of sight at each end of the tube; the smaller the angles, the greater the distance, and vice versa. Since the mid-1940s, radar has replaced optical range finders for most military targeting, and the laser range finder, developed in 1965, has largely replaced optical range find¬ ers for surveying and radar in certain military applications.
Rangeley Vranj-le\ Lakes Chain of lakes, western Maine, U.S. It includes Rangeley, Mooselookmeguntic, Richardson, and Umbagog lakes. The lakes extend more than 50 mi (80 km) and cover an area of 80 sq mi (207 sq km), with elevations between 1,200 and 1,500 ft (365 and 460 m).
Ranger Any of a series of unmanned probes launched from 1961 to 1965 by NASA. The project was NASA’s earliest attempt to explore the Moon’s surface. Ranger 4 (1962) became the first U.S. spacecraft to hit the Moon, crash-landing on its surface as planned. The last three probes in the series (1964-65) sent more than 17,000 high-resolution photo¬ graphs of the Moon before crashing. See also Luna; Pioneer; Surveyor.
Rangoon See Yangon
Ranjit Singh Vron-jit-’sF-hoX (b. Nov. 13, 1780, Budrukhan or Gujran- wala, India—d. June 27, 1839, Lahore) Founder and maharaja (1801-39) of the Sikh kingdom of the Punjab. He became chief of the Shukerchakias (a Sikh group located in what is now Pakistan) on the death of his father in 1792. In 1799 he seized Lahore, the capital of the Punjab (and now in Pakistan), and in 1801 he proclaimed himself maharaja of the Punjab. In 1802 he captured Amritsar, a city sacred to the Sikhs, and by 1820 he had consolidated his rule over the whole of Punjab between the Sutlej and the Indus rivers. The Sikh state he created, which had included Sikhs, Mus¬ lims, and Hindus in both the army and the cabinet, collapsed soon after his death.