Gordium Ancient city, capital of Phrygia. Located in what is now north¬ western Turkey, its ruins have yielded important information about ancient Phrygian culture. Excavations revealed Early Bronze Age and Hittite settle¬ ments, but the city achieved its greatest prominence as the flourishing capital of Phrygia in the 9th-8th centuries bc. According to legend, it was founded by the peasant Gordius, who later became king of Phrygia and contrived the the ingenious Gordian knot. Gordium remained the politi¬ cal centre of Phrygia until the Cimmerians overran it in the early 7th cen¬ tury bc. Though rebuilt under the Persians, it never regained its former splendour.
Gordon River River, southwestern Tasmania, Australia. It rises in the central highlands and then flows south and west to enter the Indian Ocean at Macquarie Harbour after a course of 115 mi (185 km). The river is navi¬ gable only in its lowest 20 mi (32 km). Gordon Dam, built in 1978, created Lake Gordon, one of the largest freshwater storage reservoirs in Australia.
Gordon, Charles George (b. Jan. 28, 1833, Woolwich, near Lon¬ don, Eng.—d. Jan. 26, 1885, Khar¬ toum, Sudan) British general.
Gordon distinguished himself as a young officer in the Crimean War (1853-56) and subsequently volun¬ teered for the second Opium War (1856-60). In 1862 he helped defend Shanghai during the Taiping Rebellion.
These exploits earned him the epi¬ thet “Chinese” Gordon. In 1873 the Egyptian ruler Isma'il Pasha, who regularly employed Europeans, appointed Gordon governor of the province of Equatoria in southern Sudan (1874-76) and as governor- general of the Sudan (1874-80). In that post Gordon acted to crush rebellions and suppress the slave trade. He was again sent to the Sudan by Britain in 1884 to evacuate Anglo-Egyptian forces from Khar¬ toum, which was threatened by Mah- dist movement insurgents. After his arrival the city was besieged; it remained isolated for several months until it finally succumbed (Jan. 26, 1885). Gordon was killed in the action.
Gordon, Dexter (Keith) (b. Feb. 27, 1923, Los Angeles, Calif., U.S.—d. April 25, 1990, Philadelphia, Pa.) U.S. tenor saxophonist, one of the most influential saxophonists in modern jazz. Gordon played in the big bands of Lionel Hampton and Billy Eckstine in the early 1940s, later working in small groups with Charlie Parker, Tadd Dameron, and fellow tenorist Warded Gray. He was incarcerated on narcotics charges in the early 1950s and moved to Denmark in 1962. A starring role in the film 'Round Midnight (1986) revived his career.
Gordon, Lord George (b. Dec. 26, 1751, London, Eng.—d. Nov. 1, 1793, London) English instigator of the anti-Catholic Gordon riots. The third son of the 3rd duke of Gordon, he entered Parliament in 1774. In
Northern Hemisphere, often placed
Gooseberry (Ribes)
DEREK FELL
Eastern pocket gopher (Geomys).
WOODROW GOODPASTER-THE NATIONAL AUDUBON SOCIETY COLLECTION/PHOTO RESEARCHERS
Mikhail Gorbachev, 1985.
COLTON-PICTURE SEARCH/BLACK STAR
Charles George Gordon, portrait by Lady Julia Abercromby; in the National Portrait Gallery, London.
COURTESY OF THE NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY,
LONDON
© 2006 Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
Gordy ► Goring I 781
1779 he organized the Protestant associations formed to secure the repeal of the Catholic Relief Act (1778). In 1780 he led a mob to Parliament to present a petition against the act. The ensuing riot lasted a week, causing great property damage and nearly 500 casualties. Gordon was charged with, but was acquitted of, high treason. Convicted of libeling the queen of France in 1787, he was imprisoned in Newgate, where he died.
Gordy, Berry, Jr. See Motown
Gore, Al in full Albert Arnold Gore, Jr. (b. March 31, 1948, Wash¬ ington, D.C., U.S.) U.S. politician. He was the son of Albert Gore, who served in the U.S. Senate from Tennessee. After graduating from Harvard University, he briefly attended divinity school before serving in the Viet¬ nam War as a military reporter (1969-71). He worked as a reporter for The Tennessean in Nashville (1971-76) while attending first divinity school and then law school at Vanderbilt University. He served in the U.S. House of Representatives (1977-85) and later the Senate (1985-93). A moderate Democrat, he was Bill Clinton’s vice presidential running mate in 1992 and served two terms (1993-2001) as vice president under Clin¬ ton. As the Democratic presidential nominee in 2000, he won 500,000 more popular votes than Republican George W. Bush but narrowly lost the electoral vote (271-266).
Goree \go-'ra\, lie de or Goree Island Island, Senegal. Inhabited by the Lebu people when it was occupied by the Portuguese in the mid- 15th century, it was later occupied by the Dutch and then taken by the French in 1677. It was active in the Atlantic slave trade, but historians debate whether Goree was a major centre for the trade or simply one of many places from which Africans were taken to the Americas as slaves. Under French control until Senegal’s independence in 1960, it later lost importance with the rise of St.-Louis and Dakar on the mainland. It is now a World Heritage site; a museum there displays slavery artifacts.
Goren, Charles H(enry) (b. March 4, 1901, Philadelphia, Pa., U.S.—d. April 3, 1991, Encino, Calif.) U.S. contract bridge authority. Goren learned bridge while a law student at McGill University. His inno¬ vative system of point-count bidding and his repeated successes in tour¬ naments made him one of the world’s most famous and influential players. His several popular books include the widely translated Goren’s Bridge Complete (1963).
Gorey, Edward (St. John) (b. Feb. 22, 1925, Chicago, HI., U.S.—d. April 15, 2000, Hyannis, Mass.) U.S. writer, illustrator, and designer. He studied at Harvard University and worked as an illustrator before pub¬ lishing his first children’s book, The Doubtful Guest , in 1957. In this and later books such as The Hapless Child (1961) and The Gashlycrumb Times (1962), his arch nonsense verse and mock-Victorian prose accompany pen-and-ink drawings of beady-eyed, blank-faced individuals in Edwar¬ dian costume whose dignified demeanour is undercut by silly, often maca¬ bre events. His work has been anthologized in Amphigorey (1972), Amphigorey Too (1975), and Amphigorey Also (1983).
Gorgas, Josiah (b. July 1, 1818, Dauphin county, Pa., U.S.—d. May 15, 1883, Tuscaloosa, Ala.) U.S. army officer. A graduate of West Point, he entered the U.S. Army in 1841. In keeping with the sympathies of his Alabama-born wife, he resigned his commission when the South seceded from the Union in 1860-61. As chief of ordnance for the Confederate army during the American Civil War, he sought arms from abroad while establishing factories in the South to produce rifles, small arms, bullets, powder, and cannons. He was promoted to brigadier general in 1864.
Gorgas Vgor-gosV William (Crawford) (b. Oct. 3, 1854, Mobile, Ala., U.S.—d. July 3, 1920, London, Eng.) U.S. Army surgeon. Son of the Confederate general Josiah Gorgas (1818-83), he served in the U.S. Army for many years. In charge of sanitation measures in Havana with the army’s medical corps in 1898, he conducted experiments on mosquito transmis¬ sion of yellow fever and effectively eliminated it from the area. Sent to Panama in 1904, he eradicated yellow fever from the Canal Zone and brought malaria under control, removing the chief obstacles to building the Panama Canal. He was surgeon general of the U.S. Army from 1914 to
Gorges Vgor-jozV Sir Ferdinando (b. 15667, probably at Wraxall, Somerset, Eng.—d. 1647, Long Ashton, Gloucestershire) British colonist. After a military career, he sought royal grants to establish settlements in North America. Believing that colonizing should be a royal endeavour, he obtained a grant in 1620 to all the land in North America between the 40th and 48th parallels. His plan to distribute the land as manors and fiefs