Difference between revisions of "W"

Revision as of 23:05, 24 December 2006

Waddington, Robert
74; a Lunarian Stalwart; 126

Wakefield
594; Wakefield (England), city, administrative center of the metropolitan county of West Yorkshire, northern England, on the Calder River. Wakefield has been known as a textile-manufacturing center since the late 16th century. The city has a museum and an art gallery and is the site of a cathedral (mostly 14th century). Wakefield was the scene of a Yorkist defeat (1460) during the Wars of the Roses.

Wake of Jasmine Absolute
456; See Jasmine Absolute

Wales, Mountains of
585

74, 351;Walpole-Gang, 193; The Right Honourable Robert Walpole, 1st Earl of Orford, KG, KB, PC, was a British statesman who is generally regarded as having been the first Prime Minister of Great Britain. This position had no official recognition in law, but Walpole is nevertheless acknowledged as having held the de facto office due to the extent of his influence in the Cabinet. However, the term "Prime Minister" was never used officially at this time. More from Wikipedia A Whig, he is considered England's first Prime Minister.

Wapping High Street
15; Wapping, in the 18th century, was a bawdy, impoverished district in the East End of London; More about Wapping; 52; 77; 110; 674; Wikipedia entry

War
49; 386; 551

War of '39
175; aka the "War of Jenkins' Ear" (1739) in which England went to war with Spain based on Jenkins' story that his sloop had been boarded by Spanish guarda costa and his ear torn off. The war merged into the War of the Austrian Succession (1740-48).

Warford, Joseph
575; Maryland governor Sharpe's "co-Adjutor"; 611; Historical Sources

580; wife of Joseph

Warp, Delver
100; Company writer

Washington, Colonel George (1732-99)
273; He was a rich & successful farmer who entertained liberally at his estate at Mt. Vernon, before becoming the 1st president of the United States; 572; 592

Washington, Martha

"When Martha Dandridge Custis, a widow, married George Washington in 1759, she was no shrinking violet. In the collection is a small fragment of her yellow brocade dress, which was worn over a white-silver brocade petticoat, reflecting the bright colors then in fashion. On her feet, according to accounts of the time, she wore lilac slippers embroidered in gold and silver." ^[1]

280; rich young widow George married in 1759; "Nosegay [a bouquet of flowers] of Virtue" 281;

Wasp of Twickenham
489; aka Alexander Pope

Watteau, Jean Antoine (1684-1721)
633; French painter who depicted the wide box pleats extending from shoulder to hem in an unbroken line in a woman's gown.

From Aldous Huxley's The Doors of Perception:

"Or consider Watteau; his men and women play lutes, get ready for balls and harlequinades, embark, on velvet lawns and under noble trees, for the Cythera of every lover's dream; their enormous melancholy and the flayed, excruciating sensibility of their creator find expression, not in the gestures and faces portrayed, but in the relief and texture of their taffeta skirts, their satin capes and doublets. Not an inch of smooth surface here, not a moment of peace or confidence, only a silken wilderness of countless tiny pleats and wrinkles, with an incessant modulation - inner uncertainty rendered with the perfect assurance of a master hand - of tone into tone, of one inderterminate colour into another." ^[2]

weapons
Oortman, 154; Brown Bess (rifle), 308; Hanger, 365; Musketoon, 382; Dutch Rifle (w/Pentacle) 342, 427; Beaver, 494; Lancaster County Rifle ("deadly from a mile off"), 278, 551, 613, 663; Highwayman Pistol, 638; Dirk (long knife), 400, 711

Wear
Wearside, 239; Weardale, 239; The Wear, 242; Wear Valley, 273

Wetherburn, Mr.
572; at whose house where stays in Williamsburg

Weavers, British
406; 501; 503

Webs
185; Durham Quaker, 237; Quaker, 239; "of Catholic houses of Asylum" 420; Web of Communication, 644, 567

Wecquetank
306

Wedge, The
323; aka the "Delaware Triangle"; 469-70

The "notorious Wedge" that the tangent line created did exist, and provided a kind of no man's land where criminals and other unsavory types hung out because they were...neither [in] Pennsylvania or Maryland.

Wehe
480; German: "Alas!"

Weishaupt, Adam
358

Welsh Main
24; (from "Rules relating to the Matching & Fighting of cocks in London" which appeared in Heber's Sporting Calendar for 1751, published by Reginald Heber of London and printed in 1752):

The Welsh Main, described by the Rev. Samuel Pegge in "A Memoir on Cockfighting," published by the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1786, as "a disgrace to us Englishment," is different again in that cocks are fought more than once. It is a knockout competition, between any number of birds from sixteen to thirty two. Battles are to the death in every case. The survivors of each round fight each other until only one remains alive. This means that the winner of a thirty two bird Welsh main has had to kill five opponents.

There is an even worse contest called a Battle Royal. In this contest any number of birds are placed in the pit simultaneously with no regard to weight or anything else. It is just a free-for-all with the winner being the bird left standing at the end. Historically Welsh Mains and Battles Royal were very popular, but I have no evidence of their continuance at present. Conventional Mains are the order of the day amongst steel matchers. ^[3]

Were-wolves
143; 236; 491; FAQ

Wesley, John (1703-91)
9; Englishman John Wesley founded Methodism and had a "club" called the "Oxford Methodists." In 1735 Wesley and his brother Charles went on a missionary trip to Georgia where his evangelistic zealousness and unfamiliarity with American ways caused him to incur the wrath of the colonists;100; Wesley, 380

West, The
427; 636; Eternal West, 671; 680; Westering, 707

575; girlfriend and then wife of Tom Hynes; Historical Sources

575; father of Catherine; Historical Sources

Westward Escapes, Tales of the
634; Refers to the Icelandic ventures into North America by Leif Ericsson c. 1000, as told in the Vinland Sagas (14th Century); See also: Finnbogi

"Where the Bee Sucks"
19; A tune sung by Ariel, in Shakespeare's The Tempest, Act V, Scene I, lines 88-94: "Where the bee sucks, there suck I; In a cowslip's bell I lie; There I couch when owls do cry."

[short for "Whiggamore," a member of a Scottish group that marched to Edinburgh in 1648 to oppose the court party] In American, Whigs favored independence from Great Britain. A Primer

Whike, Mr.
230; "Oafery's friend and occasional Translator"

Whimbrel, Mr.
554; printed "Pennsylvania's Fair Copy of the Field-Journals of Mason and Dixon"

White, Mr.
32; 247

Whitefield, George (1714-70)
9; Englishman George Whitefield (1714-70) was an early member of John Wesley's "club," called the "Oxford Methodists." Whitefield made numerous evanglistic visits to America beginning in 1738; 260; 261; 405

Whitehall
177; Britain's center for government in London. Eponymically named for Whitehall Palace which was located there but burned down in the late 17th century; 451

White Luminary
129; on a sign at The Moon

Whitpot, Mr.
365; "itinerant Stove-Salesman"

Whorekill Road
258; Whorekill (now Lewes) was the first town in Delaware, settled by the Dutch in 1631.

525; "principal Duties [...] to charm the Chinese"; See also Las Viudas de Cristo

Wild, Mr.
558; "Mr. Bodley's Librarian"

367; Wilkes was an English politician who was a man of fashion as well as profligate. He was a member of the Hell-fire Club which held orgies at [m.html#medmenham">Medmenham Abbey</A>. He entered parliament in 1757, but was kicked out and imprisoned in 1768 for being involved in a duel resulting from readings of his supposedly obscene Essay on Women in the House of Lords; 489

William of Orange (1650-1702)
84; William III was the Prince of Orange and king of Great Britain and Ireland from 1689. In 1692 he was appointed commander of the Dutch army and proved courageous in battling the French when they invaded the United Provinces; 226

184; actress; she was amorously linked with [g.html#garrick">Garrick</a> and they lived together from 1742-45. Apparently Woffington never married and the "Mrs." was more along the lines of an honorary title. Although Garrick married in 1749 and remained so until his death there seems some evidence that he retained an attachment to Woffington (e.g. he wore the shoe buckles she gave him until his death).

Wofte, Protasia
347; character in The Ghastly Fop

Wolf of Jesus
522; aka Father Zarpazo, at the Jesuit College; 543

Wolfe, James (1727-59)
312; English soldier who served against the Scottish Jacobites at Falkirk and Culloden; from 1749 to 1757 he was engaged in garrison duty in Scotland and England; he was killed fighting the French in Quebec in which battle the French were routed and Canada became an English colony; 407; 501

World's End, The
148; Dixon's local at the Cape; 180

437; "seventh Wrangler" - At Cambridge University, a student who placed in the first class of the mathematical tripos (18th c.). So, Maskelyne only obtained the 7th highest marks in his year. A senior wrangler is one who attains the highest marks in his year.

Wyalusing
306; Wyalusing, in the southeast corner of Bradford county, is situated on a low hill at the confluence of Wyalusing Creek and the Susquehanna River. Nearby, the Wyalusing rocks, once used by the Iroquois indians as a signaling point, rise five hundred feet above the Susquehanna river offering a splendid view of farms and forests. Official Wyalusing Website

Wyvils
590; antidraconical [anti-dragon, i.e., anti-Lucifer, or pro-God] family in Durham; Robert Wyvil was a 14C Bishop of Soilsbury

References

1. ↑ [http://www.nytimes.com/library/books/110297deit.html New York Times Books section
2. ↑ Huxley, Aldous, The Doors of Perception, Harper & Brothers, 1954, p.32
3. ↑ Rules for Cock-fighting