Reed instrument, in music, an instrument whose sound-producing agent is a thin strip of cane, wood, plastic, or metal that vibrates as air is passed over it. The predecessor of these instrumen...

Reed College, at Portland, Oreg.; coeducational; inc. 1908, opened 1911 through a bequest from Mr. and Mrs. Simeon G. Reed. Reed is noted for its program of natural sciences and for its system...

Reed organ, an organ in which air is forced over free reeds by means of bellows, usually worked by pedals. It is played by the use of one or more keyboards. Variations in tone are produced by ...

Reed, Joseph, 1741–85, American Revolutionary political leader and army officer, b. Trenton, N.J. He studied law, was admitted (1763) to the bar, and then went to London to study at the Middle...

Reed, Walter, 1851–1902, American army surgeon, b. Gloucester co., Va. In 1900 he was sent to Havana as head of an army commission to investigate an outbreak of yellow fever among American sol...

Reed, John, 1887–1920, American journalist and radical leader, b. Portland, Oreg. After graduating from Harvard in 1910, he wrote articles for various publications and from 1913 was attached t...

Smoot, Reed, 1862–1941, U.S. Senator (1903–33), b. Salt Lake City, Utah. He became successful as a banker and was prominent in the affairs of the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saint...

Reed, Sir Carol, 1906–76, English film director, b. London. He acted and directed on the stage before turning to films in the mid-1930s. Reed powerfully portrayed characters at the end of thei...

Reed, Thomas Brackett, 1839–1902, American legislator, b. Portland, Maine. A lawyer, he served in the state assembly (1868–69) and state senate (1870) and became (1870–73) state attorney gener...

Reed, Stanley Forman, 1884–1980, Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court (1938–57), b. Macon co., Ky. After receiving the B.A. degree from both Kentucky Wesleyan (1902) and Yale (1906), he...