Ansley, Clarke Fisher

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Clarke Fisher Ansley (ănz´lē), 1869–1939, American teacher and editor, b. Swedona, near Springfield, Ill., grad. Univ. of Nebraska, 1890. After teaching English at Nebraska, he was professor of English at the State Univ. of Iowa (1899–1917) and dean of its College of Fine Arts (1911–15). Having turned to editing, he conceived the idea of a one-volume general encyclopedia, compact enough and simply enough written to serve as a guide to the "young Abraham Lincoln." This work was started in 1928 as The Columbia Encyclopedia with Ansley as its editor in chief. The first edition (1935) and the first supplement (1938) were completed under his direction.