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Urdang loved words and language, and in graduate school studied Russian, German, Latin, Greek, Sanskrit and Polish. He taught linguistics for several years, but decided to change careers: he became an editor of dictionaries. After cutting his teeth at Funk and Wagnalls, he moved to Random House where he was in charge of a new project: the gigantic (9.25-pound, 2,091-page) unabridged Random House Dictionary of the English Language, published in 1966. It was the first major dictionary to be organized on a computer. But Urdang didn't rest on that laurel; he founded his own publishing company in 1969, and 1974 he started a newsletter on language, Verbatim, which I discovered shortly after high school. It helped me realize that I too loved the power of language, which led me to drop my career in Emergency Medical Services and return to college at 21 -- Journalism school, so I could learn to research and write quickly. I turned those skills toward my own newsletter, This is True. Urdang's company published more than 150 dictionaries and language reference books. He died August 21 from congestive heart failure at 81.
From This is True for 24 August 2008
Suggestions for further reading:
The Bantam Medical Dictionary, Sixth Edition
by Laurence Urdang
Amazon Price: $7.50
The Timetables of American History
by Arthur Meier Schlesinger Jr.
Amazon Price: $34.43
Customer Review: I picked up this history as a review aid for my graduate comprehensive exams. A good timetable can be useful for basic inclusion of terms. This however, is not a good timeline on any level. At best, it commits a few oversights; at worst, it will lead...
Bantam Medical Dictionary, Fifth Edition
by Laurence Urdang
Amazon Price:
Customer Review: I purchased this for my kindle to make it easy to carry around for my massage training & found I was not able to do a search to get to specific words. The only way I was able to navigate was to page through. Very disappointing & time consuming. I ...
The Synonym Finder
by J. I. Rodale, Laurence Urdang, Nancy LaRoche
Amazon Price:
Customer Review: What can I say that hasn't already been said in the title? This is way better than any of its competitors. I think I own around 5 of these books and keep one in every place I hang my hat. Hats off to Rodale!
Ruffner's Allusions: Cultural, Literary, Biblical, and Historical: A Thematic...
by Frederick G. Ruffner Jr., Laurence Urdang
Amazon Price: $39.78
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