Henry Steel Olcott
E362255
Henry Steel Olcott was an American military officer, lawyer, and journalist who became a prominent spiritual leader as a co-founder and first president of the Theosophical Society.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| Henry Steel Olcott canonical | 7 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T3494120 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Henry Steel Olcott Context triple: [Theosophy, coFoundedBy, Henry Steel Olcott]
-
A.
Norma Besant
Norma Besant is the flirtatious Southern belle protagonist of the 1929 pre-Code drama film "Coquette," portrayed by Mary Pickford in her first talking role.
-
B.
Frank Besant
Frank Besant was the clergyman husband of British social reformer and theosophist Annie Besant, from whom she later separated.
-
C.
Charles Taze Russell
Charles Taze Russell was an American religious leader and Bible student who founded the movement that later became known as Jehovah’s Witnesses.
-
D.
Russell Cantwell
Russell Cantwell is a member of the Cantwell family, a surname associated with Irish origins and various notable individuals across politics, sports, and public life.
-
E.
Felix Adler
Felix Adler was an American philosopher, social reformer, and founder of the Ethical Culture movement, which emphasized ethical living and social justice over formal religious doctrine.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: Henry Steel Olcott Target entity description: Henry Steel Olcott was an American military officer, lawyer, and journalist who became a prominent spiritual leader as a co-founder and first president of the Theosophical Society.
-
A.
Norma Besant
Norma Besant is the flirtatious Southern belle protagonist of the 1929 pre-Code drama film "Coquette," portrayed by Mary Pickford in her first talking role.
-
B.
Frank Besant
Frank Besant was the clergyman husband of British social reformer and theosophist Annie Besant, from whom she later separated.
-
C.
Charles Taze Russell
Charles Taze Russell was an American religious leader and Bible student who founded the movement that later became known as Jehovah’s Witnesses.
-
D.
Russell Cantwell
Russell Cantwell is a member of the Cantwell family, a surname associated with Irish origins and various notable individuals across politics, sports, and public life.
-
E.
Felix Adler
Felix Adler was an American philosopher, social reformer, and founder of the Ethical Culture movement, which emphasized ethical living and social justice over formal religious doctrine.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (48)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
human
ⓘ
journalist ⓘ lawyer ⓘ military officer ⓘ occultist ⓘ spiritual leader ⓘ |
| birthDate | 1832-08-02 ⓘ |
| birthPlace | Orange, New Jersey, United States ⓘ |
| burialPlace |
Adyar
ⓘ
surface form:
Adyar, Madras, India
|
| coFounded | Theosophical Society ⓘ |
| coFounderWith |
Helena Petrovna Blavatsky
ⓘ
William Quan Judge ⓘ |
| conflict | American Civil War ⓘ |
| countryOfCitizenship | United States of America ⓘ |
| deathDate | 1907-02-17 ⓘ |
| educatedAt |
College of the City of New York
ⓘ
Columbia University ⓘ |
| familyName | Olcott ⓘ |
| fieldOfWork |
Theosophy
ⓘ
religious reform ⓘ spiritualism ⓘ |
| fullName | Henry Steel Olcott self-link ⓘ |
| givenName | Henry ⓘ |
| hasHonor |
Olcott Memorial School in Adyar
ⓘ
statues in Sri Lanka commemorating him ⓘ |
| influenced |
Buddhist education in Sri Lanka
ⓘ
modern Theosophical movement ⓘ |
| militaryBranch | Union Army ⓘ |
| movement |
Buddhist modernism
ⓘ
Theosophy ⓘ |
| notableFor |
first well-known American convert to Buddhism
ⓘ
leading the Buddhist revival in Ceylon ⓘ promoting Buddhism in Sri Lanka ⓘ |
| notableWork | Old Diary Leaves ⓘ |
| occupation |
agricultural commissioner
ⓘ
author ⓘ journalist ⓘ lawyer ⓘ military officer ⓘ spiritual teacher ⓘ |
| placeOfDeath |
Adyar
ⓘ
surface form:
Adyar, Madras, India
|
| positionHeld | President of the Theosophical Society ⓘ |
| religion | Buddhism ⓘ |
| residence |
Adyar
ⓘ
surface form:
Adyar, Madras, India
Colombo ⓘ
surface form:
Colombo, Ceylon
|
| startTime | 1875 ⓘ |
| wrote |
Buddhist Catechism
ⓘ
People from the Other World ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: Henry Steel Olcott Description of subject: Henry Steel Olcott was an American military officer, lawyer, and journalist who became a prominent spiritual leader as a co-founder and first president of the Theosophical Society.
Referenced by (7)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.