Name an historical figure who fascinates you

[LostinVA]

It doesn’t have to be one of the good guys.


Mine: Eva Peron

Born in a remote part of Argentina, in poverty, illegitimate, and female. She was able to overcome all of this and become a minor celebrity in Buenos Aires, where she influenced an election and helped get – and keep – Juan Peron in power because of her position as his wife.

She got women the vote, helped throw out the British colonists, and really did alot to advance Argentinean education and medical facilities, as well as helping the very poorest of the poor in that country. All by her early 30’s.

Yes, her charitable foundation cooked the books and she had a strong streak of fascism in her, but I never said she was a hero of mine: I think her life was fascinating.

Just imagine if she HAD been one of the “good guys.”

[Mezzo]

1. Jesus Christ. nt

[Iggo]

21. oh, jeez.

[Richardo]

27. ...as he was known for short.

:)

[Richardo]

2. George Washington

[Heidi]

3. Simone de Beauvoir.

:thumbsup:

[Starbucks Anarchist]

4. Benjamin Franklin.

[LostinVA]

10. I thought it would be the inventor of EVOO

:shrug:

[DarkTirade]

34. 'xactly what I was gonna say.

He was a fascinating character.

Although with Daylight Savings Time coming up, I'd probably kick him in the balls if I met him now. :evilgrin:

[terrya]

5. Abraham Lincoln

[Bennyboy]

6. Charles Manson.....

Creepy story and I just can't take my eyes off of it. How anyone could control so many people for so long is just beyond me. And then to get them to do unspeakable acts. I knew Squeaky Fromme and Sandra Goode too, from when they lived in Midtown Sacramento. They used to come to the community gardens and pick the place clean. they never did any work either but said "it is growing from the ground so it is from God" with this "Stepford Wives" look on their faces. All those years later and still devoted to Charlie.

I also have a friend that served time with Charles "Tex" Watson and he has a some stories to tell also. he is now a preacher and very religious, but doesn't ever talk about Charlie....

[LostinVA]

16. VERY interesting

The whole Manson thing interests me, too (as well as creeps me out).

[YankeyMCC]

7. Zeus nt

[Duncan Grant]

8. Lorenzo de' Medici

Lorenzo de' Medici (January 1, 1449 – 9 April 1492) was an Italian statesman and ruler of the Florentine Republic during the Italian Renaissance. Known as Lorenzo the Magnificent (Lorenzo il Magnifico) by contemporary Florentines, he was a diplomat, politician, and patron of scholars, artists, and poets. His life coincided with the high point of the early Italian Renaissance; his death marked the end of the Golden Age of Florence.

Lorenzo wasn't simply a benevolent aristocrat but as far as cultural and historical titans go, he's fascinating.

[Fox Mulder]

9. Vlad Tepes.

[NewJeffCT]

11. nice post, Hitler!

Hitler fascinates me a bit, because I always wonder what would have happened if he hadn't come along? Would somebody just as evil, but more sane, have taken his place? What would have happened if he hadn't invaded Russia? Or, what if he had pushed into the Middle East from Greece?

[LostinVA]

14. Right -- like if he had died in WWI

I'm a huge WWII history buff, so I've thought about this, too.

[NoGOPZone]

12. John Brown

Killed for what he believed in and died for what he believed in.

[LanternWaste]

13. Marcus Aurelius and Henry V

Marcus Aurelius and Henry V (well, Shakespeare's interpretation of Henry).

A paper I wrote in college about Aurelius got me to read his 'Meditations', which in turn led me to Stoicism, which then opened me up to classical philosophy in general.

Henry V was simply the Rambo of his age-- outnumbered, out gunned, but possessing a will to prevail against overwhelming odds. (Branagh's '89 production of Henry V is a great work of film art and one of my favorite movies).

Those are two guys I'd love to sit down with in the here and now, share a few drinks with and just... talk (shades of the old PBS series, 'Meeting of the Minds')

[SallyMander]

15. Charles Darwin

I would love to sit down and have a beer with that guy!

[Tikki]

17. Charles Darwin....

He liked to watch....


Tikki

[Bennyboy]

18. Wavy Gravy!

Talk about a life well lived! Wavy is the best. He saw some blind kids in Tibet and founded the SEVA Foundation that gives simple inexpensive operations to anyone that needs then all over the world and does a lot of other fabulous things.

He has a performing arts school (Camp Winnarainbow) that teaches kids thearical arts. For every rich kid with money enrolled, he awards scholarships to kids from the hood with no money. They all live in huge Teepees and learn the arts.

Bob Dylan wrote "the Times They Are A Changin" on his typewriter when he lived in the Village way back when.

He MC'd both Woodstocks (ask him about getting hit in the head with a piece of Sod at Woodstock II) and not only knows everyone in music but enlists them in his ventures.

the funny thing is, he came from the same place in time as Manson did. In theory, the Hog Farm" was not that much different than Manson's trip.

[Wetzelbill]

19. Crazy Horse and Ulysses S. Grant

are interesting. I have lots more, but those just immediately popped into my head.

[Parche]

20. Fleet Admiral William F Halsey

:woohoo: :woohoo:


Haul A$$ with Halsey!!!


Admiral Nimitz ordered Vice Admiral Halsey at the time to carry out an attack of the
Marshall and Gilbert Islands, when no one else would, in early 1942
He was made commander South Pacific in October 1942, and from there held the line in
the Solomon Islands.
Admiral Halsey left the South Pacific in May 1944, as the war surged toward the Philippines and Japan. During September 1944 - January 1945, he led the Third Fleet during campaigns to take the Palaus, Leyte and Luzon, on many raids on Japanese bases, and during the Battle of Leyte Gulf. He returned to the combat zone in late May 1945 to command the Third Fleet through the end of the Pacific War and was present when Japan formally surrendered on the deck of his flagship, USS Missouri, on 2 September 1945. Promoted to the rank of Fleet Admiral in December 1945, Halsey retired from active duty in March 1947. Fleet Admiral William F. Halsey died on 20 August 1959.

[Mad_Dem_X]

22. Thomas Jefferson

I've had a crush on him since the third grade. :loveya:

Edited to add: I'm also fascinated with Vincent Van Gogh.

[pokerfan]

23. Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci

In fact, I'd like to make it a dinner party:

Marie Curie
Thomas Edison
Hedy Lamarr
Ada Lovelace
Lise Meitner
Socrates
Nikola Tesla

I'd invite Richard Feynman but he'd monopolize the ladies.

[DarkTirade]

35. Ooh... Tesla... forgot about him.

Hmm... might wanna change my answer.

[rosesaylavee]

41. Go ahead and invite Feynman...

I'll keep him busy!

:loveya:

[pokerfan]

46. oh you devil

[rosesaylavee]

48. I just want to discuss his theories...

uh, really...

:P

[pokerfan]

49. Yeah well, can you guess what I want to discuss with Hedy Lamarr?

[Midlodemocrat]

24. Mary Magdalene. Eleanor Roosevelt. Joan of Arc.

[bertha katzenengel]

25. Emma Goldman. n/t

[Westegg]

26. Harry K. Thaw.

[geardaddy]

28. Hmmm

Attila the Hun
Genghis Khan
Qin Shi-Huang
Lao Zi
Owain Glyndwr
Edward I

[Adsos Letter]

29. Washington, Grant, Sherman, Jane Addams.

[CBHagman]

30. That's a good question.

I wasn't really sure how to answer that. There are so many people whose work I admire and/or whose lives I find intriguing.

I guess the sculptor Tilman Riemenschneider fits into both categories. I've seen a lot of his work and visited his old stomping grounds in Franconia, Germany, and of course made multiple visits to the Riemenschneider exhibit the National Gallery ran.

The guy also appears to have had sympathies for the peasants during their uprising, and he apparently paid for that by having his fingers broken while he was in prison.

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1E1-Riemensc.html

I don't think I've met a bona fide Riemenschneider fan since 1979, when a teacher at a summer program in Heidelberg introduced the lot of us to Riemenschneider and a good deal more. I think the guy's name was Rolf Bayer, and he had the most amazing enthusiasm and gift for leading tour groups.

[zingaro]

31. Cleopatra. Sappho. Cassandra. Mary Magdalene. nt

[Greyskye]

32. Mata Hari

Exotic dancer and spy.

[SteppingRazor]

33. I've got a great example of one that gives me morbid fascination:

Donatien Alphonse François de Sade, better known simply by his title, the Marquis de Sade.

[youthere]

36. Hellen Keller.

[Call Me Wesley]

37. Lev Davidovich Bronstein,

better known as Leon Trotsky. I guess our discussions would be deep and endless. ;)

[WinkyDink]

38. Cleopatra. Jack the Ripper. JFK. Nixon. Lindbergh.

Non-human = Titanic.

[NoodleBoy]

55. I could imagine Nixon or Lindbergh being Jack the Ripper.

and JFK nailing Cleopatra... on the Titanic.

[hippywife]

39. He fascinates me and is one of

my heros. He's also in my sig. A truly amazing and selfless individual. :hi:

[GOPisEvil]

40. Albert Einstein

[rosesaylavee]

42. Harriet Tubman

[rosesaylavee]

43. delete

[UndertheOcean]

44. Mine : Spartacus

[sasquatch]

45. Napoleon Bonaparte

I can never seem to place him in a classisfication.

[Pharlo]

47. Toss up........

Hetshepsut, Talleyrand, Harriet Tubman, or Elizabeth Blackwell.

[triguy46]

50. Did you watch Evita on Bravo last night too?...

It's bizarre how her body kept being moved, hidden, held for ransom, finger falling off, etc.

[NoodleBoy]

51. George Washington Plunkitt

So much of what he said remains true about politics over a hundred years later. Not quite the person you'd want to emulate, though.

[Ptah]

52. A pair - Lewis & Clark

I grew up near their trail, on the prairie of Montana.
Thinking of them traveling through the winters in that part
of the world still is beyond my ability to fully appreciate.

My grandparents homesteaded there in 1912, and with a year-round
shelter (a wooden shack) had a very rough time.

Not only did Lewis and Clark (and crew) do it on foot,
but they encountered people that had been there for many years.

Wetzlebill's grandparents might have know my grandparents.
His ancestors were there for a very long time before mine.
Their ability to survive fascinates me.

[otherlander]

53. Mountain Girl

And not just for the books on cultivation...
:hide:

Also Ivan Illich.

[RainDog]

54. Mary Wollstonecraft

self-supporting in an age when... didn't want to marry, but finally did when pregnant with daughter, Mary Shelley (writer of Frankenstein) Married to William Godwin, early anarchist, friend of William Blake, Joseph Priestly...her publisher Joseph Johnson, also published Coleridge and Wordsworth for the first time, as well as Blake, Godwin, and others in this radical English circle at the time of the American and French Revolutions. Traveled alone to Scandanavia, again when no female did (she had her infant daughter, Harriet, and a nurse... and she wasn't rich). Was in France during the French Revolution and during the terror. Considered the mother of modern feminism. Full of contradictions.

edit to add portrait-

[BeachBaby]

56. Rosa Parks.

No explanation necessary. :)

[Xipe Totec]

57. Nezahualcoyotl - Tlatoani (ruler) of Texcoco n/t

Revered as a sage and poet-king, Nezahualcoyotl drew a group of followers called the tlamatini, generally translated as "wise men". These men were philosophers, artists, musicians and sculptors who pursued their art in the court of Texcoco.

Nezahualcoyotl is credited with cultivating what came to be known as Texcoco's Golden Age, which brought the rule of law, scholarship and artistry to the city and set high standards that influenced other cultures. Nezahualcoyotl designed a code of law based on the division of power, which created the councils of finance, war, justice and culture, the last actually called the council of music. Under his rule Texcoco flourished as the intellectual centre of the Triple Alliance and it possessed an extensive library that, tragically, did not survive the Spanish conquest. He also established an academy of music and welcomed worthy entrants from all regions of Mesoamerica.

[AngryAmish]

58. Tamerlane