Personalities in History

Theodore Roosevelt lived the kind of life that usually only appears on the pages of a novel. He won a Medal of Honor and a Nobel Prize, and was New York City’s Commissioner of Police before becoming President of the United States. He was known for achieving a great deal at an early age. He was elected to the New York State Assembly only a year after leaving Harvard, , and is still the youngest person ever to be elected President. When his wife and mother died on the same day in 1884, the tragedy affected him deeply. He left politics and headed for the “Badlands” of the Dakotas to become a rancher. He also became a deputy sheriff and refused to resort to vigilante justice when he hunted down outlaws. When the Spanish American War broke out in 1898, Roosevelt was the Secretary of the Navy. He immediately resigned and formed the First US Volunteer Cavalry Regiment from a diverse group including western cowboys and Ivy League acquaintances. The media branded his new unit the “Rough Riders”. His heroic charge up San Juan Hill in Cuba earned him a Medal of Honor nomination which was not approved. He was awarded the medal posthumously in 2001.

For most career-politicians, life after public office is often filled with endorsements, public speaking engagements and a plethora of campaign fundraisers for other, current, up-and-coming politicians. However, sometimes, one politician comes along who, though successful in the political realm, seeks out a bigger, more worldly challenge.

Al Gore spent a successful tenure as Vice President of the United States, under then- President Bill Clinton. For eight years, the pair navigated the political waters, aiming to solve problem after [...]

Laura Ingalls Wilder was born on February 7, 1867 to Charles and Caroline Ingalls in the Big Woods near Pepin, Wisconsin. Her childhood was marked by a series of moves on the prairie frontier.

In 1868, the family traveled by covered wagon to Charton County, Missouri, but moved near Independence, Kansas shortly thereafter, claiming 160 acres through the Homestead Act. In 1870, hearing that soldiers were coming to oust the settlers, they moved back to the Big Woods.

Charles’ adventurous spirit led them in 1874 to a farm in Walnut Grove, Minnesota. The sudden death in 1876 of Laura’s baby brother, Freddie, spurred a short-lived move to [...]

Few Americans can fathom a time before home security services like http://www.securitychoice.com/adt-home-security/New-Hampshire/, and even fewer can fathom a time before lights and electricity. History claims we owe a debt to Thomas Edison for the creation of the light bulb and the man is often held in such high esteem. Is he really deserving?

First and foremost, the light bulb was not invented by Thomas Edison – at least not a working model. Credit for that goes to Lewis H. Latimer who is often overlooked for his creation of the light bulb’s carbon filament – a component necessary for these things to function. This is not the first time Edison would assume credit for someone else’s ideas – nor is it the only time he muscled his way toward a breakthrough.

Case in point, Nikola Tesla. While Thomas Edison was hard at work stealing patents and attempting to get electricity into the mainstream, Tesla was perfecting a different form of electricity that was arguably more efficient. What history doesn’t immediately tell us – what you really have to do some digging for – is the fact that their rivalry was more than just business. Edison repeatedly hired thugs to assault Tesla and destroy his lab. Something to think about the next time you turn on the lights.

Benjamin Franklin was a “Renaissance Man” and is still regarded as one of America’s most talented and productive citizens.

Franklin’s career began in printing and he became a newspaper editor and a publisher. He is best known for publishing Poor Richard’s Almanack. The almanack included many of Franklin’s proverbs such as “early to bed, early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise” and “God helps those who help themselves.”

Franklin studied electricity. The lightning rod developed out of his explorations of the connection between electricity and lightning. Franklin was the first to discover [...]

The impact of the work of Sir Isaac Newton on the field of science was monumental. Newton lived during a time when religion held sway in politics, science and everyday life, but his mathematical calculations proved there were other forces at work in the universe.

Newton was first and foremost a mathematician who viewed the world as structured and ordered, not a chaotic result of the whims of spirits. By studying the works of earlier scientists such as Galileo, he used his understanding of math to coalesce these studies and his own calculations into [...]

Rosa Parks is known in some circles as the one who began the modern civil rights movement, the movement whose end goal was full legal equality for African-Americans.

Her signature protest action involved refusing to get up from a seat on the bus so that a white passenger could sit down. During the days of Jim Crow laws, which had been in place in the Southern United States since the end of the Civil War, black people were officially segregated from whites and had to drink [...]

Clara Barton was one of the most amazing and productive women in American history. Her talent for helping and healing people was life-long; as a child, she nursed her older brother back to health when he was badly injured in a fall.

During the American Civil War (1861-1865), Ms. Barton became known as the “Angel of the Battlefield” for her courage and kindness in going onto the battlefields themselves to treat the wounded soldiers. She was willing and determined to help the wounded on both sides of the conflict, feeling that they were all brave and deserving of proper [...]

Queen Victoria, the longest reigning British monarch, and longest reigning female monarch ever, was born Alexandrina Victoria on the 24th of May 1819, the daughter of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. She was the granddaughter of King George III.

Queen Victoria assumed the throne in 1837 only 25 days after her 18th birthday. When she was crowned Queen, she dropped her first name of Alexandrina and called herself Victoria from that day forward. She is the only British monarch to hold this name.

Queen Victoria married Prince Albert of [...]