introduce me to some fascinating people. i will start

just trying to keep my mind busy. i love reading bio's and simply discovering new people.

maybe you can name someone and tell me a touch about them so i can decide if i want to read further.?

i will start with a few people that i find fascinating....

phoolan devi
en.wikipedia.org...

phoolan was also called the bandit queen. she was born to a low caste and was brutalized and abused in her teens and early adulthood by pretty much everyone. raped. left in holes. just terrible #.
she rose above that. took revenge on a great many that brutalized her and even became a member of parliament...


nicola tesla
en.wikipedia.org...

he was a scientist. inventor. engineer. eccentric. genius.

george washington carver
en.wikipedia.org...

he was an inventor. botanist. former slave.
he invented more than 100 products derived from peanuts.

frank zappa
en.wikipedia.org...

he was a self taught musician, sound engineer, composer, producer, director. he released more than 60 full length lp's duing his career.

golda meir
en.wikipedia.org...

she was a teacher and politician. former prime minister of israel. she was born in what is now the ukraine. she moved to wisconsin when she was a child. lived on a kibbutz in palestine. worked her way through the political machine.

mahatma gandhi
en.wikipedia.org...

everyone should know about him. just a reminder.

everybody, knows about Newton. but I am fascinated by him, so..... en.m.wikipedia.org...

Bucky fuller. Prob even more incredible than Tesla and even more forgotten

m.youtube.com...
en.m.wikipedia.org...

a reply to: Mugly

Alexander Graham Bell is a amazing person en.wikipedia.org... I happened upon a museum while vacationing one summer in Nova Scotia en.wikipedia.org...

He had a earlier relationship with Curtiss of Curtiss-Wright en.wikipedia.org...

There is good reason to believe that he was the first to fly .

Hunter S. Thompson

www.nytimes.com...


Jack Kerouac
en.wikipedia.org...

Robert Anton Wilson


www.rawilson.com...

Bayard Rustin

en.wikipedia.org...


Larry Kramer

en.wikipedia.org...


I had a bigger list.. my mind went blank.. i'll come back with more

a reply to: Mugly

I will start off the Military people.

Dare I say it ...

Hitler, needs no introduction.

en.wikipedia.org...

Brought pre WW2 Germany out of a great depression, and brought the world to their edges of their seats to unify all of humanity that a single threat can be more powerful than we thought. Although not the soul enemy of WW2 or great threat, his campaigns were the final straw that broke the camels back.

Alexander the Great.

en.wikipedia.org...

Fortified trade, ancient military tactics, multiculturalism and set the foundations for the world we know today.

Genghis Khan.

en.wikipedia.org...

One mans 'dream' to fulfill his families powerful presence, set in place arguably the largest empire the world has ever seen, only death was in his way as such a life achievement would have taken more than a generation to complete, connecting the Arab world with the Asian world was the largest achievement of his legacy, much like Alexander that legacy is still continued in today's world, trade and not destroying culture was his predecessors feat of strengths.

Read up on William Blake... or Caligula (or just the first 6 emperors of Rome)... Joan of Arc... Emmanuel Swedenborg was fairly interesting ... Buckminster Fuller... Cleopatra... Alan Turing ... Timothy Leary ... Lord Byron... Charles Bukowski... Isadora Duncan... Dorothy Parker...

Heck, I'd think all several billion of us who ever lived has something about them that is amazing... in fact, the most amazing people never make it into Wiki or books, unfortunately...

I've always been partial to this fellow. There's not much to learn but his story is insane to me. Dipprasad Pun

I'll add a couple:

Rudolf Steiner

Eleanor Roosevelt

Helen Keller

His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama

Vicktor Schrauberger

Margaret Mead

had to add - Hazel Henderson and Ralph Nader though I don't know if there are biographies of either.

Since there are so few women on these lists here are some you may or may not be familiar with but who have inspired me:

Hedy Lamarr - Hollywood femme fatale, Invented frequency hopping/spread spectrum communication, without which our modern WIFI would be quite different if it were invented at all.

Wendy Carlos - Classical composer who pioneered the use and development of synthesizers. Scored music in the sci-fi classic film "2001: A Space Odyssey"

Mae Jemison - Space Shuttle astronaut, Pilot, Physician, Peace Corps Volunteer, Founder and President of the 100 Year Starship Organization- A possible real life precursor to "Starfleet" from the Star Trek tv/movie series.

Jill Tarter - Pioneering astronomer/astrobiologist/SETI Researcher - Carl Sagan based the character "Ellie Arroway" in his book (and later film) Contact, on a young Jill Tarter.

Eric Winkle Brown.
en.m.wikipedia.org...(pilot)
Captain Eric Melrose "Winkle" Brown, CBE, DSC, AFC, Hon FRAeS, RN[2] (born 21 January 1919) is a British former Royal Navy officer and test pilot who flew 487 different types of aircraft, more than anyone else in history.[1][3] He also holds the world record for most aircraft carrier landings performed (2,407)[1] and is the Fleet Air Arm's most decorated living pilot.[4] He achieved several "firsts" in naval aviation, including the first landing on an aircraft carrier of a twin engined aircraft, an aircraft with a tricycle undercarriage and a jet propelled aircraft.

m.youtube.com...

Alan Wilson Watts was a British-born philosopher, writer, and speaker, best known as an interpreter and populariser of Eastern philosophy for a Western audience. Wikipedia
en.m.wikipedia.org...
m.youtube.com...

Sri Ramana Maharshi, the most beautiful man I have ever seen:



From the entry to his Wiki page:

Ramana Maharshi /ˈrʌmənə məhʌˈriʃi/ (30 December 1879 – 14 April 1950) was an Indian sage[1] and jivanmukti.[2] He was born Venkataraman Iyer, in Tiruchuli, Tamil Nadu, South India,[3] and given the name Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi[note 1] in 1907, by one of his first devotees, Ganapati Muni. This would be the name by which he became more widely known.[4]

In 1896, at the age of 16, he became aware that "his real nature was formless, immanent consciousness,"[5][note 2] resulting in a state which he later described as enlightenment.[6][note 3] Six weeks later he left his family home in Madurai, and journeyed to the holy mountain Arunachala, in Tiruvannamalai, where he would remain for the rest of his life.[4]

Although his first years in Tiruvannamalai were spent in solitude, he soon attracted devotees,[7][5][8] and in later years a community grew up around him, where he was available twenty-four hours a day.[9] Although worshipped by thousands, he never received private gifts, and treated all with equal respect.[4] Since the 1930s his teachings have been popularised in the west.[10]

Throughout the years, Ramana Maharshi responded to many questions on spiritual matters, but always insisted that silence was the purest teaching.[5] In response to questions on self-liberation and the classic texts on Yoga and Vedanta, Ramana recommended self-enquiry as the principal way to awaken to "I-I",[web 3][note 4] realise the Self[11][12] and attain liberation.[13][note 5] He also recommended Bhakti, as well as giving his approval to a variety of paths and practices.[web 6]

en.wikipedia.org...

Joseph Hinneage Finch, the 7th Earl of Aylesford:

The prince invited Finch to accompany him on a seventeen-week goodwill tour of India in 1875–76. Though he arranged the sporting events and served as his sponsor's personal hunting guide, Finch abruptly returned home in early 1876 to confront his unfaithful wife and her lover. The divorce suit that followed involved the highest members of English society and resulted in Finch's being exiled, in effect, by Queen Victoria herself.

tshaonline.org...

There are several stories online about this dude who was lost and forgotten in West Texas. But he is hands down my favorite character from the area during the late 1800's.