Christopher Columbus(1451 - 1506) Italian
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Christopher Columbus is one of the most famous of all explorers. He believed he
could reach Asia by sailing west across the Atlantic Ocean and in 1492 he set sail
in the Santa Maria to prove his theory. Instead, he landed on the
islands now known as the West Indies. His discoveries led to the European exploration
and settlement of the Americas.
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William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616) English
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William Shakespeare is generally agreed to be the greatest playwright in the English
language. He began as an actor and wrote at least 154 love poems and 37 plays, including
Hamlet, King Lear, Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth. Shakespeare
also probably introduced more than 1,700 new words to the English language.
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Charles Darwin (1809 - 82) English
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Naturalist Charles Darwin established the theory of evolution. He began forming
his ideas when he served as official naturalist on a world voyage on HMS Beagle
(1831 - 36) and spent the rest of his life back in England developing them. When
his famous book The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection
was published in 1859 there were violent reactions against it. Darwin challenged
the Bible’s account of creation, and explained that human beings are descended from
an ape-like ancestor. Another English naturalist, Alfred Russel Wallace, independently
developed very similar ideas at the same time as Darwin.
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Karl Marx (1818 - 83) German
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Karl Marx’s ideas on economic history and sociology changed the world. Marx was
a social philosopher who attacked the state and predicted a future in which everyone
was equal. He explained his theories in the Communist Manifesto (compiled
which Friedrich Engels and published in 1848) and Das Kapital (1867
- 94).His ideas eventually led to the Russian Revolution and communism. By 1950
almost half of the world’s people lived under communist regimes. Karl Marx is called
the 'Father of Scientific Socialism'
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Emmeline Pankhurst (1858 - 1928) English
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Emmeline Pankhurst was the most famous of the women who campaigned for the right
to vote in the UK. From 1905 she fought for the vote by any means possible and was
frequently arrested and imprisoned. She died in 1928 shortly before her aims were
realized and every woman over 21 years old was granted the vote.
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Mahatma Gandhi (1869 - 1948) Indian
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Gandhi began his career as a lawyer but became a great political and spiritual leader.
He led the peaceful civil disobedience of Indians against British rule in India
and negotiated with the British government until 1947, when India was granted independence.
Gandhi became the first icon of a people’s struggle against oppression. His simple
lifestyle and his belief in religious tolerance have made him a symbol of decency
and peace ever since.
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Albert Einstein (1879 - 1955) German/American
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Einstein was one of the greatest of all physicists and his name has become a symbol
of genius. When his most famous work, the General Theory of Relativity, was proven
in 1919, Einstein became the most celebrated scientist in the world, and he won
the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1921. Einstein was a firm believer in pacifism, but
his scientific theories helped his adopted country, the USA, to develop the atomic
bomb. A week before he died Einstein wrote to Bertrand Russell, a British philosopher
and leading anti nuclear campaigner, asking to put his name to a manifesto urging
all countries to give up their nuclear weapons.
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Adolf Hitler (1889 - 1945) Austrian
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Adolf Hitler was Germany’s leader from 1933 to 1945, during which time he led the
world into the most devastating war in history. Hitler’s hatred of Jewish people
and his desire for a blue-eyed, blond-haired master race led to the murder of six
million people during World War II; most died in concentration camps in Eastern
Europe.
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Mao Zedong/Mao Tse-tung/Chairman Mao (1893-1976) Chinese
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Mao Zedong was one of the founders of the Chinese Communist Party and the first
chairman of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. He had an enormous influence
on his country and was greatly admired for founding the Chinese republic and for
changes in the early years of his rule. His later policies were less successful.
During his rule, Mao’s image was displayed everywhere – in every school, home, factory
and workplace.
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Nelson Mandela (1918 - ) South African
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Nelson Mandela dedicated his life to the fight against apartheid – a policy which
kept black and white South Africans apart and denied black citizens the vote. He
was imprisoned in 1964 for his aggressive opposition to South Africa’s racist government
and was held for 26 years. In 1990 after his release, Mandela was elected president
of the African National Congress. In 1993 he won the Nobel Peace Prize for his work
to end apartheid.
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James Watson (1928 - )American
And Francis Crick (1916 – 2004) English
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American biologist James Watson and English scientist Francis Crick discovered the
molecular structure of DNA, using theories already written by Maurice Wilkins. Their
theory helps to explain how DNA carries hereditary information and their discoveries
have revolutionized our understanding of genetic and the study of disease.
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Martin Luther King, Jr (1929 - 68) American
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Martin Luther King was a Baptist minister who campaigned against the segregation
of blacks in the southern states of the United States. He was influenced by Gandhi
and believed in peaceful protest. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964. King was
assassinated in 1968, but will always be remembered for his dignified, passive resistance
to an unjust society.
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Bill Gates (1955 - ) American
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Bill Gates created his first computer program while still at high school, co-founded
Microsoft in 1977, and by 1993 was the richest man on Earth. In 2000 Gates and his
wife formed the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which is the largest charity in
the world. One of its aims is to rid the Third World of polio and other deadly diseases.
History of Computers
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