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Tel Asiado's BlogPosted by Tel Asiado Today, October 7, is the birthday of Niels Bohr (1885-1962), Danish physicist born in Copenhagen Denmark. He was awarded the 1922 Nobel Prize in physics for developing the Bohr Theory of the atom. Bohr proposed that electrons travel in orbits around the atom's nucleus, and that elements are determined by the number of electrons in the outer orbits of their atoms. His model was the first quantum model for the internal structure of the atom. Here's the full article --- [Niels Bohr, Physicist] . Posted by Tel Asiado Today, October 6 (1846-1914), is the birthday of George Westinghouse, American engineer, inventor and industrialist. He founded his own company to manufacture his invention, the air brake. Westinghouse is a New Yorker, born in Central Bridge. His most important invention was the air-brake system known as the "Westinghouse air brake" which he patented in 1869. His invention allowed the brakes on all the coaches of a train to be applied simulataneously by the engine driver, and greatly increased the speed at which the trains could travel safely. In 1886, he founded the Westinghouse Electrical company. In 1895, he harnessed successfully the power of the Niagara Falls to generate sufficient electricity for the town of Buffalo. Posted by Tel Asiado Today, September 30, is the birthday of Sir Charles Villiers Stanford (1852-1924), Irish composer, conductor and teacher. He was highly influential in British music. Born in Dublin, he studied at Cambridge and Berlin. He became a professor at the Royal College of Music, among others. As a professor of Cambridge, he taught generations of young British composers. His works include choral settings of Alfred Lord Tennyson's Revenge and Voyage of Maeldune. He also composed some oratorios and operas, as well as church music. Here's his full brief biography --- Sir Charles Villiers Stanford Posted by Tel Asiado Today, September 25, is the birthday of Thomas Hunt Morgan (1866-1945), American geneticist and biologist. He was awarded the 1933 Nobel Prize for Medicine for investigations linking to chromosomes and hereditary traits. Morgan was born in Lexington, Kentucky, and graduated in zoology form Kentucky State College in 1886. Leter, he became Professor of Experimental Zoology at Columbia University and then at the California Institute of Technology. In his work on Drosophila, the fruit fly, he found that certain traits are linked, but that the traits are not always inherited together. Morgan wrote and published some books, including The Mendelian Heredity (which established the chromosome theory of inherhitance in confirmation of Gregor Mendel's work), Evolution and Adaptation and The Theory of the Gene. Posted by Tel Asiado Today, September 22, is the birthday of Michael Faraday (1791-1867), English chemist, physicist and experimentalist. Among his many discoveries, Faraday is famous for his laws of electrolysis. He worked extensively on electricity, discovering electromagnetic induction. Michael Faraday made the first generator, built a primitive electric motor, among other things. In chemistry, he liquified chlorine and discovered benzene, among others. For more of his life and works, here's the link. Farad, the unit of capacitance, is named after him. Posted by Tel Asiado Today, September 18 (1883), is the birthday of Gerald Hugh Tyrwhitt-Wilson, Berners, 14th Baron. He was an English writer, comcoser, statesman, painter and diplomat. Lord Berners total output was small but includes an orchestral fugue and several ballets, the best known was "The Triumph of Neptune" (1926) and "A Wedding Bouquet" (1937) after a play by Gertrude Stein. A noted eccentric, he also dabbled in fiction and painting. Here's a link to Lord Berners ...[14th Baron Berners] Posted by Tel Asiado Today, September 18 (1883), is the birthday of Gerald Hugh Tyrwhitt-Wilson, Berners, 14th Baron. He was an English writer, comcoser, statesman, painter and diplomat. Lord Berners total output was small but includes an orchestral fugue and several ballets, the best known was "The Triumph of Neptune" (1926) and "A Wedding Bouquet" (1937) after a play by Gertrude Stein. A noted eccentric, he also dabbled in fiction and painting. Here's a link to Lord Berners ...[14th Baron Berners] Posted by Tel Asiado Today, September 7 (1558) is the birthday of Elizabeth I, Queen of England. She was the daughter of King Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. Her reign saw England's rise as a major European power. On her succession to the throne, Queen Elizabeth I re-established Protestantism by the Acts of Supremacy and Uniformity in 1559. Despite her relatively tolerant administration, Roman Catholic discontent led to the Rising of the Northern Earls, the Ridolfi Plot, and to subesequent plots in favour of Mary, Queen of Scots, the Roman Cathoalic claimant to the succession. Mary was eventually executed as a threat to Elizabeth. Elizabeth I refused to marry. She directed her foreign policy towards reducing the powers of the Roman Catholicism, France and Spain, without war provocation either. Despite it, in 1587 war with Spaian still broke out and even with the defeat of the Spanish Armada the following year, war still continued throughout her reign. Elizabeth I's last years were times of financial difficulties and by the Earl of Essex's rebellion. By herself, Queen Elizabeth I had a strength of character and immeasurable shredness. She also had competent advisers, such as Lord Burghley and William Cecil. Posted by Tel Asiado Today, September 7 (1558) is the birthday of Elizabeth I, Queen of England (1558-1603). She was the daughter of King Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. Her reign saw England's rise as a major European power. On her succession to the throne, Queen Elizabeth I re-established Protestantism by the Acts of Supremacy and Uniformity in 1559. Despite her relatively tolerant administration, Roman Catholic discontent led to the Rising of the Northern Earls, the Ridolfi Plot, and to subesequent plots in favour of Mary, Queen of Scots, the Roman Cathoalic claimant to the succession. Mary was eventually executed as a threat to Elizabeth. Elizabeth I refused to marry. She directed her foreign policy towards reducing the powers of the Roman Catholicism, France and Spain, without war provocation either. Despite it, in 1587 war with Spaian still broke out and even with the defeat of the Spanish Armada the following year, war still continued throughout her reign. Elizabeth I's last years were times of financial difficulties and by the Earl of Essex's rebellion. By herself, Queen Elizabeth I had a strength of character and immeasurable shredness. She also had competent advisers, such as Lord Burghley and William Cecil. Posted by Tel Asiado Today, September 6 (1860-1935), is the birthday of Jane Addams, American social reformer and suffragist. A pacifist, Addams never allowed public criticism to deter her sense of purpose. She was awarded the 1931 Nobel Peace Prize for her support for peace, women's suffrage and social work. In 1887, she observed the work done at Toynbee Hall, a settlement house in London's East End. Two years later, she co-founded with Ellen Gates Starr Chicago's Hull House, the first major settlement house in the United States. Hull House became the model for settlement houses throughout the United States. Addams also actively participated during the First World War, particularly in the suffrage movement and in denouncing America's participation in the war. In 1915, she organized and chaired the Women's Peace Party, and along with Emily Balch, she founded the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF). Five years later, she supported and helped found the American Civil Liberties Union and served on its national committee for ten years. Jane Addams's commitment to world peace was finally recognized when she became the first American woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize in 1931. Sources: McGovern, Una, Ed. Chambers Biographical Dictionary. Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap, 2002 Weatherford, Doris. American Women's History. New York: Prentice Hall, 1994 Posted by Tel Asiado Today, September 4 (1913), is the birthday of Kenzo Tange, Japanese architect who established a reputation in his works as a significant architect of the 20th century. He was the winner of the 1987 Pritzker Prize for architecture. Tange combined traditional Japanese styles with modernism and designed major buildings not only in Japan but other countries. He is also an influential protagonist of the Structuralism movement in architecture. Kenzo Tange was born and educated in Tokyo. His early building, for example, the Hiroshima Peace Center is traditional and influenced by Le Corbusier, but his later works, such as Shizoka Press and Broadcasting Center, provide flexibility for change. He designed the dramatic National Gymnasium for the 1964 Olympic Games and the theme pavilion for the 1970 Osaka Exposition. From 1946 until 1974, Tange has been a professor of architecture at Tokyo University. He has also published influential books on architecture. Since 1989, Kenzo Tange has been president of the Japanese Architectural Association. Posted by Tel Asiado
Today, September 3 (1856), is the birthday of American architect Louis Henry Sullivan. He is regarded the "father of modern US architecture" and identified with early skyscraper design innovation. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, Sullivan studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and at the influential Paris atelier of Joseph Auguste-Emile Vaudremer. He worked in chicago in the 1880s and 1890s when the city was busy witih migrants influx, railroads, and other kinds of trading. In 1886, he won the New Exposition building contract with Dankmar Adler. He was one of the first to design skyscrapers, such as the Wainwright building in St Louis in 1890 and the Carson store in chicago 1899. Sullivan's experimental, functional skeleton constructions of skyscrapers and office blocks, particularly the Gage building and Stock Exchange with Adler in Chicago earned him the title of "Father of Modernism." He greatly influenced Frank Lloyd Wright among others. He died on April 1924. Related Link: Traces the History of the Skyscraper Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: August 21 Today, August 21 (1813), is the birthday of Jean S Stas, Belgian analystical chemist known for his accurate determination of atomic weights, a most skillful chemical analyst of the nineteenth century. Stas was born in Leuven. Initially, he trained as a physician. but later changed to chemistry and worked at the Polytechnic School in Paris under Jean-Baptiste Dumas. The two of them setup the atomic weight of carbon by weighing a sample of the pure matereial, burned it in pure ooxyge, then weighed the carbon dioxide produced. He was appointed professor at Brussels's Royal Miltary School in 1840. Stas became famous after he established the atomic weights of the elements more accurately than had ever been done before, using oxygen = 16 as the standard, laying the foundation for the periodic system of elements of Dmitri Mendeleev. He died in Brussels on December 13, 1891. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: August 14 Today, August 14, is the birthday of Hans Christian Oersted (1777-1851), Danish Physicist and educator. He is considered the founder of the science of electromagnetism. Hans Christian Oersted took the first steps in explaining the relationship between electricity and magnetism. He was also the first scientist to isolate pure metallic aluminum. The 'Oersted' unit of magnetic field strength is named after him. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: August 5, 2008 Today, August 5 (1850), is the birthday of Guy de Maupassant, one of the greatest French short-story writers. He also wrote novels. De Maupassant was greatly influenced by Gustave Flaubert, who used to invite him to lunch on Sundays and edit his earlier works. Flaubert introduced him to prominent writers of the time, including Émile Zola, Henry James, and Ivan Turgenev. Guy de Maupassant wrote numerous stories and few novels. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: August 4, 2008 Today, August 4 (1792), is the birthday of English poet, author and essayist Percy Bysshe Shelley. He is best-known for romantic poems and for his masterpiece Prometheus Unbound. His other popular works include "The Cloud" and "To a Skylark." Shelley died before the age of 30. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: July 26. Carl Jung is born today, July 26 (1875). He was a Swiss psychologist and psychiatrist, who founded the modern analytic and depth psychology. Jung was born in Kesswil, Switzerland, and died in Zürich, 1961, from a short illness. Jung noticed that the myths and fairytales from different cultures contained certain similarities he called "archetypes", and believed that these archetypes came from a collective unconscious shared by all human beings, and that if people could get in touch with these archetypes in their lives, they will be more happy and healthy. He emphasized the importance of balance and harmony and cautioned that modern people rely too heavily on science and logic; that they would benefit from integrating spirituality and appreciation of unconscious realms. Based on his study of Christianity and other religions, Jung perceived that a person's journey of transformation is the heart of all religions. It is a journey where self meets the Divine. Unlike Sigmund Freud, Jung believed that spiritual experience was essential to an individual's state of well-being. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: July 18. Nelson Mandela turns 90 years old today, July 18, 2008. In South Africa he is often known as Madiba, an honorary title adopted by elders of Mandela's clan. Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela is a former President of South Africa. He was the first to be elected in a fully representative democratic elections. Prior his presidency, Mandela was an anti-apartheid leader of the African National Congress. Mandela spent 27 years in prison on convictions while he lead the struggle against apartheid. He became a symbol of freedom and equality, while the apartheid government and other sympathetic nations condemned him as terrorists. Mandela was released from prison on February 11, 1990. His policy of reconciliation and negotiation helped lead the transition to democracy in South Africa. Nelson Mandela has been praised worldwide since the end of apartheid, including former opponents. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993. His philosophy of non-violence, he has credited to his major source of inspiration, Mahatma Gandhi. Posted by Tel Asiado Great thinkers Datebook: July 19. French Impressionist Edgar Degas (Hilaire Germain Edgar Degas) was born in Paris on July 19, 1834. An artist famous for his painting, sculpture, printmaking and drawing, he is best-known for his paintings depicting movements like ballet dancers as well as his sculptures in bronze, ballerinas and racehorses. He also painted nude females. He became completely blind in one eye. Despite this handicap, he worked passionately with his art. Edgar Degas never married in his entire life, with a quote: "There is love and there is work, and we only have one heart." He died on September 27, 1917. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: July 12 Today, July 12 (1904), is the birthday of Pablo Neruda, Chilean poet, dilpomat and politician. He is considered the 20th century's most important Latin American poet. He is famous for his collection of poems "Veinte poemas de amor y una cancion desesperada" (Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair) published in 1924. Neruda was awarded the 1971 Nobel Prize in Literature. Link to a brief biography of Pablo Neruda Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: July 12 George Eastman celebrates his birthday today, July 12 (1854-1932). He was an American inventor and manufacturer of roll-film photograph, what is famously known today as the Kodak camera. Eastman was born in Waterville, New York. Among his inventions, he introduced machine-coated plates (1879), paper roll film (1884), celluloid roll film & the Kodak camera (1888), and daylight-loading film (1891). For all these, he actually founded the basic materials for still and motion picture photography. In 1892, he founded the Eastan Kodak Company. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: July 8. Percy Aldridge Grainger celebrates his birthday anniversary today, July 8 (1882.) He was an Australian-born American prolific composer, virtuoso pianist, music educator and collector of folk music. Grainger founded the Grainger Museum of Australian Music in Melbourne, Australia. Percy Grainger's life has been portrayed in a 1999 film adaptation, Passion. Co-written by Rob George and John Bird, it feataured Richard Roxburgh as Grainger and Barbara Hershey as his mother. He was known for the tune "English Country Garden" and his arrangement of "Irish Tune from County Derry." For a brief biography, here's the link: Percy Aldridge Grainger . Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: July 3 Today is the birthday of John Mason Brown (1900-1969), American lecureer, author and critic. He was born on July 3, 1900 in Louiseville, Kentucky. Brown was a charter member (1935) and president of New York Drama Critics Circle for four years. John Mason Brown educated himself for a career in theater criticism by studying drama at Harvard. His career portfolio include the following: Critic drama for:
Among his many theater books:
, Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: June 19. Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) is born today, June 19. A prodigy, he wrote a book on conics when he was a teenager, then together with Pierre de Fermat, laid the foundations of the theory of probability. Pascal also contributed to hydrodynamics and calculus before retiring from science in 1655 in order to devote his time to his interests in religion and philosophical writing. An example is his Pensies. Here's a link to Blaise Pascal Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: June 4. Socrates (469-399 BC), Greek philosopher, is born June 4. He believed in self-knowledge and the value of self-analysis. Together with Plato and Aristotle, they laid the philosophical foundations of Western culture. He did not write nor publish any works but his teachings were enormously influential. Written about by Plato, he spent most of his life in Athens, engaging those he met in philosophic discussions. Believing that the highest menaing of life is attained through self-knowledge, he tried to convince his fellow men of the calue of self-analysis. Socrates was loyal to his "mission statement" and aware of the "demons" inside that leads human beings astray from their better selves. Found guilty of impiety and corruption of the young, he was condemned to death. He poisoned himself. . Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: June 2, 1840. Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), English novelist and poet, is born today, June 2. His novels, mostly tragic and set in the region of Wessex, include the famous ones made into films like Far from the Madding Crowd, The Mayor of Casterbridge and Tess of the d'Urbervilles. In the 1970s, the BBC commissioned adaptations of stories from his collection the Wessex Tales and also did a mini-series of Hardy's Jude the Obscure, which he published in 1895. Hardy later concentrated on poetry. Link to a brief biography of Thomas Hardy. . . Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: May 29 John Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy or JFK (1917-1963) is born May 29. Referred simply as JFK, John F. Kennedy was the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until 1963, the son of Joseph P. Kennedy and brother of Edward M. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy. Born in Brookline, Massachusetts, he graduated from Harvard University in 1940. He married Jacqueline Bouvier and had two children, John, Jr. (deceased) and Caroline. He served in the Navy during World War II, and later, in 1946, elected to the House of Representatives as a Democrat, and served there until he entered the Senate in 1953. In 1956, JFK made an unsuccessful bid for the vice-presidential nomination but immediately began preparations for the 1960 presidential nominations. This time he successfully got elected and defeated Richard Nixon by a small margin, becoming the second youngest president and the first Roman Catholic president. Domestic policy revolved around the federeal government's involvement in civil rights, medicine and medical insurance, and education, among others. However, the foreign affairs took most of his role as president, in particular, the Bay of Pigs of 1961, and the Cuban Missile Crisis the following year. In November 1963, JFK made a political trip to Dallas with his wife, Jackie. While riding through the streets in a motorcade, he was shot and killed. Famous JFK quote: "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country."(Taken from John F. Kennedy's Inauguaral Address, January 20, 1961.) Posted by Tel Asiado Great thinkers Datebook: May 28 Ian L. Fleming (May 28, 1908 - August 12, 1964), British author, novelist and film writer who created James Bond 007, is born May 28, in London. Initially, Fleming wanted to be a diplomat, but failed the test for Foreign Office, so he decided to pursue journalism instead. He worked for the Reuters News Service in major cities including London, Moscow, and Berlin. He then served as assistant to the British director of naval intelligence during the Second World War. After the war, he bought a house in jamaica, spent his life there for a while, including bird watching and fishing. He also gambled to complete the picture. After he got bored, he began writing a novel about a secret agent... No, it's not Dr. No as many think, but actually Casino Royale, which was his first James Bond novel. This was in 1953. Fleming followed this with four more but wasn't that successful. Becoming more disappointed, he decided to write the book specifically for the movies. He added more trimmings like beautiful women galore, and all the exotic places, and more excitement more the moviegoer. The novel From Russia, with Love, in 1957, finally did it by becoming a huge international blockbuster, a best seller of all time. The rest is history for many more James Bond novels and films. Famous James Bond stars were Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datbook: May 26, 1521 On March 26, 1521, Martin Luther was formally outlawed by the Edict of Worms. Martin Luther was the German leader of the Protestant Reformation. He left the study of law in 1505 to become an Augustinian monk and later became a professor of theology. His conversion to priesthood happened one night when he got caught in a terrible thunderstorm. He swore to God Almighty that if he survived it, he would enter the religious life. He did survive, and so he went on to study theology. He was ordained and became a professor in Wittenberg. He took seriously his faith and agonized on the problem of salvation. Eventually, he decided that salvation was not won by good works or deeds but was a gift of God's grace. As he became more involved in the Church, he began to grow disillusioned with some of its practices. In particular, he was angry about the Church's sales of indulgences, said to decrease the time a person had to spend in purgatory. His beliefs made him the object to the sale of indulgences by the Roman Catholic Church. In 1517 Luther posted his 95 Theses in Wittenberg. In so doing, he started a quarrel between him and the church leaders. He decided that the Bible was the true source of authority and renounced obedience to Rome. Further, he maintained his stand in debates with Johann Eck and at the Diet of Worms, in 1521. As a result, he was ex-communicated but German princes supported him, and he quickly gained following among church members as well as the common people. And so the Protestant Reformation began in Germany. Luther wrote hymns, catechisms, theological treatises, and translated the New Testament into German. Hymn singing has been very much a part of Protestant worship. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: May 20 Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850), French novelist, playwright and short story writer, is born today, May 20. He devoted most of his life to writing a series of novels, plays and short stories, The Human Comedy (La Comédie Humaine), that depict all aspects of the 19th century French society, Balzac had a huge influence on later 19th-century French novelists like Gustave Flaubert and Émile Zola. Henry James thought he was the best novelist of all time. He once said, "All happiness depends on courage and work." Brief bio and works of Honoré de Balzac . Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: May 12. Gabriel Urbain Fauré (1845 - 1924) is born today May 12, the son of a school director. He was a French composer, teacher, organist and pianist. As a teacher and composer, he influenced many 20th century younger composers for his harmony and melody. He is known for his calm and restraint compositions, in whatever genres they were. His Requiem Mass, in memory of the departed, is one of the best-loved church music. Link: Gabriel Fauré's Brief Biography . Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: May 11 Salvador Dali (1904-1989), Spanish artist, surrealist painter, sculptor and designer, influential for his imagery explorations. Dali was born this day, May 11, in Figueras, Catalonia, Spain. After studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Madrid, he moved to Paris. The theories of Sigmund Freud had a profound influence on him particularly the concept of the unconscious mind. He created what he called "hand-painted dream photographs" which are images of distorted human figures and burning giraffes, among others. He joined the Surrealist group in 1928 (some biographers say 1929), becoming one of the main figures of the movement. His best known work is "The Persistence of Memory" (1931.) Salvador Dali also designed jewelry, furniture, fabrics, and stage decors. His artistic creations also included sculpture, photography and film. He collaborated with Walt Disney's short cartoon "Destino," nominated for Academy-Award. A noted book illustrator, he also wrote autobiographies. Dali also collaborated with the master of suspense Alfred Hitchcock on the film "Spellbound." He moved to the US in 1940 and became famous there. He made public appearances in Hollywood and Broadway, among others. His paintings are in major Western museums. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: May 6. Sigismund Schlomo Freud or Sigmund Freud (May 6, 1856 - September 23, 1939), Austrian psychiatrist and neurologist, regarded as the father of psychoanalysis, is born this day, May 6, in Freiberg, Moravia. Woking with Josef Breuer, Freud developed new methods for treating mental disorder, through free association and dream interpretation, summarized in his book The Interpretation of Dreams (1900.) Later in his work, Freud extended psychoanalysis to a wide range of cultural and social-psychological phenomena. His work has been highly influential popularizing such terms like "defense mechanisms," "Oedipus complex," and the notion of being unconscious, among others. For a brief biography, here's the article link: [Sigmund Freud and His Couch] Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: May 5. Karl H. Marx (May 5, 1818 - March 14, 1883), German philosopher, revolutionary, political activist and economist is remembered for his 190th birth anniversary today. Marx is regarded as the father of communism. Here's the full article of his brief biography, philosophy and works --- [Karl Marx] Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: May 4. Horace Mann (1796-1859), American visionary educator, social reformer, and pioneer in establishing mental institutions. He was born on May 4, in Franklin, Massachusetts. Mann is regarded as the "father of American education," the first great American advocate of public education. Mann was elected to both the Massachusetts House and Senate, from 1827 until 1837, where he worked for passage of a new state education bill. Later, he became the secretary of the Massachusetts board of education for almost eleven years, and while at it, he established teacher-training schools, increased the salaries of teachers, along with improved teaching practices. Horace Mann strongly believed that education should be free in a democratic society. He also opposed slavery. He became the first president of Antioch College, an institution committed to co-education and equal opportunity for all students. Related Link: Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: April 30 Karl Friedrich Gauss (1777-1855), German mathematician, is born today, April 30. The unit of magnetic flux density is named in his honor. As a child prodigy coming from a poor family, the education of Gauss was supported by the duke of Brunswick. He made his remarkable breakthrough in mathematical discoveries while he was still a teenager. In 1807 he became director of Gottingen Observatory, where he remained through his life. Gauss contributed to the study of electricity and magnetism and made significant advances in such branches of mathematics as the number theory and the theory of series, among others. He completed his magnum opus Disquisitiones Arithmeticae in 1798 and he was only 21 years old. This work is significant being a basis in consolidating number theory as a discipline. Karl Friedrich Gauss, considered as one of history's most influential mathematicians, had a remarkable influence in many fields of mathematics and science. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: April 26. Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (A.D. 121-180), Roman emperor and philosopher, was born in Rome on April 26, 121. His real name was Marcus Annius Verus. With his stepbrother Lucius Verus, Aurelius succeeded his adoptive father Antoninus Pius. Antoninus Pius was emperor in 161. After the death of Lucius Verus in 169, he reigned as the sole emperor. His reign experienced numerous disasters including invasions and revolts in Egypt, Spain, and Britain. Marcus Aurelius persecuted Christians, but he was lenient to political prisoners and lowered the taxes of the poor. The Roman Empire was prosperous before Aurelius came to power, this was a period known as Pax Romana or Roman time of peace, supposed to have lasted almost two hundred years. His empire was the largest, stretching from Scotland to the Arabian desert. Somehow, for whatever reason, Rome met with a series of disasters - famines, plagues and wars - the moment Aurelius became emperor. Interestingly, he consoled himself by keeping a kind of diary filled with philosophic meditations. He studied and was a great advocate of Stoic philosophers who believed that we should detach ourselves from anything beyond our control. Marcus Aurelius is known for his work Meditations, reflective of Stoic philosophy. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: April 24 Anthony Trollope (April 24, 1815 - December 6, 1882), was born in London. He was a leading Victorian novelist of the mid-19th century. He struggled to make a living in London, but in 1841, he was offered a transfer to Ireland where he got a break with his life, and eventually with his writing. Between 1855 and 1866, Trollope published six novels about the extended families, parishioners and civil service workers living in an imaginary county of Barsetshire, novels such as The Warden, Barchester Towers, and The Last Chronicle of Barset, all of which were best-sellers. He also wrote some books in other genres. Here's a link to full article of Anthony Trollope. ~ Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinker Datebook: April 23. William Shakespeare (1564-1616), English playwright and poet, regarded by many as the greatest playwright of all time. Shakespeare was born in Stratford-on-Avon on April 23, 1564. He is a frequently quoted writer famous for his sonnets and plays. Shakespeare is best-known for many endeared plays, including Romeo and Juliet, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Macbeth, Hamlet, Othello, and many more. His poetry includes the heroic poems Venus and Adonis, The Rape of Lucrece, the 154 Sonnets, and more... For Shakespeare's brief biography, here's the link --- [William Shakespeare] Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinker Datebook: April 22 Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), German philosopher and professor, was born on April 22, 1724, in Königsberg. He is considered the most influential thinker of the modern age. Kant is best known for his three treatises:
In addition to his technical treatises, Immanuel Kant produced several essays in support of religious liberalism and enlightenment. Here's the full article --- [Immanuel Kant] ~ Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: April 18. Clarence Seward Darrow (1857-1938), American Lawyer and defender of the poor, best known for using poetry in his summation, was born on April 18, in Trumbull Country, Ohio. Darrow defended Eugene V. Debs following the Pullman strike. In the Woodworkers case, he won for labor the legal right to strike. He also successfully defended William Haywood, accused of assassinating former Idaho Governor Frank Steunenberg. Clarence Darrow achieved further fame in the Loeb-Leopold murder case and in the John Scopes "monkey" trial, successfully opposing William Jennings Bryan. Darrow wrote Crime, Its Cause and Treatment. He died in Ohio, March 13, 1938. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: April 16. Anatole France (1844-1924), one of the most popular French writers of the 20th century, was born April 16, 1844. His real name was Jacques Anatole Francois Thibault. France achieved recognition with the novels The Crime of sylvester Bonnard and Thais.Awarded the 1921 Nobel Prize for Literature, Anatole France wrote mostly historical and social novels. France supported Zola in the Dreyfus affair, and his writing became increasingly political as in the novels Contemporary History and Penguin Island, a fantasy novel he is best remembered for which is about the epic history of an imaginary penguin civilization. Here's a link to Anatole France's brief biography. ~ Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: April 16. Sir Charlie (Charles Spencer) Chaplin (1889-1977), English actor and filmmaker was born April 16. He was honored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (1973), and knighted in 1975. Regarded as the greatest comedian of the silent era and a master mime, he toured the US with a pantomime troupe and worked for Keystone Studios. In his short films, including Tillie's Punctured Romance, The Immigrant, and A Dog's Life, he developed the "Tramp" - a wistful and jaunty soul in baggy pants and moustache. In 1919, he founded United Artists Films as an independent production company, with Mary Pickford, D.W. Griffith, and Douglas Fairbanks, Sr. Chaplin is known for many film features including The Kid, The gold Rush, The Circus, The Great Dictator, and Monsieur Verdoux. He settled in Switzerland in 1952. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinker Datebook: April 15. Henry James, Jr. (1843-1916), American-born British novelist, short-story writer, and critic, is born in New York City. The son of Henry James, Sr. and brother pf philosopher and psychologist William James, Henry James received his early education in Europe but also studied in Harvard Law School. However, he entered upon a literary career and published his first novel Watch and Ward in 1871. Five years later, he established residence in England, and after almost 40 years, became a British subject. In his childhood, Henry James was injured. Some scholars suggested that maybe he was psychologically scarred that's why he didn't have a love affair with anyone. He is famous for classic novels including The Wings of the Dove, Washington Square and The Portrait of a Lady - all made into Hollywood movies. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinker Datebook: April 15. Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), Italian painter, sculptor, architect, engineer and scientist, is born April 15, in the Republic of Florence. Da Vinci was the founder of the classic style of High Renaissance. Less than twenty of this paintings are known, and few of them completed to his satisfaction. Da Vinci is best known for Mona Lisa and The Last Supper. As his brilliant mind flowed with ideas, Da Vinci kept these ideas either written or doodled on his notepads. He left numerous notebooks of writings and sketches. Notably, Leonardo da Vinci's writings were written backward, so that it could only be legible when held up to a mirror. Leonardo is best known for his painting the Mona Lisa, considered the most recognizable and analyzed work of art. Many scholars tried to determine the identity of the woman in the painting. Today, songs are composed and fiction books written about her. When he was 30 years old, da Vinci began a sculpture of a horse, said to be difficult to design because the final product weighed many tons when cast in bronze. He spent years sketching the solution how the horse could be balanced. When he finally tried to cast the horse, all the bronze had been used to built cannons for the impending war. The horse sculpture remained unfinished until 1999, not until a Japanese-American sculptor used his drawings and plans to build the horse. The completed horse sculpture was 23 feet high, weighed 15 tons. It was perfectly balanced! One of Leonardo da Vinci's last known paintings is St John the Baptist. In 1517, two years before he died, he became chief painter, architect, and engineer to Francis I at Amboise, France. He died there. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Tthinkers Datebook: April 13. Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), 3rd US president (1801-1809), was born on April 13, on his father's plantation in Goochland (now in Albemarle County), Virginia. He graduated from William and Mary College. He married Martha Wayles Skelton and they had six children. When he was chosen to write the Declaration of Independence, he was just 33 years old. Aside from being a writer, Thomas Jefferson was said to be a strict politician, lawyer, naturalist, musician, scientist, philosopher, and more. His house was filled with scientific gadgets and inventions, and kept accounting on the most obscure details of anything, including the daily fluctuation of the barometric pressure. Quite picky indeed. He designed his own more accurate astronomical clock after missing the 1811 start of the solar eclipse. And more? Jefferson in later life composed all his papers with a device that allowed him to write with two pens at the same time for the simple purpose of keeping copies of all the papers he produced and passed through his hands. Although Thomas Jefferson did not invent the idea of human rights, he was the first to propose founding a new nation on the basis of this very human rights. In the founding document, Jefferson wrote the now famous words, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness." Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinker Datebook: April 10. Joseph Pulitzer (1847-1911), American journalist, was born in Hungary, on April 10, 1847. He emigrated to the United States in 1864, aged 17, and served in the Union Army. Pulitzer pioneered sensational journalism and founded the Pulitzer prizes, as incentive to excellence, of which he is continuously famous for. Pulitzer purchased in 1878 the St Louis Post, merging it with the Dispatch. Later, he also bought the New York World and made it the nation's biggest alleged big business by crusading for oppressed workers and again, against alleged corruption in both government and business corporations. He used the "yellow-press" techniques that another publishing magnate, William Randolph Hearst, copied and also used successfully. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinker Datebook: April 10. Robert Burns Woodward (April 10, 1917 - July 8, 1979), was an American chemist born in Boston, Massachusetts, the son of an English father and Scottish mother. He became professor Harvard and was a Nobel laureate, awarded a Nobel Prize in 1965 in recognition of his synthesis of a number of complex organic substances including cholesterol, cortisone, strychnine, reserpine, chlorophyll, lysergic acid, and some others. Robert Woodward worked closely with Roald Hoffman on theoretical studies of chemical reactions. His contributions are significant especially in the area of organic chemistry. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: April 6. (Raffaello "Raphael" Santi or Raffaello Sanzio (1483-1520), is an Italian painter known for his frescoes. Raphael was influential in establishing the standards of the High Renaissance style, along with the other two older major artists that also influenced him: da Vinci and Michelangelo. Raphael merged the poetic and the dramatic, to achieve a personal and unique power evidenced in his early work "Madonna del Granduca." While Michelangelo worked on the Sistine Chapel, Raphael executed a series of frescoes on the walls and ceiling of the Stanza della Segnatura in the Vatican Palace, a commission he received from Julius II. Raphael's "School of Athens" is considered his masterpiece. Here's a brief biography of Raffaello "Raphael" Santi * * * Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: April 2. Emile Zola (1840-1902), French novelist, is born today. He was a leader of the naturalist school and an influential writer of the 19th century France. He was famous for the Dreyfus affair. Some of his novels include Nana, Germinal, and Le Docteur Pascal.Zola was tried for writing a letter J'accuse in support of Alfred Dreyfus in 1898, and fled to England for a brief exile. Here's a brief biography of Emile Zola. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinker Datebook: April 2 Max Ernst (1891-1976), German painter and sculptor is born today, April 2. Ernst founded the Dada group in Cologne in 1919, and later, prominent in the surrealist movement. He used paintings and collages and developed the form known as 'frottage,' to express his fantastic visions. In 1926, Ernst exhibited in the Galerie Surrealiste that also featured works by Pablo Picasso, Andre Masson, Yves Tanguy, Joan Miro, Man Ray, among others. Here's a link to Dada artist Max Ernst. His sculptures in bronzes were known to be most outstanding. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinker Datebook: 1 April Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismark, Count of Bismarck-Schönhausen (1815-1898), Prussian and German statesman of the 19th century, was born April 1, 1815 in Schönhausen, today Saxony-Anhalt. Born into a wealthy Prussian family, he dedicated his life to building a strong, unified Germany under Prussian leadership. He entered the Prussian Parliament in 1847 and served until he was appointed minister to the German diet. He also became ambassador to Russia, and then, France. Bismarck oversaw the unification of Germany when he became the Minister-President of Prussia from 1862-90. From 1867, he was Chancellor of the North German Confederation. When the second German Empire was formed in 1871 in which William I was proclaimed German emperor, Bismarck served as its first Chancellor. He turned to alliances rather than wars to foster German interests. He gained the nickname "Iron Chancellor." As Chancellor, Bismark held an important role in German government and greatly influenced German politics during his time of service. Posted by Tel Asiado Great Thinkers Datebook: March 31. Rene Descartes, French philosopher, mathematician and physicist famous for 'Cogito Ergo Sum' - 'I think therefore I am - turns 412. He was born March 31, 1596. He is known as the 'father of modern philosophy,' and to physicists, he discovered the law of refraction. Link to full article ... Rene Descartes Other great thinker celebrants: Sir Lawrence Bragg (1890), Australian-born British physicist, shared 1915 Nobel Prize with his father Sir William, for work on crystal structure. Robert Bunsen (1811), German chemist, invented and improved electrochemical battery and gas burner (named in his honor) and photometer. He also discovered elements cesium and rubidium. Franz Joseph "Papa" Haydn (1732), Austrian composer, known as the 'father of the symphony' |
