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Aung San Suu Kyi
Aung San Suu Kyi was born on June 19, 1945 as the daughter of national leader General Aung San (assassinated July 19, 1947) and Daw Khin Kyi. She was educated in Rangoon, Burma until she was 15 years old. In 1960 she accompanied her mother to Delhi, India on her appointment as Burmese ambassador to India and Nepal. Kyi studied politics at Delhi University. She earned a BA in philosophy, politics and economics from St. Hugh’s College, Oxford University....
Mohandas Karamchand (Mahatma) Gandhi
Thinker, statesman and nationalist leader, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi not only led his own country to independence but also influenced political activists of many persuasions throughout the world with his methods and philosophy of nonviolent confrontation, or civil disobedience. Born in Porbandar in Gujarat on October 2, 1869, his actions inspired the great Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore to call him “Mahatma” (“great soul”). For him, the universe was regulated by a Supreme Intelligence or Principle, which he preferred to call satya (Truth) and, as a concession to convention, God....
Albert Einstein
German-American physicist Albert Einstein contributed more than any other scientist to the 20th-century vision of physical reality. In the wake of World War I, Einstein’s theories, especially his theory of relativity, seemed to many people to point to a pure quality of human thought, one far removed from the war and its aftermath. Seldom has a scientist received such public attention for having cultivated the fruit of pure learning. Born in Ulm in Germany on March 14, 1879, Einstein’s parents were nonobservant Jews who moved from Ulm to Munich when Einstein was an infant....
Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa was born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu, the youngest of three children of an Albanian builder, on August 26, 1910 in Skopje, Macedonia. She felt that August 27, 1910, the day of her baptism, was her true birthday. At the age of 18 she joined the Order of the Sisters of Our Lady of Loreto in Ireland. She trained in Dublin, where the motherhouse of the Loreto Sisters was located. She chose the name of Sister Teresa, in memory of Saint Thérèse of Lisieux....
Rabindranath Tagore
Mystic, painter and Nobel laureate for literature, Rabindranath Tagore was a prolific writer (3,000 poems, 2,000 songs, 8 novels, 40 volumes of essays and short stories, 50 plays), who drew inspiration both from his native Bengal and from English literary tradition. His major theme was humanity’s search for God and truth. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for his collection of well-known poems Gitanjali (Song Offerings). Born in Calcutta on May 7, 1861, Rabindranath was the youngest of fourteen children....
Karl Marx
German economist, philosopher, and revolutionist, Karl Marx’s writings form the basis of the body of ideas known as Marxism. As one of the most original and influential thinkers of modern times, Karl Marx produced, with the aid of Friedrich Engels, much of the theory of modern socialism and communism. Born on May 5, 1818, Marx lived in a period of unrestrained capitalism when exploitation and misery were the lot of the industrial working classes, and it was his and Engels’ humanitarianism and concern for social justice that inspired his work....
Muhammad Ali
American boxer Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr, was born on January 17, 1942 in Louisville, Kentucky. Better known as Muhammad Ali, he was perhaps the most celebrated sports figure in the world during most of the 1960s and ’70s. His rise to prominence may be attributed to a combination of circumstances his role as a spokesman for and idol of blacks; his vivacious personality; his dramatic conversion to the Black Muslim religion; and most important, his staying power as an athlete....
Dalai Lama
His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet was born in 1935, soon after the 13th Dalai Lama passed away. He was the fourth son of a poor peasant family in Takster village, Amdo province in eastern Tibet. The line of Dalai Lamas, spiritual and temporal rulers of Tibet since the 13th century, is a succession of incarnations. In accordance with tradition, search parties were sent to find the successor to the thirteenth Dalai Lama. Two years later, following the various signs and portents, a government party was led to Takster, where they found the infant Lhamo Thondup....
Nelson Mandela
Nelson Rohihlahla Mandela, b. July 18, 1918, was the first South African president to be elected in a fully representative democratic election. Trained as an attorney, he helped form the Youth League of the African National Congress (ANC) in 1944. In 1961 he abandoned peaceful protest and became head of the ANC’s new military wing. Sentenced to life imprisonment in 1964, Mandela came to symbolize black political aspirations and was named head of the ANC after his release on Feb....
Jacques-Yves Cousteau
If there is one person who single-handedly fascinated millions of landlocked viewers to venture underwater into the unknown, through television, it is the Frenchman Jacques Cousteau. Jacques-Yves Cousteau was born on June 11, 1910, in the town of St.-Andre-de-Cubzac near Bordeaux, in France, to Daniel and Elizabeth Cousteau. As a child, Jacques was quite sickly but he nonetheless learned to swim at the age of four. His initial dip led to his everlasting love for the sea....