| Biography (145) |
Find biographies of famous male and female historial characters throughout the last thousand years. |
Biography
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Harriet Beecher Stowe.
In a plain home, in the town of Litchfield, Conn., was born, June 14,
1811, Harriet Beecher Stowe. The house was well-nigh full of little
...
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Helen Hunt Jackson.
Thousands were saddened when, Aug. 12, 1885, it was flashed across the
wires that Helen Hunt Jackson was dead. The _Nation_ said, "The new...
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"helen Jackson."
That same day she wrote her last touching poem:--
"Father, I scarcely dare to pray,
So clear I see, now it is done,
That I have wa...
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Lucretia Mott.
Years ago I attended, at some inconvenience, a large public meeting,
because I heard that Lucretia Mott was to speak. After several
addres...
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Mary A. Livermore.
When a nation passes through a great struggle like our Civil War,
great leaders are developed. Had it not been for this, probably Mrs.
Liv...
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Margaret Fuller Ossoli.
From engraving by Hall]
Margaret Fuller, in some respects the most remarkable of American
women, lived a pathetic life and died a tragic d...
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Maria Mitchell.
In the quiet, picturesque island of Nantucket, in a simple home, lived
William and Lydia Mitchell with their family of ten children. Willi...
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William Mitchell.
The answer showed that Miss Mitchell had indeed made a new discovery.
Frederick VI., King of Denmark, had, sixteen years before, offered a...
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Louisa M. Alcott.
A dozen of us sat about the dinner-table at the Hotel Bellevue,
Boston. One was the gifted wife of a gifted clergyman; one had written
two...
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Mary Lyon.
There are two women whose memory the girls in this country should
especially revere,--Mary Lyon and Catharine Beecher. When it was
unfashi...
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Harriet G. Hosmer.
Women.")]
Some years ago, in an art store in Boston, a crowd of persons stood
gazing intently upon a famous piece of statuary. The red cur...
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Madame De Stael.
From the painting by Mlle. Godefroy.]
It was the twentieth of September, 1881. The sun shone out mild and
beautiful upon Lake Geneva, as w...
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Rosa Bonheur
In a simple home in Paris could have been seen, in 1829, Raymond
Bonheur and his little family,--Rosa, seven years old, August,
Isadore, a...
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Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
Ever since I had received in my girlhood, from my best friend, the
works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, in five volumes in blue and gold,
...
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George Eliot.
Going to the Exposition at New Orleans, I took for reading on the
journey, the life of George Eliot, by her husband, Mr. J.W. Cross,
writt...
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Elizabeth Fry.
When a woman of beauty, great wealth, and the highest social position,
devotes her life to the lifting of the lowly and the criminal, and
...
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Elizabeth Thompson Butler.
While woman has not achieved such brilliant success in art, perhaps,
as in literature, many names stand high on the lists. Early history
h...
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Florence Nightingale.
Eminent Men and Women."]
One of the most interesting places in the whole of London, is St.
Thomas' Hospital, an immense four-story structu...
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Lady Brassey.
One of my pleasantest days in England was spent at old Battle Abbey,
the scene of the ever-memorable Battle of Hastings, where William of
...
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Baroness Burdett-coutts.
We hear, with comparative frequency, of great gifts made by men:
George Peabody and Johns Hopkins, Ezra Cornell and Matthew Vassar,
Commod...
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Jean Ingelow.
The same friend who had given me Mrs. Browning's five volumes in blue
and gold, came one day with a dainty volume just published by Robert...
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Ellis And Acton Bell
It has been thought that all the works published under the names of
Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell were, in reality, the production of
on...
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The Story Of Antony And Cleopatra
Of all love stories that are known to human history, the love
story of Antony and Cleopatra has been for nineteen centuries the
mos...
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Abelard And Heloise
Many a woman, amid the transports of passionate and languishing
love, has cried out in a sort of ecstasy:
"I love you as no woman e...
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Queen Elizabeth And The Earl Of Leicester
History has many romantic stories to tell of the part which women
have played in determining the destinies of nations. Sometimes it
...
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Mary Queen Of Scots And Lord Bothwell
Mary Stuart and Cleopatra are the two women who have most
attracted the fancy of poets, dramatists, novelists, and painters,
from t...
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Queen Christina Of Sweden And The Marquis Monaldeschi
Sweden to-day is one of the peaceful kingdoms of the world, whose
people are prosperous, well governed, and somewhat apart from the
...
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King Charles Ii. And Nell Gwyn
One might classify the kings of England in many ways. John was
undoubtedly the most unpopular. The impetuous yet far-seeing Henry
I...
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The Story Of Prince Charles Edward Stuart
The royal families of Europe are widely known, yet not all of them
are equally renowned. Thus, the house of Romanoff, although
comp...
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The Empress Catharine And Prince Potemkin
It has often been said that the greatest Frenchman who ever lived
was in reality an Italian. It might with equal truth be asserted
...
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Marie Antoinette And Count Fersen
The English-speaking world long ago accepted a conventional view
of Marie Antoinette. The eloquence of Edmund Burke in one
brillian...
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The Story Of Aaron Burr
There will come a time when the name of Aaron Burr will be cleared
from the prejudice which now surrounds it, when he will stand in
...
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George Iv. And Mrs. Fitzherbert
In the last decade of the eighteenth century England was perhaps
the most brilliant nation of the world. Other countries had been
h...
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Charlotte Corday And Adam Lux
Perhaps some readers will consider this story inconsistent with
those that have preceded it. Yet, as it is little known to most
rea...
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Napoleon And Marie Walewska
There are four women who may be said to have deeply influenced the
life of Napoleon. These four are the only ones who need to be
ta...
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The Story Of Pauline Bonaparte
It was said of Napoleon long ago that he could govern emperors and
kings, but that not even he could rule his relatives. He himself
...
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The Story Of The Empress Marie Louise And Count Neipperg
There is one famous woman whom history condems while at the same
time it partly hides the facts which might mitigate the harshness
...
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The Wives Of General Houston
Sixty or seventy years ago it was considered a great joke to chalk
up on any man's house-door, or on his trunk at a coaching-station...
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Lola Montez And King Ludwig Of Bavaria
Lola Montez! The name suggests dark eyes and abundant hair, lithe
limbs and a sinuous body, with twining hands and great eyes that
...
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Leon Gambetta And Leonie Leon
The present French Republic has endured for over forty years.
Within that time it has produced just one man of extraordinary
power ...
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Lady Blessington And Count D'orsay
Often there has arisen some man who, either by his natural gifts
or by his impudence or by the combination of both, has made
himsel...
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Byron And The Countess Guiccioli
In 1812, when he was in his twenty-fourth year, Lord Byron was
more talked of than any other man in London. He was in the first
flu...
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The Story Of Mme. De Stael
Each century, or sometimes each generation, is distinguished by
some especial interest among those who are given to fancies--not
to...
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The Story Of Karl Marx
Some time ago I entered a fairly large library--one of more than
two hundred thousand volumes--to seek the little brochure on Karl
...
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Ferdinand Lassalle And Helene Von Donniges
The middle part of the nineteenth century is a period which has
become more or less obscure to most Americans and Englishmen. At
on...
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The Story Of Rachel
Outside of the English-speaking peoples the nineteenth century
witnessed the rise and triumphant progress of three great tragic
act...
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Dean Swift And The Two Esthers
The story of Jonathan Swift and of the two women who gave their
lives for love of him is familiar to every student of English
liter...
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Percy Bysshe Shelley And Mary Godwin
A great deal has been said and written in favor of early marriage;
and, in a general way, early marriage may be an admirable thing.
...
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The Story Of The Carlyles
To most persons, Tennyson was a remote and romantic figure. His
homes in the Isle of Wight and at Aldworth had a dignified
seclusio...
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The Story Of The Hugos
Victor Hugo, after all criticisms have been made, stands as a
literary colossus. He had imaginative power which makes his finest
pa...
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The Story Of George Sand
To the student of feminine psychology there is no more curious and
complex problem than the one that meets us in the life of the
gi...
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The Mystery Of Charles Dickens
Perhaps no public man in the English-speaking world, in the last
century, was so widely and intimately known as Charles Dickens.
Fr...
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Honore De Balzac And Evelina Hanska
I remember once, when editing an elaborate work on literature,
that the publisher called me into his private office. After the
door...
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Charles Reade And Laura Seymour
The instances of distinguished men, or of notable women, who have
broken through convention in order to find a fitting mate, are
ve...
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The Nibelungs
The time came when the people of Western Europe learned to believe
in one God and were converted to Christianity, but the old ...
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Alaric The Visigoth
King from 394-410 A.D.
Long before the beginning of the period known as the Middle Ages
a tribe of barbarians called the Go...
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Attila The Hun
King from 434-453 A.D.
The fierce and warlike tribe, called the Huns, who had driven the
Goths to seek new homes, came from A...
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Genseric The Vandal
King from 427-477 A.D.
The Vandals were another wild and fierce tribe that came from the
shores of the Baltic and invaded cen...
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Theodoric The Ostrogoth
King from 475-526 A.D.
The Ostrogoths, or East Goths, who had settled in Southern Russia,
at length pushed southward and west...
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Clovis
King from 481-511 A.D.
While the power of the Roman Empire was declining there dwelt on
the banks of the River Rhine a number...
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Justinian The Great
Emperor from 527-565 A.D.
In the time of Clovis the country now called Bulgaria was inhabited
by Goths. One day a poor sheph...
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Mohammed
Lived from 570-632 A.D.
A great number of people in Asia and Africa and much of those in
Turkey in Europe profess the Mohamme...
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Charles Martel
714-741 A.D. and Pepin, 741-768 A.D.
After the death of Mohammed the Saracens, as Mohammedans are also
called, became great warrior...
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Charlemagne
King from 768-814 A.D.
Pepin had two sons Charles and Carloman. After the death of their
father they ruled together, but...
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Harun-al-rashid
Caliph from 786-809 A.D.
The most celebrated of all Mohammedan caliphs was Harun-al-Rashid,
which means, in English, Aaron th...
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Egbert
King from 802-837 A.D.
Egbert the Saxon lived at the same time as did Harun-al-Rashid and
Charlemagne. He was the first king...
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Rollo The Viking
Died 931 A.D.
For more than two hundred years during the Middle Ages the Christian
countries of Europe were attacked on the s...
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Alfred The Great
King from 871-901 A.D.
The Danes were neighbors of the Norwegian Vikings, and like them
were fond of the sea and piracy. The...
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Henry The Fowler
King from 919-936 A.D.
About a hundred years had passed since the death of Charlemagne,
and his great empire had fallen to pi...
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Canute The Great
King from 1014-1035
The Danes, you remember, had the eastern and northern parts
of England in the time of Alfred. Alfred's s...
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The Cid
Late one sunny afternoon one and twenty knights were riding along
the highway in the northern part of Spain. As they were passi...
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Edward The Confessor
King from 1042-1066
The Danish kings who followed Canute were not like him. They were
cruel, unjust rulers and all the peopl...
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William The Conqueror
King from 1066-1087
On the death of Edward the Confessor the throne of England was
claimed by William, Duke of Normandy.
W...
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Peter The Hermit
About 1050-1115
During the Middle Ages the Christians of Europe used to go to the
Holy Land for the purpose of visiting the...
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Frederick Barbarossa
Emperor from 1152-1190
Frederick I was one of the most famous of German emperors. He was
a tall, stalwart man of majestic ap...
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Henry The Second
1154-1189 and His Sons 1189-1216
In 1154, while Barbarossa was reigning in Germany, Henry II, one
of England's greatest monarchs, c...
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Louis The Ninth
King from 1226-1270
After the time of Barbarossa and Richard Cœur de Lion lived another
great Crusading king. This was a gra...
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Robert Bruce
King from 1306-1329
The most famous king that Scotland ever had was Robert Bruce. He
lived in the days when Edward I, Edward II,...
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Marco Polo
Lived from 1254-1324
Some years before St. Louis led his last Crusade there was born in
Venice a boy named Marco Polo. His f...
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Edward The Black Prince
Lived from 1330-1376
One of the most famous warriors of the Middle Ages was Edward the
Black Prince. He was so called becaus...
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William Tell And Arnold Von Winkelried
Far up among the Alps, in the very heart of Switzerland, are three
districts, or cantons, as they are called, which are known as...
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Tamerlane
Lived from 1333-1405
Tamerlane was the son of the chief of a Mongolian tribe in Central
Asia. His real name was Timour, but ...
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Henry V
King from 1413-1422
Of all the kings that England ever had Henry V was perhaps the
greatest favorite among the people. They ...
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Joan Of Arc
Lived from 1412-1431
In the long wars between the French and English not even the Black
Prince or King Henry V gained such fa...
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Gutenberg
Lived from 1400-1468
While Joan of Arc was busy rescuing France from the English, another
wonderful worker was busy in German...
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Warwick The Kingmaker
Lived from 1428-1471
The earl of Warwick, known as the "kingmaker," was the most famous
man in England for many years after t...
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George Peabody
If America had been asked who were to be her most munificent givers in
the nineteenth century, she would scarcely have pointed to tw...
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Bayard Taylor
Since Samuel Johnson toiled in Grub Street, London, literature has
scarcely furnished a more pathetic or inspiring illustration of s...
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Captain James B Eads
On the steamship "Germanic" I played chess with the great civil
engineer, Captain Eads, stimulated by the thought that to beat him w...
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James Watt
The history of inventors is generally the same old struggle with
poverty. Sir Richard Arkwright, the youngest of thirteen children, ...
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Sir Josiah Mason
One sunny morning in June, I went out five miles from the great
manufacturing city of Birmingham, England, to the pretty town called...
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Bernard Palissy
In the Louvre in Paris, preserved among almost priceless gems, are
several pieces of exquisite pottery called Palissy ware. Thousand...
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Bertel Thorwaldsen
A few months ago we visited a plain old house in Copenhagen, the boyhood
home of the great Danish sculptor. Here he worked with his ...
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Mozart
The quaint old city of Salzburg, Austria, built into the mountain-side,
is a Mecca for all who love music, and admire the immortal M...
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Dr Samuel Johnson
In a quaint old house in Lichfield, England, now used as a draper's
shop, Samuel Johnson, son of a poor bookseller and bookbinder, w...
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Oliver Goldsmith
On a low slab in a quiet spot, just north of the Church of Knight
Templars, in London, are the simple words, "Here lies Oliver Golds...
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Michael Faraday
In the heart of busy London, over a stable, lived James and Margaret
Faraday, with their four little children. The father was a blac...
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Sir Henry Bessemer
A little way from London, England, at Denmark Hill, looking toward the
Crystal Palace, is a mansion which is fit for royalty. The gr...
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Sir Titus Salt
I spent a day, with great interest, in visiting the worsted mills and
warehouses at Saltaire, just out from Bradford, England, which...
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Joseph Marie Jacquard
The small world which lives in elegant houses knows little of the great
world in dingy apartments with bare walls and empty cupboard...
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Horace Greeley
Among the hills of New Hampshire, in a lonely, unpainted house, Horace
Greeley was born, Feb. 3, 1811, the third of seven children. ...
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William Lloyd Garrison
For a great work God raises up a great man. Usually he is trained in the
hard school of poverty, to give him courage and perseveranc...
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Giuseppe Garibaldi
Few men come to greatness. Most drift on with the current, having no
special plan nor aim. They live where their fathers lived, taki...
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Jean Paul Richter
Vasari, who wrote the lives of the Italian painters, truly said, "It is
not by sleeping, but by working, waking, and laboring contin...
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Leon Gambetta
On January 6, 1883, Paris presented a sad and imposing spectacle. Her
shops were closed; her public buildings and her homes were dra...
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David Glasgow Farragut
The possibilities of American life are strikingly illustrated by the
fact that the two names at the head of the army and navy, Grant...
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Ezra Cornell
In the winter of 1819 might have been seen travelling from New Jersey to
De Ruyter in New York, a distance of two hundred and fifty ...
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Lieutenant General Sheridan
It is sometimes said that circumstances make the man; but there must be
something in the man, or circumstances, however favorable, c...
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Thomas Cole
Four of my favorite pictures from childhood have been Cole's "Voyage of
Life." I have studied the tiny infant in the boat surrounded...
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Ole Bull
In the quaint old town of Bergen, Norway, so strange with its narrow
streets, peculiar costumes, and open-hearted people, that no tr...
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Meissonier
The old maxim, that "the gods reward all things to labor," has had fit
illustration in Meissonier. His has been a life of constant, ...
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George W Childs
The "Public Ledger" of Philadelphia, and its owner, are known the world
over. Would we see the large-hearted, hospitable millionaire...
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Dwight L Moody
"There's no chance to get in there. There's six thousand persons inside,
and two thousand outside."
This was said to Dr. Magoun, ...
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Abraham Lincoln
In Gentryville, Indiana, in the year 1816, might have been seen a log
cabin without doors or window-glass, a dirt floor, a bed made ...
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Galileo Galilei
"The same memorable day is marked by the setting of one of the most
brilliant stars in the firmament of art and the rising of ano...
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Sir Isaac Newton
In the same year, 1642, in which Galileo, sad and blind, went away from
the earth, Sir Isaac Newton came to make his home upon it...
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Carl Linnaeus
It was on the 24th of July that we left Stockholm, the Venice of the
North, built on her nine islands, for the famous university ...
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Baron Cuvier
In the town of Montbeliard, France, then belonging to the Duke of
Wuertemberg, August 23, 1769, was born the founder of the Scien...
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Sir William And Caroline Herschel
In Hanover, Germany, in the year 1732, Isaac Herschel and a plain,
industrious girl, Anna Ilse Moritzen, began their home life to...
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Alexander Von Humboldt
The great Agassiz, in his eloquent address, in Boston, on the hundredth
anniversary of the birth of Humboldt, said: "All the fund...
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Sir Humphrey Davy
Coleridge said, "Had not Davy been the first chemist, he probably would
have been the first poet of his age."
Said Professor S...
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John James Audubon
The problem why certain men and women come to eminence, and why others,
with apparently as much ability, remain forever in obscur...
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Samuel Finley Breese Morse
Samuel F. B. Morse was born at the foot of Breed's Hill, Charlestown,
Mass., April 27, 1791. He was the eighth child in a family of ...
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Sir Charles Lyell
Galileo studied and found out the truth that the earth moves around the
sun, and died recanting it.
Buffon, the great French natu...
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Joseph Henry Lld
On Thursday evening, January 16, 1879, a large company gathered in the
hall of the House of Representatives at Washington. They c...
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Louis Agassiz
In the midst of as beautiful scenery as one finds on earth, snow-white
Alps, blue lakes, great fields of purple crocus, and pictu...
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Charles Robert Darwin
On Wednesday, April 26, 1882, sitting in the North Transept of
Westminster Abbey, I looked upon a sad and impressive scene. Under...
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Francis Trevelyan Buckland
Most of those whose lives are sketched in this volume lived to be old
men; but Frank Buckland, the pet and pride of thousands in Eng...
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John Sebastian Bach
(1685-1750)
THE CHILD MUSICIAN
Long ago, in a little German town, lived a jolly old miller. From
morning till night he sang...
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George Frederick Handel
(1685-1759)
THE WONDER CHILD
[Music: (The Messiah.) He shall feed His flock like a shepherd.]
It is a bright, sunshiny morni...
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
(1756-1791)
THE CHILD MOZART
Far, far away over land and sea lies the little town of Salzburg. What a
beautiful place it is! O...
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Francis Joseph Haydn
(1732-1809)
THE CHOIR BOY
Once upon a time there lived, in a tiny village in Austria, a
wheelwright and his family. The wheelw...
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Ludwig Van Beethoven
(1770-1827)
EARLY LIFE OF BEETHOVEN
Some day you may be fortunate enough to cross the broad Atlantic and
visit European countr...
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Felix Mendelssohn
(1809-1847)
If you were to go into the woods and hear the rustling of the leaves,
the singing of the birds, and the babbling of t...
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Frederick Chopin
(1809-1849)
A POLISH LAD WHO BECAME FAMOUS
Many famous men were born in the year 1809. We are proud to number among
them sever...
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Robert Schumann
(1810-1856)
BOYHOOD OF SCHUMANN
"Left, face! Forward, march!" Clear rang out the words of the little
commander. Quickly the st...
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Franz Peter Schubert
(1797-1828)
God sent his singers upon earth
With songs of gladness and of mirth,
That they might touch the hearts of m...
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Richard Wagner
(1813-1883)
EARLY LIFE OF WAGNER
[Music: (Die Walküre.) (Sword Motif.)]
Richard Wagner was born in Leipzig, in 1813. He was...
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Robert Boyle
Robert Boyle was descended from a family who, in Saxon times, held
land in the county of Hereford, and whose name in the Doomsday Bo...
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Benjamin Franklin
Among those whose contributions to physics have immortalized their
names in the annals of science, there is none that holds a more
...
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Henry Cavendish
It would not be easy to mention two men between whom there was a
greater contrast, both in respect of their characters and lives, th...
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Count Rumford
Benjamin Thompson, like Franklin, was a native of Massachusetts, his
ancestors for several generations having been yeomen in that pr...
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Thomas Young
"We here meet with a man altogether beyond the common standard, one in
whom natural endowment and sedulous cultivation rivalled each...
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Michael Faraday
The work of Michael Faraday introduced a new era in the history of
physical science. Unencumbered by pre-existing theories, and
unt...
|
James Clerk Maxwell
The story of the life of James Clerk Maxwell has been told so recently
by the able pen of his lifelong friend, Professor Lewis Campb...
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