Favorite character from history and why??

Answer 1

Lincoln. Such a tragic figure. Self-educated. Played the starring role in perhaps the most important episode in US history. His frustrations dealing with incompetent generals. Deaths of his sons. Wife goes insane. Empathy for the south. Murdered because, and just after, he finally accomplished his greatest task. Great sense of humor. Great writer. A genius who hid it well. Probably an atheist.

Answer 2

How about Emperor Norton the First?
Okay, so he's not all that well known, but he lost all his money in San Francisco in the late-1800s and lost his mind with it. He would parade around the city thinking he was an emperor. During this time he came up with such terrible ideas as building a suspension bridge across the Golden Gate (which really was the name of the opening into San Francisco Bay long before it was a bridge). It goes to show that there can be great knowledge and creativity, even in madness.

Answer 3

Boudicca Queen of the Iceni. In Britain, 61 AD, she began a rebellion against Rome that almost kicked them out forever. She is basically the female Braveheart and came 1200 years before William Wallace.

She was a real hero and stood defiantly against the most powerful empire in the world at that time...alone...at first anyway.

I like Alexander the Great too.


And just so you know, Woodrow Wilson was not a very good President. He kept peace by lieing and decieving. He promised to keep America out of the war and as soon as he was inaugrated he declared war against Germany. He hated the little guy or the Socialists of America and did everything he could to quiet them. And he repeatedly told Americans that they needed to fight, that we need your young men, and lied again when he told the people what was going on over there. That no one was dying. 7,000 were killed a day in trench warfare and 1 million at one battle. If Americans really knew what was going on do you think they would have wanted to fight??

Woodrow Wilson was one of the biggest liars the White House has ever seen.

Answer 4

Julius Caesar. I find it truly remarkable how one man can utterly change the course of history, and 2000 years later he is still remembered as a household name.

And yet, despite his reputation, he is still utterly mysterious. Was he a tyrant or a hero? Some consider him a tyrant, as he broke laws and invaded Rome, enacted Martial law, and over the course of his reign, had his political rivals murdered, but he was not the first Roman to do any of these things, nor the first to be elected perpetual dictator (that distinction belongs to Sulla) and it was known at the time of his assassination he was planning a campaign to conquer Parthia. Hardly a good short term strategy if he was, in fact, planning to consolidate his powers as an absolute dictator. Politically, he was a populist, which means that he was a man of the people. His opponents were Optimates, who were men of the conservative aristocracy. Julius Caesar championed freeing slaves, creating jobs, and improving security. This is not an apology for what he did. After all, his actions were responsible for the creation of the Imperial Era, which ultimately ended up destroying Rome. But it is interesting how he contradicted many presumptions that we have about tyranny and democracy.

As a military commander, his genius is beyond dispute. He took his relatively small army, invaded one of Rome's oldest, largest, and most aggressive neighbors (the Gauls) and over the course of a single 8-year campaign, pacified them, and turned them into one of Rome's most stalwart and enduring provinces. The boarders that Caesar established remained so right up until Rome's disintegration.

By any accounts, he should have ended up like Sulla. Someone we remember as a successful Roman, but relatively obscure outside academia. But the stars aligned with Caesar. While a young praetor in Hispania, he reputedly saw a statue of Alexander the Great, and fell at its feet, weeping bitterly, because he had not accomplished anything in his life at the time that came close to Alexander's exploits when he was at that age. But in the end, Caesar became the only man from antiquity that virtually everyone knows about, or at least has heard his name.

Answer 5

My favorite person from history would have to be Achilles the Myrmidon, who fought with the greek army under the command of Agammenon. His mother was the immortal goddess Thetis, and his father the mortal Peleus. As is well known, his only weakness was his heel. When he was a child, he was dipped in the river Styx, in an attempt to make him immortal, and the only part of his body that did not touch the water was his heel. Perhaps it was fate then that allowed Paris to aim his arrows in that very place, therby killing the warrior percieved by so many as an immortal.

Achillies is so great a character simply because of the choice he was forced to make. He was warned that leaving his home and fighting alongside the Greeks at Troy would lead him to his doom. He was warned that in the final moments, as the Trojans were fleeing from the burning citadel, that at last he would be slain. But also was he warned that if he did not travel to Troy, his name would be forgotten. That none would remember him , save his children and their children. That the name of Achilles would pass out of all memory, and the small mark he had left on the world would mean nothing so many thousands of years later.

To Achilles, the choice was clear. He wished for nothing more than honor and glory, for immortality. He wished only to have his name not merely remembered by those who knew him, but to be ingrained in legend and history alike, for as long time herself should live on. I respect and honor him more than anyone else in all of history, becuase he knew his doom. He took it by the hands and danced with it. And it has payed off hasnt it?? Here we are three thousand years later, with his name still on our lips, and in our hearts.

Answer 6

Franklin Roosevelt because he saved capitalism during the Depression by modifying it into a system that worked, and led the Allies to victory in World War 2. And he did all that from a wheelchair. Truly a hero.

Answer 7

So many people have influenced the course of human history, how can anyone pick just one? I like the stories of people who aren't very well known, but have had a lasting impact.

Answer 8

Elizabeth 1. If she doesn't prove that a woman can do the job. Then who does?
There are many more but she did what she had to do when women really were regarded as 2nd class people.

Answer 9

I agree with jxt299 ...I believe Roosevelt can be ranked in the worlds top 10 greatest people

Answer 10

Buddy Holly, pioneer of Rock n Roll