phenomenons, people, occasions... which changed the world!

[aye_sha90]

Hey guys and girls. I've thought lot of times to start a thread about the phenomenons, people, wars, revolutions etc etc etc... which had a relative influence on us and on our world
You all can collaborate and update! :D

Here i start with the "Tsunami"; which regards specially our country and South. Asia.


TSUNAMI

http://img27.picoodle.com/img/img27/3/10/16/f_Tsunamim_7c43eb6.jpg (http://www.picoodle.com/view.php?img=/3/10/16/f_Tsunamim_7c43eb6.jpg&srv=img27)

A tsunami (pronounced /(t)suːˈnɑːmi/) is a series of waves created when a body of water, such as an ocean, is rapidly displaced. Earthquakes, mass movements above or below water, some volcanic eruptions and other underwater explosions, landslides, underwater earthquakes, large asteroid impacts and testing with nuclear weapons at sea all have the potential to generate a tsunami. The effects of a tsunami can be devastating due to the immense volumes of water and energy involved. Since meteorites are small, they will not generate a tsunami.


Terminology


The term tsunami comes from the Japanese meaning harbor ("tsu", 津) and wave ("nami", 波). [a. Jap. tsunami, tunami, f. tsu harbour + nami waves.—Oxford English Dictionary]. For the plural, one can either follow ordinary English practice and add an s, or use an invariable plural as in Japanese. Tsunamis are common throughout Japanese history; approximately 195 events in Japan have been recorded.

Causes

A tsunami can be generated when converging or destructive plate boundaries abruptly move and vertically displace the overlying water. It is very unlikely that they can form at divergent (constructive) or conservative plate boundaries. This is because constructive or conservative boundaries do not generally disturb the vertical displacement of the water column. Subduction zone related earthquakes generate the majority of all tsunamis.

A tsunami has a much smaller amplitude (wave height) offshore, and a very long wavelength (often hundreds of kilometers long), which is why they generally pass unnoticed at sea, forming only a slight swell usually about 300 mm above the normal sea surface. A tsunami can occur at any state of the tide and even at low tide will still inundate coastal areas if the incoming waves surge high enough.

[twisted]

oh thanks for info

[aye_sha90]

oh thanks for info
i need updates :P
hehe..

[twisted]

i need updates :P
hehe..

how do you mean :)

[aye_sha90]

how do you mean :)
I mean that you'll got the possibility to put whatvr you wanna!
About wars, dictators.. important people.. etc etc :D

[twisted]

I mean that you'll got the possibility to put whatvr you wanna!
About wars, dictators.. important people.. etc etc :D

oh i get it now lol I'll try later lol I'm not much of a fan of such things you know ;)

[psyche]

post slot reserved for a plausible topic :D ;)

[ni_shi2005]

nice topic aicha!!

[aye_sha90]

post slot reserved for a plausible topic :D ;)



:D thanks

[aye_sha90]

nice topic aicha!!
thanks :)

[Sudantha_s]

Vasily Zaytsev

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5a/Vasily.Zaitsev.jpg/454px-Vasily.Zaitsev.jpg

Soviet sniper during World War II, notable particularly for his activities between November 10 and December 17, 1942 during the Battle of Stalingrad. He killed 225 soldiers and officers of the Wehrmacht and other Axis armies, including 11 enemy snipers.[1] Prior to 10 November, he had already killed 32 Axis soldiers with the standard-issue Mosin-Nagant rifle. Between October 1942 and January 1943, Zaytsev had made 242 verified kills, but the real number may be much higher;some argue it might have been as many as 500.His military rank at the time was Junior Lieutenant.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9a/Zajcev_rifle.jpg



Zaytsev was born in Yeleninskoye and grew up in the Ural Mountains. His surname Zaytsev has the same root as the word "hare" (zayats) in Russian. Before going to Stalingrad, he served in the Russian Navy as a clerk but upon reading about the brutality of the fighting in Stalingrad, he volunteered for front-line duty. Zaytsev served in the 1047th Rifle Regiment of the 284th Rifle Division of the 62nd Army. He is notable for having participated in the Battle of Stalingrad. There, the Russians set up a snipers' training school in the Lazur chemical works; it was run by Zaytsev. The snipers Zaytsev trained were nicknamed zaichata, meaning "leverets" (baby hares). Anthony Beevor wrote in Stalingrad that this was the start of the "sniper movement" in the 62nd Army. Conferences were arranged to spread the doctrine of "sniperism" and exchange ideas on technique and principles that were not limited to marksmanship skills. It is estimated that the snipers Zaytsev trained killed more than 3000 enemy soldiers.

http://us.movies1.yimg.com/movies.yahoo.com/images/hv/photo/movie_pix/paramount_pictures/enemy_at_the_gates/_group_photos/joseph_fiennes2.jpg

Zaytsev served until January 1943, when he suffered an injury to his eyes from a landmine. He was attended to by Professor Filatov, who is credited with restoring his sight. He then returned to the front and finished the war on the Dniestr River with the military rank of Captain. After the end of the war, Zaytsev visited Berlin, where he met friends who served with him. After the war, Zaytsev managed a factory in Kiev, and remained in that city until he died at the age of 76 after suffering a disease

[Sudantha_s]

if i put whatever i want you'll hate me :lol:

this is the PRO Section not the Chat Section :dull: , I'll put More World war II Articles here :D

[zCexVe]

Alfred Bernhard Nobel { http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Nobel )

Alfred Bernhard Nobel was born in Stockholm, Sweden (http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/2WWsweden.htm) in 1833. The son of an engineer, he moved in his childhood to Russia, where his father was working on an underwater mine. Alfred studied Chemistry in Paris and worked for a time in the USA before returning to Sweden in 1859.

In 1866 Nobel produced what he believed was a safe and manageable form of nitroglycerin called dynamite. He established his own factory to produce it but in 1864 an explosion at the plant killed Nobel's younger brother and four other workers. Deeply shocked by this event, he now worked on a safer explosive and in 1875 came up with gelignite.

Other inventions followed including ballistite, a form of smokeless power (http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/FWWsmoke.htm), artificial gutta-percha and a mild steel for armour-plating. As well as manufacturing goods, Nobel also successfully obtained oil from the Baku in Aberbaijan.

By the time Alfred Nobel died on December 10th 1896, he had obtained a massive fortune. He left instructions that most of his money should be used to endow annual Nobel prizes. The very first awards were made in 1901 on the fifth anniversary of Nobel's death.

[aye_sha90]

Vasily Zaytsev

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5a/Vasily.Zaitsev.jpg/454px-Vasily.Zaitsev.jpg

Soviet sniper during World War II, notable particularly for his activities between November 10 and December 17, 1942 during the Battle of Stalingrad. He killed 225 soldiers and officers of the Wehrmacht and other Axis armies, including 11 enemy snipers.[1] Prior to 10 November, he had already killed 32 Axis soldiers with the standard-issue Mosin-Nagant rifle. Between October 1942 and January 1943, Zaytsev had made 242 verified kills, but the real number may be much higher;some argue it might have been as many as 500.His military rank at the time was Junior Lieutenant.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9a/Zajcev_rifle.jpg



Zaytsev was born in Yeleninskoye and grew up in the Ural Mountains. His surname Zaytsev has the same root as the word "hare" (zayats) in Russian. Before going to Stalingrad, he served in the Russian Navy as a clerk but upon reading about the brutality of the fighting in Stalingrad, he volunteered for front-line duty. Zaytsev served in the 1047th Rifle Regiment of the 284th Rifle Division of the 62nd Army. He is notable for having participated in the Battle of Stalingrad. There, the Russians set up a snipers' training school in the Lazur chemical works; it was run by Zaytsev. The snipers Zaytsev trained were nicknamed zaichata, meaning "leverets" (baby hares). Anthony Beevor wrote in Stalingrad that this was the start of the "sniper movement" in the 62nd Army. Conferences were arranged to spread the doctrine of "sniperism" and exchange ideas on technique and principles that were not limited to marksmanship skills. It is estimated that the snipers Zaytsev trained killed more than 3000 enemy soldiers.

http://us.movies1.yimg.com/movies.yahoo.com/images/hv/photo/movie_pix/paramount_pictures/enemy_at_the_gates/_group_photos/joseph_fiennes2.jpg

Zaytsev served until January 1943, when he suffered an injury to his eyes from a landmine. He was attended to by Professor Filatov, who is credited with restoring his sight. He then returned to the front and finished the war on the Dniestr River with the military rank of Captain. After the end of the war, Zaytsev visited Berlin, where he met friends who served with him. After the war, Zaytsev managed a factory in Kiev, and remained in that city until he died at the age of 76 after suffering a disease



AWWWW..AMAZING :D
thanks bro :)

[aye_sha90]

if i put whatever i want you'll hate me :lol:
nope. but it's the pro section.. But well, u can put example.. abt a musical. band :rolleyes:

[zCexVe]

Mikhail Kalashnikov .The maker of AK47.The assualt rifle killed most of the world :P [T 56 is the chinese version]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AK-47
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Kalashnikov

[zCexVe]

Martin Luther King Jr.

Worked for the freedom of Black people in USA.

www.martinlutherking.org

[zCexVe]

Abraham Lincoln

The 16th president of USA.A great person.From road to castle.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln

[zCexVe]

AWWWW..AMAZING :D
thanks bro :)

To know about him well and get really emotional watch the movie "Enemy at the gates".One of my favourites :D

[aye_sha90]

MOTHER TERESA

http://img34.picoodle.com/img/img34/3/10/16/f_motherteresm_2a86c87.jpg (http://www.picoodle.com/view.php?img=/3/10/16/f_motherteresm_2a86c87.jpg&srv=img34)


Mother Teresa was born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu in Skopje*, Macedonia, on August 26**, 1910. Her family was of Albanian descent. At the age of twelve, she felt strongly the call of God. She knew she had to be a missionary to spread the love of Christ. At the age of eighteen she left her parental home in Skopje and joined the Sisters of Loreto, an Irish community of nuns with missions in India. After a few months' training in Dublin she was sent to India, where on May 24, 1931, she took her initial vows as a nun. From 1931 to 1948 Mother Teresa taught at St. Mary's High School in Calcutta, but the suffering and poverty she glimpsed outside the convent walls made such a deep impression on her that in 1948 she received permission from her superiors to leave the convent school and devote herself to working among the poorest of the poor in the slums of Calcutta. Although she had no funds, she depended on Divine Providence, and started an open-air school for slum children. Soon she was joined by voluntary helpers, and financial support was also forthcoming. This made it possible for her to extend the scope of her work.

On October 7, 1950, Mother Teresa received permission from the Holy See to start her own order, "The Missionaries of Charity", whose primary task was to love and care for those persons nobody was prepared to look after. In 1965 the Society became an International Religious Family by a decree of Pope Paul VI.

Today the order comprises Active and Contemplative branches of Sisters and Brothers in many countries. In 1963 both the Contemplative branch of the Sisters and the Active branch of the Brothers was founded. In 1979 the Contemplative branch of the Brothers was added, and in 1984 the Priest branch was established.

The Society of Missionaries has spread all over the world, including the former Soviet Union and Eastern European countries. They provide effective help to the poorest of the poor in a number of countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, and they undertake relief work in the wake of natural catastrophes such as floods, epidemics, and famine, and for refugees. The order also has houses in North America, Europe and Australia, where they take care of the shut-ins, alcoholics, homeless, and AIDS sufferers.

The Missionaries of Charity throughout the world are aided and assisted by Co-Workers who became an official International Association on March 29, 1969. By the 1990s there were over one million Co-Workers in more than 40 countries. Along with the Co-Workers, the lay Missionaries of Charity try to follow Mother Teresa's spirit and charism in their families.

Mother Teresa's work has been recognised and acclaimed throughout the world and she has received a number of awards and distinctions, including the Pope John XXIII Peace Prize (1971) and the Nehru Prize for her promotion of international peace and understanding (1972). She also received the Balzan Prize (1979) and the Templeton and Magsaysay awards.


http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1979/teresa-bio.html

[zCexVe]

Albert Einstein

His theory in relativity brought pysics into new dimensions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein

[aye_sha90]

this is the PRO Section not the Chat Section :dull: , I'll put More World war II Articles here :D

kool :D :)

[zCexVe]

Thomas alva Edison

He helped some really great innvations

www.thomasedison.com

[aye_sha90]

Thomas alva Edison

He helped some really great innvations

www.thomasedison.com/


paste em outa here :D

[aye_sha90]

GALILEO GALILEI

http://img27.picoodle.com/img/img27/3/10/16/f_galileo2m_540cd1c.jpg (http://www.picoodle.com/view.php?img=/3/10/16/f_galileo2m_540cd1c.jpg&srv=img27)




Galileo Galilei was born in Pisa, Italy on February 15, 1564. He was the oldest of seven children. His father was a musician and wool trader, who wanted his son to study medicine as there was more money in medicine. At age eleven, Galileo was sent off to study in a Jesuit monastery.

Galileo Galilei - Rerouted from Religon to Science
After four years, Galileo had announced to his father that he wanted to be a monk. This was not exactly what father had in mind, so Galileo was hastily withdrawn from the monastery. In 1581, at the age of 17, he entered the University of Pisa to study medicine, as his father wished.

Galileo Galilei - Law of the Pendulum
At age twenty, Galileo noticed a lamp swinging overhead while he was in a cathedral. Curious to find out how long it took the lamp to swing back and forth, he used his pulse to time large and small swings. Galileo discovered something that no one else had ever realized: the period of each swing was exactly the same. The law of the pendulum, which would eventually be used to regulate clocks, made Galileo Galilei instantly famous.

Except for mathematics, Galileo Galilei was bored with university. Galileo's family was informed that their son was in danger of flunking out. A compromise was worked out, where Galileo would be tutored full-time in mathematics by the mathematician of the Tuscan court. Galileo's father was hardly overjoyed about this turn of events, since a mathematician's earning power was roughly around that of a musician, but it seemed that this might yet allow Galileo to successfully complete his college education. However, Galileo soon left the University of Pisa without a degree.

FOR MORE INFO ...

http://inventors.about.com/od/gstartinventors/a/Galileo_Galilei.htm

[zCexVe]

paste em outa here :D
He have 1001 innovations under his belt.You want them all ?? :D

[aye_sha90]

He have 1001 innovations under his belt.You want them all ?? :D


lol.. nope.. juz put few :D

[twisted]

nope. but it's the pro section.. But well, u can put example.. abt a musical. band :rolleyes:

ya may be later sorry ..gone :)

[aye_sha90]

LEONARDO DA VINCI


http://img34.picoodle.com/img/img34/3/10/17/f_2904leonardm_760ba1b.jpg (http://www.picoodle.com/view.php?img=/3/10/17/f_2904leonardm_760ba1b.jpg&srv=img34)

INTRODUCTION

Leonardo da Vinci (April 15, 1452 – May 2, 1519) was an Italian Renaissance architect, musician, inventor, engineer, sculptor and painter. He has been described as the archetype of the "Renaissance man" and as a universal genius. Leonardo is famous for his masterly paintings, such as The Last Supper and Mona Lisa. He is also known for designing many inventions that anticipated modern technology but were rarely constructed in his lifetime. In addition, he helped advance the study of anatomy, astronomy, and civil engineering.


FIRST YEARS

Leonardo da Vinci was born in a farm house in Anchiano, 3 kilometres away from Vinci. Since this was before modern naming conventions in Europe, Leonardo's full name became "Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci" which simply means "Leonardo, son of Piero, from Vinci". However Leonardo da Vinci signed most of his work with his first name Leonardo, presumably because he was an illegitimate child. Up to today most authorities refer to his works as Leonardo's and not da Vinci's.

Leonardo's father was a 25 year old public notary at the time Leonardo was born. Leonardo's mother, Catarina, was the daughter of a local farmer. Due to this difference in social class, Leonardo's father married another woman and Leonardo became an illegitimate child. Leonardo stayed in Anchiano till he was 5 and then moved to Vinci where he stayed till he was 14 years old, which was in 1466. It was often told that Leonardo drove his teachers crazy with all his questions.


APPRENTICESHIP IN FLORENCE

When he was 14, Leonardo moved with his father to Florence where he became an apprentice to painter Andrea del Verrocchio. Verrocchio was at this time the most gifted and manifoldest artist in Florence. He was a sculptor, painter, goldsmith, bronze caster and more. The influence of Verrocchio on Leonardo was of sheer importance. In Verrocchio's workshop, Leonardo da Vinci also met up with other famous artists Botticelli, Perugino and Lorenzo di Credi. Leonardo da Vinci got listed in the red book of painters from Florence in 1472, which meant that his apprenticeship was finished.


FIRST WORKS AND LEONARDO'S IMPREACHMENT

The first known and dated work of Leonardo da Vinci is a pen-and-ink drawing of the Arnovalley. Leonardo drew it on August 5, 1473. In 1476 Leonardo and his former master Verrocchio created the painting "Baptism of Christ". This painting was an order from the S.Salvo cloister. Leonardo painted the front angel and the landscape. In 1480/1481 Leonardo da Vinci created the small "Annuncion", now located in the Louvre (Paris, France).

A remarkable fact in the life of Leonardo was his impeachment in 1476. At this time it was a common practice of handing out anonymous accusations in a wooden box in front of the Palazzo Vecchio. Leonardo was charged, together with three other men, of homosexual conduct. All defendants however were acquitted because of lack of evidence. That Leonardo was homosexual now is generally accepted though.


1482 - 1516

From c. 1482 to 1499 Leonardo worked for Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan and maintained his own workshop with apprentices there. Seventy tons of bronze that had been set aside for Leonardo's "Gran Cavallo" horse statue were cast into weapons for the Duke in an attempt to save Milan from the French under Charles VIII in 1495 — see also Italian Wars.

When the French returned under Louis XII in 1498, Milan fell without a fight, overthrowing Sforza. Leonardo stayed in Milan for a time, until one morning he found French archers using his life-size clay model for the "Gran Cavallo" for target practice. He left with Salai and his friend (and inventor of double-entry bookkeeping) Luca Pacioli for Mantua, moving on after 2 months for Venice, then moving again to Florence at the end of April 1500.

In Florence he entered the services of Cesare Borgia (also called "Duca Valentino" and son of Pope Alexander VI) as a military architect and engineer. In 1506 he returned to Milan, now in the hands of Maximilian Sforza after Swiss mercenaries drove out the French.

In 1507 Leonardo met a 15 year old aristocrat of great personal beauty, Count Francesco Melzi. Melzi became his pupil, life companion, and heir.

From 1513 to 1516 he lived in Rome, where painters like Raphael and Michelangelo were active at the time; he did not have much contact with these artists, however. He, however has been assumed to be of pivotal importance in relocation of 'David', the great masterpiece of Michaelangelo. Michaelangelo was apparently quite unhappy about this.


FRANCE (LATTER YEARS AND DEATH)

In 1515 Francis I of France retook Milan, and Leonardo was commissioned to make a centrepiece (of a mechanical lion) for the peace talks in Bologna between the French king and Pope Leo X, where he must have first met the king. Leonardo then spent the last span of his life in Amboise (France), with his famous painting Mona Lisa in his baggage. Leonardo da Vinci lived in a castle next to the king, receiving a very generous pension. In France Leonardo didn't paint, but he made hydrological studies. Being 67 years old, Leonardo died May 2, 1519 in Amboise.


LEONARDO DA VINCI'S PAINTINGS

Leonardo most famous works include "The Last Supper" (painted in 1497) and the "Mona Lisa" painted in 1503-1506. However there are serious doubts whether da Vinci painted Mona Lisa himself or whether it was primarily the work of his students. Only seventeen of his paintings, and none of his statues survive. Of these paintings, only Ginevra de' Benci, The Mona Lisa and The Last Supper are in the Western Hemisphere.


LEONARDO DA VINCI'S OTHER ACHIEVEMENTS

Perhaps even more impressive than his artistic work are his studies in science and engineering, recorded in notebooks comprising some 13,000 pages of notes and drawings, which fuse art and science. He was left-handed and used mirror writing throughout his life. Explainable by fact that it is easier to pull a quill pen than to push it; by using mirror-writing, the left-handed writer is able to pull the pen from right to left.

His approach to science was an observatory one: he tried to understand a phenomenon by describing and depicting it in utmost detail, and did not emphasize experiments or theoretical explanations. Throughout his life, he planned a grand encyclopedia based on detailed drawings of everything. Since he lacked formal education in Latin and mathematics, Leonardo the scientist was mostly ignored by contemporary scholars.

He participated in autopsies and produced many extremely detailed anatomical drawings, planning a comprehensive work of human and comparative anatomy. Around the year 1490, he produced a study in his sketchbook of the Canon of Proportions as described in recently rediscovered writings of the Roman architect Vitruvius. The study, called the Vitruvian Man, is one of his most well-known works.

His study of human anatomy led eventually to the design of the first known robot in recorded history. The design, which has come to be called Leonardo's robot, was probably made around the year 1495 but was rediscovered only in the 1950s. It is not known if an attempt was made to build the device.

Fascinated by the phenomenon of flight, Leonardo produced detailed studies of the flight of birds, and plans for several flying machines, including a helicopter powered by four men (which would not have worked since it would have rotated) and a light hang-glider which could have flown. On January 3, 1496 he unsuccessfully tested a flying machine he had constructed.

In 1502 Leonardo da Vinci produced a drawing of a single span 720-foot (240 m) bridge as part of a civil engineering project for Sultan Beyazid II of Constantinople. The bridge was intended to span an inlet at the mouth of the Bosphorus known as the Golden Horn. It was never built, but Leonardo's vision was resurrected in 2001 when a smaller bridge based on his design was constructed in Norway.

His notebooks also contain several inventions in the military field: machine guns, an armored tank powered by humans or horses, cluster bombs, etc. even though he later held war to be the worst of human activities. Other inventions include a submarine, a cog-wheeled device that has been interpreted as the first mechanical calculator, and a car powered by a spring mechanism. In his years in the Vatican, he planned an industrial use of solar power, by employing concave mirrors to heat water.

In astronomy, Leonardo believed that the Sun and Moon revolved around the Earth, and that the Moon reflects the sun's light due to its being covered by water.

Leonardo did not publish or otherwise distribute the contents of his notebooks. Most scholars believe that Leonardo wanted to publish his notebooks and make his observations public knowledge. They remained obscure until the 19th century, and were not directly of value to the development of science and technology. In January 2005, researchers discovered the hidden laboratory used by Leonardo da Vinci for studies of flight and other pioneering scientific work in previously sealed rooms at a monastery next to the Basilica of the Santissima Annunziata, in the heart of Florence.[

[$kywalker]

hodai hodai..thankx

[aye_sha90]

hodai hodai..thankx


updates are required :P :lol:
joke joke .. but :(

[$kywalker]

updates are required :P :lol:
joke joke .. but :(

k sure.... :P

[$kywalker]

Pablo Picasso

Pablo Picasso, formally Pablo Ruiz Picasso, (October 25, 1881 - April 8, 1973) was one of the recognized masters of 20th century art.

Overview

His name in full was Pablo (or Pablito) Diego José Santiago Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno Crispín Crispiniano de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz Blasco y Picasso López. His father was José Ruiz y Blasco; his mother, María Picasso y López. In his early years he signed his name Ruiz Blasco after his father but, from about 1901 on, switched to using his mother's name.

Picasso was born in Málaga, Spain, and is probably most famous as the founder, along with Georges Braque, of Cubism. However in a long life he produced a wide and varied body of work, the best-known being the Blue Period works which feature moving depictions of acrobats, harlequins, prostitutes, beggars and artists.

While Picasso was primarily a painter (in fact he believed that an artist must paint in order to be considered a true artist), he also worked with small ceramic and bronze sculptures, collage and even produced some poetry. "Je suis aussi un poète," as he quipped to his friends.

Several paintings by Picasso rank among the most expensive paintings in the world. On May 4, 2004 Picasso's painting Garcon à la Pipe was sold for USD $104 million at Sotheby's, thus establishing a new price record (see also List of most expensive paintings). http://www.famouspeople.co.uk/p/images/pablopicasso.jpg
Picasso hated to be alone when he wasn't working. In Paris, in addition to having a distinguished coterie of friends in the Montmartre and Montparnasse quarters, including André Breton, Guillaume Apollinaire, writer Gertrude Stein and others, he usually maintained a number of mistresses in addition to his wife or primary partner.

In the 1915 photograph seen here is friends (left to right): Manuel Ortiz de Zárate, Henri-Pierre Roché (in uniform), Marie Vassilieff, Max Jacob and Pablo Picasso.

Picasso's most famous work is probably his depiction of the German bombing of Guernica, Spain; the Guernica (painting). This large canvas embodies for many the inhumanity, brutality and hopelessness of war. The painting of the picture was captured in a series of photographs by Picasso's most famous lover, Dora Maar, a distinguished artist in her own right. A Nazi officer is supposed to have come to his door brandishing a postcard and demanding, "Did you do this?" "No," Picasso is supposed to have replied, "you did." The Guernica hung in New York's Museum of Modern Art for many years; Picasso stipulated that the painting should not return to Spain until democracy was restored in that country. In 1981 the Guernica was returned to Spain and exhibited at the Casón del Buen Retiro. In 1992 the painting became one of the main attractions in Madrid's Museo de La Reina Sofía (Queen Sofía's Museum) when it opened.

As certain works, for example the Cubist pieces, tend to be associated in the public mind with Picasso, it is important to realize how talented Picasso was as a painter and draughtsman. He was capable of working with oils, watercolours, pastels, charcoal, pencil, ink, or indeed any medium with equally high facility. With his most extreme cubist works he came close to deconstructing a complex scene into just a few geometric shapes while at the same time being capable of photo-realistic pen and ink sketches of his friends. Picasso had a massive talent for almost any artistic endeavor he turned his mind to, despite limited formal academic training (he finished only one year of his course of study at the Royal Academy in Madrid), and a ferocious work-ethic.

Early life

Picasso's father, José Ruiz y Blasco, was himself a painter and for most of his life was a professor of art at Spanish colleges. It is from Don José that Picasso learned the basics of formal academic art training – figure drawing, and painting in oil. Although Picasso attended art schools thoughout his childhood, often those his father taught at, he never finished his college level course of study at the Royal Academy of San Fernando in Madrid, leaving after less than a year.

The Picasso Museum in Barcelona features many of Picasso's early works, created while he was living in Spain, as well as the extensive collection of Jaime Sabartés, Picasso's close friend from his Barcelona days, and for many years, Picasso's personal secretary. There are many precise and detailed figure studies done in his youth under his father's tutelage that clearly demonstrate his firm grounding in classical techniques, as well as rarely seen works from his old age.

Picasso and pacifism

Picasso remained neutral during the Spanish Civil War, World War I and World War II, refusing to fight for any side or country. Picasso never commented on this but encouraged the idea that it was because he was a pacifist. Some of his contemporaries though (including Braque) felt that this neutrality had more to do with cowardice than principle.

As a Spanish citizen living in France, Picasso was under no compulsion to fight against the invading Germans in either world war. In the Spanish Civil War, service for Spaniards living abroad was optional and would have involved a voluntary return to the country to join either side. While Picasso expressed anger and condemnation of Franco and the Fascists through his art he did not take up arms against them.

He also remained aloof from the Catalan independence movement during his youth despite expressing general support and being friendly with activists within it. No political movement seemed to compel his support to any great degree.

After the Second World War, Picasso joined the French Communist party, and even attended an international peace conference in Poland. But party criticism of a portrait of Stalin as insufficiently realistic cooled Picasso's interest in Communist politics.

Personal life

Picasso had a long string of lovers, four children by three women, and two wives. In the early years of the 20th century, Picasso, still a struggling youth, began a long term relationship with Fernande Olivier. It is she who appears in many of the Blue and Rose period paintings. After garnering fame and some fortune, Picasso left Fernande for Marcelle Humbert, whom Picasso called Eva. When it became clear that Eva was dying, Picasso left her as well. Picasso frequented brothels throughout his life, and also had numerous affairs.

In 1918 Picasso married Olga Koklova, a ballerina with Sergei Diaghilev's troupe. Olga introduced Picasso to high society, formal dinner parties, and all the social niceties attendant on the life of the rich in 1920s Paris. The two had a son, Paulo, who would grow up to be a sometime motorcycle racer, sometime chauffeur to his father, and dissolute.

Olga's insistence on social propriety clashed with Picasso's bohemian tendencies, and the two lived in a state of near constant conflict. In 1927 Picasso met the then underage (17) Marie Thérèse Walter, and began a secret affair with her. Picasso's marriage to Olga soon ended in separation, as French law required an even division of property in the case of divorce, and Picasso did not want Olga to have half his wealth. The two remained legally married until Olga's death in 1955.

Picasso carried on a long standing affair with Marie Thérèse, and fathered a daughter, Maya, with her. Marie Thérèse lived in the vain hope that Picasso would one day marry her, and eventually hanged herself after Picasso's death.

The photographer and painter Dora Maar was also a constant companion and lover of Picasso. The two were closest in the late 30s and early 40s, and it was Dora who documented the painting of Guernica. Like all the women in his life, Dora was cruelly abused emotionally by the narcissistic Picasso.

After the liberation of Paris in 1944, Picasso began to keep company with a young art student, Françoise Gilot. The two eventually became lovers, and had two children together, Claude, and Paloma. Uniquely among Picasso's women, Françoise eventually left Picasso in 1953 because of his abusive treatment, and infidelities. This came as a severe blow to Picasso, who was used to submissive women who lived for whatever scraps of affection or attention he deigned to give them.

He went through a difficult period after Françoise's departure, coming to terms with his advancing age, and his perception that he was an old man, now in his seventies, who was no longer attractive, but rather grotesque to young women. A number of ink drawings from this period explore this theme of the hideous old dwarf as buffoonish counterpoint to the beautiful young girl.

Picasso was not long in finding another lover, Jacqueline Roque. Jacqueline worked at the Madoura Pottery, where Picasso made and painted ceramics. The two remained together for the rest of Picasso's life, marrying in 1961. Their marriage was also the means of one last act of revenge against Françoise. Françoise had been seeking a legal means to legitimize her children with Picasso, Claude and Paloma. With Picasso's encouragement, she had arranged to divorce her then husband, Luc Simon, and marry Picasso to secure her children's rights. Picasso then secretly married Jacqueline after Françoise had filed for divorce in order to exact his revenge for her leaving him.

Later works

In his 80s and 90s, Picasso, no longer quite the energetic dynamo he had been in his youth, became more, and more reclusive. His second wife, Jacqueline Roque, screened all but the most important visitors, and closest friends, even excluding Picasso's two children, Claude and Paloma, both by his former partner, the painter Françoise Gilot.

This reclusive existence intensified after Picasso underwent surgery for a prostate condition in 1965. This surgery is rumored to have left Picasso largely impotent. To a man for whom sexual adventure was such an important part of life, this was a serious life change, and Picasso seems to have dealt with it by redoubling his already prolific artistic output.

Devoting his full energies to his work, Picasso became more daring, his works more colorful and expressive, and from 1968 through 1971 he produced a torrent of paintings and hundreds of copperplate engravings. At the time these works were dismissed by most as pornographic fantasies of an impotent old man, or the slapdash works of an artist who was past his prime. One long time admirer, Douglas Cooper called them "the incoherent scribblings of a frenetic old man in the antechamber of death". Only a decade later, after Picasso's death, when the rest of the art world had moved on from abstract expressionism, did the critical community come to see that Picasso had already discovered neo-expressionism, and was, as usual, ahead of his time.

Pablo Picasso died on April 8, 1973 at Mougins, France, and was interred at Castle Vauvenargues' park, in Vauvenargues, Bouches-du-Rhône. Jacqueline prevented his children Claude and Paloma from attending the funeral.

At the time of his death, Picasso, by now a multi-millionaire, owned a vast quantity of his own work, consisting of personal favorites which he had kept off the art market, or which he had not needed to sell. In addition, Picasso had a considerable collection of the work of other famous artists, some his contemporaries, like Henri Matisse, with whom he had exchanged works. Since Picasso left no will, his death duties, or estate tax to the French state were paid in the form of his works, and others from his collection. These works form the core of the immense, and representative collection of the Musée Picasso in Paris. And recently in 2003, relatives of Picasso inaugurated a museum dedicated to him, in his hometown of Malaga, Spain, called the Museo Picasso Málaga.

In 1999, Picasso's Les Noces de Pierrette (The Marriage of Pierrette) sold for more than USD $51 million...................

[zCexVe]

Isaac Newton

One who made a good impression on modern physics in 1600s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton

[zCexVe]

Bono(Paul David Hewson) - U2 lead singer

He fights for social justice using his fame.A really great character.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bono

www.u2.com

[aye_sha90]

Pablo Picasso

Pablo Picasso, formally Pablo Ruiz Picasso, (October 25, 1881 - April 8, 1973) was one of the recognized masters of 20th century art.

Overview

His name in full was Pablo (or Pablito) Diego José Santiago Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno Crispín Crispiniano de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz Blasco y Picasso López. His father was José Ruiz y Blasco; his mother, María Picasso y López. In his early years he signed his name Ruiz Blasco after his father but, from about 1901 on, switched to using his mother's name.

Picasso was born in Málaga, Spain, and is probably most famous as the founder, along with Georges Braque, of Cubism. However in a long life he produced a wide and varied body of work, the best-known being the Blue Period works which feature moving depictions of acrobats, harlequins, prostitutes, beggars and artists.

While Picasso was primarily a painter (in fact he believed that an artist must paint in order to be considered a true artist), he also worked with small ceramic and bronze sculptures, collage and even produced some poetry. "Je suis aussi un poète," as he quipped to his friends.

Several paintings by Picasso rank among the most expensive paintings in the world. On May 4, 2004 Picasso's painting Garcon à la Pipe was sold for USD $104 million at Sotheby's, thus establishing a new price record (see also List of most expensive paintings). http://www.famouspeople.co.uk/p/images/pablopicasso.jpg
Picasso hated to be alone when he wasn't working. In Paris, in addition to having a distinguished coterie of friends in the Montmartre and Montparnasse quarters, including André Breton, Guillaume Apollinaire, writer Gertrude Stein and others, he usually maintained a number of mistresses in addition to his wife or primary partner.

In the 1915 photograph seen here is friends (left to right): Manuel Ortiz de Zárate, Henri-Pierre Roché (in uniform), Marie Vassilieff, Max Jacob and Pablo Picasso.

Picasso's most famous work is probably his depiction of the German bombing of Guernica, Spain; the Guernica (painting). This large canvas embodies for many the inhumanity, brutality and hopelessness of war. The painting of the picture was captured in a series of photographs by Picasso's most famous lover, Dora Maar, a distinguished artist in her own right. A Nazi officer is supposed to have come to his door brandishing a postcard and demanding, "Did you do this?" "No," Picasso is supposed to have replied, "you did." The Guernica hung in New York's Museum of Modern Art for many years; Picasso stipulated that the painting should not return to Spain until democracy was restored in that country. In 1981 the Guernica was returned to Spain and exhibited at the Casón del Buen Retiro. In 1992 the painting became one of the main attractions in Madrid's Museo de La Reina Sofía (Queen Sofía's Museum) when it opened.

As certain works, for example the Cubist pieces, tend to be associated in the public mind with Picasso, it is important to realize how talented Picasso was as a painter and draughtsman. He was capable of working with oils, watercolours, pastels, charcoal, pencil, ink, or indeed any medium with equally high facility. With his most extreme cubist works he came close to deconstructing a complex scene into just a few geometric shapes while at the same time being capable of photo-realistic pen and ink sketches of his friends. Picasso had a massive talent for almost any artistic endeavor he turned his mind to, despite limited formal academic training (he finished only one year of his course of study at the Royal Academy in Madrid), and a ferocious work-ethic.

Early life

Picasso's father, José Ruiz y Blasco, was himself a painter and for most of his life was a professor of art at Spanish colleges. It is from Don José that Picasso learned the basics of formal academic art training – figure drawing, and painting in oil. Although Picasso attended art schools thoughout his childhood, often those his father taught at, he never finished his college level course of study at the Royal Academy of San Fernando in Madrid, leaving after less than a year.

The Picasso Museum in Barcelona features many of Picasso's early works, created while he was living in Spain, as well as the extensive collection of Jaime Sabartés, Picasso's close friend from his Barcelona days, and for many years, Picasso's personal secretary. There are many precise and detailed figure studies done in his youth under his father's tutelage that clearly demonstrate his firm grounding in classical techniques, as well as rarely seen works from his old age.

Picasso and pacifism

Picasso remained neutral during the Spanish Civil War, World War I and World War II, refusing to fight for any side or country. Picasso never commented on this but encouraged the idea that it was because he was a pacifist. Some of his contemporaries though (including Braque) felt that this neutrality had more to do with cowardice than principle.

As a Spanish citizen living in France, Picasso was under no compulsion to fight against the invading Germans in either world war. In the Spanish Civil War, service for Spaniards living abroad was optional and would have involved a voluntary return to the country to join either side. While Picasso expressed anger and condemnation of Franco and the Fascists through his art he did not take up arms against them.

He also remained aloof from the Catalan independence movement during his youth despite expressing general support and being friendly with activists within it. No political movement seemed to compel his support to any great degree.

After the Second World War, Picasso joined the French Communist party, and even attended an international peace conference in Poland. But party criticism of a portrait of Stalin as insufficiently realistic cooled Picasso's interest in Communist politics.

Personal life

Picasso had a long string of lovers, four children by three women, and two wives. In the early years of the 20th century, Picasso, still a struggling youth, began a long term relationship with Fernande Olivier. It is she who appears in many of the Blue and Rose period paintings. After garnering fame and some fortune, Picasso left Fernande for Marcelle Humbert, whom Picasso called Eva. When it became clear that Eva was dying, Picasso left her as well. Picasso frequented brothels throughout his life, and also had numerous affairs.

In 1918 Picasso married Olga Koklova, a ballerina with Sergei Diaghilev's troupe. Olga introduced Picasso to high society, formal dinner parties, and all the social niceties attendant on the life of the rich in 1920s Paris. The two had a son, Paulo, who would grow up to be a sometime motorcycle racer, sometime chauffeur to his father, and dissolute.

Olga's insistence on social propriety clashed with Picasso's bohemian tendencies, and the two lived in a state of near constant conflict. In 1927 Picasso met the then underage (17) Marie Thérèse Walter, and began a secret affair with her. Picasso's marriage to Olga soon ended in separation, as French law required an even division of property in the case of divorce, and Picasso did not want Olga to have half his wealth. The two remained legally married until Olga's death in 1955.

Picasso carried on a long standing affair with Marie Thérèse, and fathered a daughter, Maya, with her. Marie Thérèse lived in the vain hope that Picasso would one day marry her, and eventually hanged herself after Picasso's death.

The photographer and painter Dora Maar was also a constant companion and lover of Picasso. The two were closest in the late 30s and early 40s, and it was Dora who documented the painting of Guernica. Like all the women in his life, Dora was cruelly abused emotionally by the narcissistic Picasso.

After the liberation of Paris in 1944, Picasso began to keep company with a young art student, Françoise Gilot. The two eventually became lovers, and had two children together, Claude, and Paloma. Uniquely among Picasso's women, Françoise eventually left Picasso in 1953 because of his abusive treatment, and infidelities. This came as a severe blow to Picasso, who was used to submissive women who lived for whatever scraps of affection or attention he deigned to give them.

He went through a difficult period after Françoise's departure, coming to terms with his advancing age, and his perception that he was an old man, now in his seventies, who was no longer attractive, but rather grotesque to young women. A number of ink drawings from this period explore this theme of the hideous old dwarf as buffoonish counterpoint to the beautiful young girl.

Picasso was not long in finding another lover, Jacqueline Roque. Jacqueline worked at the Madoura Pottery, where Picasso made and painted ceramics. The two remained together for the rest of Picasso's life, marrying in 1961. Their marriage was also the means of one last act of revenge against Françoise. Françoise had been seeking a legal means to legitimize her children with Picasso, Claude and Paloma. With Picasso's encouragement, she had arranged to divorce her then husband, Luc Simon, and marry Picasso to secure her children's rights. Picasso then secretly married Jacqueline after Françoise had filed for divorce in order to exact his revenge for her leaving him.

Later works

In his 80s and 90s, Picasso, no longer quite the energetic dynamo he had been in his youth, became more, and more reclusive. His second wife, Jacqueline Roque, screened all but the most important visitors, and closest friends, even excluding Picasso's two children, Claude and Paloma, both by his former partner, the painter Françoise Gilot.

This reclusive existence intensified after Picasso underwent surgery for a prostate condition in 1965. This surgery is rumored to have left Picasso largely impotent. To a man for whom sexual adventure was such an important part of life, this was a serious life change, and Picasso seems to have dealt with it by redoubling his already prolific artistic output.

Devoting his full energies to his work, Picasso became more daring, his works more colorful and expressive, and from 1968 through 1971 he produced a torrent of paintings and hundreds of copperplate engravings. At the time these works were dismissed by most as pornographic fantasies of an impotent old man, or the slapdash works of an artist who was past his prime. One long time admirer, Douglas Cooper called them "the incoherent scribblings of a frenetic old man in the antechamber of death". Only a decade later, after Picasso's death, when the rest of the art world had moved on from abstract expressionism, did the critical community come to see that Picasso had already discovered neo-expressionism, and was, as usual, ahead of his time.

Pablo Picasso died on April 8, 1973 at Mougins, France, and was interred at Castle Vauvenargues' park, in Vauvenargues, Bouches-du-Rhône. Jacqueline prevented his children Claude and Paloma from attending the funeral.

At the time of his death, Picasso, by now a multi-millionaire, owned a vast quantity of his own work, consisting of personal favorites which he had kept off the art market, or which he had not needed to sell. In addition, Picasso had a considerable collection of the work of other famous artists, some his contemporaries, like Henri Matisse, with whom he had exchanged works. Since Picasso left no will, his death duties, or estate tax to the French state were paid in the form of his works, and others from his collection. These works form the core of the immense, and representative collection of the Musée Picasso in Paris. And recently in 2003, relatives of Picasso inaugurated a museum dedicated to him, in his hometown of Malaga, Spain, called the Museo Picasso Málaga.

In 1999, Picasso's Les Noces de Pierrette (The Marriage of Pierrette) sold for more than USD $51 million...................



KOOOOOOOOOOL... GREAT :P
thanks :D

[coolioWiZ]

since it's just not only ppl who changed the course of history . . i'd like to point out to one important event in history which completely changed our path . .if this happend in a different way our world would have been completely different :yes:

Battle For Stalingrad


source : http://www.historyofwar.org/articles/battles_stalingrad.html

After the narrow failure of Hitler's invasion of Russia in 1941 the German Army no longer had the strength and resources for a renewed offensive on the scale of Operation Barbarossa, but Hitler was unwilling to stay on the defensive and consolidate his gains. An offensive solution was sought that with limited means, might yield more than a limited result. The lack of resources meant that the Germans concentrated on the southern part of the Eastern Front, with the aim of capturing the Caucasus oilfields, which each side needed if it was to maintain the mobility of its armoured forces. If the Germans could gain possession of that oil, they might subsequently be able to turn north onto the rear of the thus immobilized Russian armies covering Moscow, or even strike at Russia's new war-industries that had been established in the Urals. Alternatively, Turkey might be coerced into joining the Axis and success in North Africa by the Deutsches Afrika Korps might mean an encirclement of British possessions in the Middle East. The losses to the Wehrmacht had been great, but these were replaced by new formations as well as units from the Axis partners of Italy, Romania and Hungary. Hitler's Directive No. 41 was limited in its aim and gave the objectives as Stalingrad (4th Panzer and 6th Armies) and Maikop (1st Panzer and 17th Armies, supported by the 11th) but Directive No. 45 extended these to include Baku, Grozny and Batumi, in fact most of the Caucasus. As a result, the 1942 offensive (codenamed Operation Blue or Blau) was a greater gamble than that of the previous year because, if it were to be checked, the long flank of this southerly drive would be exposed to a counterstroke anywhere along its thousand-mile front. Hitler's Commanders warned that they did not have the forces available to go for Stalingrad and the Caucasus at the same time.

Fortunately for the Soviets, Hitler split his effort between the Caucasus and Stalingrad, formerly Tsaritsyn, on the Volga, gateway to the north and the Urals. With the 6th Army advancing on Stalingrad, Hitler transferred the 4th Panzer Army to the move south towards the Caucasus, thus loosing the opportunity to take the city while it was still relatively undefended. Moreover when the first attacks on Stalingrad by General Friedrich Paulus's 6th Army, were checked in late August, Hitler started to transfer forces from the drive south (most notably diverting elements of the 4th Panzer Army) to reinforce the attack on Stalingrad, which had been but a secondary objective. The city quickly became symbolic to Hitler, who could not bear to be defied by it. The German forces would be worn down in a battle of attrition in the prolonged effort to achieve its capture, having lost sight of the initial prime objective, capturing the vital oil supplies of the Caucasus. With the first phase of Operation Blue bringing the German forces to the River Don, the second phase began with Army Group A (11th and 17th Armies) and the 1st Panzer Army driving on Maikop in Operation Edelweiss and from there on towards the main oilfields, at Baku and Grozny. It met increasing resistance from local troops, fighting now to defend their homes, while being depleted in favour of Paulus' bid to capture Stalingrad. The advance of Army Group A slowed from over thirty miles a day to just a few. German and Romanian Moutain Troops were committed to the battle but the Soviets held on. The battle degenerated into platoon-level battles over individual positions and Hitler refused to consider the evidence of worsening weather, harsh terrain and diminishing resources. List resigned on 10 September and for a while, the 17th Army and 1st Panzer Army were forced to deal directly with Hitler's headquarters. 17th Army reached Novorossiisk on 6 September but failed to take the city. 1st Panzer Army's progress slowed with the lead elements reaching Ordzhonikidze by the end of September and Nalchik towards the end of October.

On August 23, 1942, precisely at 18:00, one thousand airplanes began to drop incendiary bombs on Stalingrad. In that city of 600,000 people, there were many wooden buildings, gas tanks and fuel tanks used for industrial purposes. Stalingrad was heavily hit by air attack; one raid of 600 planes started vast fires and killed 40,000 civilians. By then, the 6th Army was in the Stalingrad suburbs and had taken the bank of the River Don just north of the city, while German tanks from the 14th Panzer Division approaching the Volga in the south. With the 62nd Army not even in the city at that point, the first German attacks were taken by a single division of NKVD and some workers from the city tractor factory. OKW, concerned about the inadequacy of the forces protecting the 6th Army's flanks, advised a withdrawal be undertaken from Stalingrad to consolidate the line and prevent the army being cut off by an enemy breakthrough. Hitler instead transferred units away from the Don sector to the 6th Army and ordered it to capture the city.

When the Germans entered Stalingrad, they saw nothing but ruins, however their advance was frustrated as thousands of micro battles erupted all over the streets of what used to be a city. Resistance was fierce but the German forces eventually managed to occupy a large part of the northern bank by the middle of September, backed by the aircraft of Luftflotte IV. "The Germans obviously thought that the fate of the town had been settled," wrote Vasily Chuikov, the commander of the 62nd Army who had replaced Lopatin on 10 September. "We saw drunken Germans jumping down from their trucks, playing mouth organs, shouting like madmen and dancing on the pavements." They penetrated to within two hundred yards of his command post. Still the Soviets fought on and the Germans continued to meet resistance in the streets of Stalingrad. It broke down to battalion, company and platoon engagements, usually at close quarters. A German general said: "The mile, as a measure of distance, was replaced by the yard ..."

General Chuikov threw in every last reserve he had. By the middle of November the 6th Army had cut through Stalingrad, cutting the 62nd Army in two parts. But that still did not mean the end of it. Shrinking into an ever smaller perimeter, the Red Army was fighting stubbornly. Particularly severe clashes took place over Mamayev Kurgan on Hill 102, which changed hands at least eight times. One house in Stalingrad was defended by a single platoon under Sergeant Pavlov. That house, known as "Pavlov’s house", became a symbol of determination of Soviets to hold the city no matter what. Completely surrounded by Germans, Pavlov’s soldiers were holding the constantly attacked house until the relief came. The battle raged for fifty-nine days. As an illustration of the see-saw nature of the fighting, the diary of 62nd Army, described the intensity of fighting for the Central Station in Stalingrad, which changed hands fifteen times, four times in one day: "0800 Station in enemy hands. 0840 Station recaptured. 0940 Station retaken by enemy. 1040 Enemy ... 600 meters from Army command post … 1320 Station in our hands."

At the Central Station, a battalion of Soviet Guardsmen dug in behind smashed railroad cars and platforms. Bombed and shelled, the survivors moved to a nearby ruin where, tormented by thirst, they fired at drainpipes to see if any water would drip out. During the night, German sappers blew up the wall separating the room holding the Soviets from the German-held part of the building and threw in grenades. An attack cut the battalion in two and the headquarters staff was trapped inside the Univermag department store where the battalion commander was killed in hand-to-hand fighting. The last forty men of the battalion pulled back to a building on the Volga. They set up a heavy machine-gun in the basement and broke down the walls at the top of the building to prepare lumps of stone and wood to hurl at the Germans. They had no water and only a few pounds of scorched grain to eat. A German tank ground forward and a Russian slipped out with the last antitank rifle rounds to deal with it. He was captured by German machine gunners. He persuaded his captors that the Soviets had run out of ammunition, because the Germans moved out of their shelter. The last belt of machine-gun ammunition was fired into them and an hour later they led the anti-tank rifleman on to a heap of ruins and shot him. More German tanks appeared and reduced the building with point-blank fire. At night, six survivors of the battalion freed themselves from the rubble and struggled to the Volga.

The Luftwaffe was making up to 3,000 sorties a day. The Germans had superiority in airpower and artillery. To neutralize it, General Chuikov directed his troops to "hug" the Germans, to remain in a close combat so that German commanders could not use air strikes without endangering their own men. The 62nd Army was practically on its own, the Red Army finding it difficult to help with supplies and replacements. Any that reached the city had to cross the Volga River under German fire. The survivors of those crossings said some days the river was red with the blood. The whole battle was a nightmare for the both sides. The Germans assaulted the Red October factory on 27 September and occupied the northern landing stages on 5 October. Despite a huge Soviet bombardment the Germans managed to take the Tractor Plant on 16 October and parts of the Barricades Gun Plant on the 23 October.


The intensity of fighting can be gauged from what one German Leutnant wrote: "We have fought during fifteen days for a single house. The front is a corridor between burnt-out rooms; it is the thin ceiling between two floors ... From story to story, faces black with sweat, we bombard each other with grenades in the middle of explosions, clouds of dust and smoke, heaps of mortar, floods of blood, fragments of furniture and human beings ... The street is no longer measured by meters but by corpses ... Stalingrad is no longer a town. By day it is an enormous cloud of burning, blinding smoke; it is a vast furnace lit by the reflection of the flames. And when night arrives, one of those scorching howling bleeding nights, the dogs plunge into the Volga and swim desperately to gain the other bank. The nights of Stalingrad are a terror for them. Animals flee this hell; the hardest stones cannot bear it for long; only men endure."

In early November, on 19 November 1942 a Russian counter-offensive began (codednamed Operation Uranus) under the overall command of Marshal Georgii Zhukov. Zhukov had decided to hold Stalingrad with the minimum amount of troops necessary and concentrate his reserves on the weaker Axis forces protecting the 6th Army's flanks, something OKW had foreseen. The Axis forces, chiefly the 3rd and 4th Romanian Armies, surrounding Stalingrad were taken by surprise and could not contain the attack. On 23 November the two wings of the Red Army met. The German 6th Army and elements of the 4th Panzer Army, about 220,000 men, were trapped in a pocket 35 miles wide and 20 miles from north to south. OKW begged Hitler to allow the 6th Army to breakout to the west while the Soviet lines were still not firmly established but Reichsmarschall Hermann Goring boasted he could fly in 500 tons of supplies a day and keep the 6th Army going as an effective fighting force. Hitler seized on this and ordered Paulus to fortify his positions and await a relief. <--- the biggest mistake :) Meanwhile the Soviets struck further south too, and forced the 17th Army and 1st Panzer Army to withdraw and despite trying to cut Army Group A in the Caucasus, appalling weather allowed the Germans to retreat steadily both northwards towards Rostov and westwards back towards the Kerch Straits where 17th Army formed a large bridgehead on the Taman Peninsula. This was gradually pushed back but the vast majority of 17th Army escaped back into the Crimea across the straits.

A valiant relief effort, codenamed Operation Winter Storm, was launched by General Erich von Manstein's Army Group Don on 12 December 1942. The force included the 4th Romanian Army, and the Hoth Group with the 6th, 17th and 23rd Panzer Divisions. It had managed to advance to within thirty miles of the city by 21 December 1942, but faced strong resistance by the 5th Shock and 2nd Guards Armies. Manstein took it upon himself to order Paulus to breakout to the southwest and link up with Army Group Don but Paulus refused to move without a direct order from the Fuhrer and the 6th Army remained trapped around Stalingrad. The Soviets launched Operation Little Saturn on 24 December 1942 to further isolate Stalingrad from the main German forces. On 9 January 1943 the Soviets began to drive on the centre of the city but found that the tables had now been reversed. They would be the ones to attack every house, every building and fight for every room. The Luftwaffe managed to keep the 6th Army supplied (although it was never really enough) until quite close to the end and airlifted over 30,000 troops out of the pocket. Finally, on February 2, Field Marshal von Paulus surrendered, with 23 generals, 2500 other officers and 90,000 soldiers. Only some 6,000 would live to see Germany again.


more info here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Stalingrad
pics here:
http://www.geocities.com/ww2_pictures/battle-of-stalingrad-pics.htm

[$kywalker]

Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein (March 14, 1879 – April 18, 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest physicists of all time. He formulated the special and general theories of relativity. In addition, he made significant contributions to quantum theory and statistical mechanics. While best known for the Theory of Relativity (and specifically mass-energy equivalence, E=mc²), he was awarded the 1921 Nobel Prize for Physics for his explanation of the photoelectric effect in 1905 (his "wonderful year" or "miraculous year") and "for his services to Theoretical Physics".
http://www.famouspeople.co.uk/e/images/einstein.jpg
Following the May-1919 British solar-eclipse expeditions, whose later analysis confirmed that light rays from distant stars were deflected by the Sun's gravitation as predicted by the Field Equation of general relativity, in November 1919 Albert Einstein became world-famous, an unusual achievement for a scientist. The London Times ran the headline on November 7, 1919: "Revolution in science – New theory of the Universe – Newtonian ideas overthrown". Nobel laureate Max Born viewed General Relativity as the "greatest feat of human thinking about nature"; fellow laureate Paul Dirac called it "probably the greatest scientific discovery ever made". In popular culture, the name "Einstein" has become synonymous with great intelligence and genius.

Biography

Einstein was born on March 14, 1879, around 11:30 AM LMT, in the city of Ulm in Württemberg, Germany, about 100 km east of Stuttgart. His father was Hermann Einstein, a salesman who later ran an electrochemical works, and his mother was Pauline, née Koch. They were married in Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt.

At his birth, Albert's mother was reputedly frightened that her infant's head was so large and oddly shaped. Though the size of his head appeared to be less remarkable as he grew older, it's evident from photographs of Einstein that his head was proportionately large for his body throughout his life, a trait regarded as "benign macrocephaly" in large-headed individuals with no related disease or cognitive deficits.

Another more famous aspect of Einstein's childhood is the fact that he spoke much later than the average child. Einstein claimed that he did not begin speaking until the age of three and only did so hesitantly, even beyond the age of nine. Because of Einstein's late speech development and his later childhood tendency to ignore any subject in school that bored him — instead focusing intensely only on what interested him — some observers at the time suggested that he might be "retarded," such as one of the Einstein's housekeepers. This latter observation was not the only time in his life that controversial labels and pathology would be applied to Einstein.

Albert's family members were all non-observant Jews and he attended a Catholic elementary school. At the insistence of his mother, he was given violin lessons. Though he initially disliked the lessons, and eventually discontinued them, he would later take great solace in Mozart's violin sonatas

When Einstein was five, his father showed him a small pocket compass, and Einstein realized that something in "empty" space acted upon the needle; he would later describe the experience as one of the most revelatory events of his life. He built models and mechanical devices for fun and showed great mathematical ability early on.

In 1889, a medical student named Max Talmud (later: Talmey), who visited the Einsteins on Thursday nights for 6 years, introduced Einstein to key science and philosophy texts, including Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Two of his uncles would further foster his intellectual interests during his late childhood and early adolescence by recommending and providing books on science, mathematics and philosophy.

Einstein attended the Luitpold Gymnasium, where he received a relatively progressive education. He began to learn mathematics around age twelve; in 1891, he taught himself Euclidean plane geometry from a school booklet and began to study calculus 4 years later; Einstein realized the power of axiomatic deductive reasoning from the book of Euclid's Elements, which Einstein called the "holy little geometry book" (given by Max Talmud). While at the Gymnasium, Einstein clashed with authority and resented the school regimen, believing that the spirit of learning and creative thought were lost in such endeavors as strict memorization.........

Read MORE (http://www.famouspeople.co.uk/e/einstein.html)

[aye_sha90]

since it's just not only ppl who changed the course of history . . i'd like to point out to one important event in history which completely changed our path . .if this happend in a different way our world would have been completely different :yes:



Exactly.... :yes:
Not only people.... Im kinda interested about wars and revolutions..
Anyway, thanks dear :D

[aye_sha90]

Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein (March 14, 1879 – April 18, 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest physicists of all time. He formulated the special and general theories of relativity. In addition, he made significant contributions to quantum theory and statistical mechanics. While best known for the Theory of Relativity (and specifically mass-energy equivalence, E=mc²), he was awarded the 1921 Nobel Prize for Physics for his explanation of the photoelectric effect in 1905 (his "wonderful year" or "miraculous year") and "for his services to Theoretical Physics".
http://www.famouspeople.co.uk/e/images/einstein.jpg
Following the May-1919 British solar-eclipse expeditions, whose later analysis confirmed that light rays from distant stars were deflected by the Sun's gravitation as predicted by the Field Equation of general relativity, in November 1919 Albert Einstein became world-famous, an unusual achievement for a scientist. The London Times ran the headline on November 7, 1919: "Revolution in science – New theory of the Universe – Newtonian ideas overthrown". Nobel laureate Max Born viewed General Relativity as the "greatest feat of human thinking about nature"; fellow laureate Paul Dirac called it "probably the greatest scientific discovery ever made". In popular culture, the name "Einstein" has become synonymous with great intelligence and genius.

Biography

Einstein was born on March 14, 1879, around 11:30 AM LMT, in the city of Ulm in Württemberg, Germany, about 100 km east of Stuttgart. His father was Hermann Einstein, a salesman who later ran an electrochemical works, and his mother was Pauline, née Koch. They were married in Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt.

At his birth, Albert's mother was reputedly frightened that her infant's head was so large and oddly shaped. Though the size of his head appeared to be less remarkable as he grew older, it's evident from photographs of Einstein that his head was proportionately large for his body throughout his life, a trait regarded as "benign macrocephaly" in large-headed individuals with no related disease or cognitive deficits.

Another more famous aspect of Einstein's childhood is the fact that he spoke much later than the average child. Einstein claimed that he did not begin speaking until the age of three and only did so hesitantly, even beyond the age of nine. Because of Einstein's late speech development and his later childhood tendency to ignore any subject in school that bored him — instead focusing intensely only on what interested him — some observers at the time suggested that he might be "retarded," such as one of the Einstein's housekeepers. This latter observation was not the only time in his life that controversial labels and pathology would be applied to Einstein.

Albert's family members were all non-observant Jews and he attended a Catholic elementary school. At the insistence of his mother, he was given violin lessons. Though he initially disliked the lessons, and eventually discontinued them, he would later take great solace in Mozart's violin sonatas

When Einstein was five, his father showed him a small pocket compass, and Einstein realized that something in "empty" space acted upon the needle; he would later describe the experience as one of the most revelatory events of his life. He built models and mechanical devices for fun and showed great mathematical ability early on.

In 1889, a medical student named Max Talmud (later: Talmey), who visited the Einsteins on Thursday nights for 6 years, introduced Einstein to key science and philosophy texts, including Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. Two of his uncles would further foster his intellectual interests during his late childhood and early adolescence by recommending and providing books on science, mathematics and philosophy.

Einstein attended the Luitpold Gymnasium, where he received a relatively progressive education. He began to learn mathematics around age twelve; in 1891, he taught himself Euclidean plane geometry from a school booklet and began to study calculus 4 years later; Einstein realized the power of axiomatic deductive reasoning from the book of Euclid's Elements, which Einstein called the "holy little geometry book" (given by Max Talmud). While at the Gymnasium, Einstein clashed with authority and resented the school regimen, believing that the spirit of learning and creative thought were lost in such endeavors as strict memorization.........

Read MORE (http://www.famouspeople.co.uk/e/einstein.html)



Love Einstein!! Specially his hair :P :lol:

[$kywalker]

Love Einstein!! Specially his hair :P :lol:

he he..nice hear ne :P

[aye_sha90]

he he..nice hear ne :P


lol..sexy :lol:
but he was kinda dumb in maths. :rofl:

[$kywalker]

lol..sexy :lol:
but he was kinda dumb in maths. :rofl:

ya.lolz...but he s the man :lol:...i mean in mathematics..:P

[aye_sha90]

ya.lolz...but he s the man :lol:...i mean in mathematics..:P


lol..even though he was kinda dumb at school :P
His marks werent that superb asa far as i know :lol:

[$kywalker]

lol..even though he was kinda dumb at school :P
His marks werent that superb asa far as i know :lol:

lol..i think u have wnt thrugh his whole biogrphy.:P..bt i dnt kno much about dat stuf lol..:P

[aye_sha90]

FRENCH REVOLUTION


http://img32.picoodle.com/img/img32/3/10/18/f_frenchrevolm_8e13b69.jpg (http://www.picoodle.com/view.php?img=/3/10/18/f_frenchrevolm_8e13b69.jpg&srv=img32)

The French Revolution began in 1789 with the meeting of the States General in May. On July 14 of that same year, the Bastille was stormed: in October, Louis XVI and the Royal Family were removed from Versailles to Paris. The King attempted, unsuccessfully, to flee Paris for Varennes in June 1791. A Legislative Assembly sat from October 1791 until September 1792, when, in the face of the advance of the allied armies of Austria, Holland, Prussia, and Sardinia, it was replaced by the National Convention, which proclaimed the Republic. The King was brought to trial in December of 1792, and executed on January 21, 1793. In January of 1793 the revolutionary government declared war on Britain, a war for world dominion which had been carried on, with short intermissions, since the beginning of the reign of William and Mary, and which would continue for another twenty-two years.

The Committee of Public Safety and the Revolutionary Tribunal were instituted immediately after the execution of the King. The Reign of Terror, during which the ruling faction ruthlessly exterminated all potential enemies, of whatever sex, age, or condition, began in September of 1793 and lasted until the fall of Robespierre on July 27, 1794: during the last six weeks of the Terror alone (the period known as the "Red Terror") nearly fourteen hundred people were guillotined in Paris alone. The Convention was replaced in October of 1795 with the Directory, which was replaced in turn, in 1799, by the Consulate. Napoleon Buonaparte became Emperor in May of 1804.

The French Revolution was not only a crucial event considered in the context of Western history, but was also, perhaps the single most crucial influence on British intellectual, philosophical, and political life in the nineteenth century. In its early stages it portrayed itself as a triumph of the forces of reason over those of superstition and privilege, and as such it was welcomed not only by English radicals like Thomas Paine and William Godwin and William Blake, who, characteristically, saw it as a symbolic act which presaged the return of humanity to the state of perfection from which it had fallen away — but by many liberals as well, and by some who saw it, with its declared emphasis on "Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity," as being analgous to the Glorious Revolution of 1688: as it descended into the madness of the Reign of Terror, however, many who had initially greeted it with enthusiasm — Wordsworth and Coleridge, for example, who came to regard their early support as, in Coleridge's words, a "sqeaking baby trumpet of sedition" — had second thoughts.

The old regime in England, on the other hand, had from the first allied itself closely with Locke and Newton, those great advocates of reason and order, and Edmund Burke could denounce the Revolution in 1790 in his great Reflections on the Revolution in France, elegantly bound copies of which George III, who was not renowned for his intellect, gave to all his friends, saying that it was a book "which every gentleman ought to read." Burke maintained that the radicals who had begun the Revolution by releasing the enormous pent-up quasi-religious energies of the common people of France were interested first in the conquest of their own country and then in the conquest of Europe and of the the rest of the world, which would be "liberated" whether it wished to be or not. Tom Paine's great response to Burke's work,The Rights of Man, appeared in 1791, and the debate between conservatives and radicals raged on for many years, and certainly influenced, directly or indirectly, the thought and the work of every major English author for the remainder of the century and beyond.



http://www.victorianweb.org/history/hist7.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Revolution

[$kywalker]

FRENCH REVOLUTION


http://img32.picoodle.com/img/img32/3/10/18/f_frenchrevolm_8e13b69.jpg (http://www.picoodle.com/view.php?img=/3/10/18/f_frenchrevolm_8e13b69.jpg&srv=img32)

The French Revolution began in 1789 with the meeting of the States General in May. On July 14 of that same year, the Bastille was stormed: in October, Louis XVI and the Royal Family were removed from Versailles to Paris. The King attempted, unsuccessfully, to flee Paris for Varennes in June 1791. A Legislative Assembly sat from October 1791 until September 1792, when, in the face of the advance of the allied armies of Austria, Holland, Prussia, and Sardinia, it was replaced by the National Convention, which proclaimed the Republic. The King was brought to trial in December of 1792, and executed on January 21, 1793. In January of 1793 the revolutionary government declared war on Britain, a war for world dominion which had been carried on, with short intermissions, since the beginning of the reign of William and Mary, and which would continue for another twenty-two years.

The Committee of Public Safety and the Revolutionary Tribunal were instituted immediately after the execution of the King. The Reign of Terror, during which the ruling faction ruthlessly exterminated all potential enemies, of whatever sex, age, or condition, began in September of 1793 and lasted until the fall of Robespierre on July 27, 1794: during the last six weeks of the Terror alone (the period known as the "Red Terror") nearly fourteen hundred people were guillotined in Paris alone. The Convention was replaced in October of 1795 with the Directory, which was replaced in turn, in 1799, by the Consulate. Napoleon Buonaparte became Emperor in May of 1804.

The French Revolution was not only a crucial event considered in the context of Western history, but was also, perhaps the single most crucial influence on British intellectual, philosophical, and political life in the nineteenth century. In its early stages it portrayed itself as a triumph of the forces of reason over those of superstition and privilege, and as such it was welcomed not only by English radicals like Thomas Paine and William Godwin and William Blake, who, characteristically, saw it as a symbolic act which presaged the return of humanity to the state of perfection from which it had fallen away — but by many liberals as well, and by some who saw it, with its declared emphasis on "Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity," as being analgous to the Glorious Revolution of 1688: as it descended into the madness of the Reign of Terror, however, many who had initially greeted it with enthusiasm — Wordsworth and Coleridge, for example, who came to regard their early support as, in Coleridge's words, a "sqeaking baby trumpet of sedition" — had second thoughts.

The old regime in England, on the other hand, had from the first allied itself closely with Locke and Newton, those great advocates of reason and order, and Edmund Burke could denounce the Revolution in 1790 in his great Reflections on the Revolution in France, elegantly bound copies of which George III, who was not renowned for his intellect, gave to all his friends, saying that it was a book "which every gentleman ought to read." Burke maintained that the radicals who had begun the Revolution by releasing the enormous pent-up quasi-religious energies of the common people of France were interested first in the conquest of their own country and then in the conquest of Europe and of the the rest of the world, which would be "liberated" whether it wished to be or not. Tom Paine's great response to Burke's work,The Rights of Man, appeared in 1791, and the debate between conservatives and radicals raged on for many years, and certainly influenced, directly or indirectly, the thought and the work of every major English author for the remainder of the century and beyond.



http://www.victorianweb.org/history/hist7.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Revolution


ah nice...

[aye_sha90]

ah nice...

thanks:P
See the determination of people when they really want a thing !!!! ;)

[$kywalker]

thanks:P
See the determination of people when they really want a thing !!!! ;)

hahhaaa.......;)...true :P

[mentor_ub]

Chris Angel aka Mind Freak

Criss Angel is the star and creator of the A&E Network show Criss Angel Mindfreak. Seasons 1 and 2 were filmed at the The Aladdin in Las Vegas, with Season 3 at the Luxor Hotel. Premiering on July 20, 2005, the illusions have included walking on water, levitating above the Luxor Hotel (in the light of 39 lightbulbs that can be seen from space), floating between two buildings, causing a Lamborghini to disappear, surviving in an exploding C4 Crate, cutting himself in half in full view of an audience and getting run over by a steamroller while lying stomach down on a bed of glass.[1] Season 4 of Mindfreak debuted on July 23, 2008, and the show is scheduled to run for two more seasons after that.
http://img508.imageshack.us/img508/8232/6a00d8341c98e553ef00e54hs3.jpg

Phenomenon

Starting in October 2007 he appeared as a judge on Phenomenon, with Uri Geller and in a CNN interview about the show he told Larry King "no one has the ability, that I'm aware of, to do anything supernatural, psychic, talk to the dead. And that was what I said I was going to do with Phenomenon. If somebody goes on that show and claims to have supernatural psychic ability, I'm going to bust [him] live and on television."[2]


On the October 31, 2007 episode of the reality show Phenomenon, Paranormalist Jim Callahan performed a summoning, purportedly of author Raymond Hill, to help discover the contents of a locked box.[3] Although fellow judge Uri Geller praised the performance, Angel called it "comical" and subsequently challenged both Callahan and Geller to guess the contents of two envelopes he pulled out of his pocket, offering a million dollars of his own money to whomever could do so. This led to an argument between Callahan and Angel, during which Callahan accused Angel of being an "ideological bigot", and after Angel rose from his chair and approached Callahan, the two were pulled apart as the show promptly went to a commercial break. Angel has since revealed the contents of one envelope and at the unveiling he challenged Geller one more time. Geller was unsuccessful, and the envelope was revealed to contain an index card with the numbers "911" printed on it for September 11, 2001. Criss' explanation was this: "If on 9-10 somebody could have predicted that 9-11 was going to happen, they could have saved thousands of lives". The other envelope's contents will be revealed on the first episode of Season 4 of Criss Angel: Mindfreak.

Callahan later vented his anger toward Criss in an interview for "Phenomenon", saying that his demonstration of walking on water is "his way of proving Jesus Christ was real." He also added, "Every Christian in the world should not be angry with him."

reference-wikipedia

[aye_sha90]

hahhaaa.......;)...true :P


;)
We should get a nice example seeing these!
Our country is not literally democratic yet ;)

[aye_sha90]

Chris Angel aka Mid Freek

Criss Angel is the star and creator of the A&E Network show Criss Angel Mindfreak. Seasons 1 and 2 were filmed at the The Aladdin in Las Vegas, with Season 3 at the Luxor Hotel. Premiering on July 20, 2005, the illusions have included walking on water, levitating above the Luxor Hotel (in the light of 39 lightbulbs that can be seen from space), floating between two buildings, causing a Lamborghini to disappear, surviving in an exploding C4 Crate, cutting himself in half in full view of an audience and getting run over by a steamroller while lying stomach down on a bed of glass.[1] Season 4 of Mindfreak debuted on July 23, 2008, and the show is scheduled to run for two more seasons after that.
http://img508.imageshack.us/img508/8232/6a00d8341c98e553ef00e54hs3.jpg



wooow..kool thanks :D

[aye_sha90]

BERLIN WALL



http://img34.picoodle.com/img/img34/3/10/18/f_wallm_a7db46c.jpg (http://www.picoodle.com/view.php?img=/3/10/18/f_wallm_a7db46c.jpg&srv=img34)

Construction began on The Berlin Wall early in the morning of Sunday, August 13, 1961. It was a desperate – and effective - move by the GDR (German Democratic Republic) to stop East Berliners escaping from the Soviet-controlled East German state into the West of the city, which was then occupied by the Americans, British and French.

Berlin's unique situation as a city half-controlled by Western forces, in the middle of the Soviet Occupation Zone of Germany, made it a focal point for tensions between the Allies and the Soviets and a place where conflicting ideologies were enforced side-by-side. However, as more and more people in the Soviet-controlled East grew disillusioned with communism and the increasingly oppressive economic and political conditions, an increasing number began defecting to the West. By 1961 an estimated 1,500 people a day were fleeing to the West, damaging both the credibility and - more importantly - the workforce of the GDR. Soon rumours began to spread about a wall, and it wasn’t long after that those rumours were made a concrete reality.

In a masterfully-planned operation, spanning just 24 hours, the streets of Berlin were torn up, barricades of paving stones were erected, tanks were gathered at crucial places and subways and local railway services were interrupted, so that within a day the West of Berlin was completely sealed off from the East. As of that same day inhabitants of East Berlin and the GDR were no longer allowed to enter the West of the city (including the 60,000 who had been commuters). In response to international criticism that such drastic measures inevitably drew, the GDR claimed that the barricade had been raised as an ‘anti-fascist protection wall’, and that they had moved to prevent a third world war.

The version of the ‘Wall’ that started life in 1961, was in fact not a wall but a 96 miles barbed wire fence. However, after this incarnation proved too easy to scale, work started in 1962 on a second fence, parallel to the first but up to 100 yards further in. The area in between the two fences was demolished to create an empty space, which became widely known as "death strip" as it was here that many would-be escapers met their doom. The strip was covered with raked gravel, making it easy to spot footprints, it offered no cover, was mined and booby-trapped with tripwires and, most importantly, it offered a clear field of fire to the armed guards – who were instructed to shoot on sight.

Later on even these measures were deemed insufficient and a concrete wall was added in 1965, which served until 1975 when the infamous ‘Stützwandelement UL 12.11’ was constructed. Known also as Grenzmauer 75 (Border Wall ’75), it was the final and most sophisticated version of the Wall. It was made from 45,000 separate sections of reinforced concrete, each 3.6 m high and 1.5 m wide, and topped with a smooth pipe, intended to make it more difficult for escapers to scale it. The Grenzmauer was reinforced by mesh fencing, signal fencing, anti-vehicle trenches, barbed wire, over 300 watchtowers, and thirty bunkers… Just to be on the safe side!

Despite the various security measures enforced, escape attempts were commonplace, especially in the years immediately following the erection of the wall, when there was still a fighting chance of making it across alive. Climbing was the obvious way to go and some 5,000 were said to have reached the other side. However in its thirty year history 100 people were shot dead, most famously the eighteen year old Peter Fetcher, who, after he was hit in the hip, was left to bleed to death in no-man’s land as the world’s media watched on.

As security tightened, more ‘creative’ escape plans became the order of the day. Tunnels and jumping from bordering buildings were two more successful ways of getting to the West, although the Wetzel and Strlzyck families eloped in true style - floating to salvation in a hot air balloon which they had fashioned from hundreds of small pieces of nylon cloth (after which it became almost impossible to buy cloth in the East). Rivalling them for the coveted prize of brave escapes, is the citizen who drove up to the checkpoint barrier and, winding down the roof of his convertible at the last minute, slipped underneath! Needless to say that a lower barrier was subsequently installed.

For those unable or unwilling to abscond from the East, life was bleak; and things only continued to get worse throughout the 70s and 80s as Communism and the USSR began to collapse. Honecker and the GDR resolutely stuck to their guns, speaking out in support of their regime; but when Hungary opened its borders in the summer of 1989, a flood of East Germans made their way West. Meanwhile student protests in Leipzeig put pressure on the government to lower the borders into West Berlin.

As the Iron Curtain cracked the fall of the wall looked inevitable. In the evening of November 9th, 1989 Gunter Schabowski, Minister of Propoganda, read out a note at a press conference announcing that the border would be opened for "private trips abroad”. The news spread like wildfire and the German people immediately gathered in their thousands by the checkpoints, demanding passage. There was some confusion as to what the official line was and the border guards, uncertain of what to do and ill-equipped to deal with the huge and unyielding mob, were forced to let them pass. The Wall had fallen.

The days that followed saw chaotic celebrations erupt over the country as Germany celebrated the political fall of the Wall - and in the following days and weeks hundreds of citizens began physically tearing down the concrete division. These events were the first steps to the reunification of Germany, which was formally concluded on October 3rd, 1990. Today remnants of the Berlin Wall can be found at Bernauer Strasse and in front of the Neiderkirchnerstrasse, the former Prussian Parliament and current Berlin Parliament.

[$kywalker]

American Revolution -

1775-1783: The Complete History of The American Revolution

http://www.americanrevolution.com/images/1786-I1.jpg 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.

The struggle by which the Thirteen Colonies on the Atlantic seaboard of North America won independence from Great Britain and became the United States. It is also called the American War of Independence.

The "shot heard round the world" fired at Lexington on April 19, 1775 began the war for American Independence. It ended eight and a half years later September 3, 1783 with the Treaty of Paris.




The Thirteen Colonies
http://www.americanrevolution.com/images/george_washington_2.jpgThe term used for the colonies of British North America that joined together in the American Revolution against the mother country, adopted the Declaration of Independence in 1776, and became the United States. They were New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. They are also called the Thirteen Original States.

Causes and Early Troubles
By the middle of the 18th century, differences in life, thought, and interests had developed between the mother country and the growing colonies. Local political institutions and practice diverged significantly from English ways, while social customs, religious beliefs, and economic interests added to the potential sources of conflict. The British government, like other imperial powers in the 18th century, favored a policy of mercantilism; the Navigation Acts were intended to regulate commerce in the British interest. These were only loosely enforced, however, and the colonies were by and large allowed to develop freely with little interference from England.

Conditions changed abruptly in 1763. The Treaty of Paris in that year ended the French and Indian Wars and removed a long-standing threat to the colonies. At the same time the ministry (1763-65) of George Grenville in http://www.americanrevolution.com/images/WARREN.jpgGreat Britain undertook a new colonial policy intended to tighten political control over the colonies and to make them pay for their defense and return revenue to the mother country. The tax levied on molasses and sugar in 1764 caused some consternation among New England merchants and makers of rum; the tax itself was smaller than the one already on the books, but the promise of stringent enforcement was novel and ominous.

War's Outbreak
April 19, 1775, shots had been exchanged by colonials and British soldiers, men had been killed, and a revolution had begun. On the very day (May 10, 1775) that the Second Continental Congress met, Ethan Allen http://www.americanrevolution.com/images/BRIDGE.jpgBefore Congress met again the situation had changed. On the morning of and his Green Mountain Boys, together with a force under Benedict Arnold, took Fort Ticonderoga from the British, and two days later Seth Warner captured Crown Point. Boston was under British siege, and before that siege was climaxed by the costly British victory usually called the battle of Bunker Hill (June 17, 1775) the Congress had chosen (June 15, 1775) George Washington as commander in chief of the Continental Armed Forces.

Indecision and Declaration
The war was on in earnest. Some delegates had come to the Congress already committed to declaring the colonies independent of Great Britain, but even many stalwart upholders of the colonial cause were not ready to take such a step. The lines were being more clearly drawn between the pro-British Loyalists and colonial revolutionists. The time was one of indecision, and the division of the people was symbolized by the split between Benjamin Franklin and his Loyalist son, William Franklin.

Loyalists were numerous and included small farmers as well as large landowners, royal officeholders, and members of the professions; they were to be found in varying strength in every colony. A large part of the population was more or less neutral, swaying to this side or that or else remaining inert in the struggle, which was to some extent a civil war. So it was to remain to the end.

Civil government and administration had fallen apart and had to be patched together locally. In some places the result was bloody strife, as in the partisan raids in the Carolinas and Georgia and the Mohawk valley massacre in New York. Elsewhere hostility did not produce open struggles.

In Jan., 1776, Thomas Paine wrote a pamphlet, Common Sense, which urged the colonial cause. Its influence was tremendous, and it was read everywhere with enthusiastic acclaim. Militarily, however, the cause did not prosper greatly. Delegations to the Canadians had been unsuccessful, and the Quebec campaign (1775-76) ended in disaster. The British gave up Boston in March, 1776, but the prospects were still not good for the ill-trained, poorly armed volunteer soldiers of the Continental Army when the Congress decided finally to declare the independence of the Thirteen Colonies.

The Declaration of Independence is conventionally dated July 4, 1776. Drawn up by Thomas Jefferson (with slight emendations), it was to be one of the great historical documents of all time. It did not, however, have any immediate positive effect.

The British under Gen. William Howe and his brother, Admiral Richard Howe, came to New York harbor. After vain attempts to negotiate a peace, the British forces struck. Washington lost Brooklyn Heights, retreated northward, was defeated at Harlem Heights in Manhattan and at White Plains, and took part of his dwindling army into New Jersey. Thomas Paine in a new pamphlet, The Crisis, exhorted the revolutionists to courage in desperate days, and Washington showed his increasing military skill and helped to restore colonial spirits in the winter of 1776-77 by crossing the ice-ridden Delaware and winning small victories over forces made up mostly of Hessian mercenaries at Trenton (Dec. 26) and Princeton (Jan. 3).

Foreign Assistance
The warfare in the Middle Atlantic region settled almost to stagnation, but foreign aid was finally arriving. Agents of the new nationnotably Benjamin Franklin, Arthur Lee, Silas Deane, and later John Adamswere striving to get help, and in 1777 Pierre de Beaumarchais had succeeded in getting arms and supplies sent to the colonials in time to help win the battle of Saratoga. That victory made it easier for France to enter upon an alliance with the United States, for which Franklin and the comte de Vergennes (the French foreign minister) signed (1778) a treaty. Spain entered the war against Great Britain in 1779, but Spanish help did little for the United States, while French soldiers and sailors and especially French supplies and money were of crucial importance.

Aftermath
The Treaty of Paris formally recognized the new nation in 1783, although many questions were left unsettled. The United States was floundering through a postwar depression and seeking not too successfully to meet its administrative problems under the Articles of Confederation.

The leaders in the new country were those prominent either in the council halls or on the fields of the Revolution, and the first three Presidents after the Constitution of the United States was adopted were Washington, Adams, and Jefferson. Some of the more radical Revolutionary leaders were disappointed in the turn toward conservatism when the Revolution was over, but liberty and democracy had been fixed as the highest ideals of the United States.

The American Revolution had a great influence on liberal thought throughout Europe. The struggles and successes of the youthful democracy were much in the minds of those who brought about the French Revolution, and most assuredly later helped to inspire revolutionists in Spain's American colonies...........

[psyche]

J. Robert Oppenheimer

"....the father of the atomic bomb.."

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/03/JROppenheimer-LosAlamos.jpg/225px-JROppenheimer-LosAlamos.jpg

J. Robert Oppenheimer (April 22, 1904 – February 18, 1967) was an Americantheoretical physicist and professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley. He is known for his role as the scientific director of the Manhattan Project: the World War II effort to develop the first nuclear weapons at the secret Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. For this reason he is remembered as "the father of the atomic bomb". In reference to the Trinity testBhagavad Gita: "If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one. Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e0/Nagasakibomb.jpg/200px-Nagasakibomb.jpg

After the war Oppenheimer was a chief advisor to the newly created United States Atomic Energy Commission and used that position to lobby for international control of atomic energy and to avert the nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union. After provoking the ire of many politicians with his outspoken political opinions during the Red Scare, he had his security clearance revoked in a much-publicized and politicized hearing in 1954. Though stripped of his direct political influence Oppenheimer continued to lecture, write, and work in physics. A decade later President John F. Kennedy awarded him (and President Lyndon B. Johnson presented him) the Enrico Fermi Award as a gesture of political rehabilitation.

As a scientist Oppenheimer is remembered most for being the chief founder of the American school of theoretical physics while at the University of California, Berkeley. As director of the Institute for Advanced Study he would hold Einstein's old position of Senior Professor of Theoretical Physics. Oppenheimer's notable achievements in physics include the Born-Oppenheimer approximation, work on electron-positron theory, the Oppenheimer-Phillips process, quantum tunneling, relativistic quantum mechanics, quantum field theory, black holes, and cosmic rays.

read more... (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Oppenheimer)

[coolioWiZ]

http://img90.imageshack.us/img90/6246/080424140400largelt0.jpg
Extinction of Dinosaurs

Deep into history, we find there is an event which decided the very existance of humans or for the matter mammals. If this event did not occur, mammals would never have come to prominence and the current world domination by the human animal would be dead impossible.

65 million years ago the world was dominated by reptiles we today know identify as dinosaurs. they were the predators they dominated the food chains, they grew to incredible sizes and was on earth sky and even the oceans. mammals were still evolving and was suppressed by the dominion of these saurians.

But suddenly something happened, the dinosaurs went extinct, and the vaccum was soon filled by mammals and evolution favored them to their current domination of our biosphere . . ultimately the evolution of the human species and their current command.

I feel this mass extinction event is the ultimate phenomenon which decided the very exisitance of humans. I'd like to imagine if this event didn't happen, would we find civilized dinos who would find languages, build cities and conquer the space :lol:
http://img90.imageshack.us/img90/2316/25069358id4.jpg

Read More on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cretaceous–Tertiary_extinction_event)

[aye_sha90]

J. Robert Oppenheimer

"....the father of the atomic bomb.."

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/03/JROppenheimer-LosAlamos.jpg/225px-JROppenheimer-LosAlamos.jpg

J. Robert Oppenheimer (April 22, 1904 – February 18, 1967) was an Americantheoretical physicist and professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley. He is known for his role as the scientific director of the Manhattan Project: the World War II effort to develop the first nuclear weapons at the secret Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. For this reason he is remembered as "the father of the atomic bomb". In reference to the Trinity testBhagavad Gita: "If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one. Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds."

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e0/Nagasakibomb.jpg/200px-Nagasakibomb.jpg

After the war Oppenheimer was a chief advisor to the newly created United States Atomic Energy Commission and used that position to lobby for international control of atomic energy and to avert the nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union. After provoking the ire of many politicians with his outspoken political opinions during the Red Scare, he had his security clearance revoked in a much-publicized and politicized hearing in 1954. Though stripped of his direct political influence Oppenheimer continued to lecture, write, and work in physics. A decade later President John F. Kennedy awarded him (and President Lyndon B. Johnson presented him) the Enrico Fermi Award as a gesture of political rehabilitation.

As a scientist Oppenheimer is remembered most for being the chief founder of the American school of theoretical physics while at the University of California, Berkeley. As director of the Institute for Advanced Study he would hold Einstein's old position of Senior Professor of Theoretical Physics. Oppenheimer's notable achievements in physics include the Born-Oppenheimer approximation, work on electron-positron theory, the Oppenheimer-Phillips process, quantum tunneling, relativistic quantum mechanics, quantum field theory, black holes, and cosmic rays.

read more... (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Oppenheimer)

heeey..thanks darling :P mwah

[aye_sha90]

POL POT

http://img26.picoodle.com/img/img26/3/11/3/f_PolPotm_5ff9331.jpg (http://www.picoodle.com/view.php?img=/3/11/3/f_PolPotm_5ff9331.jpg&srv=img26)

Pol Pot, who become responsible for the deaths of over two million of his own people, was born Saloth Sar in a small Cambodian village about 140 kilometers north of Phnom Penh. His date of birth is uncertain although French records give it as May 25, 1928. At age six he went to live with his brother at the Royal household in Phnom Penh. Here he learned Buddhist precepts and discipline. At age eight he went to a Catholic primary school, where he remained for six years. It was here that he picked up the basics of Western culture, as well as the French language.

In 1949, Pol Pot went to study in Paris on a government scholarship. It was here that he got his introduction to Communism, joining the French Communist Party. After four years of exposure to Stalinist Communism he returned to Cambodia in 1953. Within a month he had joined the Communist resistance, becoming a member of the Indochina Communist Party (IHC) which was dominated by the Viet Minh.

The 1954 Cambodian elections saw the Communists throw in support with the Democrats. The Democrats were soundly defeated, however, by the incumbent Government of Prince Sihanouk who now held absolute power. Pol Pot now took up a post as a teacher in a private college. He also spent his time recruiting the educated classes to the Communist cause. The Government, however, began a Communist crackdown and Pol Pot was forced to flee to the Jungles near the Vietnam border to avoid arrest. For the next seven years he would spend his time in the Cambodian jungle hiding from the police.

Over the ensuing years the communists bided their time as they built up their strength for a take-over attempt. They were bolstered by the North Vietnamese who were waging warfare against the Cambodian Government. A major Vietnamese victory in 1971 allowed the Communists to take control of certain areas of the country. In 1973 the communists launched a major attack on the Government but this was halted by American bombing. A final Communist assault began on January 1, 1975. This time they were victorious. On April 17, Communist forces entered Phnom Penh. Within 24 hours they had ordered the entire city evacuated. This process was repeated in other cities resulting in more than 2 million Cambodians being forced out of their homes. Many of them starved to death.

Pol Pot was now Prime Minister of Cambodia, which he promptly renamed Kampuchea. In August, 1976 he unveiled his Four Year Plan, which detailed the collectivisation of agriculture, the nationalization of industry and the financing of the economy through increased agricultural exports. This plan caused untold misery to the nation with many thousands dying in the paddy fields. Crops needed to feed the population were marked for export. Malnutrition was rampant, made worse by the Communist insistence on traditional Cambodian medicine. Pol Pot also started the infamous S-21 interrogation center where more than 20,000 men, women and children were tortured to death.

Throughout 1976 and ’77 skirmishes with Vietnam continued. In December 1977 The Vietnamese made real inroads in Kampuchea. Pol Pot, however, held on for another year. By January, 1979 the Vietnamese forces had actually reached Phnom Penh. The Kampuchean Government fled by train while Pol Pot was taken by helicopter to Thailand. His last public appearance was an interview in December 1979. For the next 19 years he remained in exile in the Thai jungle. Pol Pot died in 1998.

[madurax86]

Linus Torvalds
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/69/Linus_Torvalds.jpeg/225px-Linus_Torvalds.jpeg
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
Linus Torvalds

Born December 28, 1969 (1969-12-28) (age 38)
Helsinki, Finland
Residence Portland, Oregon
Nationality Finnish
Occupation Software engineer
Employer Linux Foundation
Known for Linux kernel, Git
Spouse(s) Tove Torvalds
Parents Nils Torvalds (father)
Relatives Ole Torvalds (grandfather)
Website
www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/torvalds/

Linus Benedict Torvalds (pronunciation (help·info); [ˈliːnɵs ˈtuːrvalds]; born December 28, 1969 in Helsinki, Finland) is a Finnish software engineer best known for having initiated the development of the Linux kernel. He later became the chief architect of the Linux kernel, and now acts as the project's coordinator.
Contents
[hide]

* 1 Biography
o 1.1 Early years
o 1.2 Later years
* 2 The Linus/Linux connection
* 3 Authority on Linux
* 4 Linux trademark
* 5 Recognition
* 6 See also
* 7 Notes
* 8 References
* 9 External links

[edit] Biography

[edit] Early years

Linus Torvalds was born in Helsinki, Finland, the son of journalists Anna and Nils Torvalds,[1] and the grandson of poet Ole Torvalds. His family belongs to the Swedish-speaking minority (5.5%) of Finland's population. Torvalds was named after Linus Pauling, the American Nobel Prize-winning chemist, although in the book Rebel Code: Linux and the Open Source Revolution, Torvalds is quoted as saying, "I think I was named equally for Linus the peanut-cartoon character," noting that this makes him half "Nobel-prize-winning chemist" and half "blanket-carrying cartoon character."[2] Both of his parents were campus radicals at the University of Helsinki in the 1960s.

Torvalds attended the University of Helsinki from 1988 to 1996, graduating with a master's degree in computer science. His M.Sc. thesis was titled Linux: A Portable Operating System. From 1997 to 1999 he was involved in 86open helping to choose the standard binary format for Linux and Unix.

His interest in computers began with a Commodore VIC-20.[3] After the VIC-20 he purchased a Sinclair QL which he modified extensively, especially its operating system. He programmed an Assembly language and a text editor for the QL, as well as a few games.[4] He is known to have written a Pac-Man clone named Cool Man. In 1990 he purchased an Intel 80386-based IBM PC and spent a few weeks playing the game Prince of Persia before receiving his MINIX copy which in turn enabled him to begin his work on Linux.[2]

[edit] Later years

Linus Torvalds is married to Tove Torvalds (née Monni) – a six-time Finnish national Karate champion – whom he first met in the autumn of 1993.[5] Torvalds was running introductory computer laboratory exercises for students and instructed the course attendants to send him an e-mail as a test, to which Tove responded with an e-mail asking for a date.[2] Tove and Linus were later married and have three daughters, Patricia, Daniela, and Celeste.[6]

After a visit to Transmeta in late 1996,[7] he accepted a position at the company in California, where he would work from February 1997 through June 2003. He then moved to the Open Source Development Labs, which has since merged with the Free Standards Group to become the Linux Foundation, under whose auspices he continues to work. In June 2004, Torvalds and his family moved to Portland, Oregon to be closer to the consortium's Beaverton, Oregon-based headquarters.

Red Hat and VA Linux, both leading developers of Linux-based software, presented Torvalds with stock options in gratitude for his creation.[8] In 1999, both companies went public and Torvalds' net worth shot up to roughly $20 million.[9][10]

His personal mascot is a penguin nicknamed Tux, which has been widely adopted by the Linux community as the mascot of the Linux kernel.

Unlike many open source icons, Torvalds maintains a low profile and generally refuses to comment on competing software products.[dubious – discuss] Torvalds generally stays out of non-kernel-related debates. Although Torvalds believes that "open source is the only right way to do software", he also has said that he uses the "best tool for the job", even if that includes proprietary software.[11] He has been criticized for his use and alleged advocacy of the proprietary BitKeeper software for version control in the Linux kernel. However, Torvalds has since written a free-software replacement for BitKeeper called Git. Torvalds has commented on official GNOME developmental mailing lists that, in terms of desktop environments, he encourages users to switch to KDE.[12][13]

[edit] The Linus/Linux connection

Main article: History of Linux

Initially Torvalds wanted to call the kernel he developed Freax (a combination of "free", "freak", and the letter X to indicate that it is a Unix-like system), but his friend Ari Lemmke, who administered the FTP server where the kernel was first hosted for downloading, named Torvalds' directory linux.

[edit] Authority on Linux

Since Linux has had thousands of contributors, such a percentage represents a significant personal contribution to the overall amount of code. Torvalds remains the ultimate authority on what new code is incorporated into the standard Linux kernel.[14]

[edit] Linux trademark

Torvalds owns the "Linux" trademark, and monitors[15] use of it chiefly through the non-profit organization Linux International.

[edit] Recognition

* In 1996 Asteroid 9793 Torvalds was named after Linus Torvalds.
* In 1998 he received an EFF Pioneer Award.[16]
* In 1999 he received honorary doctor status at Stockholm University.
* The 1999 novel Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson features several characters who use "Finux" a Unix-like operating system developed in Finland.
* In 2000 he received honorary doctor status at University of Helsinki.
* In 2000 he was awarded the Lovelace Medal.[17]
* In the Time magazine's Person of the Century Poll, Torvalds was voted at #17 at the poll's close in 2000.[18]
* In 2001, he shared the Takeda Award for Social/Economic Well-Being with Richard Stallman and Ken Sakamura.
* The 2001 film Swordfish contains a Finnish character – the number one computer hacker in the world – named Axl Torvalds.
* In 2004, he was named one of the most influential people in the world by the Time magazine article "Linus Torvalds: The Free-Software Champion" by Lawrence Lessig, Time Magazine, posted Monday, Apr. 26, 2004, retrieved October 3, 2006.
* In the search for the 100 Greatest Finns of all time, voted in the summer of 2004, Torvalds placed 16th.
* In 2005 he appeared as one of "the best managers" in a survey by BusinessWeek.[19]
* In August 2005, Torvalds received the Vollum Award from Reed College.[20]
* In 2006, Business 2.0 magazine named him one of "10 people who don't matter" because the growth of Linux has shrunk Torvalds' individual impact.[21]
* In 2006, Time Magazine—Europe Edition named him one of the revolutionary heroes of the past 60 years.[22]
* In 2008, he was inducted into the Hall of Fellows of the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California.[23][24]

[henderson]

Adolf Hitler

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/7/7d/Adolf_Hitler_cph_3a48970.jpg/225px-Adolf_Hitler_cph_3a48970.jpg

Adolf Hitler (20 April 1889 – 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born politician who was elected to lead the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei NSDAP), the Nazi Party. He was Chancellor of Germany (1933–1945) and Führer und Reichskanzler of Germany (1934–1945).

Hitler was a decorated veteran of World War I who led the Nazi Party in Weimar Germany. Following his imprisonment after a 1923 failed coup, he gained support by promoting nationalism, antisemitism and anti-communism with charismatic oratory and propaganda. The Nazis executed or assassinated many of their opponents, restructured the state economy, rearmed the armed forces and established a totalitarian and fascist dictatorship. Hitler pursued a foreign policy with the declared goal of seizing Lebensraum ("living space"). The German invasion of Poland in 1939 caused the British and French Empires to declare war on Germany, leading to the outbreak of World War II in Europe.[3]

The Axis powers occupied most of continental Europe and parts of Asia and Africa until defeated by the Allies. By 1945, Germany was in ruins. Hitler's bid for territorial conquest and racial subjugation caused the deaths of 43 million people, including the systematic genocide of an estimated six million Jews as well as various additional "undesirable" populations in what is known as the Holocaust.

During the final days of the war in 1945, as Berlin was being invaded by the Red Army, Hitler married Eva Braun.[4] Less than 24 hours later, the two committed suicide in the Führerbunker.

[aye_sha90]

Linus Torvalds
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/69/Linus_Torvalds.jpeg/225px-Linus_Torvalds.jpeg
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
Linus Torvalds

Born December 28, 1969 (1969-12-28) (age 38)
Helsinki, Finland
Residence Portland, Oregon
Nationality Finnish
Occupation Software engineer
Employer Linux Foundation
Known for Linux kernel, Git
Spouse(s) Tove Torvalds
Parents Nils Torvalds (father)
Relatives Ole Torvalds (grandfather)
Website
www.cs.helsinki.fi/u/torvalds/

Linus Benedict Torvalds (pronunciation (help·info); [ˈliːnɵs ˈtuːrvalds]; born December 28, 1969 in Helsinki, Finland) is a Finnish software engineer best known for having initiated the development of the Linux kernel. He later became the chief architect of the Linux kernel, and now acts as the project's coordinator.
Contents
[hide]

* 1 Biography
o 1.1 Early years
o 1.2 Later years
* 2 The Linus/Linux connection
* 3 Authority on Linux
* 4 Linux trademark
* 5 Recognition
* 6 See also
* 7 Notes
* 8 References
* 9 External links

[edit] Biography

[edit] Early years

Linus Torvalds was born in Helsinki, Finland, the son of journalists Anna and Nils Torvalds,[1] and the grandson of poet Ole Torvalds. His family belongs to the Swedish-speaking minority (5.5%) of Finland's population. Torvalds was named after Linus Pauling, the American Nobel Prize-winning chemist, although in the book Rebel Code: Linux and the Open Source Revolution, Torvalds is quoted as saying, "I think I was named equally for Linus the peanut-cartoon character," noting that this makes him half "Nobel-prize-winning chemist" and half "blanket-carrying cartoon character."[2] Both of his parents were campus radicals at the University of Helsinki in the 1960s.

Torvalds attended the University of Helsinki from 1988 to 1996, graduating with a master's degree in computer science. His M.Sc. thesis was titled Linux: A Portable Operating System. From 1997 to 1999 he was involved in 86open helping to choose the standard binary format for Linux and Unix.

His interest in computers began with a Commodore VIC-20.[3] After the VIC-20 he purchased a Sinclair QL which he modified extensively, especially its operating system. He programmed an Assembly language and a text editor for the QL, as well as a few games.[4] He is known to have written a Pac-Man clone named Cool Man. In 1990 he purchased an Intel 80386-based IBM PC and spent a few weeks playing the game Prince of Persia before receiving his MINIX copy which in turn enabled him to begin his work on Linux.[2]

[edit] Later years

Linus Torvalds is married to Tove Torvalds (née Monni) – a six-time Finnish national Karate champion – whom he first met in the autumn of 1993.[5] Torvalds was running introductory computer laboratory exercises for students and instructed the course attendants to send him an e-mail as a test, to which Tove responded with an e-mail asking for a date.[2] Tove and Linus were later married and have three daughters, Patricia, Daniela, and Celeste.[6]

After a visit to Transmeta in late 1996,[7] he accepted a position at the company in California, where he would work from February 1997 through June 2003. He then moved to the Open Source Development Labs, which has since merged with the Free Standards Group to become the Linux Foundation, under whose auspices he continues to work. In June 2004, Torvalds and his family moved to Portland, Oregon to be closer to the consortium's Beaverton, Oregon-based headquarters.

Red Hat and VA Linux, both leading developers of Linux-based software, presented Torvalds with stock options in gratitude for his creation.[8] In 1999, both companies went public and Torvalds' net worth shot up to roughly $20 million.[9][10]

His personal mascot is a penguin nicknamed Tux, which has been widely adopted by the Linux community as the mascot of the Linux kernel.

Unlike many open source icons, Torvalds maintains a low profile and generally refuses to comment on competing software products.[dubious – discuss] Torvalds generally stays out of non-kernel-related debates. Although Torvalds believes that "open source is the only right way to do software", he also has said that he uses the "best tool for the job", even if that includes proprietary software.[11] He has been criticized for his use and alleged advocacy of the proprietary BitKeeper software for version control in the Linux kernel. However, Torvalds has since written a free-software replacement for BitKeeper called Git. Torvalds has commented on official GNOME developmental mailing lists that, in terms of desktop environments, he encourages users to switch to KDE.[12][13]

[edit] The Linus/Linux connection

Main article: History of Linux

Initially Torvalds wanted to call the kernel he developed Freax (a combination of "free", "freak", and the letter X to indicate that it is a Unix-like system), but his friend Ari Lemmke, who administered the FTP server where the kernel was first hosted for downloading, named Torvalds' directory linux.

[edit] Authority on Linux

Since Linux has had thousands of contributors, such a percentage represents a significant personal contribution to the overall amount of code. Torvalds remains the ultimate authority on what new code is incorporated into the standard Linux kernel.[14]

[edit] Linux trademark

Torvalds owns the "Linux" trademark, and monitors[15] use of it chiefly through the non-profit organization Linux International.

[edit] Recognition

* In 1996 Asteroid 9793 Torvalds was named after Linus Torvalds.
* In 1998 he received an EFF Pioneer Award.[16]
* In 1999 he received honorary doctor status at Stockholm University.
* The 1999 novel Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson features several characters who use "Finux" a Unix-like operating system developed in Finland.
* In 2000 he received honorary doctor status at University of Helsinki.
* In 2000 he was awarded the Lovelace Medal.[17]
* In the Time magazine's Person of the Century Poll, Torvalds was voted at #17 at the poll's close in 2000.[18]
* In 2001, he shared the Takeda Award for Social/Economic Well-Being with Richard Stallman and Ken Sakamura.
* The 2001 film Swordfish contains a Finnish character – the number one computer hacker in the world – named Axl Torvalds.
* In 2004, he was named one of the most influential people in the world by the Time magazine article "Linus Torvalds: The Free-Software Champion" by Lawrence Lessig, Time Magazine, posted Monday, Apr. 26, 2004, retrieved October 3, 2006.
* In the search for the 100 Greatest Finns of all time, voted in the summer of 2004, Torvalds placed 16th.
* In 2005 he appeared as one of "the best managers" in a survey by BusinessWeek.[19]
* In August 2005, Torvalds received the Vollum Award from Reed College.[20]
* In 2006, Business 2.0 magazine named him one of "10 people who don't matter" because the growth of Linux has shrunk Torvalds' individual impact.[21]
* In 2006, Time Magazine—Europe Edition named him one of the revolutionary heroes of the past 60 years.[22]
* In 2008, he was inducted into the Hall of Fellows of the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California.[23][24]

awww...amazing :D thanks a lot! :)

[aye_sha90]

Adolf Hitler

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/7/7d/Adolf_Hitler_cph_3a48970.jpg/225px-Adolf_Hitler_cph_3a48970.jpg

Adolf Hitler (20 April 1889 – 30 April 1945) was an Austrian-born politician who was elected to lead the National Socialist German Workers Party (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei NSDAP), the Nazi Party. He was Chancellor of Germany (1933–1945) and Führer und Reichskanzler of Germany (1934–1945).

Hitler was a decorated veteran of World War I who led the Nazi Party in Weimar Germany. Following his imprisonment after a 1923 failed coup, he gained support by promoting nationalism, antisemitism and anti-communism with charismatic oratory and propaganda. The Nazis executed or assassinated many of their opponents, restructured the state economy, rearmed the armed forces and established a totalitarian and fascist dictatorship. Hitler pursued a foreign policy with the declared goal of seizing Lebensraum ("living space"). The German invasion of Poland in 1939 caused the British and French Empires to declare war on Germany, leading to the outbreak of World War II in Europe.[3]

The Axis powers occupied most of continental Europe and parts of Asia and Africa until defeated by the Allies. By 1945, Germany was in ruins. Hitler's bid for territorial conquest and racial subjugation caused the deaths of 43 million people, including the systematic genocide of an estimated six million Jews as well as various additional "undesirable" populations in what is known as the Holocaust.

During the final days of the war in 1945, as Berlin was being invaded by the Red Army, Hitler married Eva Braun.[4] Less than 24 hours later, the two committed suicide in the Führerbunker.


thanks :)



http://www.thirdreich.net/Hitler_Bio.html

[randula01]

Thanx for info...............

[aye_sha90]

Thanx for info...............
you're welcome. :) Update :D

[sri_lion]

Barack Obama (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama) (We all know why!! :lol::lol:)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1f/BarackObama2005portrait.jpg/225px-BarackObama2005portrait.jpg

[aye_sha90]

Barack Obama (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama) (We all know why!! :lol::lol:)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1f/BarackObama2005portrait.jpg/225px-BarackObama2005portrait.jpg
buhahahahahahahahhaa :lol: :lol:

[coolioWiZ]

buhahahahahahahahhaa :lol: :lol:

hehe give that guy a break . . lol now let's see wut's gonna happen to the "change" :P

[aye_sha90]

hehe give that guy a break . . lol now let's see wut's gonna happen to the "change" :P


lol.... hehehe. I say nothing. :D
We'll seee :P

[G.R.E.A]

Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi!!

Wish there were more people like them! The world would be a better place!!

What they have done and HOW they have done it, no words for it!! There CAN be a world without violence and war, unlike nowadays.
to get the world to a step forward in the right direction!

[aye_sha90]

HIS EXCELLENCY HONOURABLE MAHINDA RAJAPAKSHA (KING OF SRI LANKA)

http://img188.imageshack.us/img188/3554/mahindarajapaksa300.jpg (http://img188.imageshack.us/i/mahindarajapaksa300.jpg/)


Mahinda Rajapaksa (IPA:�[maˈhində ˈraːɟəˌpakʂə], Sinhala:මහින්ද රාජපක්ෂ, full name Percy Mahinda Rajapaksa; born November 18, 1945) is the 6th and current executive President of Sri Lanka. A lawyer by profession, Rajapaksa was first elected to the Parliament of Sri Lanka in 1970, and served as prime minister from April 6, 2004 until his victory in the 2005 Presidential election. He was sworn in for a six-year term as president on November 19, 2005. President Rajapaksa is credited with defeating Tamil Tiger (LTTE) rebels completely and unitingSri Lanka as one nation on May 18, 2009, the day LTTE leader Vellupillai Prabhakaran was killed.

His Excellency President Mahinda Rajapaksa, the greatest President in the world. :) :)

Honour and Respect to my King.

Love live the King
Love live the King
Love live the King



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahinda_Rajapaksa

[coolioWiZ]

HIS EXCELLENCY HONOURABLE MAHINDA RAJAPAKSHA (KING OF SRI LANKA)




Honour and Respect to my King.

Love live the King
Love live the King
Love live the King



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahinda_Rajapaksa

lol welcome back . .it's after a long time :)

[aye_sha90]

lol welcome back . .it's after a long time :)

OMG :shocked::shocked::shocked::shocked::shocked::shoc ked::shocked::shocked::shocked::shocked:


HELLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW WWWWWWWWWWWWW


My God..where u've beeeeeeeeen?:O:O