I’ve wondered thsat muhself.
Beethoven and Ben Franklin. Though my fantasies are always a bit evil, involving carefully giving him enough information understand how television works, then letting him watch a documentary like Walking with Dinosaurs and send him back thinking it was all real and we just hadn’t looked hard enough for them.
Show Washington how we’ve grown. (But not necessarily “grown up”.)
Me too. Sometimes I’ll daydream at length, not necessarily about physically taking some around but somehow just telling them what’s happened, somehow. It’s mostly authors that I have read multiple books from, so I actually have a sense of the person beyond just what they did. For instance, it might be Richard Feynman or Ayn Rand. You know, I’d tell Feynman all about technology, computers, the Internet, or the space program. Or to Ayn Rand, about the fall of the Soviet Union, and then the whole terrorism thing. Some vice versa though, just everything that’s happened.
I want to watch the Lord of the Rings movies with Tolkien himself. Something tells me he’d really like 'em.
Thank you so much for starting this thread, pizzabrat. My jaw actually dropped when I saw it.
My historical visitor is James Madison. It’s interesting how many of us chose founding fathers. I started hosting Madison when I was given a class assignment to write about what he would have thought of the Civil War. Now I think of him every time I’m fascinated by some aspect of the modern world. The other day I showed him the incredible abundance of produce at my local supermarket.
Thudlow Boink - George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Paul Revere, and Queen Victoria all visited the present (and were more or less amused) on Bewitched.
I have to add that the even weirder thing for me is that many of who do this have one specific visitor from the past.
And the idea of showing the produce selection to James Madison is absolutely slaying me. I hope he is impressed!
Yes he was, but I couldn’t figure out whether he would have seen pineapple before or not. Having historical visitors does increase your interest in learning more about them. I’ve read tons about Madison, including the massive (753 page) biography by Ralph Ketcham, and The Business of May Next, which specifically details Madison’s role in the writing of the Constitution, and uses his own writings and letters to illustrate his thought process. The more you know about a historical figure, the more you can get into his head (and the more he can get into yours!)
I’m currently reading a biography of Daniel Boone, who was a contemporary of Madison and the founders, but when I tried to give him a tour, it didn’t really work out. I honestly don’t think Boone would care if we had highways or computers; he was singularly focused on hunting and the unexplored wilderness, and I think he’d be more disappointed than intrigued by the modern world.
ETA: And believe me, I think this whole thing is weird too. That’s what makes this thread so great. I may be a nut, but at least now I know that I’m a nut in good company.
Ben Franklin. I think he’s the only historical figure mentioned so far who specifically fantasized about it:
“I wish it were possible, from this instance, to invent a method of embalming drowned persons, in such a manner that they might be recalled to life at any period, however distant; for having very ardent desire to see and observe the state of America a hundred years hence, I should prefer to an ordinary death, being immersed with a few friends in a cask of Madeira, until that time, then to be recalled to life by the solar warmth of my dear country.”
I’ve always thought it would be wonderful to be able to satisfy that curiosity.
I’ve had these fantasies too. I always thought it would be fun to drive George Washington or Benjamin Franklin around in a car and just talk.
Wow, I am also amazed at this thread. Mine, for some reason, is Henry Ford. I figure he’d be impressed by all the fancy new automobiles and just how ubiquitous they have become worldwide.
John Adams. I live in Boston, I wonder what he’d think of it nowadays.
And, occasionally some ancient Romans: Ovid or Julius Caesar.
That is an AWESOME idea.
When I play this game with myself, I envision someone from my own age group and analogous socioeconomic class from about 200-250 years ago. Ben Franklin is a more intriguing subject, though. I actually gave that idea a try just now as I went to get a soda. It brought to mind just how huge the differences are between then and now. Computers, TV, the internet, and things like that are still relatively novel–especially the internet, since we all can think back to when it wasn’t as everyday as it’s become. It hit me just how amazing something as basic to us as electricity, running water, and cars would be to someone from that time period. Hell, even a bike would probably be pretty neat to someone from the 1700s.
And then it occurred to me how such new information would affect the health of someone like Ben Franklin at the age he was when most of us probably think of him. That is, he’d probably get to find out pretty soon just how far medicine has advanced too. 
Chalk me up as another Ben Franklin. Quite aside from things like technology, I imagine his reaction to being escorted into a Toyota and driven down the New Jersey Turnpike at 75 MPH.
For me, it’s a was of quizzing myself on how things, whether technology, systems or social practices, work. I imagine explaining them to someone who’d have no exposure to them, but would still have no trouble grasping the idea once he came in contact with it.
My usual pick is H.G. Wells.
And Thudlow Boink might be interested in seeing Time After Time, which transplants Wells and Jack the Ripper to the San Francisco of 1979.
Mine is the most recent: George Orwell, simply because I’ve read so much of his nonfiction I have an echo of him padding around my head. I’d like to take him to see the destruction of the Berlin Wall and the subsequent peaceful death of the Soviet Empire, then skip a bit through the rest of the 1990s and into modern times. I’d show him all of the ways people have to get around censorship, and how much easier it is to archive data now. I’d also show him modern India and Burma, now many decades post-colonial.
I fantasize about modern-day conversations with Washington all the time. I love American Revolutionary history, so I like to imagine Washington at different points during the Revolution being brought up here. Just after the Siege of Boston, when morale is so high, I’d show him our massive land and infrastructure so he could see what the USA has become. Just before crossing the Delaware, when morale was very low and confidence in Washington was abysmal, I’d take him to his monument and give him a dollar bill to show how beloved he is today.
Other times, I imagine taking him to play golf or ride a motorcycle. One of my favorites is giving him all sorts of candy and then taking him to flush a toilet. I don’t know why, but that always gives me a case of the chuckles.
Oh, sweet Jebus, I thought I was alone! I thought I was…boo hoo…alone.
Actually, I find myself thinking about this most frequently while driving. In my head it’s always some ancient figure like Socrates or Alexander.
Imagine how things like cars and airplanes would seem totally bizarre while a pub will always make sense.
…so, inexplicably, I recognize the guy by the side of the desert highway - it’s Abraham Lincoln! Well, I can’t leave him standing there, can I? Although it is pretty hard to convince him that this “automobile” thing is safe, and not particularly enchanted. Lincoln (your friends call you that? I’m not being too familiar, am I?), it’s just like a small railroad train, even works on many of the same ideas, so… please get in, okay?
Well, Lincoln, the Union still stands, and we are very prosperous - but there’s a lot that might be very hard for you to accept…