# People who must exist by definition, but you can never find: Who interests you most? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 25, 2026, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-must-exist-by-definition-but-you-can-never-find-who-interests-you-most/1027000 "2026-01-25T09:38:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [January 27, 2026, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-must-exist-by-definition-but-you-can-never-find-who-interests-you-most/1027000/101 "2026-01-27T18:56:06Z")
> [@Gyrate](#): > > I’m still holding out hope to get on the Sexiest Man Dead list. Turn me on, dead man! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2026, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-must-exist-by-definition-but-you-can-never-find-who-interests-you-most/1027000/102 "2026-01-28T14:55:51Z")
Coming in late: How about, the first person to die in WWII? Someone on 1 Sept 1939 had to be first among 60 million\*. Look at all they missed! And now are nothing but a statistic, an unknowable statistic at that. What would they have thought, if they could have known? And who was the last person to die in the war. Missed it by _that_ much! \*a number that is in itself unknowable. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2026, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-must-exist-by-definition-but-you-can-never-find-who-interests-you-most/1027000/103 "2026-01-28T15:06:22Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > the first person to die in WWII > **[Franciszek Honiok](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franciszek_Honiok)** > > Franciszek Honiok (1896 – 31 August 1939) was a Polish male civilian who is famous for having been the first known victim of World War II, on the evening of 31 August 1939. > He was one of several victims of the Gleiwitz incident, a multi-part false flag operation contrived by German Schutzstaffel (SS) Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler and his deputy, Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, as a pretext for carrying out German Führer Adolf Hitler's plan to invade Poland. > A self-described Silesian (Ger... ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2026, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-must-exist-by-definition-but-you-can-never-find-who-interests-you-most/1027000/104 "2026-01-28T15:14:16Z")
This book is not about the last WWII death, but the last of USAAF’s WWII combat deaths: > **[The Last Fighter Pilot: The True Story of the Final Combat Mission of World War...](https://www.amazon.com/Last-Fighter-Pilot-Combat-Mission/dp/1621575063)** > > The Last Fighter Pilot: The True Story of the Final Combat Mission of World War II \[Brown, Don, Yellin, Jerry\] on Amazon.com. \*FREE\* shipping on qualifying offers. The Last Fighter Pilot: The True Story of the Final Combat Mission of World War II It’s an interesting and sobering read for anyone, but especially for somebody in the biz. Another factor: For an op as large as WWII, soldiers of each participant nation were dying in accidents every day even after the war was over and nobody was trying to hurt anyone. ---
**Author:** ![MrAtoz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@MrAtoz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrAtoz)\ **Post date:** [January 28, 2026, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-must-exist-by-definition-but-you-can-never-find-who-interests-you-most/1027000/105 "2026-01-28T15:36:48Z")
> [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](#): > > The trailers for Disney’s _Brother Bear_ made the obvious joke: “Wait, if they only see one movie this year, isn’t it the one they’re about to see?” _Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me_ came out the same year as the first Star Wars prequel, _The Phantom Menace_. There was an Austin Powers trailer that said something like, “If you see only one movie this year, it’ll be Star Wars. But if you see two, see Austin Powers also.” ---
**Author:** ![mixdenny](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mixdenny/32/2962_2.png) [@mixdenny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mixdenny)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2026, 7:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-must-exist-by-definition-but-you-can-never-find-who-interests-you-most/1027000/106 "2026-01-30T07:19:11Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > Back in 1978, local papers used to try to find the person in town who had seen _Star Wars_ the most times. Don’t remember how strict the criteria for proof were-- I’m thinking “not very.” In 1964 for some reason people began calling into the local radio station and claiming to have seen a certain number of alligators at some specific location. A disc jockey started it somehow and encouraged it. Over the weeks the numbers and locations got more and more crazy. I managed to get through one night and claimed like 200 alligators in Beaver Creek (Amherst, Ohio). Why am I mentioning this? Because in my high school yearbook the funny caption for me is “Counting alligators at 2:00 am”. Future researchers are going to have a hell of a time figuring that out. ---
**Author:** ![ekedolphin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ekedolphin/32/10003_2.png) [@ekedolphin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ekedolphin)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2026, 8:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-must-exist-by-definition-but-you-can-never-find-who-interests-you-most/1027000/107 "2026-01-30T08:03:42Z")
> [@mixdenny](#): > > Why am I mentioning this? Because in my high school yearbook the funny caption for me is “Counting alligators at 2:00 am”. Future researchers are going to have a hell of a time figuring that out. “They died the same way they lived: counting alligators at 2:00 a.m.” “They were very weird.” ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 31, 2026, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-must-exist-by-definition-but-you-can-never-find-who-interests-you-most/1027000/108 "2026-01-31T02:06:11Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > And who was the last person to die in the war. Missed it by _that_ much! The hard part there is defining the precise end of the war. By some standards, the Korean War was just a continuation of World War II, and the Korean War still hasn’t ended. Pin down the precise end, and you can probably pin down the last casualty. Oh, and you also need to decide whether to include people who were injured in the war, but who then died of those injuries sometime later. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/people-who-must-exist-by-definition-but-you-can-never-find-who-interests-you-most/1027000.md?page=5)