Oh, wait, it’s a tale of another Monster named the Hulk. Freaky. Also, I seem to remeber a Superman villian named Dr. Doom. No relation (Any screen shots avalible?) Anyone have any other examples? Oh, and Doctor Droom doesn’t count, smartass.
There is, apparently, a former footballer, now a manager with my name. Though I don’t follow sport and can’t tell you anything about him. Actually, there’s a lot of Peter Morrises out there. http://www.googlism.com/index.htm?ism=peter+morris&type=1
variously, we are : executive director of indeco limited, a recognised leader in the construction industry, nuffield professor of surgery emeritus, director of policy and research at the british trade union, former federal transport minister, studying at hyles, a certified practising accountant, communication officer for ice camp sirius, assistant professor of internal medicine, acknowledged as one of the finest, correct, hoping to change all that, #804, a weak little man, head of construction and engineering and such a hot guy.
?Then there’s Gary Graham the actor and Gary Graham the criminal executed on very flimsy evidence.
Several years ago two Amish boys were arrested for possession of crack. Both were named Abner Stoltzfus even though they were no relation.
If different spellings count, there’s also Charles Dickens the writer of Oliver Twist and Charles Dikkens with 2 k’s, the well known Dutch author (who wrote Rarnably Budge).
Jethro Tull & Jethro Tull
Harry Corbett, the pupeteer, creator of sooty & Harry Corbett the actor, star of Steptoe & son. The actor adopted an “H” as his middle name, which stands for “Henything you want.”
There’s also currently an aspiring SF writer who has the same name as a well-established Hugo-winning SF artist. The former has been spamming other SF writers to try to get them to buy his ebook, and hasn’t caught on to the fact that doing that is bad form. The name gets him noticed until they realize there are two of them.
George Scithers also told the tale of a writer who kept submitting to him while he was editor of Asimov’s whose name was Robert Heinlein, and didn’t take kindly to suggestions that it might be a good idea for him to use a pen name. AFAIK, he was never published.
Lawrence Evans and Lawrence Evans – both authors, the latter hyphenating his middle name and writing as Lawrence Watt-Evans to avoid confusion. The first Lawrence Evans disappeared from the writing scene.
Michael McDowell and Michael McDowell – two authors. The latter started writing as Michael Kube-McDowell.
In the world of athletics, there was Chris Evert and Chris Evert. Both are in the Hall of Fame for their respective sports and that latter had some successful offspring by Secretariat.
– Homer Simpson
– Florida’s Commissioner of Agriculture Charles Bronson
– I worked with a Paul Neumann
– Two Book of Love members with surname Ottaviano, but are of no relation
Keith Lockhart the conductor of the Boston Pops and
Keith Lockhart, former mediocre second baseman for the Atlanta Braves
It always confused me when one of those holiday concert/fireworks shows would come on and the announcer would say “Apperance by Keith Lockhart”. And I would think, self, why is the mediocre second baseman for the Atlanta Braves appearing on New Year’s At the Capital?
Ha! Funny you mention this. In my 6th grade History class, we had to write a three-page biography on a famous historical figure, but we were assigned names. I was given Churchill. So I flipped open the encyclopedia to Winston Churchill. There was only about half a column of material on him, so I made up a bunch of stuff.
I got an F on that paper.
If I had only turned the page in that encyclopedia…
When I was in high school, television was full of Wendy’s commercials starring their founder Dave Thomas. I also had a friend in school named Dave Thomas, and our neighbor across the street was Dave Thomas. But, I would imagine that is quite a common name anyway.