Wow! Glad to see the spirited debate that resulted from my original post.
Yes, the AOL/Discovery Channel list of 100 is a bit asinine, and it’s 'way too top-heavy with late 20th century/early 21st century entertainers and pop celebrities, but it also has some weighty names. I agree with those who’ve noted that writers and scientists are underrepresented.
I also have to say, I bow to no one in my admiration of Benjamin Franklin (Franklin is, I kid you not, my middle name), for all of the reasons stated. He was an amazing man, well ahead of his time. However, his unmatched diplomatic skills would have availed him nothing had not Washington and other American military leaders in the field (esp. Gates at Saratoga, although his luck turned bad when he fought the British in the South) been winning battles, keeping the Continental Army in the game, and showing the French that the colonists actually had the potential to beat the British.
After the war, Franklin was president of Pennsylvania and an honored elder statesman, and his attendance at the Constitutional Convention and his support of ratification were key. His national impact afterwards was quite limited, however, esp. by comparison to Washington, who of course served two terms as President and then peacefully yielded power to his duly-elected successor, John Adams. That’s why I’d still put Washington at #1.
BTW, Washington and Franklin respected each other enormously, and their correspondence makes for interesting reading.
The Washington Post’s Gene Weingarten did a pretty funny piece where he called up a discovery flack and made her try to justify the list. It’s not on the web yet but I’ll link to it when it is. (You’ll probably have to register but you should anyway, the Post’s a good paper.)
I’d go with Lincoln, Hamilton, Franklin, Edison, and MLK jr. High school civics-ish I know, but what’re ya gonna do?
As with any list of the “Top 100 _____ Of All Time,” there’s a reason the obvious choices are so obvious. I think sometimes people try to get to clever with these things.
I suspect that many of the pop icons are on the list to make it more accessible to the historically ignorant among us. The list makers don’t want them to feel alienated.
[QUOTE=Wesley Clark]
Norman Borlaug. His agricultural techniques saved over a billion lived
[QUOTE]
For some reason I thought he was Scandinavian. I looked it up and unless Cresco, Iowa was somehow ceded to Sweden after the First World War he’s American. This being the case, I’ll second him.
Interesting tidbit-I live in Pittsburgh, where Salk created his vaccine, and the school nurse at my high school worked with Dr. Salk during the whole thing.
After the top ten, the Canadian list is a joke. Let’s see if the final American list can compete with this level of pop- culture idiocy. Picks 11 to 100 include:
Shanaia Twain (the 18th greatest Canadian of all time)
Mike Myers (20th)
Celine Dion (Unfathomably, the 27th greatest Canadian ever to live. Shoot me now.)
Jim Carrey (#29 in terms of hisorical Canadian greats.Rrriiiiiight.)
Michael J Fox (32)
Gordon Lightfoot (33) Winnipeg Radio Personality Hal Anderson (34)
the inimitable hand puppeteer Mr DressUp (36)
professional wrestler Bret “hitman” Hart (39)
Avril Lavigne (yes ferchrissakes, Avril Fucking Lavigne at #40)
John Candy (41)
Rick Mercer (50)
Pamela Anderson (for what, inventing home porn? for pioneering subcutaneous personal flotation devices? #51)
William Shatner (ze goggles, zey do nossink 56)
Burton Cummings (seriously, what the fuck??? 65)
Sarah Machlachlan (75)
Dan Akroyd (presumably for portraying both the skinny and the fat Blues Brother #82)
Bryan Adams (at least he has pretensions of being a photographer- 90)
Joni Mitchell (I’d let her in for that “case of you” song, but still!- 93)
Anne Murray (94)
and the inimitable (literally- any normal person trying to imitate this man singing will have an aneurism) Geddy Lee (wailing in at 96).
That’s not even bothering to mention the 10 hockey players on the list. Any Canadian wanting to ridicule the American list is seriously irony impaired… or perhaps just seriously impaired.
I’m always surprised (though I shouldn’t be) as how these lists always leave off John D. Rockefeller in favor of Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, or some more recent “titan.” Of the top 30 largest companies on the planet, Rockefeller created 10% of them - Exxon/Mobil, Conoco/Phillips. and Chevron/Texaco (Phillips and Texaco were not part of the original Standard Oil Trust, but merged with companies that were.) Gates, however, has one company barely in the top 50.
Inventor of the mystery novel, refiner of the short story, and the father of the horror story? The one whom most American writers consider the father of American writing?
Yeesh.
Oh, Washington is tops, Lincoln a moderately distant second.
Throw my vote in for Lincoln. Although he had his faults (especially in hindsight), the man held this country together and almost out of sheer will at times.
I would second Ben Franklin; however, it is really hard to single out one person from the amazing range of contributors from that time period:
Washington
Jefferson
Hamilton
Madison
Monroe
Adams
et cetera (he was the most important! )
Lincoln, on the other hand, seemed to be a bastion of strength and conviction that refused to let our nation become torn apart.
