Sergei Nikitich Khrushchev, son of the Soviet leader, is now a naturalized US citizen. He often writes articles about the Cold War from the Soviet point of view and is a Senior Fellow at the Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown University in Providence, RI.
Lord Watson was a British judge who sat on the Judicial Committee of the Imperial Privy Council. His judgments in several Canadian constitutional cases favoured provincial powers over the powers of the federal Parliament.
Thomas John Watson, Sr. had an interesting early career and was even sentenced to jail for anti‑trust violation in 1913. In 1914 he joined the Computing Tabulating Recording Corporation which, under his leadership, evolved into the world’s largest computer company.
Dr. John H. Watson once professed surprise that his friend and colleague Mr. Sherlock Holmes did not seem to know that the Earth orbited the Sun rather than the other way around, but the great consulting detective explained that he had only so much room in his mind for useful information, and that particular fact was not something he needed to know.
The velocity at which the Earth orbits the Sun is 66,000 miles per hour. The entire Solar System is moving toward the constellation Hercules at a rate of 13 miles per second.
August Derleth wrote a series of mystery stories featuring Solar Pons, a pastiche of Sherlock Holmes. Derleth has asked Conan Doyle to continue to Holmes stories and was refused, so Derleth renamed all the characters and ended up writing more stories about Pons than Conan Doyle wrote about Holmes.
Arthur Conan Doyle, in addition to being an author, was a medical doctor and an accomplished amateur athlete - playing in goal for the Portsmouth Football Club, appearing in 10 first class cricket matches for Marleybone and was an excellent golfer.
In the early days of golf, the balls were actually tiny pouches of leather, filled with boiled feathers and sewn shut. When the feathers were boiled, they stank to high heaven, making the manufacture of such golf balls a highly undesirable occupation.
Queen Mary Stuart alledgedly played a round of golf at Musselburgh Golf Course.
Mary Stuart had been married to the eldest son of the King of France, known as the dauphin, a word derived from “dolphin.” Dolphins were indeed featured on her coat of arms:
When Mary’s father-in-law, Henri II (died as predicted by Nostradamus :rolleyes: ), her husband Francis became King of France and she became Queen of France. When Francis died a year later, she became Dowager Queen of France and eventually returned to take up her royal duties as Queen of Scots. She was the only person to be both Queen of France and Queen of Scots.
George Marshall was the only person to be both a secretary of state (1947-49) and secretary of defense (1950-51).
The role of Marshall Matt Dillon was played on radio by William Conrad. Though he had a strong voice for radio, Conrad was not chosen for the TV version because he was far too fat. When radio drama ended, he worked as the narrator of the Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoons and eventually made it as a live TV star in Cannon and Jake and the Fat Man.
The predecessor to the Emergency Broadcast System, best known for its annoying tests over broadcast radio and TV, was CONELRAD, for Control of Electromagnetic Radiation, which was in service 1951-63. To inhibit incoming Soviet bombers from using commercial broadcasting antennas for homing, all Civil Defense broadcasts would jump from one to another in a given area.
Queen Elizabeth I of England signed the death warrant for her cousin Mary, Queen of Scots, with great reluctance, and only when it was clear that Mary had tacitly encouraged the assassination of Elizabeth.
ETA: Elizabeth’s predecessor was her half-sister, also named Mary.
An example of the USSR’s Myasishchev M-50 Bounder, a medium-range strategic bomber, was reputed to be the world’s first (and only) atomic-powered aircraft. According to one report, the single crew who flew it soon died from radiation poisoning.
The Bounder was a 1980’s British sitcom featuring Peter Bowles in the title role of an ex-convict who had served two years for investment fraud.
Actor Tim Allen of Home Improvement fame served 28 months for dealing cocaine.
Wiki says no, FWIW: Myasishchev M-50 - Wikipedia
Tim Allen provided the voice of Buzz Lightyear in all three Toy Story movies. Initial production designs had Buzz as much smaller relative to the Sheriff Woody doll (voiced by Tom Hanks).
Tiny Tim (born Herbert Khaury) was best known as being a punchline in Laugh-In, after his first national exposure there singing “Tiptoe Through the Tulips” (and later by marrying live on the Tonight Show). His backup band for his early singles was the Band – Robbie Robertson and crew, before they recorded Music from Big Pink.