Leaders and Soldiers Alive in 1889

Leaders and Soldiers Alive in 1889 January 22, 2025

1889 is the crossroads where the descendants, living persons and ancestors of previous, current and future influencers meet on the chronological timeline of earth’s history.

Wikipedia is the place where all these people live in our collected memories that we can access. I took that information and compiled it into this document.

The individuals I looked at and choose to highlight in this edition of Notable People Alive In 1889 

  • Were leaders who led their countries for better or worse into prosperity and growth or into war and destruction.
  • Soldiers who fought for freedom or tyranny.
  • The main players who started the wars that brought the world together to death and destruction.
  • And others who governed or fought for their countries.

And Now…

We Start With

The Oldest Generation of 1889

With Those

Born in 1800’s    

Napoleon Conquers & Lewis & Clark Explore The Early 1800’s

William Ewart Gladstone FRS FSS
(December 29, 1809 – 19 May 19, 1898)

He was a British statesman and Liberal Party politician. In a career lasting over 60 years, he was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom for 12 years, spread over four non-consecutive terms (the most of any British prime minister) beginning in 1868 and ending in 1894. He also was Chancellor of the Exchequer four times, for over 12 years. Apart from 1845 to 1847, he was a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1832 to 1895 and represented a total of five constituencies.

Born in 1810’s

Frankenstein’s Silent Night 1810 – 1819

Pope # 256 Pope Leo XIII
(
March 2,  1810 –  July 20, 1903)
born Gioacchino Vincenzo Raffaele Luigi Pecci
Papal Reign from February  20, 1878 –  July 20, 1903
(25 years, 150 days)

In 1889, Pope Leo XIII authorized the founding of Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., and granted it Papal degrees in theology. 

John C. Frémont 
(January 21, 1813 – July 13, 1890)

He was an American explorer, military officer, and politician. He was a United States senator from California and was the first Republican nominee for president of the U.S. in 1856 and founder of the California Republican Party when he was nominated. He lost the election to Democrat James Buchanan when the vote was split by Know Nothings.

Queen Victoria
(May 24, 1819 –  January 22, 1901)

While staying in Biarritz, in 1889 Queen V became the first reigning monarch from Britain to set foot in Spain when she crossed the border for a brief visit. Queen V was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 20, 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days, which was longer than those of any of her predecessors, is known as the Victorian era.

Daniel Sickles
(October 20, 1819 – May 3, 1914)

He was an American politician, soldier, and diplomat.

Born to a wealthy family in New York City, Sickles was involved in a number of scandals, most notably the 1859 homicide of his wife’s lover, U.S. Attorney Philip Barton Key II, whom Sickles gunned down in broad daylight in Lafayette Square, across the street from the White House.  He was acquitted after using temporary insanity as a legal defense for the first time in United States history.

Upon the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861, Sickles became one of the war’s most prominent political generals, recruiting the New York regiments that became known as the Excelsior Brigade in the Army of the Potomac. Sickles was appointed as chairman of the New York State Civil Service Commission from 1888 to 1889, and Sheriff of New York County in 1890. In 1891, he was elected to the board of the Gettysburg Battlefield Memorial Association.

Major General Sickles c. 1862

Born in 1820’s

The Mormon Saturday Evening Post Arrives in the 1820s

James Longstreet 
(January 8, 1821 – January 2, 1904)

He was a Confederate general during the American Civil War and was the principal subordinate to General Robert E. Lee, who called him his “Old War Horse”. He served under Lee as a corps commander for most of the battles fought by the Army of Northern Virginia in the Eastern Theater, and briefly with Braxton Bragg in the Army of Tennessee in the Western Theater.

Pedro II of Brazil 
(December 2, 1825 –December 5, 1891)

Nicknamed the Magnanimous was the second and last monarch of the Empire of Brazil, reigning for over 58 years. Pedro II pushed through the abolition of slavery despite opposition from powerful political and economic interests. A savant in his own right, the Emperor established a reputation as a vigorous sponsor of learning, culture, and the sciences, and he won the respect and admiration of people such as Charles DarwinVictor Hugo, and Friedrich Nietzsche, and was a friend to Richard WagnerLouis Pasteur, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, among others.

Varina Davis,
May 7, 1826 – October 16, 1906)

First Lady of the Confederate States of America (d. 1906)

Deodoro da Fonseca 
(August 5, 1827 –August 23, 1892)

He was a Brazilian politician and military officer who served as the first president of Brazil. Fonseca took office as provisional president after heading a military coup that deposed Emperor Pedro II and established the First Brazilian Republic in 1889, disestablishing the Empire. After his election in 1891, he stepped down the same year under great political pressure when he dissolved the National Congress. He died less than a year later.

 

Florvil Hyppolite 
(May 26, 1828 –  March 24, 1896)

He was a Haitian general and politician who served as the President of Haiti from 17 October 1889 to 24 March 1896. As soon as he assumed the presidency, he had to deal with the Môle Saint-Nicolas affair. It was an 1891 diplomatic incident between Haiti and the United States when in an act of gunboat diplomacyPresident of the United States Benjamin Harrison ordered Rear-Admiral Bancroft Gherardi to persuade the cession or lease of Môle Saint-Nicolas to the United States in order to establish a naval base for the United States Navy. Following a prolonged request for Gherardi’s diplomatic credentials and increased public pressure, Haiti refused the request of the United States.

Born in 1830’s

Mark Twain and the Wellerman Come on a Comet – 1830 – 1839

Franz Joseph I of Austria
(August 18, 1830 –  November 21, 1916)

He was Emperor of AustriaKing of Hungary, and the ruler of the other states of the Habsburg monarchy from December 2, 1848 until his death in 1916. Franz Joseph was troubled by nationalism throughout his reign. He concluded the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, which granted greater autonomy to Hungary and created the dual monarchy of Austria-Hungary. He ruled peacefully for the next 45 years, but personally suffered the tragedies of the execution of his brother Emperor Maximilian I of Mexico in 1867, the suicide of his son Rudolf in 1889, and the assassinations of his wife Elisabeth in 1898 and his nephew and heir presumptive, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, in 1914.

Emperor Franz Josef of Austria, in uniform, undated. Credit: Library of Congress

Pauline Cushman 
June 10, 1833 – December 2, 1893)

She was an American actress and a spy for the Union Army during the American Civil War. She is considered one of the most successful Civil War spies.

John S. Mosby
(December 6, 1833 – May 30, 1916),

Also known by his nickname “Gray Ghost“, was an American military officer who was a Confederate cavalry commander in the American Civil War. His command, the 43rd Battalion, Virginia Cavalry (known as Mosby’s Rangers or Mosby’s Raiders) was a partisan ranger unit noted for its lightning-quick raids and its ability to elude Union Army pursuers and blend in with local farmers and townsmen. The area of northern central Virginia in which Mosby operated with impunity became known as Mosby’s Confederacy.

After the Civil War, Mosby became a Republican and worked as an attorney, supporting his former enemy’s commander, U.S. President Ulysses S. Grant. He also served as the American consul to Hong Kong and in the U.S. Department of Justice.

In 1992 Mosby was among the first group of men inducted into the United States Army Ranger Hall of fame. In June 2023, the Fort Moore (previously named Benning) garrison commander ordered his name to be removed from the hall of fame as well as the National Ranger Memorial along with three other rangers. The National Ranger Memorial foundation, headquartered in Columbus, Ga filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court Middle District to restore Mosby’s name to the memorial as well as the hall of fame. At a December 16th, 2024 court hearing, U.S. District Judge Clay D. Land dismissed the foundation’s request to restore Mosby’s name to the memorial and hall of fame.

Empress Dowager Cixi –
(November  29 1835–November  15, 1908)

She was a Manchu noblewoman of the Yehe Nara clan who effectively controlled the Chinese government in the late Qing dynasty as empress dowager and regent for almost 50 years, from 1861 until her death in 1908.

On  March 5, 1889, Cixi retired from her second regency, but nonetheless served as the effective head of the imperial family

Guangxu married and took up the reins of power in 1889. By that year, the emperor was already 18, older than the conventional marriage age for emperors. Prior to his wedding, a large fire engulfed the Gate of Supreme Harmony at the Forbidden City. This event followed a trend of recent natural disasters that were considered alarming by many observers. According to traditional Chinese political theory, such incidents were taken as a warning of the imminent loss of the “Mandate of Heaven” by current rulers.

Kalākaua 
(David Laʻamea Kamanakapuʻu Māhinulani Nālaʻiaʻehuokalani Lumialani Kalākaua)
 November 16, 1836 – January 20, 1891)

He was the last king and penultimate monarch of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi, reigning from February 12, 1874, until his death in 1891. Succeeding Lunalilo, he was elected to the vacant throne of Hawaiʻi against Queen Emma. Kalākaua was known as the Merrie Monarch for his convivial personality – he enjoyed entertaining guests with his singing and ukulele playing. At his coronation and his birthday jubilee, the hula, which had hitherto been banned in public in the kingdom, became a celebration of Hawaiian culture.

Henry Rathbone,
(July 1, 1837 – August 14, 1911)

He was a United States military officer and lawyer who was present at the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln; Rathbone and his fiancé Clara Harris were sitting with Lincoln and Lincoln’s wife Mary Todd Lincoln when the president was shot by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theatre. When Rathbone attempted to apprehend Booth, Booth stabbed and seriously wounded him. Rathbone may have played a part in Booth’s leg injury. Although he recovered, Rathbone’s mental state deteriorated afterwards, and in 1883, he murdered his wife, Clara, in a fit of madness, later being declared insane by doctors and living the rest of his life in a lunatic asylum.

Alois Hitler
(June 7, 1837 –January 3, 1903)

He was an Austrian civil servant in the customs service, and the father of Adolf Hitlerdictator of Germany from 1933 to 1945.

Liliuokalani,
(September 2, 1838 – November 11, 1917)

She was the only queen regnant and the last sovereign monarch of the Hawaiian Kingdom, ruling from January 29, 1891, until the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom on January 17, 1893. The composer of “Aloha ʻOe” and numerous other works, she wrote her autobiography Hawaiʻi’s Story by Hawaiʻi’s Queen (1898) during her imprisonment following the overthrow.

Malinda Blalock 
(March 10, 1839, or 1842 – March 9, 1901, or 1903)

She was a female soldier during the American Civil War. Despite originally being a sympathizer for the right of secession, she fought on both sides. She followed her husband, William Blalock, and joined the CSA’s 26th North Carolina Regiment, disguising herself as a young man and calling herself Samuel Blalock. The couple eventually escaped by crossing Confederate lines and joining the Union partisans in the mountains of western North Carolina. During the last years of the war, she was a pro-Union marauder raiding the Appalachia region. Today she is one of the most remembered female combatants of the Civil War.

Sarah M Pritchard Blalock. She is holding a picture of her husband Keith.

Robert Smalls 
(April 5, 1839 – February 23, 1915)

He was an American politician who was born into slavery in Beaufort, South Carolina. During the American Civil War, the still enslaved Smalls commandeered a Confederate transport ship in Charleston Harbor and sailed it from the Confederate-controlled waters of the harbor to the U.S. blockade that surrounded it. He then piloted the ship to the Union-controlled enclave in Beaufort–Port Royal–Hilton Head area, where it became a Union warship. In the process, he freed himself, his crew, and their families. His example and persuasion helped convince President Abraham Lincoln to accept African-American soldiers into the Union Army.

Born in 1840’s

The Longest Pope at La Salette -1840’s

William Harvey Carney 
(February 29, 1840 – December 9, 1908)

He was an American soldier during the American Civil War. Born enslaved, he was awarded the Medal of Honor in 1900 for his gallantry in saving the regimental colors during the Battle of Fort Wagner in 1863. The action for which he received the Medal of Honor preceded that of any other African American Medal of Honor recipient; however, his medal was actually one of the last to be awarded for Civil War service. Some African Americans received the Medal of Honor as early as April 1865.

Levi Lewis Dorr –
(April 1840 – September 10, 1934)

He was an American Civil War veteran and physician. He served at the Battle of Antietam, and as a physician was one of the original faculty of Cooper Medical College, the predecessor to Stanford University School of Medicine.

William James
(January 11, 1842 – August 26, 1910)

He was an American philosopher and psychologist, and the first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States.  James is considered to be a leading thinker of the late 19th century, one of the most influential philosophers of the United States, and the “Father of American psychology.

Albert Cashier
(December 25, 1843 – October 10, 1915),

Born Jennie Irene Hodgers, was an Irish-born American soldier who served in the Union Army during the American Civil War. Cashier adopted the identity of a man before enlisting, and maintained it until death. Cashier became famous as one of at least 250 soldiers who were assigned female at birth and enlisted as men to fight in the Civil War. The consistent and nearly lifelong (at least 53 years) commitment to a male identity has prompted some historians to believe that Cashier was a trans man.

Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha 
(August 6, 1844 – 30 July 30, 1900)

He was sovereign Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha from 22 August 1893 until his death in 1900. He was the second son and fourth child of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. He was known as the Duke of Edinburgh from 1866 until he succeeded his paternal uncle Ernest II as the reigning Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha in the German Empire.

Alexander III of Russia
(March 10, 1845 –November 1, 1894)

Alexander III and Maria Feodorovna in the family circle on the porch of his home in LanginkoskiFinland in summer 1889.

Isabel, Princess Imperial of Brazil,
(July 29, 1846 –November 14, 1921),
daughter of Emperor Pedro II of Brazil

She was the Princess Imperial (heiress presumptive to the throne) of the Empire of Brazil and the Empire’s regent on three occasions.

 

Albert I, Prince of Monaco
(November 13, 1848 –   June 26, 1922)

He was Prince of Monaco from  September 10, 1889 until his death in 1922. He devoted much of his life to oceanography, exploration and science. Alongside his expeditions, Albert I made reforms on political, economic and social levels, bestowing a constitution on the principality in 1911.

A statue of Albert as a seafarer in Monaco-Ville’s St Martin Gardens.

Lord Randolph Churchill
, (February 13, 1849 –  January 24, 1895)

was a British aristocrat and politician. Churchill was a Tory radical and coined the term ‘Tory democracy‘. He participated in the creation of the National Union of the Conservative Party. His elder son was Winston Churchill, who wrote a biography of him in 1906.

Born in 1850’s

Stop and Pray the Angelus between 1850 – 1859

John Lincoln Clem (Johnny Shiloh)
August 13, 1851 – May 13, 1937)

He was an American general officer who served as a drummer boy in the Union Army during the American Civil War. He gained fame for his bravery on the battlefield, becoming the youngest noncommissioned officer in the history of the United States Army at the age of 12.

Clem during his Civil War service

Hirohito’s Ancestors

 Mutsuhito
(November 3, 1852 –July 30, 1912)

Posthumously honored as Emperor Meiji  was the 122nd emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession. Reigning from 1867 to his death, he was the first monarch of the Empire of Japan and presided over the Meiji era. His reign is associated with the Meiji Restoration, a series of rapid changes that witnessed Japan’s transformation from an isolationistfeudal state to an industrialized world power. He is the paternal grandfather of

Hirohito 
(April 29, 1901 –January 7, 1989),

Posthumously honored as Emperor Shōwa, was the 124th emperor of Japan, reigning from 1926 until his death in 1989. He was one of the longest-reigning monarchs in the world, with his reign of 62 years being the longest of any Japanese emperor.

Hirohito reigned as a constitutional monarch and was the head of state under the Meiji Constitution during Japanese imperial expansion particularly in China, militarization, and involvement in World War II. During Hirohito’s reign, Japan waged a war across Asia in the 1930s and ’40s.

Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna of Russia
(October 17,  1853 –  October 24, 1920)

She was the fifth child and only surviving daughter of Alexander II of Russia and Marie of Hesse and by Rhine; she was Duchess of Edinburgh and later Duchess of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha as the wife of Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. She was the younger sister of Alexander III of Russia and the paternal aunt of Russia‘s last emperor, Nicholas II.

 Pope # 258 Benedict XV
(November 21, 1854 –January 22,  1922)
Papal Reign from 3 September 1914 –22 January 1922
(7 years, 141 days)
He was 35 in 1889.

Supreme Court Justice
William O. Douglas Parents

William Douglas (1856-abt.1904)
+ Julia Bickford (Fisk) Douglas (1872-1941)

= William O. Douglas
(October 16, 1898 – January 19, 1980)

He was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1939 to 1975. Douglas was known for his strong progressive and civil libertarian views and is often cited as the U.S. Supreme Court‘s most liberal justice ever. Nominated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1939, Douglas was confirmed at the age of 40, becoming one of the youngest justices appointed to the court. In 1975, Time called Douglas “the most doctrinaire and committed civil libertarian ever to sit on the court.” He is the longest-serving justice in history, having served for 36 years and 209 days.

Douglas’s notable opinions included Griswold v. Connecticut (1965)—which established the constitutional right to privacy, and was foundational to later cases such as Eisenstadt v. BairdRoe v. WadeLawrence v. Texas and Obergefell v. HodgesSkinner v. Oklahoma (1942), United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc. (1948), Terminiello v. City of Chicago (1949), Brady v. Maryland (1963), and Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections (1966). Douglas also served as an associate justice in the landmark civil rights case Brown v. Board of Education (1954), a Supreme Court case that outlawed segregation in American public schools. He wrote notable concurring or dissenting opinions in cases such as Dennis v. United States (1951), United States v. O’Brien (1968), Terry v. Ohio (1968), and Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969). He was also known as a strong opponent of the Vietnam War and an ardent advocate of environmentalism.

Pope # 259 Pius XI
(May 31, 1857 – February 10, 1939)
Papal Reign from February 6, 1922 to February 10, 1939.
(17 years, 4 days)
He was 32 in 1889

World War I Flying Ace’s Parents

William Rickenbacher (1857-1904)
+ Elizabeth “Lizzie” Basler Rickenbacher (1864-1946)

= Eddie Rickenbacker
(October 8, 1890 – July 23, 1973)

He was an American fighter pilot in World War I and a Medal of Honor recipient. With 26 aerial victories, he was the most successful and most decorated United States flying ace of the war.  He was also a racing driver, an automotive designer, and a long-time head of Eastern Air Lines. 

Capt. E.V. “Eddie” Rickenbacker wearing the Congressional Medal of Honor. (U.S. Air Force photo)

Omar al-Mukhtar
(August 20, 1858 – 16 September 16 1931)

Called The Lion of the Desert, known among the colonial Italians as Matari of the Mnifa, was a Libyan revolutionary and Imam who led the native resistance in Cyrenaica (currently Eastern Libya) under the Senussids, against the Italian colonization of Libya. A teacher-turned-general, Omar was a prominent figure of the Senussi movement and is considered the national hero of Libya and a symbol of resistance in the Arab and Islamic worlds.  He was 31 in 1889.

Eva Peron’s Parents

 Juan Duarte Manechena Etchegoyen 1858–1926
+ Juana Ibarguren Nuñez 1894–1971

Eva Perón 
 (May 7, 1919 –  July 26, 1952)

was an Argentine politician, activist, actress, and philanthropist who served as First Lady of Argentina from June 1946 until her death in July 1952, as the wife of Argentine President Juan Perón. She was born in poverty in the rural village of Los Toldos, in the Pampas, as the youngest of five children. In 1934, at the age of 15, she moved to the nation’s capital of Buenos Aires to pursue a career as a stage, radio, and film actress. She married Perón in 1945, when he was still an army colonel, and was propelled into the political stage when he became President in 1946. She became a central figure of Peronism and Argentine culture because of the Eva Perón Foundation, a charitable organization that had a huge impact in Argentine society.

By Unknown author – Archivo General de la Nación Argentina, Public Domain,

Wilhelm II
(January 27, 1859 –  June 4, 1941)

He was the last German Emperor and King of Prussia from 1888 until his abdication in 1918, which marked the end of the German Empire as well as the Hohenzollern dynasty’s 300-year rule of Prussia.

Red Barron’s Parents

Albrecht Philipp von Richthofen (1859-1920)
+ Kunigunde von Schickfus und Neudorff von Richthofen (1868-1962)

= Manfred von Richthofen
(May 2, 1892 – April 21, 1918)

Known in English as Baron von Richthofen or the Red Baron, He was a fighter pilot with the German Air Force during World War I. He is considered the ace-of-aces of the war, being officially credited with 80 air combat victories.

Richthofen was mentioned regularly in the comic strip Peanuts, by Charles Schulz, and was included in subsequent television specials as a running gag. Charlie Brown‘s beagle Snoopy frequently fantasized about being a World War I flying ace. In his daydreams, he imagined his dog house to be a Sopwith Camel and carried a personal grudge against the Red Baron, whom he imagined to be his arch enemy. In spite of Snoopy’s best efforts, however, the “Baron” always shot him down with little difficulty, leading Snoopy to curse the Baron for his success and swear to one day shoot him down. This recurring story arc inspired songs by The Royal Guardsmen. The imaginary air battles between Snoopy and the Baron are referenced in The Bloody Red Baron, the second book in Kim Newman’s Anno Dracula series, where a beagle resembling Snoopy is shot by the Baron, who feels a strange hatred towards the animal he cannot explain. Despite the antagonistic relationship the characters had in the comic strip, novels and video games, other media depicted them in less combative roles. In the Royal Guardsmen’s song “Snoopy’s Christmas“, the Baron and Snoopy are depicted as participating in The Christmas Truce. A later song by the Guardsmen, “Snoopy for President“, sees the Baron cast the ballot that allows Snoopy to become President of the United States, explicitly referring to Snoopy as his friend, as he also does in “Snoopy’s Christmas”.

Born in 1860’s

The Civil War Years in Wonderland- 1860 – 1869

Klara Hitler,
(August 12, 1860 –December 21, 1907)

She was the mother of Adolf Hitler, dictator of Nazi Germany. According to the family physician, Dr. Eduard Bloch, she was a very quiet, sweet, and affectionate woman.  In 1934, Hitler honored Klara by naming a street in Passau after her.

John J. Pershing
(September 13, 1860 – July 15, 1948)

Nicknamed “Black Jack“, was a senior American United States Army officer. He served most famously as the commander of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) during World War I from 1917 to 1920. In addition to leading the AEF to victory in World War I, Pershing notably served as a mentor to many in the generation of generals who led the United States Army during World War II, including George C. MarshallDwight D. EisenhowerOmar BradleyLesley J. McNairGeorge S. Patton, and Douglas MacArthur.

The Civil War Years

Nadezhda Sigida
(1862–1889)

She was a Russian revolutionary, heroine of the Kara katorga tragedy of 1889.

The Kara Tragedy occurred on 6-16 November 1889. Political prisoners enjoyed certain privileges in comparison to criminals. The Katorga administration decided to abolish them, that in combination of harsh treatment of the women convicts, resulted in hunger strikes in protest. Eventually, the governor-general Andrei Korf ordered corporal punishment for a female prisoner of the Ust-Kara settlement. She was Nadezhda Sigida, a 27 year old convict arrested in 1886 for being a member of Narodnaya Volya and establishing an underground printing shop in Taganrog. After being flogged she killed herself with poison. As a protest, 23 other political prisoners also took poison resulting in the death of 6 convicts in total, 4 women and 2 men. 

This event stirred a public outcry. As a consequence, the political prison of the Kara katorga was closed, and the use of corporal punishment against imprisoned women and dvorians was abolished by the law of 28 March 1893

Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria
(December 18,  1863 –June 28, 1914)

He was the heir presumptive to the throne of Austria-Hungary  His assassination in Sarajevo was the most immediate cause of World War I. On  June 28, 1914, Franz Ferdinand and his wife were assassinated in Sarajevo by the 19-year-old Gavrilo Princip, a member of Young Bosnia. Franz Ferdinand’s assassination led to the July Crisis and precipitated Austria-Hungary’s declaration of war against Serbia, which in turn triggered a series of events that eventually led – four weeks after his death – to Austria-Hungary’s allies and Serbia’s allies declaring war on each other, starting World War I.

Edith Cavell
(December 4, 1865 – October 12, 1915)

She was a British nurse. She is celebrated for treating wounded soldiers from both sides without discrimination during the First World War and for helping some 200 Allied soldiers escape from German-occupied Belgium. Cavell was arrested, court-martialled under German military law and sentenced to death by firing squad. Despite international pressure for mercy, the German Government refused to commute her sentence and she was shot. The execution received worldwide condemnation and extensive press coverage.

The night before her execution, she said, “Patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone”. These words were inscribed on the Edith Cavell Memorial opposite the entrance to the National Portrait Gallery near Trafalgar Square. Her strong Anglican beliefs propelled her to help all those who needed it, including both German and Allied soldiers. She was quoted as saying, “I can’t stop while there are lives to be saved.”  The Church of England commemorates her in its Calendar of Saints on October 12.

End of the Civil War Years

Communist Hunter Joseph McCarthy’s Parents

Timothy Thomas McCarthy (1867-1946)
+ Bridget McCarthy (Tierney) (1870-1941)

= Joseph McCarthy
(November 14, 1908 – May 2, 1957)

He was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death at age 48 in 1957. Beginning in 1950, McCarthy became the most visible public face of a period in the United States in which Cold War tensions fueled fears of widespread communist subversion. He alleged that numerous communists and Soviet spies and sympathizers had infiltrated the United States federal government, universities, film industry, and elsewhere. Ultimately, he was censured by the Senate in 1954 for refusing to cooperate with, and abusing members of, the committee established to investigate whether or not he should be censured. The term “McCarthyism“, coined in 1950 in reference to McCarthy’s practices, was soon applied to similar anti-communist activities. Today, the term is used more broadly to mean demagogic, reckless, and unsubstantiated accusations, as well as public attacks on the character or patriotism of political opponents.

John T. Raulston
(September 22, 1868 – July 11, 1956)

He was an American state judge in Rhea CountyTennessee, who received national publicity for presiding over the 1925 Scopes trial, a famous creationism–evolution debate.

Bamba Sutherland
(September 29, 1869 – March 10, 1957)

She was a member of the royal family that ruled the Sikh Empire in the Punjab. After a childhood in England, she settled in Lahore, the capital of what had been her father’s kingdom, where she was a suffragette and a passionate advocate of self rule and independence of India. She was a close and personal friend of Indian revolutionaries whom she hosted at her house in Lahore like Lala Lajpat Rai.

Born in 1870’s

The Post Civil War Years – 1870 – 1879

Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck
(March 20, 1870 –March 9, 1964),

Popularly known as the Lion of Africa (GermanLöwe von Afrika), was a general in the Imperial German Army and the commander of its forces in the German East Africa campaign. For four years, with a force of about 14,000 (3,000 Germans and 11,000 Africans), he held in check a much larger force of 300,000 British, Indian, Belgian, and Portuguese troops. He is known for never being defeated or captured in battle. 

Lettow-Vorbeck was the only German commander to successfully invade a part of the British Empire during the First World War. His exploits in the campaign have been described by historian Edwin Palmer Hoyt as “the greatest single guerrilla operation in history, and the most successful”.

Vladimir Lenin 
(April 10, 1870 – January 21, 1924)

He was a Russian revolutionary, politician and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until his death in 1924, and of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1924. Under his administration, Russia, and later the Soviet Union, became a one-party socialist state governed by the Communist Party. Ideologically a Marxist, his developments to the ideology are called Leninism.

In 1889 his family moved to the city of Samara, where he joined Alexei Sklyarenko‘s socialist discussion circle.  There, Lenin fully embraced Marxism and produced a Russian language translation of Marx and Friedrich Engels‘s 1848 political pamphlet, The Communist Manifesto.

Rosa Luxemburg,
(March 5,  1871 –January 15, 1919)

She was a Polish and naturalised-German revolutionary socialistorthodox Marxist, and anti-War activist during the First World War. She became a key figure of the revolutionary socialist movements of Poland and Germany during the late 19th and early 20th century, particularly the Spartacist uprising.

Mao’s Parents

Yichang Mao
(Oct 15, 1870  –Jan 23, 1920)

He was a farmer and also known as a Master of the Abacus.
He was the father of

Mao Zedong
(December 26, 1893 –September  9, 1976)

He was a Chinese politician, Marxist theorist, military strategist, poet, and revolutionary who was the founder of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). He led the country from its establishment in 1949 until his death in 1976, while also serving as the chairman of the Chinese Communist Party during that time. His theories, military strategies and policies are known as Maoism.

Daniel Daly
(November 11, 1873 – April 27, 1937)

He was a United States Marine and one of nineteen U.S. servicemen to have been awarded the Medal of Honor twice. Daly and Major General Smedley Butler are the only Marines who earned two Medals of Honor for two separate acts of valor.

Daly is among the most decorated U.S. Marines in history, and over a thirty year career saw action in all the major Marine Corps campaigns from 1899 to the end of World War I. He earned his first Medal of Honor during the Boxer Rebellion in 1900 and the second in Haiti in 1915. Butler described Daly as “the fightingest Marine I ever knew…It was an object lesson to have served with him.” General John A. Lejeune called Daly “the outstanding Marine of all time.” 

In World War I, Daly became further cemented into Marine Corps lore when he is said to have yelled, “Come on, you sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?” to his company before charging the Germans at the Battle of Belleau Wood, though there is considerable evidence that the battle cry was the invention of an enthusiastic war correspondent. He was also awarded the Navy Cross and the Distinguished Service Cross for his actions in France.

Daly’s Medals of Honor are on display at the National Museum of the Marine Corps in Triangle, Virginia, which also features the “live forever” quote etched in the stone of the building’s rotunda.

Alfred Emanuel Smith
(December 30, 1873 – October 4, 1944)

He was an American politician who served four terms as the 42nd governor of New York and was the Democratic Party‘s presidential nominee in 1928.

Smith was the first Roman Catholic to be nominated for president of the United States by a major party. His 1928 presidential candidacy mobilized both Catholic and anti-Catholic voters. Many Protestants (including German Lutherans and Southern Baptists) feared his candidacy, believing that the Pope in Rome would dictate his policies. Smith was also a committed “wet” (i.e., an opponent of Prohibition); as New York governor, he had repealed the state’s prohibition law. As a “wet”, Smith attracted voters who wanted beer, wine, and liquor and did not like dealing with criminal bootleggers, along with voters who were outraged that new criminal gangs had taken over the streets in most large and medium-sized cities. Incumbent Republican Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover was aided by national prosperity, the absence of American involvement in war, and anti-Catholic bigotry, and he defeated Smith in a landslide in 1928.

Time cover, July 13, 1925

Sir Winston Churchill
(November 30,  1874 –January 24, 1965)

He was a British statesman, military officer, and writer who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 (during the Second World War) and again from 1951 to 1955. Apart from 1922 to 1924, he was a member of Parliament (MP) from 1900 to 1964 and represented a total of five constituencies. Ideologically an adherent to economic liberalism and imperialism, he was for most of his career a member of the Conservative Party, which he led from 1940 to 1955. He was a member of the Liberal Party from 1904 to 1924.

Winston During Early Years, 1889 Photograph: Winston During Early Years, 1889, Churchill and the Great Republic (A Library of Congress Interactive Exhibition, Text Version) (loc.gov)

In 1889, when this photograph was taken, Churchill was a fourteen-year-old attending Harrow, a well-known private school. He was an indifferent student in several subjects and struggled to pass the entrance examination for the British military academy at Sandhurst. Churchill nonetheless distinguished himself in history, English composition, and fencing. He also successfully memorized 1,200 lines of poetry to win a school prize. Although both he and his parents frequently were disappointed with his performance, Churchill remembered several aspects of his school days with fondness and often returned for visits in later life.

Churchill In April 1888, aged 13, he narrowly passed the entrance exam for Harrow School. His father wanted him to prepare for a military career and so his last three years at Harrow were in the army form.

Felipe Carrillo Puerto 
(November 8, 1874 – January 3, 1924)

He was a Mexican journalist, politician and revolutionary who served as the governor of Yucatán from 1922 until his assassination in 1924. He became known for his efforts at reconciliation between the Yucatec Maya and the Mexican government after the Caste War. 

Pope #260 Ven. Pius XII
(March 2, 1876 –October 9,  1958)
Papal Reign from March 2, 1939 –October 9,  1958
(19 years, 221 days)
He was 13 in 1889.

Motto: Opus Justitiae Pax
(“The work of justice [shall be] peace”)

Mata Hari 
(August 7, 1876 – October 15, 1917)

She was a Dutch exotic dancer and courtesan who was convicted of being a spy for Germany during World War I. She was executed by firing squad in France. The idea of a beautiful exotic dancer using her powers of seduction as a spy made her name synonymous with the femme fatale. Her story has inspired books, films, and other works.

It has been said that she was convicted and condemned because the French Army needed a scapegoat, and that the files used to secure her conviction contained falsifications. Some have even stated that Mata Hari could not have been a spy and was innocent.

Mata Hari on the day of her arrest 

Caraway, Hattie Wyatt 
1878–1950,

In 1932 she was appointed to fill the unexpired Senate term from Arkansas of her late husband, Thaddeus H. Caraway. With the support of Huey Long, she was elected for a full term later that year, becoming the first woman to be elected to the U.S. Senate. After failing to win renomination in 1944, she was appointed (1945) by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to the Federal Employees Compensation Commission. Infoplease

Pancho Villa
(June 5, 1878 –   July 20, 1923)

He  was a Mexican revolutionary and general in the Mexican Revolution. In life, Villa helped fashion his own image as an internationally known revolutionary hero, starring as himself in Hollywood films and giving interviews to foreign journalists, most notably John Reed.  After his death he was excluded from the pantheon of revolutionary heroes until the Sonoran generals Obregón and Calles, whom he battled during the Revolution, were gone from the political stage. Villa’s exclusion from the official narrative of the Revolution might have contributed to his continued posthumous popular acclaim. He was celebrated during the Revolution and long afterward by corridos, films about his life and novels by prominent writers. In 1976, his remains were reburied in the Monument to the Revolution in Mexico City in a huge public ceremony.

Joseph Stalin,
(December 6, 1878 –  March 5, 1953)

He was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secretary of the Communist Party from 1922 to 1952 and Chairman of the Council of Ministers from 1941 until his death. Initially governing as part of a collective leadership, Stalin consolidated power to become dictator by the 1930s; he formalized his Leninist interpretation of Marxism as Marxism-Leninism, while the totalitarian political system he established became known as Stalinism.

Leon Trotsky
(November 7,  1879 –August 21, 1940)

He was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He was a central figure in the 1905 Revolution, October RevolutionRussian Civil War, and establishment of the Soviet Union. Trotsky and Vladimir Lenin were widely considered the two most prominent Soviet figures, and Trotsky was de facto second-in-command during the early years of the Russian Soviet Republic. Ideologically a Marxist and Leninist, his thought and writings inspired a school of Marxism known as Trotskyism.

Patrick Pearse 
(November 10, 1879 –  May 3, 1916)

He was an Irish teacher, barristerpoet, writer, nationalistrepublican political activist and revolutionary who was one of the leaders of the Easter Rising in 1916. Following his execution along with fifteen others, Pearse came to be seen by many as the embodiment of the rebellion.

Born in 1880’s

1st Electric Circus Garden Outlaws – 1880 – 1888

Douglas MacArthur
(January 26, 1880 –  April 5, 1964)

He was an American military leader who served as General of the Army for the United States, as well as a field marshal to the Philippine Army. He served with distinction in World War I, was Chief of Staff of the United States Army during the 1930s and played a prominent role in the Pacific theater during World War II.

Jeannette Rankin
(June 11, 1880 – May 18, 1973)

She was an American politician and women’s rights advocate who became the first woman to hold federal office in the United States. She was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives as a Republican from Montana in 1916 for one term, then was elected again in 1940. Rankin remains the only woman ever elected to Congress from Montana.

Each of Rankin’s congressional terms coincided with the initiation of U.S. military intervention in one of the two world wars. A lifelong pacifist, she was one of 50 House members who opposed the declaration of war on Germany in 1917. In 1941, she was the sole member of Congress to vote against the declaration of war on Japan following the attack on Pearl Harbor.

suffragist during the Progressive Era, Rankin organized and lobbied for legislation enfranchising women in several states, including Montana, New York, and North Dakota. While in Congress, she introduced legislation that eventually became the 19th Constitutional Amendment, granting unrestricted voting rights to women nationwide. She championed a multitude of diverse women’s rights and civil rights causes throughout a career that spanned more than six decades. In 1920, she helped found the American Civil Liberties Union and served as a vice president.

Pope # 261 St. John XXIII
(November 25, 1881 –  June 3, 1963)
Papal Reign from October 28,  1958 –  June 3, 1963
(4 years, 218 days)
He turned 8 in 1889.

Motto: Obedientia et Pax
 (“Obedience and peace”)

Thomas Selfridge
(February 8, 1882 – September 17, 1908)

He was a first lieutenant in the U.S. Army and the first person to die in an airplane crash. He was also the first active-duty member of the U.S. military to die in a crash while on duty. He was killed while seated as a passenger in a Wright Flyer, on a demonstration flight piloted by Orville Wright.

Charles Stuart MacKenzie
(November 15, 1882- May 6, 1917)

He was a sergeant in the Seaforth Highlanders, who along with hundreds of his brothers-in-arms from the ElginRothes area in MorayScotland went to fight in World War I. Sergeant MacKenzie was bayoneted to death at age 33, while defending one of his badly injured fellow soldiers during hand-to-hand trench warfare.  His memory is captured in the song Sgt. MacKenzie  written and sung by his great grandson Joseph Kilna MacKenzie (1955-2009). It has been used in the 2002 movie We Were Soldiers and the ending scene of the 2012 film End of Watch. Child actor Atticus Shaffer was interested in the story of the actual soldier, so he dressed up as MacKenzie on Halloween. This was incorporated into his character, Brick, on The Middle, who does the same in a Halloween episode, then writes a hip-hop musical in a later episode based on MacKenzie’s life and inspired by the hit Broadway musical Hamilton.

Benito Mussolini
(July 29, 1883 – April 28, 1945)

He was an Italian dictator who founded and led the National Fascist Party (PNF). He was Prime Minister of Italy from the March on Rome in 1922, until his deposition in 1943, as well as Duce of Italian fascism from the establishment of the Italian Fasces of Combat in 1919, until his execution in 1945. As a dictator and founder of fascism, Mussolini inspired the international spread of fascist movements during the interwar period. 

Mussolini with Adolf Hitler in Berlin, 1937

Schindler’s Parents

Hans Johann Schindler (1883-1947)
+ Francisca Luserová (1884-1935)

= Oskar Schindler 
(April 28, 1908 –October 9, 1974)

He was a German industrialisthumanitarian, and member of the Nazi Party who is credited with saving the lives of 1,200 Jews during the Holocaust by employing them in his enamelware and ammunitions factories in occupied Poland and the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. He is the subject of the 1982 novel Schindler’s Ark and its 1993 film adaptation, Schindler’s List, which reflect his life as an opportunist initially motivated by profit who came to show extraordinary initiative, tenacity, courage, and dedication in saving his Jewish employees’ lives.

United Nations Founders’

Olive Agnes Johnson Bunch
(1884-1917)
is the mother of

Ralph Bunche
(August 7, 1904 – December 9, 1971)

was an American political scientist, diplomat, and leading actor in the mid-20th-century decolonization process and US civil rights movement, who received the 1950 Nobel Peace Prize for his late 1940s mediation in Israel. He is the first black Nobel laureate and the first person of African descent to be awarded a Nobel Prize. He was involved in the formation and early administration of the United Nations (UN), and played a major role in both the decolonization process and numerous UN peacekeeping operations.

1885

While Marty and Doc Traveled Through Time This Also Happened

John Henry Towers,
(January 30, 1885 – April 30, 1955)

He was a highly decorated United States Navy four-star admiral and pioneer naval aviator.He was one of few and the only early Naval Aviation pioneers to survive the hazards of early flight to remain with naval aviation throughout his career.

Clementine Churchill, .
(April 1, 1885 –December 12, 1977)

She was the wife of English prime minister Winston Churchill.

George S. Patton
(November 11, 1885 – December 21, 1945)

He was a general in the United States Army who commanded the Seventh Army in the Mediterranean Theater of World War II, and the Third Army in France and Germany after the Allied invasion of Normandy in June 1944.

Patton’s colorful image, hard-driving personality, and success as a commander were at times overshadowed by his controversial public statements. His philosophy of leading from the front, and his ability to inspire troops with attention-getting, vulgarity-laden speeches, such as his famous address to the Third Army, was received favorably by his troops, but much less so by a sharply divided Allied high command. His sending the doomed Task Force Baum to liberate his son-in-law, Lieutenant Colonel John K. Waters, from a prisoner-of-war camp further damaged his standing with his superiors. His emphasis on rapid and aggressive offensive action proved effective, and he was regarded highly by his opponents in the German High Command. An award-winning biographical film released in 1970, Patton, helped popularize his image.

Alvin York
(December 13, 1887 – September 2, 1964)

Also known by his rank as Sergeant York, was an American soldier who was one of the most decorated United States Army soldiers of World War I.[1] He received the Medal of Honor for leading an attack on a German machine gun nest, gathering 35 machine guns, killing at least 25[2] enemy soldiers and capturing 132 prisoners. York’s Medal of Honor action occurred during the United States-led portion of the Meuse–Argonne offensive in France, which was intended to breach the Hindenburg line and force the Germans to surrender. He earned decorations from several allied countries during the war, including France, Italy and Montenegro.

T. E. Lawrence 
(August 16, 1888 – May 19, 1935)

He was a British Army officer, archaeologist, diplomat and writer best known for his role during the Arab Revolt and Sinai and Palestine campaign against the Ottoman Empire in the First World War. The breadth and variety of his activities and associations, and Lawrence’s ability to describe them vividly in writing, earned him international fame as Lawrence of Arabia, a title used for the 1962 film based on his wartime activities.

Saints and other Catholics Alive and Well in 1889

Descendants of Popes and Presidents Alive in 1889

Ancestors of Popes and Presidents Alive in 1889

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1889


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