Biographies Of Infamous Historical Figures  

Bill Gates

William Henry Gates III, KBE (born October 28, 1955), commonly known as Bill Gates, is an American businessman and a microcomputer pioneer. Along with others, he wrote the original Altair BASIC interpreter for the Altair 8800 (an early microcomputer). With Paul Allen, he co-founded Microsoft Corporation, and is now its chairman and "Chief Software Architect."

According to Forbes magazine, Gates is the wealthiest person in the world, even including heads of state whose wealth is tied to their position (although the standard Forbes list does not include heads of state, Forbes has released separate lists for the estimated wealth of heads of state; when the lists are combined, Bill Gates still remains the world's wealthiest person).


Biography
Bill Gates was born in Seattle, Washington, on October 28, 1955, to William H. Gates, Sr., a corporate lawyer, and Mary Maxwell Gates, board member of Berkshire Hathaway, First Interstate Bank, Pacific Northwest Bell and the national board of United Way. He is William Henry Gates III, his great-grandfather being the true William Henry Gates Sr.

Gates attended Lakeside School, Seattle's most exclusive prep school, where he was able to develop his programming skills on the school's minicomputer. In need of more computing power, Gates and his computer buddy, Paul Allen, sneaked into the University of Washington computer labs. They were later caught but struck an agreement with lab administrators by providing free computer help to students. He later went on to study at Harvard University but dropped out without graduating to pursue what would become a lifelong career in software development. It was while he was at Harvard that he met the current CEO of Microsoft, Steve Ballmer. They were roommates during their freshman year.

While he was a student at Harvard, he co-wrote with Paul Allen the original Altair BASIC interpreter for the Altair 8800 (the first commercially successful personal computer) in the mid 1970s. It was inspired by BASIC, an easy-to-learn programming language developed at Dartmouth College for teaching purposes.

Gates married Melinda French on January 1, 1994. They have three children, Jennifer Katharine Gates (born April 26, 1996), Rory John Gates (born May 23, 1999) and Phoebe Adele Gates (born September 14, 2002).

In 1994, Gates acquired the Codex Leicester, a collection of writings by Leonardo da Vinci; as of 2003 it was on display at the Seattle Art Museum.


On the cover of Time
Again on the cover of Time promoting the Xbox 360.In 1997, Gates was the victim of a bizarre extortion plot by Chicago resident Adam Quinn Pletcher. Gates testified at the subsequent trial. Pletcher was convicted and sentenced in July 1998 to six years in prison. In February 1998 Gates was attacked by Noël Godin with a cream pie.

According to Forbes, Gates donated money to the 2004 presidential campaign of George W. Bush. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Gates is cited as having donated at least $33,335 to over 50 political campaigns during the 2004 election cycle.

On December 14, 2004, Bill Gates joined Berkshire Hathaway's board, formalizing the relationship between him and Warren Buffett. Berkshire Hathaway is a conglomerate that includes Geico (automobile insurance), Benjamin Moore (paint) and Fruit of the Loom (textiles). Gates also serves on the board of Icos, a Bothell biotech company.

On March 2, 2005, the Foreign Office of the United Kingdom announced that Gates would receive the title of Knight of the British Empire for his contribution to enterprise in the United Kingdom and his efforts in poverty reduction around the world. Because he is not a Commonwealth citizen, he cannot use the title of "Sir," but he may put the letters "KBE" after his name.


Home
The Gates family lives in the exclusive suburb of Medina, Washington, in a huge earth-sheltered home in the side of a hill overlooking Lake Washington. The Gates home is a very modern 21st century house in the "Pacific Lodge" style, with advanced electronic systems everywhere. In one respect though it is more like an 18th or 19th century mansion: it has a large private library with a domed reading room. While it does have a classic flavour, the home has many unique qualities. Visitors are surveyed and given a microchip upon entrance. This small chip sends signals throughout the house, and a given room's temperature and other conditions will change according to preset user preferences. According to King County public records, as of 2002, the total assessed value of the property (land and house) is $113 million, and the annual property tax is just over $1 million.


Microsoft Corporation
In 1975, Gates and Allen co-founded Micro-Soft, later Microsoft Corporation, to market their version of BASIC, called Microsoft BASIC. Microsoft BASIC became the foundation of a successful software licensing business, being bundled (usually in ROM) with most home and personal computers of the 1970s and 1980s.

In February 1976, Bill Gates wrote the Open Letter to Hobbyists, which annoyed the computer hobbyist community by asserting that a commercial market existed for computer software. Gates stated in the letter that software should not be copied without the publisher's permission, which he equated to piracy. While legally correct, Gates' proposal was unprecedented in a community that was influenced by its ham radio legacy and hacker ethic, in which innovations and knowledge were freely shared in the community. Nevertheless, Gates was right about the market prospects, and his efforts paid off: Microsoft Corporation became one of the world's most successful commercial enterprises and a key player in the creation of a retail software industry.

Microsoft's key moment came when IBM was planning to enter the personal computer market with its IBM Personal Computer (PC), which was released in 1981. IBM approached Microsoft for an operating system (they had already licensed its language products), but Microsoft did not have one to sell and referred IBM to Digital Research. At Digital Research, IBM representatives spoke to Gary Kildall's wife Dorothy, but she declined to sign their standard non-disclosure agreement, which she considered overly burdensome. IBM then returned to talk to Microsoft. Gates obtained rights to a cloned design of CP/M, QDOS, from Tim Paterson of Seattle Computer products for $50,000 and licensed it to IBM for "about $80,000", according to Gates, and MS-DOS/PC-DOS was born. Later, IBM discovered that Gates' operating system could have infringement problems with CP/M, contacted Kildall, and in exchange for a promise not to sue, made an agreement that CP/M would be sold along with PC-DOS when the IBM PC was released. The price set by IBM for CP/M was $250, and for MS-DOS/PC-DOS it was $40. MS-DOS/PC-DOS outsold CP/M many times over, becoming the standard. Microsoft's licensing deal with IBM was not particularly lucrative in itself (it did not include royalties), but critically, Microsoft retained the right to sell MS-DOS to other computer manufacturers. By marketing MS-DOS aggressively to manufacturers of IBM-PC clones, Microsoft gained unprecedented visibility in the microcomputer industry, even rivalling IBM.

In the mid-1980s Gates became excited about the possibilities of compact disc technology for storage and sponsored the publication of the book CD-ROM: The New Papyrus that promoted the idea of CD-ROM.

In the late 1980s, Microsoft and IBM partnered in the development of a more advanced operating system, OS/2. The operating system was marketed in connection with a new hardware design, the PS/2, that was proprietary to IBM. As the project progressed, Gates oversaw continuing friction with IBM over the system's design, hardware support, and user interface. Ultimately he came to believe that IBM wanted to marginalize Microsoft from having any input in OS/2's development. On May 16, 1991, Gates announced to Microsoft employees that the OS/2 partnership was over and Microsoft would henceforth focus its platform efforts on Windows and the NT kernel. In the ensuing years OS/2 fell to the side, and Windows became the favored PC platform.

During the transition from MS-DOS to Windows, Microsoft gained ground on application software competitors such as WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3.

Nearly a decade later, Microsoft's Internet Explorer web browser displaced Netscape's Navigator, which many attributed to Microsoft's inclusion of Internet Explorer in Windows at no extra charge. An opposing view is that the inclusion in Windows was less important in Internet Explorer's adoption than Microsoft's improvement of the browser's features to a level comparable with Navigator.

As the architect of Microsoft's product strategy, Gates has aggressively broadened the company's range of products and, once it has obtained a leading position in a category, has vigorously defended that position. His and other Microsoft executives' strategic decisions have more than once drawn the concern of competition regulators and in some cases have been ruled illegal.

In 2000, Gates promoted long-time friend and Microsoft executive Steve Ballmer to the role of Chief Executive Officer and took on the role of "Chief Software Architect".


Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
With his wife, Gates founded the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a charitable organization. The foundation's grants have provided funds for underrepresented minority college scholarships, AIDS prevention, diseases that strike mainly in the third world, and other causes. The Foundation currently provides 90% of the world budget for the attempted eradication of poliomyelitis (polio), the World Health Organization having 'moved on' to other diseases. In June 1999, Gates and his wife donated US$5 billion to their foundation. They have donated more than US$100 million to help children suffering from AIDS. On

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Hillary Rodham Clinton

During the 1992 presidential campaign, Hillary Rodham Clinton observed, "Our lives are a mixture of different roles. Most of us are doing the best we can to find whatever the right balance is . . . For me, that balance is family, work, and service."

Hillary Diane Rodham, Dorothy and Hugh Rodham's first child, was born on October 26, 1947. Two brothers, Hugh and Tony, soon followed. Hillary's childhood in Park Ridge, Illinois, was happy and disciplined. She loved sports and her church, and was a member of the National Honor Society, and a student leader. Her parents encouraged her to study hard and to pursue any career that interested her.

As an undergraduate at Wellesley College, Hillary mixed academic excellence with school government. Speaking at graduation, she said, "The challenge now is to practice politics as the art of making what appears to be impossible, possible."

In 1969, Hillary entered Yale Law School, where she served on the Board of Editors of Yale Law Review and Social Action, interned with children's advocate Marian Wright Edelman, and met Bill Clinton. The President often recalls how they met in the library when she strode up to him and said, "If you're going to keep staring at me, I might as well introduce myself." The two were soon inseparable--partners in moot court, political campaigns, and matters of the heart.

After graduation, Hillary advised the Children's Defense Fund in Cambridge and joined the impeachment inquiry staff advising the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives. After completing those responsibilities, she "followed her heart to Arkansas," where Bill had begun his political career.

They married in 1975. She joined the faculty of the University of Arkansas Law School in 1975 and the Rose Law Firm in 1976. In 1978, President Jimmy Carter appointed her to the board of the Legal Services Corporation, and Bill Clinton became governor of Arkansas. Their daughter, Chelsea, was born in 1980.

Hillary served as Arkansas's First Lady for 12 years, balancing family, law, and public service. She chaired the Arkansas Educational Standards Committee, co-founded the Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families, and served on the boards of the Arkansas Children's Hospital, Legal Services, and the Children's Defense Fund.

As the nation's First Lady, Hillary continued to balance public service with private life. Her active role began in 1993 when the President asked her to chair the Task Force on National Health Care Reform. She continued to be a leading advocate for expanding health insurance coverage, ensuring children are properly immunized, and raising public awareness of health issues. She wrote a weekly newspaper column entitled "Talking It Over," which focused on her experiences as First Lady and her observations of women, children, and families she has met around the world. Her 1996 book It Takes a Village and Other Lessons Children Teach Us was a best seller, and she received a Grammy Award for her recording of it.

As First Lady, her public involvement with many activities sometimes led to controversy. Undeterred by critics, Hillary won many admirers for her staunch support for women around the world and her commitment to children's issues.

She was elected United States Senator from New York on November 7, 2000. She is the first First Lady elected to the United States Senate and the first woman elected statewide in New York.

Ashoka Indian Ruler

One of the greatest rulers of India's history is Ashoka (Asoka). Ruling
for thirty-eight years (274 B.C.-232 B.C.), he was generally mentioned
in his inscriptions as Devanampiya Piyadasi ("Beloved of the gods"). As
the third emperor of the Mauryan dynasty, he was born in the year 304
B.C. His greatest achievements were spreading Buddhism throughout his
empire and beyond. He set up an ideal government for his people and
conquered many lands, expanding his kingdom. The knowledge of Ashoka's
early reign is limited because little information was found. His edicts
and inscriptions allowed us to understand his reign and empire, and
have an insight into the events that took place during this remarkable
period of history. Eight years after he took his throne, Ashoka's
powerful armies attacked and conquered Kalinga (present day Orissa).
Although he had conquered many other places, this violent war was the
last war he ever fought and a turning point of his career. He was
disgusted by the extreme deaths of numerous civilians, especially the
Brahmans. All these misfortunes brought Ashoka to turn into a religious
ruler compared to a military ruler. As he turned to Buddhism, he
emphasized dharma (law of piety) and ahimsa (nonviolence). He realized
he could not spread Buddhism all by himself and therefore appointed
officers to help promote the teachings. These officers were called
Dhamma Mahamattas or "Officers of Righteousness"" They were in charge
of providing welfare and happiness among the servants and masters.
Preventing wrongful doings and ensuring special consideration was also
their duty. Emphasizing his role as king, he paid close attention to
welfare, the building of roads and rest houses, planting medicinal
trees, and setting up healing centers. In order to pursue ahimsa,
Ashoka gave up his favorite hobby of hunting and forbade the killing of
animals, spreading vegetarianism throughout India. Furthermore, his
soldiers were taught the golden rule- to behave to others the way you
want them to behave to you, which is the basic law of life. In the
nineteenth century, a large number of edicts written in Brahmi script
carved on rocks and stone pillars were discovered in India, proving the
existence of Ashoka. These edicts, found scattered in more than 30
places throughout India, Nepal, Pakistan and Afghanistan, are mainly
concerned with moral principles Ashoka recommended, his conversion to
Buddhism, his personality and his success as a king. The Minor Edicts
is a summary of Ashoka's instruction of dharma, which talks about the
purity of thoughts, kindness, thruthfulness, reverence, and other good
morals of life. The Fourteen Rock Edicts were the major edicts, and
issued the principles of the government. Some of these edicts tell of
animal sacrifices, the principles of dharma, the Kalinga War, and
religious toleration. There is also record of Ashoka's famous statement
of "All men are my children". The Seven Pillar Edicts deals with some
achievements of Samudragupta. Ashoka died in the thirty-eighth year of
his reign, 232 B.C. The Buddhist ideas no longer inspire the government
and at the same time, his descendents quarrel over the successions. In
addition, the army, having become less warlike, was no longer able to
defend the empire from invasion. In less than fifty years after his
death, the Maurya Empire collapsed and fell into pieces.

Biography of Genghis Khan
The old world had many great leaders. Alexander the Great,
Hannibal and even Julius Caesar met with struggle on their rise to
power. Perhaps Genghis Khan was the most significant of all these
rulers. To prove that Genghis Khan was the greatest ruler, we must go
back to the very beginning of his existence. We must examine such
issues as; Genghis¹s struggle for power/how his life as a child would
affect his rule, his personal and military achievements and his
conquests.

Genghis Khan was originally born as Temujin in 1167. He showed
early promise as a leader and a fighter. By 1206, an assembly of
Mongolian chieftains proclaimed him Genghis Khan. Which meant
Universal or invincible prince. This was a bold move for the assembly.
They obviously saw some leadership qualities in Genghis that others
didn¹t. When Genghis Khan was little, his chieftain father poisoned.
With no leader left, the tribe abandoned Genghis and his mother. They
were left alone for many years to care for themselves. Throughout
these years, his family met many hardships such as shortage of food
and shortage of money. Though unable to read, Genghis was a very wise
man. His mother told him at a very early age the importance of trust
and independence. "Remember, you have no companions but your shadow"
Grolier Encyclopedia. (1995) CD ROM

This quote was to mean to Genghis, don¹t put to much trust in
anyone, trust no one but yourself and if you must go your own way then
do so. In 1206, Genghis Khan proclaimed the ruler of Mongolia. Genghis
was a very respected leader. Like other leaders he knew what his
people wanted. They want everything that is good and nothing that is
bad. Genghis knew he could not promise this so instead he pledged to
share both the sweet and the bitter of life. Genghis did not want to
end up being poisoned like his father so instead he made alliances,
and attacked anyone who posed a serious threat. Through this method
of leadership, Genghis¹s army grew to the point where they were
unbeatable.

Genghis contributed alot of items to the chinese and even
western civilizations. Perhaps his greatest contribution was a code of
laws that he declared. Since Genghis couldn¹t read or write, these law
were documented by one of his followers. His laws were carried on by
people though the many generations to the point of still being in use
today. Either as a modification of Genghis¹s laws or as Genghis had
declared them. Genghis Khan promoted the growth of trade between China
and Europe. This allowed him to gain essential supplies such as food,
weapons and other essential survival materials. Genghis also invented
a system similar to the pony express. It was a system in which the
horse and rider could silently communicate, a system that is still in
use today. Perhaps the greatest gift ever given by Genghis Khan was
the gift of language. Genghis was the first ruler to develop a
Mongolian language. Genghis Khan was also a military and strategic
genius. He structured his army in a unique and interesting fashion. He
integrated soldiers from different tribes into one powerful fighting
force. This was a brilliant idea. Not only could he have diversity and
people who specialize in certain aspects of warfare, but it also
inspired loyalty to the mongolian army as a whole rather than to a
specific group of people. Genghis used harsh training and strict
discipline to create a superior fighting force, he also insured that
everyone of his soldiers was well equipped and could easily adopted
new warfare tactics. His soldiers were always learning. Whether it be
a new tactic Genghis had invented or a new weapon He decided the army
would use, his soldiers were constantly learning. Genghis inspired
loyalty by a unique way of promotion. Genghis felt that the best way
to gain a loyal following was to promote people on the basis of
achievement and not within the family. This did not only inspire a
great deal of loyalty but it also made his army better and actually
raised the morale of his soldiers. Every soldier gave their life to
Genghis and one hundred percent of their effort because no one knew
who would be the next Genghis would promote.

Finally, once Genghis's army was trained and ready for battle,
Genghis felt it was time to flex the muscles of the Mongolian empire.
Genghis took on the great task of conquering all of china and uniting
it under a single ruler. Genghis began his assault on China by
attacking a northwest kingdom called Xi Xia. He defeated Xi Xia with
little effort and then in 1215 he moved northeast, attacking and
conquering Bejing, the capital city of the Jin empire. In 1218, for
reasons unknown, he decided to cease his assault on China and sweep
into central Asia. He crushed the kingdom of Krorezm which was
located in what is now present-day Uzebekistan and Turkmenistan. In
1220, he destroyed the cities of Bukhara and Samarkand, which are
located in present-day Uzebekistan and Neyshabar in modern Iran. By
1223, Genghis Khan and his troops had conquered the Kipchaks, and they
had defeated the Russians at the Kalka River. It had taken Genghis
Khan 17 years to create an empire superior in strength and achievement
to Alexander the great, Julius Caesar and even Hannibal. From 1225
until Genghis¹s death in 1227, His army was at war with Yi Yia
kingdom.

Genghis Khan died on August 18, 1227, and was buried in a secret
location in Mongolia. By rewarding skill and allegiance, and punishing
those who opposed him, Genghis Khan established a vast empire and the
most powerful empire to ever exist. Upon his death, Genghis¹s son
Kublai Khan took over the empire, founding the chinese-style Yuan
dynasty. Mongol rule brought relative peace to Asia, leaving China
accessible to foreign visitors, such as Marco Polo.


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Alexander the Great

Alexander the Great, a patient and often devious man; had
never struck without careful planning. The youthful,
headstrong Alexander liked to settle problems by immediate
action. Making decisions with great speed, he took
extraordinary risks; his success was achieved by the amount
of sheer force and drive to overcome these risks. Alexander
was educated as a student by the Greek philosopher
Aristotle. The philosopher imbued Alexander with a love of
Greek art and poetry, and instilled in him a lasting
interest in Philosophy and science.

Within a year of his accession, Alexander extended his
dominions northward toward the Danube River and westward
towards the Adriatic Sea. He then turned his attention to
Greece where Thebes and Athens were threatening to bolt the
league with weapons purchased with Persian gold. Also,
Athens and Thebes were to unite in war against Macedon. In
335 B.C. Alexander decided to punish the city for what he
regarded as treachery; .The city was destroyed and its
people sold into slavery or killed. All of the city_s
buildings were destroyed except for temples and the house
of Pindar the poet. Pindar was long dead, but Alexander
wanted to prove that even a Macedonian conqueror could be a
Hellene. The savage lesson of Thebes brought results, the
Athenian assembly quickly congratulated Alexander, and the
Greek states, with Sparta as the continuing exception,
remained Macedonian allies.

Alexander now took on a project that Philip had planned but
never carried out: an invasion of Persia. He decision to do
this was purely a political one. For a century Persia had
interfered increasingly in Greek affairs and had constantly
oppressed the Greek cities in Asia Minor. Alexander had
personal reasons too. Avid for glory and for identification
with Greece, Alexander knew no better way to win both than
by attacking Greece_s ancient foe. In some ways the
invasion, the longest military campaign ever undertaken,
was a reckless undertaking. It required a large army to
move an enormous distance from its supply bases, through
and unfamiliar country, against a power incalculably rich
in money and men. Furthermore, Persia was governed by a
patriotic and devoted military caste that was egar to show
its strength in war. However the enemy had a weakness. The
current king, Darius III, had come to the throne through
the murder of his predecessor and was highly
incompetent._Darius was no leader-in fact, he was not even
a brave man. The best of his generals and satraps might
have been able to compensate for his shortcomings, but the
rigidly structured hierarchy of the Empire did not give
them a chance._ Besides the fact that Persia was poorly
ruled, Alexander was counting on another shortcoming of the
Persian Empire to aide in his conquest. The Persian
Empire_s subject were unloyal to and had very little
affection towards their ruler(s) and would be unlikely to
resist and invading army.

In 334 B.C. Alexander crossed the Hellespont. Something
that his father had planned but not fully achieved. He
defeated the Persian forces that were gathered on the Asian
side of the River Granicus. After this victory Alexander
sent three hundred suits of Persian armor back to Athens.
The message that went with them read, _Alexander, the son
of Philip, and the Greeks, except the Spartans, have won
this spoil from the barbarians of Asia,_ thus expressing in
one brief and self-assured sentence his contempt for the
Persians, his even greater contempt for the Spartans, and
his conviction that he was furthering a Greek cause. _Of
all the generals of the ancient world Alexander was surely
the greatest. He possessed an almost clairvoyant insight
into strategy and was a consummately resourceful tactician.

Alexander could be compared to Napoleon in swiftness and in
movement, but Alexander could be patient as well. As he
showed in his siege of the fortress of Tyre, which lasted
for about seven months. The old port of Tyre had been
abandoned for some time, and the Tyrians were now securely
enclosed behind massive walls on an island that was half a
mile from the shore. Alexander made attempts to negotiate
an entrance into the city but they were halted by a display
of force against his envoy by the Tyrians. _Alexander was
determined to run every risk and make every effort to save
the Macedonian army from being held in contempt by a single
undistinguished city._ This commitment turned out to be far
more exacting then Alexander could have ever imagined.
Nevertheless, his determination and aversion to failure
drove him to conjure up a more imaginative approach. He
built a solid causeway over the water, half a mile long and
two hundred feet wide. Then he constructed siege towers of
150 feet in height. Unfortunately the Tyrians responded to
each and every effort with innovations of their own. At one
point during the siege, his advisors gave him reason to
abandon the assault. However, Alexander was not about to
admit that he had labored in vain, nor was he willing to
leave Tyre behind as a monument of his fallibility.
Reinforced by ships from the Persian fleet that had
defected to him, Alexander launched a varied assault on the
city. Eight thousand Tyrians were said to have perished
during the sack. Alexander personally led the attack on a
breached section of the city_s wall. The siege was a
moderate success in his eyes considering the resources
lost. _Alexander was a man incapable of shrugging his
shoulders and walking away from an unsuccessful effort. If
as a result of several futile attempts, frustrated and
angry, he would have decided that a quick and sudden attack
would rescue him from embarrassment. Victory on the
battlefield promised to be more complex. During the
intervening two years since the battle of Issus, Darius had
assembled some 25,000 horseman from his eastern satrapies,
an untold number of infantry, 200 scythed chariots, and
even 15 elephants. He was now encamped on a wide plain near
Gaugamela. Alexander could only field 7,000 horsemen and
40,000 footmen. His men were superior in discipline and
experience in the field, but he was short in numbers and
well aware of it. Alexander delayed the attack until he had
seen the battle field with his own eyes. Scanning the
terrain for advantageous positions to make up for the
lacking number of Macedonian forces. The day of the battle
came and went with a stunning victory for Alexander. His
plan was to create a rift in the center of the Persian
troops. For that was where Darius was and where the
commands for the Persian army were coming from. Alexander
simply charged towards Darius_s chariot. Like Issus this
tactic again proved to be successful. Darius fled Gaugamela
like he fled at Issus.

Alexander was extremely skillful at dealing with unfamiliar
tactics of warfare, such as the use of chariots armed with
scythes, elephants deployed in battle, and evasive,
encircling movements by nomad horseman. Nevertheless, he
sometimes received unexpected help from his enemies.
Darius, who was cruel as well as cowardly, treated
prisoners with a harshness that embittered the Macedonian
soldiers. Alexander saw this and led his army to victory at
Issus in 333 B.C., and Gaugamela in 331 B.C., both times
Darius fled from the battle field. With these two victories
Alexander broke the main Persian resistance and in the
autumn of 331 B.C. he entered Babylon, the winter capital
of the Persian kings. In December of the same year he
entered the summer capital at Susa. Both cities were taken
relatively without major problems. From Susa he went on to
the ceremonial capital at Persepolis. Persepolis gave
Alexander a great deal of wealth/treasure that would
require 20,000 mules and 5,000 camels to remove it. Before
leaving Persepolis, Alexander burned the palace of the
great king for reasons that have never been made clear.
Possibly it was a whim, some sources say that he did it in
a fit of drunken excitement, while others say he did it to
signify that the Persian invasion of Greece had at last
been avenged. Alexander had already considered himself king
of Persia, but his right to the throne was in question as
long as Darius was still alive and at large. So in the
summer of 330 B.C. he marched north in pursuit of Darius.
Alexander had almost caught up to him but Darius was slain
by his own men, finally brought to rebellion by their long
resentment of his mismanagement of the Persian defense.
When Alexander came upon Darius_s body he ordered it to be
sent back to Persepolis to be buried in the royal cemetery
of the Achaemenid kings. Now, at last, Alexander was
officially the great king of Persia. In his new role he
headed east to take possession of the remaining Persian
provinces. After two years he reached and subdued Bactria
and Sogdiana; he now controlled all that belonged to
Darius.

As the campaign of Persia was ending, Alexander_s plan
expanded. Originally his purpose had been simply to destroy
the Persian army. He had decided to take over the whole
Persian empire, and he went on to achieve this without
losing a single battle. If Alexander thought of the Persian
empire at all, he thought of it simply as a source of
wealth. However, as he took o

ver more and more territory, he saw that he could not hold
the empire without governing it. To govern it effectively,
he had to merge it with the Greek world. _Alexander proved
to be as skillful at statecraft as he was at military
matters Since his main concern was to keep the empire
functioning , Alexander tolerated many local religious, and
social customs. He even, to some extent, permitted each
country to keep its national institutions. At the same time
he introduced Hellenic ideas. The most important being the
Greek city state. As Alexander traveled and conquered h

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Alexander the Great

Alexander the Great was born in 356 BC, and died in 323
BC. He was the king of Macedonia, conqueror of the
Persian Empire, and one of the greatest military geniuses
of all times. Born in Pella, the ancient capital of
Macedonia, Alexander was the son of Philip II, king of
Macedonia, and of Olympias, a princess of Epirus.
Alexander's tutor was Aristotle; Aristotle gave Alexander
extremely good training in rhetoric and literature while
also stimulating his interest in science, medicine, and
philosophy. Philip was assassinated in the summer of 336
BC. Alexander ascended to the Macedonian throne and
unfortunately then found himself surrounded by enemies at
home and threatened by rebellion abroad.

With little hesitation, Alexander disposed quickly of all
conspirators and domestic enemies by ordering them to be
executed. Next, Alexander descended on Thessaly, where
partisans of independence had gained ascendancy, and also
successfully restored Macdeonian rule. Before the end of
the summer of 336 BC, he had reestablished his position in
Greece and was elected by a congress of states at Corinth.
In 335 BC as general of the Greeks in a campaign against
Persians, he carried out a successful campaign against
the defecting Thracians, penetrating to the Danube River,
which was all originally planned by his own father. During
Alexander's return, in as little as a single week, he
crushed the threatening Illyrians and then hastened to
Thebes, which had revolted. He took the city by storm and
razed it, sparing only the house of the Greek lyric poet
Pindar and the temples of the gods, and then selling about
8000 surviving inhabitants into slavery. Because of
Alexander's quickness in destroying the revolt of Thebes,
the other Greek states were brought into instant and
abject submission.

With an army of 35,000 Macedonian and Greek troops,
Alexander began his war against Persia in the spring of
334 BC by crossing the Hellespont. His chief officers
were all Macedonians and included such people as
Antigonus, Ptolemy, and Seleucus. Near the ancient city of
Troy, at the river Granicus, Alexander attacked a Persian
army and Greek mercenaries (hoplites) totaling 40,000
men. His forces defeated the enemy and, according to
tradition, lost only 110 men. All the states of Asia Minor
submitted to him after this battle. In passing
through Phrygia he is said to have cut with his sword the
Gordian knot. Continuing to advance southward, Alexander
ran into the main Persian army which was commanded by
King Darius III at Issus, in northeastern Syria. The size
of Darius's army is unknown, however the ancient
tradition which said it contained up to 500,000 men is now
considered a wild exaggeration. In 333 BC, The Battle of
Issus ended in a great victory for Alexander. Cut off
from his base, Darius fled northward, abandoning his
mother, wife, and children to Alexander, who treated them
with the respect due to royalty. A strongly fortified
seaport by the name of Tyre, offered obstinate
resistance, but Alexander once again took it by storm in
332 BC after a seven month siege. Next, Alexander
captured Gaza and then continued on into Egypt, where he
was greeted as a deliverer. In the spring of 331 BC,
Alexander made a pilgrimage to the great temple and
oracle of Amon-Ra, whom the Greeks identified with Zeus.
The earlier Egyptian pharaohs were believed to be sons of
Amon-Ra, therefore Alexander, the new ruler of Egypt,
wanted the god to acknowledge him as his son. The
pilgrimage apparently was successful, and it may have
confirmed in him a belief in his own divine origin.
Turning northward again, he reorganized his forces at
Tyre and started for Babylon with an army of 40,000
infantry and 7000 cavalry. Alexander then met Darius at the
head of an army of unknown size, which, according to the
exaggerated accounts of antiquity, was said to number a
million men. Alexander completely defeated the army in
the Battle of Gaugamela, October 1, 331 BC. Darius then
fled as he had done at Issus but was later slain by two
of his own generals. Babylon surrendered after this, and
the city of Susa with its enormous treasures was soon
conquered. Then, in midwinter, Alexander forced his way to
Persepolis, the capital of Persia. After plundering the
royal treasuries and taking other rich booty, he burned
the city during a drunken binge and thus completed the
destruction of the ancient Persian Empire. By these
successes he secured control of the entire eastern
Mediterranean coastline. Later in 332 he founded, at the
mouth of the Nile River, the city of Alexandria, which
later became the literary, scientific, and commercial
center of the Greek world. The capital of the ancient North
African kingdom of Cyrenaica, Cyrene, submitted to
Alexander soon afterward, extending his dominion to
Carthaginian territory. In order to complete his
conquest of the remnants of the Persian Empire, which had
once included part of western India, Alexander crossed
the Indus River in 326 BC, and invaded the Punjab as far as
the river Hyphasis; at this point the Macedonians
rebelled and refused to go farther. In September 325 BC,
he constructed a fleet and passed down the Indus,
reaching its mouth. The fleet then sailed to the Persian
Gulf. He returned overland across the desert to Media
with his army. Severe losses and hardship among the
troops was caused by shortages of food and water.
Alexander spent about a year organizing his dominions and
completing a survey of the Persian Gulf in preparation
for further conquests. In the spring of 323 BC in
Babylon, Alexander arrived. Then in June he contracted a
fever and died. He left his empire, in his own words, "to
the strongest"; this ambiguous testament resulted in dire
conflicts for half a century. Noted for his brilliance
as a tactician and troop leader, Alexander was one of the
greatest generals of all time. Usually Alexander was brave
and generous, but he could be very cruel and ruthless
when politics were at hand. One theory even states he was
a alcoholic, for example, he killed his friend Clitus in
a drunken fury but later regretted the act deeply. Shortly
before Alexander died, he ordered the Greek cities to
worship him as a god. Although he probably gave the order
for political reasons, he was, in his own view and that
of his contemporaries, of divine birth. Due to his death
shortly after he issued this, the order was largely
nullified. To bind his conquests together, Alexander
founded a number of cities, most of them named
Alexandria. These cities were well located, well paved,
and provided good water supplies. Greek veterans from his
army often settled in them, along with young men,
traders, merchants, and scholars. From this, Greek
culture was introduced and the Greek language became
widely known. Thus, Alexander vastly extended the influence
of Greek civilization and prepared the way for the
kingdoms of the Hellenistic period and the conquests of
the Roman Empire. I believe Alexander The Great was the
greatest military genius ever. His skills were so amazing,
no other military leader could traverse great expanses of
territory with his rapidity. The way he could also make
people follow and believe in him is even more impressive
than that of Adolf Hitler.

President George W. Bush
43rd President of the United States
2001 - Present
Born July 6, 1946
Married to Laura Welch Bush



George W. Bush is the 43rd President of the United States. He was sworn into office on January 20, 2001, re-elected on November 2, 2004, and sworn in for a second term on January 20, 2005. Prior to his Presidency, President Bush served for 6 years as the 46th Governor of the State of Texas, where he earned a reputation for bipartisanship and as a compassionate conservative who shaped public policy based on the principles of limited government, personal responsibility, strong families, and local control.

President Bush was born on July 6, 1946, in New Haven, Connecticut, and grew up in Midland and Houston, Texas. He received a bachelor’s degree in history from Yale University in 1968, and then served as an F-102 fighter pilot in the Texas Air National Guard. President Bush received a Master of Business Administration from Harvard Business School in 1975. Following graduation, he moved back to Midland and began a career in the energy business. After working on his father’s successful 1988 Presidential campaign, President Bush assembled the group of partners who purchased the Texas Rangers baseball franchise in 1989. On November 8, 1994, President Bush was elected Governor of Texas. He became the first Governor in Texas history to be elected to consecutive 4-year terms when he was re-elected on November 3, 1998.

Since becoming President of the United States in 2001, President Bush has worked with the Congress to create an ownership society and build a future of security, prosperity, and opportunity for all Americans. He signed into law tax relief that helps workers keep more of their hard-earned money, as well as the most comprehensive education reforms in a generation, the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. This legislation is ushering in a new era of accountability, flexibility, local control, and more choices for parents, affirming our Nation’s fundamental belief in the promise of every child. President Bush has also worked to improve healthcare and modernize Medicare, providing the first-ever prescription drug benefit for seniors; increase homeownership, especially among minorities; conserve our environment; and increase military strength, pay, and benefits. Because President Bush believes the strength of America lies in the hearts and souls of our citizens, he has supported programs that encourage individuals to help their neighbors in need.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, terrorists attacked our Nation. Since then, President Bush has taken unprecedented steps to protect our homeland and create a world free from terror. He is grateful for the service and sacrifice of our brave men and women in uniform and their families. The President is confident that by helping build free and prosperous societies, our Nation and our friends and allies will succeed in making America more secure and the world more peaceful.

President Bush is married to Laura Welch Bush, a former teacher and librarian, and they have twin daughters, Barbara and Jenna. The Bush family also includes two dogs, Barney and Miss Beazley, and a cat, Willie.


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George H. W. Bush
Forty-First President
1989-1993
Born: June 12, 1924 in Milton, Massachusetts
Married to Barbara Pierce Bush



George Bush brought to the White House a dedication to traditional American values and a determination to direct them toward making the United States "a kinder and gentler nation." In his Inaugural Address he pledged in "a moment rich with promise" to use American strength as "a force for good."

Coming from a family with a tradition of public service, George Herbert Walker Bush felt the responsibility to make his contribution both in time of war and in peace. Born in Milton, Massachusetts, on June 12, 1924, he became a student leader at Phillips Academy in Andover. On his 18th birthday he enlisted in the armed forces. The youngest pilot in the Navy when he received his wings, he flew 58 combat missions during World War II. On one mission over the Pacific as a torpedo bomber pilot he was shot down by Japanese antiaircraft fire and was rescued from the water by a U. S. submarine. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for bravery in action.

Bush next turned his energies toward completing his education and raising a family. In January 1945 he married Barbara Pierce. They had six children-- George, Robin (who died as a child), John (known as Jeb), Neil, Marvin, and Dorothy.

At Yale University he excelled both in sports and in his studies; he was captain of the baseball team and a member of Phi Beta Kappa. After graduation Bush embarked on a career in the oil industry of West Texas.

Like his father, Prescott Bush, who was elected a Senator from Connecticut in 1952, George became interested in public service and politics. He served two terms as a Representative to Congress from Texas. Twice he ran unsuccessfully for the Senate. Then he was appointed to a series of high-level positions: Ambassador to the United Nations, Chairman of the Republican National Committee, Chief of the U. S. Liaison Office in the People's Republic of China, and Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

In 1980 Bush campaigned for the Republican nomination for President. He lost, but was chosen as a running mate by Ronald Reagan. As Vice President, Bush had responsibility in several domestic areas, including Federal deregulation and anti-drug programs, and visited scores of foreign countries. In 1988 Bush won the Republican nomination for President and, with Senator Dan Quayle of Indiana as his running mate, he defeated Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis in the general election.

Bush faced a dramatically changing world, as the Cold War ended after 40 bitter years, the Communist empire broke up, and the Berlin Wall fell. The Soviet Union ceased to exist; and reformist President Mikhail Gorbachev, whom Bush had supported, resigned. While Bush hailed the march of democracy, he insisted on restraint in U. S. policy toward the group of new nations.

In other areas of foreign policy, President Bush sent American troops into Panama to overthrow the corrupt regime of General Manuel Noriega, who was threatening the security of the canal and the Americans living there. Noriega was brought to the United States for trial as a drug trafficker.

Bush's greatest test came when Iraqi President Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, then threatened to move into Saudi Arabia. Vowing to free Kuwait, Bush rallied the United Nations, the U. S. people, and Congress and sent 425,000 American troops. They were joined by 118,000 troops from allied nations. After weeks of air and missile bombardment, the 100-hour land battle dubbed Desert Storm routed Iraq's million-man army.

Despite unprecedented popularity from this military and diplomatic triumph, Bush was unable to withstand discontent at home from a faltering economy, rising violence in inner cities, and continued high deficit spending. In 1992 he lost his bid for reelection to Democrat William Clinton.



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George Washington
First President
1789-1797
Born: February 22, 1732 in Westmoreland County, Virginia
Died: December 14, 1799 in Mount Vernon, Virginia
Married to Martha Dandridge Washington


On April 30, 1789, George Washington, standing on the balcony of Federal Hall on Wall Street in New York, took his oath of office as the first President of the United States. "As the first of every thing, in our situation will serve to establish a Precedent," he wrote James Madison, "it is devoutly wished on my part, that these precedents may be fixed on true principles."

Born in 1732 into a Virginia planter family, he learned the morals, manners, and body of knowledge requisite for an 18th century Virginia gentleman.

He pursued two intertwined interests: military arts and western expansion. At 16 he helped survey Shenandoah lands for Thomas, Lord Fairfax. Commissioned a lieutenant colonel in 1754, he fought the first skirmishes of what grew into the French and Indian War. The next year, as an aide to Gen. Edward Braddock, he escaped injury although four bullets ripped his coat and two horses were shot from under him.

From 1759 to the outbreak of the American Revolution, Washington managed his lands around Mount Vernon and served in the Virginia House of Burgesses. Married to a widow, Martha Dandridge Custis, he devoted himself to a busy and happy life. But like his fellow planters, Washington felt himself exploited by British merchants and hampered by British regulations. As the quarrel with the mother country grew acute, he moderately but firmly voiced his resistance to the restrictions.

When the Second Continental Congress assembled in Philadelphia in May 1775, Washington, one of the Virginia delegates, was elected Commander in Chief of the Continental Army. On July 3, 1775, at Cambridge, Massachusetts, he took command of his ill-trained troops and embarked upon a war that was to last six grueling years.

He realized early that the best strategy was to harass the British. He reported to Congress, "we should on all Occasions avoid a general Action, or put anything to the Risque, unless compelled by a necessity, into which we ought never to be drawn." Ensuing battles saw him fall back slowly, then strike unexpectedly. Finally in 1781 with the aid of French allies--he forced the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown.

Washington longed to retire to his fields at Mount Vernon. But he soon realized that the Nation under its Articles of Confederation was not functioning well, so he became a prime mover in the steps leading to the Constitutional Convention at Philadelphia in 1787. When the new Constitution was ratified, the Electoral College unanimously elected Washington President

He did not infringe upon the policy making powers that he felt the Constitution gave Congress. But the determination of foreign policy became preponderantly a Presidential concern. When the French Revolution led to a major war between France and England, Washington refused to accept entirely the recommendations of either his Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, who was pro-French, or his Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, who was pro-British. Rather, he insisted upon a neutral course until the United States could grow stronger.

To his disappointment, two parties were developing by the end of his first term. Wearied of politics, feeling old, he retired at the end of his second. In his Farewell Address, he urged his countrymen to forswear excessive party spirit and geographical distinctions. In foreign affairs, he warned against long-term alliances.

Washington enjoyed less than three years of retirement at Mount Vernon, for he died of a throat infection December 14, 1799. For months the Nation mourned him.

Abraham Lincoln
Sixteenth President
1861-1865
Born: February 12, 1809, in Hodgenville, Hardin County, Kentucky
Died: April 15, 1865.
Lincoln died the morning after being shot at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. by John Wilkes Booth, an actor.
Married to Mary Todd Lincoln


Lincoln warned the South in his Inaugural Address: "In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you.... You have no oath registered in Heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to preserve, protect and defend it."

Lincoln thought secession illegal, and was willing to use force to defend Federal law and the Union. When Confederate batteries fired on Fort Sumter and forced its surrender, he called on the states for 75,000 volunteers. Four more slave states joined the Confederacy but four remained within the Union. The Civil War had begun.

The son of a Kentucky frontiersman, Lincoln had to struggle for a living and for learning. Five months before receiving his party's nomination for President, he sketched his life:

" I was born Feb. 12, 1809, in Hardin County, Kentucky. My parents were both born in Virginia, of undistinguished families--second families, perhaps I should say. My mother, who died in my tenth year, was of a family of the name of Hanks.... My father ... removed from Kentucky to ... Indiana, in my eighth year.... It was a wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods. There I grew up.... Of course when I came of age I did not know much. Still somehow, I could read, write, and cipher ... but that was all."

Lincoln made extraordinary efforts to attain knowledge while working on a farm, splitting rails for fences, and keeping store at New Salem, Illinois. He was a captain in the Black Hawk War, spent eight years in the Illinois legislature, and rode the circuit of courts for many years. His law partner said of him, "His ambition was a little engine that knew no rest."

He married Mary Todd, and they had four boys, only one of whom lived to maturity. In 1858 Lincoln ran against Stephen A. Douglas for Senator. He lost the election, but in debating with Douglas he gained a national reputation that won him the Republican nomination for President in 1860.

As President, he built the Republican Party into a strong national organization. Further, he rallied most of the northern Democrats to the Union cause. On January 1, 1863, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation that declared forever free those slaves within the Confederacy.

Lincoln never let the world forget that the Civil War involved an even larger issue. This he stated most movingly in dedicating the military cemetery at Gettysburg: "that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain--that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom--and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

Lincoln won re-election in 1864, as Union military triumphs heralded an end to the war. In his planning for peace, the President was flexible and generous, encouraging Southerners to lay down their arms and join speedily in reunion.

The spirit that guided him was clearly that of his Second Inaugural Address, now inscribed on one wall of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D. C.: "With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds.... "

On Good Friday, April 14, 1865, Lincoln was assassinated at Ford's Theatre in Washington by John Wilkes Booth, an actor, who somehow thought he was helping the South. The opposite was the result, for with Lincoln's death, the possibility of peace with magnanimity died.