Catherine Hughes, Radio and TV Executive
From a high school dropout and single teenaged mother to the first woman owner of a number one radio station and the first African-American...
Kim Jong Il, North Korea’s “Dear Leader”
Kim Jong Il assumed power a few years after his father suffered a heart attack. The dictator had a reputation as a somewhat erratic...
William Faulkner, American Novelist
William Faulkner, revered modernist writer, historian and sociologist, is known for capturing the raw beauty of the rural South in all its dark complexity....
Arthur Ashe, Tennis Star and Human Rights Activist
Arthur Ashe was one of the most accomplished tennis players of his generation and the only African-American man to win a Grand Slam title,...
Omar Khayyam: Persian Mathematician, Astronomer and Poet
Omar Khayyam was a brilliant mathematician, astronomer, philosopher and physician of the 11th century. He contributed to the basic principles of algebra and developed...
Václav Havel, Playwright and Former President of the Czech Republic
Václav Havel was a revolutionary, a poet, a playwright and a president. Although he was reluctant to become a public figure, he has been...
Rupert Murdoch, Media Mogul
Rupert Murdoch and his conglomerate News Corporation own divisions in virtually every form of today’s media: book publishing, newspapers and television. Whether fan or...
Rosa Parks, Mother of the Civil Rights Movement
Rosa Parks was a seamstress and NAACP secretary whose simple act of civil disobedience—her refusal to give up her seat on the bus to...
Carole King, Chart-Topping Singer-Songwriter
Carole King started playing the piano at age 4 and hasn’t stopped since. Out of college in the 1960s King was writing some of...
Bahá’u’lláh, Founder of the Bahá’í Religion
Iranian spiritual leader Bahá'u'lláh founded the Bahá’í religion in 1863. Today, it has five million followers from around the world.
Bahá'u'lláh's Early Days
Mirza Hoseyn Ali...
