MrNatch3L - Posted - 09/01/2010:  01:02:01

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I got an email from my daughter who works at Newsweek in Moscow. She asks the following:

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Could u please name me 5 people who really brought a change to this world but their names are unknown. They have to be alive. go!:)

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I take it "unknown" means not famous. I'm coming up clueless... I keep thinking I must know somebody who fits this but I keep drawing a blank. Anybody have any candidates? Doesn't have to be 5 - even 1 would help!

frail42 - Posted - 09/01/2010:  02:10:52

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"Name 5 people whose names are unknown"

Sounds like a trick question to me...

John Allison - Posted - 09/01/2010:  04:52:50

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Defiinitely my Dad as one; then my fifth grade teacher, Ms Quarnstrom; My college math professor, Mr. Neff; Father Vincent Sicora; these are four and I am sure there are more. And, I totally realize that these are people who made a difference in my life: but, as I am part of the world .........

And then, there are those who have given so much for us and our country; all the servicemen (Army, Navy, Marine, CG).

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Edited by - John Allison on 09/01/2010 04:54:50

R Buck - Posted - 09/01/2010:  06:49:53

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If they are unknown, how can we know them?


Then there is Unknown Hinson.

desert rose - Posted - 09/01/2010:  07:52:29

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Anyone who wore a uniform, or pulled the handle on a drill press in a factory during the years 1941 to 1945 qualifys in my mind

Scott

BigMonFan - Posted - 09/01/2010:  08:11:44

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Migrant workers. I don't know any of their names so feel free to pick any five you want.

pickNgrin - Posted - 09/01/2010:  08:45:28

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William Kamkwamba. Read the book "The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind" to find out why. He not only made a difference as a boy, but is working on making an even bigger difference as a man.

-matt

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Edited by - pickNgrin on 09/01/2010 08:45:51

fivebranch - Posted - 09/01/2010:  10:38:12

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The guy who invented peanut butter if I knew his name I would post it

dflowers - Posted - 09/01/2010:  10:43:10

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My grandpa who taught a city boy how to farm. He also taught me how to harvest walnuts with a long pole and a hard-shelled army helmet.

minstrelmike - Posted - 09/01/2010:  11:30:58

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Pick any 5 suicide bombers in Irag or Pakistan.
Didn't say the change had to be good nor world-wide.

Of course, they aren't alive anymore so you can pick the people who bought the explosives (probably Saudi Arabians) or the ones who made the explosives (probably Americans).

For something a little more positive (possibly depending on pov), the writers/creators of famous television shows such as The Simpsons or West Wing or Lost or other shows that changed a little bit how Americans think of the world.

If I knew their names, that would mean they are famous. (Conan O'Brien was a writer on The Simpsons).

dawgdoc - Posted - 09/01/2010:  11:59:45

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quote:

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Originally posted by fivebranch

The guy who invented peanut butter if I knew his name I would post it

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George Washington Carver. Pretty famous dude, actually. Not too many black scientists in his day and he made an impressive contribution to agriculture.

FatManMary - Posted - 09/01/2010:  13:55:33

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quote:

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Originally posted by R Buck

If they are unknown, how can we know them?


Then there is Unknown Hinson.

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You get a cookie hell you get the whole box of cookies for name dropping Hinson.

frailin - Posted - 09/01/2010:  14:28:48

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Dr. Richard Cardozo - U of MN instructor who inspires his students to live a life where they truly make a difference.

Will Bartruff - A Violin luthier who GIVES instruments to talented kids who can't afford them.

Justice Alan Page (former MN Viking) - Every year Alan Page sends several bus loads of underprivileged, inner city kids to an outdoor science center in Hackensack, MN for a week of nature education... on his nickel.

And two people from my church that - every weekend - travel to inner Minneapolis to feed the homeless at a church shelter.

These people ALL give for the greater good... and their fellow man. Few know their names, but the ONE that counts, does. And that's what matters.

MrNatch, thanks for the chance to praise those that don't get the credit they richly deserve (at least down here).

Craig

BigMonFan - Posted - 09/01/2010:  15:06:38

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Craig, your post caused me to think of someone that probably not too many people have heard of, Derek Sivers.

Derek was the founder and owner of "CD Baby" until about two years ago. That's when he "gave away" his company.
You all may be familiar with CD Baby if you have shopped much for cds on-line.

A few months ago I got an email from him; that's how I came to learn of his generosity. The last line of his email to me is below if anyone wants to know more about Derek and his story
____________________

P.S. Why I sold CD Baby and where the money went: sivers.org/trust

fivebranch - Posted - 09/01/2010:  15:22:32

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quote:

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quote:
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Originally posted by fivebranch

The guy who invented peanut butter if I knew his name I would post it

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George Washington Carver. Pretty famous dude, actually. Not too many black scientists in his day and he made an impressive contribution to agriculture.

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Yeah and he also came up with nitroglycerin which is used to make dynamite invented by Alford Noble in which the Noble peace prize is named after so lets hear it for peanut butter and peanuts which by the way as we all know taste good with jams, jellys and bananas which is how Elvis like, fried peanut bananas sandwichs wow and it also helped a southern Georgia Farmer become president and our President wins a noble peace prize. Boy all this from a peanut.

raybob - Posted - 09/01/2010:  16:28:58

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Carver was born 17 years after nitroglycerin was 'invented' by a chemist named Sobrero at the University of Turin in Italy. Carver is credited with trying to synthesize it by using peanuts (or the chemicals found in peanuts). Nobel's brother, Emil, was killed in a nitroglycerin explosion in the family's armament factory in Sweden the year Carver was born. They were trying to figure out safer ways to handle it. Yikes!

steve davis - Posted - 09/01/2010:  17:54:11

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Any 5 people that aren't plotting some kind of revenge,right now.
And may I say,"Thank you" to them.

pstroud1 - Posted - 09/01/2010:  17:59:41

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Fred Salter,,,,,,,Recon scout WWII

El Dobro - Posted - 09/01/2010:  18:24:23

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quote:

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Originally posted by desert rose

Anyone who wore a uniform, or pulled the handle on a drill press in a factory during the years 1941 to 1945 qualifys in my mind

Scott

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And let's not forget anyone that was in the resistance.

brokenstrings - Posted - 09/01/2010:  19:33:38

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Any of the people who came to help New Orleans get back on its feet.

mike gregory - Posted - 09/01/2010:  19:39:58

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It is, in Truth, a trick question.

EVERY person makes a change in the world.
Somebody buying a candy bar is involved in providing the demand for chocolate, which is often produced by people being treated not much better than slaves, in areas where the jungle and all the critters in it, were cleared of to put in the plantation.

Not trying to be a tree-hugger, shaming you all into eschewing the chocolate you soo enjoy chewing (and ain't words fun???).
Just pointing out that it's like the pretty lady sang, so many years ago:
"Everythings part of everything anyway..."

Brian T - Posted - 09/01/2010:  20:54:29

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Non-famous people sometimes go to great lengths to stay that way. They don't want or need you in their face. They do what they do without anybody's meddling help. When some "do-gooder" makes the news, they have 6 speeds in reverse.

The better question is: "Just how do they manage to escape notice for so long?"

Mike Greylak - Posted - 09/02/2010:  04:53:51

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Mike Gregory taught me my first licks on banjo and sold me my first banjo, of course now he's known from Coast to Coast (almost).

mike gregory - Posted - 09/02/2010:  05:46:32

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Well, there is that, about the Hangout.

Ask a hundred people who are NOT familiar with the BHO: "What did Eric Schlange do for the benefit of the larger community", and not one of them will say
"He made Mike Gregory's song lyric parodies available to 50,000 people in 50 different nations around the world."

But, he did.
And,as a side effect of that noble effort, he also made it possible for 50,000 people in 50 nations to become some sort of community.

Jim Cannon - Posted - 09/02/2010:  08:34:27

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Those air-line passengers (whose names are unknown to me) who wrestled control of the plane from the terrorists that morning over Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001.

Jim Cannon - Posted - 09/02/2010:  08:52:04

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There were medical practitioners living in India and/or China about three millenniums ago who learned how to create immunity in their patients. This was the beginning of eradication of the scourges that ravaged civilization throughout our history.

Jim Cannon - Posted - 09/02/2010:  08:55:02

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Oops! My choices are no longer alive. Sorry about that.

frailin - Posted - 09/02/2010:  10:37:39

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quote:

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Oops! My choices are no longer alive. Sorry about that.
Jim Cannon

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A minor technicality.

Thanks for bring those people to mind.

dawgdoc - Posted - 09/02/2010:  13:14:14

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Do we have to relegate it to humans?

How about a dog (patient #33 I believe) who was the first to be successfully treated for diabetes. Within 6 months, humans were able to live with the disease. I'd put that pretty high up on the 'making a difference' scale.

Or the knotheads in California who , as drug users, botched an attempt to make synthetic heroin and instead produced a neurotoxin known as MPTP. The next day, the addicts were catatonic with severe Parkinsonian symptoms. All of the patients improved immediately with L-dopa. It opened the doors for understanding Parkinson's disease because it could be simulated.

oldwoodchuckb - Posted - 09/02/2010:  14:35:49

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It might have been a bad textbook in 8th grade, but I believe Nobel was credited with inventing dynamite, which IS nytroglycerine in a safer form. It not only is safe to handle, but can only be set off with an explosive. Light a crate of dynamite and it will not explode... If it is fresh. As many a miner has learned the hard way - you don't store excess dynamite over a few hot summers.