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Talitha Dina Pol was born on October 18, 1940, in Mojokerto, Java, in the Dutch East Indies, now Indonesia, the daughter of Dutch artists Willem Jilts Pol and Arnoldine Adriana “Adine” Mees Pol. Art belonged to Talitha’s world from the beginning. Her mother had studied at the academies of art in Rotterdam and The Hague and worked in drawing, painting, lithography, and woodcut, while her father pursued his own career as a painter. Talitha’s earliest childhood was overtaken by

Dorothy Cadwell Taylor was born on February 13, 1888, in Watertown, Jefferson County, New York, the daughter of Bertrand LeRoy Taylor and Nellie Cadwell Taylor. At the time of her birth, her parents were living in the former home of Judge Robert Lansing, although the circumstances into which Dorothy was born would become considerably more prosperous as she grew. Her mother came from the Cadwell and Woodruff families, while her father built substantial business interests in le

Ida Alice Shourds was born on July 4, 1848, at Little Egg Harbor, New Jersey, the daughter of the Reverend John Howard Shourds and Margaret Shourds. Her father was an Episcopal clergyman, and Ida was raised with her brothers and sister in a family far removed from the immense wealth and social prominence that would later surround her. She spent part of her early life in Philadelphia, and later accounts describe her as having briefly pursued the stage before entering nursing.

Madalyn Murray O’Hair: The Most Hated Woman in America On the morning of August 28, 1995, employees arriving at the American Atheists headquarters in Austin, Texas, found the doors locked. A typewritten note had been left behind explaining that the Murray-O’Hair family had been called out of town on an emergency and did not know when they would return. At the nearby home shared by Madalyn Murray O’Hair, her son Jon Garth Murray and her granddaughter Robin Murray O’Hair, there

There are few places in the Metropolitan Museum of Art that leave visitors as awestruck as the Vélez Blanco Patio. Bathed in natural light, its delicate marble arches, intricate carvings, and graceful Renaissance proportions seem almost impossible to believe were once part of a sixteenth-century Spanish castle. Every day, thousands of visitors pause beneath its colonnades, admiring one of the museum's greatest architectural treasures. Most never realize that before it became

Howard Allen Frances O’Brien was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, on October 4, 1941, the second of four daughters born to Howard James O’Brien and Katherine Rita Allen O’Brien. The name was unusual for a little girl, and from the beginning it seemed to place her between expectation and invention. Her father worked for the United States Postal Service, and her mother, remembered as imaginative and emotionally vivid, helped shape the inner world of the child who would one day b

Henry Latham Doherty was born in Columbus, Ohio, on May 15, 1870, the son of Frank and Anna Lavonia McElvain Doherty. He grew up in a working-class household and from an early age showed little interest in traditional schooling. As a boy he sold newspapers on the streets of Columbus, learning lessons about hard work and self-reliance that would remain with him throughout his life. By the age of twelve he had gone to work for the Columbus Gas Company, bringing his formal educa

Barbara Cushing was born on July 5, 1915, in Brookline, Massachusetts, into a family where brilliance, discipline, ambition, and social expectation shaped nearly every corner of life. She was the youngest child of Dr. Harvey Williams Cushing and Katharine Stone Crowell Cushing, and from the beginning she belonged to a household unlike most others in America. Her father was already one of the most important physicians of his generation. Harvey Cushing helped transform brain su

Frank Winfield Woolworth was born on April 13, 1852, in the small farming community of Rodman in Jefferson County, New York, at a time when northern New York remained a landscape of rough farms, muddy roads, hard winters, and isolated rural settlements. He was the eldest son of John Hubbell Woolworth and Fanny McBrier Woolworth, who struggled to maintain a modest farm while raising their family amid the economic uncertainties of mid-nineteenth century agricultural life. The f

Caroline Webster Schermerhorn was born on September 22, 1830, in New York City, into a world that still belonged to old New York. The city she entered was not yet the sprawling metropolis that would later astonish the world with its towering mansions, electric lights, and endless streams of carriages along Fifth Avenue. Much of fashionable society remained concentrated far downtown, where narrow streets and brick residences stood near the harbor and the old Dutch churches of

Sir Harry Oakes, 1st Baronet, was born Harry Oakes on December 23, 1874, in Sangerville, Piscataquis County, Maine, the son of William Pitt Oakes and Edith Nancy Lewis Oakes. He was born into a long-established New England family whose roots in central Maine stretched back generations, but his own ambitions carried him far beyond the forests and farming communities of Piscataquis County. Through persistence, instinct, and an extraordinary willingness to endure hardship, he ro

Carl Kirsch Dresser was born on March 27, 1890, in Bradford, McKean County, Pennsylvania, the son of Solomon Robert Dresser and Caroline Kirsch Dresser. He belonged to one of the most important industrial families connected to the development of the American oil and natural gas industry. Carl Kirsch Dresser His father founded the S. R. Dresser Manufacturing Company, whose pipeline couplings, valves, and fittings became essential to petroleum and gas production throughout the

Edward Francis Hutton was born September 7, 1875, in Manhattan, New York, the son of James Laws Hutton and Frances Eloise Hulse Hutton. His father died when he was still a child, leaving the family in reduced financial circumstances and requiring him at an early age to begin supporting himself. The discipline and determination formed during those years became defining traits throughout his later career. As a teenager, Hutton entered the financial world at the lowest level, wo

Franklyn Laws Hutton Yale Graduation Photo Franklyn Laws Hutton was born on December 1, 1876, in Manhattan, New York, the youngest son of James Laws Hutton and Frances Eloise Hulse Hutton. He and his older brother, Edward Francis Hutton, were born into a New York family whose home stood at 10 East Forty-second Street, at a time when that area was still residential. Their father, James Laws Hutton, had come to New York from Ohio as a young man, leaving the farm at the age of s

Barbara Woolworth Hutton was born on November 14, 1912, in New York City, New York, the only child of Franklyn Laws Hutton and Edna Woolworth Hutton. She was born into two of the most powerful financial dynasties in the United States. Her maternal grandfather was Frank Winfield Woolworth, founder of the F. W. Woolworth Company, whose five-and-dime stores became one of the great retail empires of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Her father was a co-founder of

Photo Courtesy of The Ringling John Ringling was born Johann Nicholas Rüngeling on May 31, 1866, in McGregor, Iowa, into a family that understood work long before it understood wealth. John Ringling His father, August, was a harness maker, and the family later settled in Baraboo, Wisconsin, where the Ringling children grew up in a household shaped by labor, necessity, and persistence. There was no indication in those early years that one of them would one day control the larg

Alexander Turney Stewart October 12, 1803 – April 10, 1876 Alexander Turney Stewart was born on October 12, 1803, in Lisburn, Ireland, to Scottish Protestant parents. His father died only weeks after his birth, and soon after, his mother left for America with her new husband. Stewart remained behind, raised by his grandfather, who intended for him to enter the ministry. His early education was strict and deliberate, but his path changed after his grandfather’s death. He was t

Margaret Wright Bedford, known to her friends simply as "Peggy," lived a life that could have been scripted for the society pages. Born in 1932 to Mr. and Mrs. Frederick Henry Bedford, Jr., she was heir to the Standard Oil fortune through her father, who served as a director of the powerful company. Her childhood alternated between the Bedford estate in Greens Farms, Connecticut, and the family's apartment in New York's Pierre Hotel, an existence that was hardly "ordinary," t

Elizabeth Muhlenberg Brooke was born on April 25, 1916, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, into a family whose name already carried history. Her father, George Brooke Jr., was a banker and steel manufacturer whose family roots were embedded in Pennsylvania industry. Her mother, Lucile Stewart Polk of Baltimore, descended from President James K. Polk and had survived the sinking of the Titanic four years before Elizabeth's birth. That tragedy would shadow the family name, though E

Abraham Kingsley Macomber was born 7 March 1875 in Morristown, New Jersey, the son of Henry Kirke Macomber and Amelia Montague Collerd. While still young he moved with his family to Pasadena, Los Angeles County, California, where his father became known locally as Dr. H. K. Macomber. Kingsley grew up in a city that was expanding in the closing years of the nineteenth century, and later reminiscences recalled him as one of the boys of early Pasadena, first on El Molino Avenue