Portal:Chicago/Selected biography
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[edit] Selected biographies list
Portal:Chicago/Selected biography/1
Michael Jordan is a retired American professional basketball player. Widely considered one of the greatest basketball players of all time, he became one of the most effectively marketed athletes of his generation and was instrumental in popularizing the NBA (National Basketball Association) around the world in the 1980s and 1990s. After a standout career at the University of North Carolina, Jordan joined the NBA's Chicago Bulls in 1984. He quickly emerged as one of the stars of the league, entertaining crowds with his prolific scoring. His leaping ability, illustrated by performing slam dunks from the foul line at Slam Dunk Contests, earned him the nicknames "Air Jordan" and "His Airness." He also gained a reputation as one of the best defensive players in basketball. In 1991, he won his first NBA championship with the Bulls, and followed that with titles in 1992 and 1993, securing a "three-peat". Though Jordan abruptly left the NBA in October 1993 to pursue a career in baseball, he rejoined the Bulls in 1995 and led them to three additional championships (1996, 1997, and 1998). His 1995–96 Bulls team won an NBA-record 72 regular-season games. Jordan retired for a second time in 1999, but he returned for two more NBA seasons as a member of the Washington Wizards from 2001 to 2003.
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Wesley Clark is a retired four-star general of the United States Army. Clark was valedictorian of his class at West Point, was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to the University of Oxford where he obtained a degree in PPE, and later graduated from the Command and General Staff College with a master's degree in military science. He spent 34 years in the Army and the Department of Defense, receiving many military decorations, several honorary knighthoods, and a Presidential Medal of Freedom. Clark joined the 2004 race for the Democratic Party presidential nomination as a drafted candidate on September 17, 2003, but withdrew from the primary race on February 11, 2004 in favor of campaigning for the eventual Democratic nominee, John Kerry. Clark currently leads a political action committee — "WesPAC: Securing America" — which was formed after the primaries, and used it to support numerous Democratic Party candidates in the 2006 midterm elections.
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CM Punk is an American professional wrestler currently signed to World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) on its Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW) brand. Punk initially came to prominence through his career on the professional wrestling independent circuit, primarily as a member of the Ring of Honor (ROH) roster where he was an ROH Tag Team Champion, ROH World Champion, the first head trainer of the ROH wrestling school and was considered to be one of the three icons of ROH (along with Samoa Joe and Homicide). In June 2005 Punk accepted a developmental contract from WWE and was sent to WWE's developmental promotion Ohio Valley Wrestling (OVW) in which he won all the championships in the promotion, including the OVW Heavyweight Championship. When the ECW brand was revived in 2006 Punk was brought into the brands roster where he had early success when, from his debut in June 2006 until January 2007, he was undefeated in singles competition.
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Gustavus Franklin Swift founded a meat-packing empire in the Midwest during the late 19th century, over which he presided until his death. He is credited with the development of the first practical ice-cooled railroad car which allowed his company to ship dressed meats to all parts of the country and even abroad, which ushered in the "era of cheap beef." Swift pioneered the use of animal by-products for the manufacture of soap, glue, fertilizer, various types of sundries, even medical products. Swift generously donated large sums of money to such institutions as the University of Chicago, the Methodist Episcopal Church, and the Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA). He established Northwestern University's "School of Oratory" in memory of his daughter, Annie May Swift, who died while attending the school. When he died in 1903, his company was valued at between $25 million and $35 million, and had a workforce that was more than 21,000 strong. "The House of Swift" slaughtered as many as two million cattle, four million hogs, and two million sheep a year. Three years after his death, the value of the company's capital stock topped $50 million.
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Timothy Blackstone served as president of the Chicago and Alton Railroad from 1864 through 1899. He was also a one-term mayor of La Salle, Illinois, and a founding president of the Union Stock Yards. He was also the benefactor of the James Blackstone Library in Branford, Connecticut, and a nearly identical library was donated to the Chicago Public Library by Timothy Blackstone's widow in 1902. Additionally, the Blackstone's funded Blackstone Hall at for the Art Institute of Chicago's Building. Chicago's Blackstone Library is the first dedicated branch of the Chicago Public Library system, and later his mansion became the site of the Blackstone Hotel and the Blackstone Theatre.
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Harold Innis was a professor of political economy at the University of Toronto and the author of seminal works on Canadian economic history, media, and communication theory. In spite of his dense and difficult prose, Innis is considered by many scholars to have been one of Canada's most original thinkers. He helped develop the staples thesis, which holds that Canada's culture, political history and economy have been decisively influenced by the exploitation and export of a series of staples such as fur, fish, wood, wheat, mined metals and fossil fuels. Innis's communications writings explore the role of media in shaping the culture and development of civilizations. He argued, for example, that a balance between oral and written forms of communication contributed to the flourishing of Greek civilization in the 5th century BC. He warned however that Western civilization is now imperilled by powerful, advertising-driven media obsessed by "present-mindedness" and the "continuous, systematic, ruthless destruction of elements of permanence essential to cultural activity".
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Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. is the junior United States Senator from Illinois and a leading candidate for the Democratic nomination in the 2008 U.S. presidential election. Born to a Kenyan father and an American mother, he spent most of his early life in Honolulu, Hawaii. From ages six to ten, he lived in Jakarta, Indonesia with his mother and Indonesian stepfather. He married his wife, Michelle Robinson, in 1992 and has two daughters. A graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, Obama worked as a community organizer, university lecturer, and civil rights lawyer before running for public office and serving in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004. Obama delivered the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in November 2004 with 70% of the vote. Since announcing his presidential campaign in February 2007, Obama has emphasized ending the Iraq War, increasing energy independence, and providing universal health care as his top three priorities. He has written two bestselling books: a memoir of his youth titled Dreams from My Father, and The Audacity of Hope, a personal commentary on U.S. politics.
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Dominik Hašek is a professional ice hockey goaltender for the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League. In his 15-season NHL career, he has also played for the Chicago Blackhawks, Buffalo Sabres, and the Ottawa Senators. During his years in Buffalo, he became one of the league's finest goaltenders, earning him the nickname "The Dominator." His strong play has been credited with establishing European goaltenders in a league widely dominated by North Americans. Hašek has been one of the league's most successful goaltenders of the 1990s and early 2000s. From 1993 to 2001 he won six Vezina Trophies, and in 1998 he became the first goaltender to win consecutive Hart Trophies. During the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan, he led the Czech national ice hockey team to its first and only Olympic gold medal. The feat made him a popular figure in his home country and prompted hockey legend Wayne Gretzky to call him "the best player in the game." While with the Red Wings in 2002, Hašek became the first European starting goaltender to win the Stanley Cup. In the process, he set a record for shutouts in a playoff year.
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Lee Arthur Smith is a retired American right-handed relief pitcher who played for eight teams in Major League Baseball from 1980 to 1997. In his 18-year major league career, Smith's longest tenure with any one team was with the Cubs, with whom he spent his first eight seasons. One of the dominant closers in history, Smith held the major league record for career saves from 1993 until 2006, when San Diego Padres relief pitcher Trevor Hoffman passed his final total of 478 on September 24. Smith was known as an intimidating figure on the pitcher's mound at 6 feet, 6 inches (1.98 m) and 265 pounds (120 kg) with a 95 mile per hour (150 km/h) fastball. In 1991, Smith set a National League record with 47 saves for the St. Louis Cardinals, and was runner-up for the league's Cy Young Award; it was the second of three times he led the NL in saves, and he later led the American League once while with the Baltimore Orioles in 1994. He also set the major league career record for games finished (802), and his 1,022 career games pitched were the third most in history when he retired; he still holds the team records for career saves for the Cubs (180), and he also held the Cardinals record (160) until 2006.
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Nancy Davis Reagan (born Anne Frances Robbins) is the widow of former United States President Ronald Reagan and served as an influential First Lady of the United States from 1981 to 1989. Born in New York, her parents divorced soon after her birth; she grew up in Maryland, living with an aunt and uncle while her mother pursued acting jobs. As Nancy Davis, she was an actress in the 1940s and 1950s, starring in films such as Donovan's Brain, Night into Morning, and Hellcats of the Navy. In 1952 she married Ronald Reagan, who was then president of the Screen Actors Guild; they had two children. Nancy became the First Lady of California when her husband was Governor from 1967 to 1975. She became the First Lady of the United States in January 1981 following her husband's victory, but experienced criticism early in his first term largely due to her decision to replenish the White House china. Nancy restored a Kennedy-esque glamor to the White House following years of lax formality, and her interest in high-end fashion garnered much attention, as well as criticism for accepting unreported loans and gifts from fashion designers. She championed recreational drug prevention causes by founding the "Just Say No" drug awareness campaign, which was considered her major initiative as First Lady.
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Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States (1981–1989) and the 33rd Governor of California (1967–1975). Born in Illinois, Reagan moved to Los Angeles, California in the 1930s, where he became an actor, president of the Screen Actors Guild (SAG), and a spokesman for General Electric (GE). His start in politics occurred during his work for GE; originally a member of the Democratic Party, he switched to the Republican Party in 1962. After delivering a rousing speech in support of Barry Goldwater's presidential candidacy in 1964, he was persuaded to seek the California governorship, winning two years later and again in 1970. He was defeated in his run for the Republican presidential nomination in 1968 as well as 1976, but won both the nomination and election in 1980. As president, Reagan implemented new political initiatives as well as economic policies, advocating a limited government and economic laissez-faire philosophy, but the extent to which these ideas were implemented is debatable. The supply side economic policies, dubbed "Reaganomics", included substantial tax cuts implemented in 1981. After surviving an assassination attempt and ordering controversial military actions in Grenada, he was re-elected in a landslide victory in 1984. Reagan's second term was marked by the ending of the Cold War, as well as a number of administration scandals, notably the Iran-Contra Affair. The president ordered a massive military buildup in an arms race with the Soviet Union, forgoing the previous strategy of détente.
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Morris "Moe" Berg was an American professional baseball player who later served as a spy for the Office of Strategic Services during World War II. Although he spent 15 seasons in Major League Baseball, Berg was never more than an average player, and was better known for being "the brainiest guy in baseball" than for anything he accomplished in the game. A graduate of Princeton University and Columbia Law School, Berg spoke several languages and regularly read 10 newspapers a day. His reputation was fueled by his successful appearances as a contestant on the radio quiz show Information, Please!. As an agent of the United States government, Berg traveled to Yugoslavia to gather intelligence on resistance groups the government was considering supporting. He was then sent on a mission to Italy, where he interviewed various physicists concerning the German nuclear program.
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Edward Teller was a Hungarian-born American theoretical physicist, known colloquially as "the father of the hydrogen bomb," even though he claimed that he did not care for the title. Teller is best known for his work on the American nuclear program, specifically as a member of the Manhattan Project during World War II, his role in the development of the hydrogen bomb, and his long association with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. He achieved infamy in the 1950s due to his controversial testimony in the security clearance hearing of his former Los Alamos colleague Robert Oppenheimer, and as such became ostracized from much of the scientific community. He continued to find support from the U.S. government and military research establishment, particularly for his advocacy for nuclear energy development, a strong nuclear arsenal, and a vigorous nuclear testing program. In his later years he became especially known for his advocacy of controversial technological solutions to both military and civilian problems, including a plan to excavate an artificial harbor in Alaska using thermonuclear explosives. He was a vigorous advocate of Ronald Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative, perhaps overselling the feasibility of the program.
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Milton Friedman was an American Nobel Laureate economist and public intellectual. He made major contributions to the fields of macroeconomics, microeconomics, economic history, and statistics. In 1976, he was awarded the Nobel memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his achievements in the fields of consumption analysis, monetary history and theory, and for his demonstration of the complexity of stabilization policy. He was an advocate of economic freedom. According to The Economist, Friedman "was the most influential economist of the second half of the 20th century…possibly of all of it". Alan Greenspan stated "There are very few people over the generations who have ideas that are sufficiently original to materially alter the direction of civilization. Milton is one of those very few people." In his 1962 book Capitalism and Freedom, Friedman advocated minimizing the role of government in a free market as a means of creating political and social freedom. In his 1980 television series Free to Choose, Friedman explained his view of how free markets work, emphasizing his conviction that free markets have been shown to solve social and political problems that other systems have failed to address adequately. His books and columns for Newsweek were widely read, and even circulated underground behind the Iron Curtain.
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Brian Keith Urlacher is an American football player for the Chicago Bears of the National Football League. Urlacher, an alumni of the University of New Mexico, is a six-time Pro Bowl player and has established himself as one of the NFL's most productive linebackers. He is regarded as one of the best defensive players in the NFL, winning the NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year Award in 2000 and the NFL Defensive Player of the Year Award in 2005, becoming only the fifth player in NFL history to win both awards.
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Abram Lincoln Harris, Jr. was an American economist, academic, anthropologist and a social critic of blacks in the United States. Considered by many as the first African American to achieve prominence in the field of economics, Harris was also known for his heavy influence on black radical and neo-conservative thought in the United States. As an economist, Harris is most famous for his 1931 collaboration with political scientist Sterling Spero to produce a study on African American labor history titled The Black Worker and his 1936 work The Negro as Capitalist, in which he criticized black businessmen for not promoting interracial trade. He headed the economics department at Howard University from 1936 to 1945 and taught at the University of Chicago from then until his death. As a social critic, Harris took an active radical stance on racial relations by examining historical black involvement in the workplace, and suggested that African Americans needed to take more action in race relations.
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Andrés Marcelo Nocioni is an Argentine basketball player for the NBA's Chicago Bulls, and for the Argentine national team. Nocioni won a gold medal with the Argentine national team at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens. His natural position is small forward, though with the Bulls he has played some minutes at power forward. He shares both Argentine and Italian citizenship. Nocioni is known as Chapu after the Mexican children TV series El Chapulín Colorado. Nocioni has a wife named Paula and a son named Laureano.
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Albert Alexander "Ox" Wistert is a former All-Pro American football offensive tackle in the National Football League (NFL) for the Philadelphia Eagles. He played his entire nine-year NFL career for the Eagles and became their team captain. He was named to play in the NFL's first Pro Bowl as an Eagle. During most of Wistert's career there were no football All-star games although he was named to the league All-Pro team eight times. He played college football for the University of Michigan Wolverines. He is one of the three Wistert brothers (Alvin, Francis) who were named All-American Tackles at Michigan and later inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame. He was the first Michigan Alum to be selected to the National Football League Pro Bowl. He and his brothers are three of the seven players who have had their numbers retired by the Michigan Wolverines football program.
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William Ashley Sunday was an American athlete and religious figure who, after being a popular outfielder in baseball's National League during the 1880s, became the most celebrated and influential American evangelist during the first two decades of the 20th century. Born into poverty, Sunday spent some years in an orphanage before taking a series of odd jobs in several small Iowa towns as he demonstrated his prowess in amateur athletics. Converted to evangelical Christianity in the 1880s, Sunday left baseball for the Christian ministry. He gradually developed his skills as a pulpit evangelist in the Midwest and then, during the early 20th century, he became the nation's most famous evangelist with his colloquial sermons and frenetic delivery. Sunday held heavily reported campaigns in America's largest cities, made a great deal of money, and was welcomed into the homes of the wealthy and influential. He may have personally preached the gospel of Jesus Christ to more people than any other person in history up to that time. Sunday almost certainly played a significant role in the adoption of the Eighteenth Amendment in 1919.
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Dwyane Tyrone Wade, Jr. is an American professional basketball player who currently plays for the Miami Heat in the National Basketball Association (NBA). Wade was named 2006 Sportsman of the Year by Sports Illustrated. Despite the unorthodox spelling, Wade's first name is pronounced as Dwayne; often in print media, it is misspelled as such. Wade had the top selling jersey in the NBA for nearly two years, as he led the NBA in jersey sales from the 2005 NBA playoffs, until the mid-point of the 2006-07 NBA season. After entering the league with little fanfare as the fifth pick in the 2003 NBA Draft, Wade has become one of the more accomplished young players in the NBA today. After making the All-Rookie team in his first season, and the All-Star team the following two seasons, Wade led the Miami Heat to their first NBA Championship in franchise history in his third pro campaign. He was named the 2006 NBA Finals MVP as he led the Heat to a 4–2 series win over the Dallas Mavericks.
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Ernest Miller Hemingway was an American novelist, short-story writer, and journalist. He was part of the 1920s expatriate community in Paris, as well as the veterans of World War One later known as "the Lost Generation", as described in his posthumous memoir A Moveable Feast. ("'That's what you are. That's what you all are,' Miss Stein said. 'All of you young people who served in the war. You are a lost generation.'" Stein had overheard a garage owner use the phrase to criticize a mechanic.) He received the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 for The Old Man and the Sea, and the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954. Hemingway's distinctive writing style is characterized by economy and understatement, in contrast to the style of his literary rival William Faulkner. It had a significant influence on the development of twentieth-century fiction writing. His protagonists are typically stoic men who exhibit an ideal described as "grace under pressure." Many of his works are now considered canonical in American literature.
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Frances Kathleen Oldham Kelsey, Ph.D., M.D., is a naturalized American pharmacologist, most famous as the reviewer for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) who refused to authorize thalidomide for market because she had concerns about the drug's safety. Her concerns proved to be justified when it was proven that thalidomide caused birth defects. Kelsey's career intersected with the passage of laws strengthening the FDA's oversight of pharmaceuticals.
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George Lawrence Mikan, Jr. was an American professional basketball player for the Chicago American Gears of the National Basketball League (NBL) and the Minneapolis Lakers of the NBL, the Basketball Association of America (BAA) and the National Basketball Association (NBA). Invariably playing with thick, round spectacles, the 6 ft 10 in 245 lb. Mikan is seen as one of the pioneers of professional basketball, redefining it as a game of so-called big men. Mikan had a successful player career, winning seven NBL, BAA and NBA championships, an All-Star MVP trophy, three scoring titles and being member of the first four NBA All-Star and the first six All-BAA and All-NBA Teams. Mikan was so dominant that he caused several rule changes in the NBA, among them widening the foul lane — known as the "Mikan Rule" — and introducing the shot clock. After his player career, Mikan became one of the founding fathers of the American Basketball Association (ABA), and was also vital for the forming of the Minnesota Timberwolves. In his later years, Mikan was involved in a long-standing legal battle against the NBA, fighting against the meager pensions for players who had retired before the league became lucrative. Mikan was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1959, made the 25th and 35th NBA Anniversary Teams of 1970 and 1980 and was elected one of the NBA 50 Greatest Players in 1996.
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Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton is the junior United States Senator from New York, and a candidate for the Democratic nomination in the 2008 presidential election. She is married to Bill Clinton—the 42nd President of the United States—and was the First Lady of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A native of Illinois, Hillary Rodham attracted national attention in 1969 when she delivered an address as the first student to speak at commencement exercises for Wellesley College. She began her career as a lawyer after graduating from Yale Law School in 1973. She moved to Arkansas in 1974 and married Bill Clinton in 1975. She was later named the first female partner at Rose Law Firm. As First Lady of the United States, her major initiative, the Clinton health care plan, failed to gain approval by the U.S. Congress in 1994. She became the only First Lady to be subpoenaed, testifying before a federal grand jury as a consequence of the Whitewater controversy in 1996. She was never charged with any wrongdoing in this or several other investigations during her husband's administration. Clinton was elected as senator for New York State in 2000; this was the first time an American First Lady ran for public office and she is the first female senator from that state. She was re-elected by a wide margin in 2006. In the 2008 presidential nomination race, Clinton has won the most primaries and delegates of any woman in U.S. history.
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Jeannette Ridlon Piccard was an American teacher, scientist, priest, and aeronaut who was a pioneer of balloon flight. A member of the famed Piccard family of balloonists and of the International Space Hall of Fame, she was the first licensed female balloon pilot, the first woman to fly to the stratosphere, and a speaker for NASA. Her 1934 flight held the women's altitude record for three decades. Called a woman of causes and irrepressible, Piccard is remembered as one of the Philadelphia Eleven, the first women to be ordained Episcopalian priests.
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John Marshall Harlan II was an American jurist. He served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court from 1955 to 1971. He was the grandson of another Associate Justice, John Marshall Harlan, who served from 1877 to 1911. Harlan is often characterized as a member of the conservative wing of the Warren Court. He advocated a limited role for the judiciary, remarking that the Supreme Court should not be considered "a general haven for reform movements." In general, Harlan adhered more closely to precedent, and was more reluctant to overturn legislation, than many of his colleagues on the Court. He strongly disagreed with the doctrine of incorporation, which held that the guarantees of the federal Bill of Rights were applicable at the state level. At the same time, he advocated a broad interpretation of the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause, arguing that it protected a wide range of rights not expressly mentioned in the Constitution. Harlan is sometimes called the "great dissenter" of the Warren Court, and is often regarded as one of the most influential Supreme Court justices in the twentieth century.
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Kirk James Hinrich is an American professional basketball player, currently starting at point guard for the NBA's Chicago Bulls. He is also a member of the USA National Team.
Hinrich was exposed to basketball at an early age, due to his father, Jim, being a high school basketball coach in Sioux City, Hinrich's father coached him from the third grade through high school. As a high school senior, Hinrich was named the 1999 Co-Iowa Mr. Basketball, along with future college teammate and roommate, Nick Collison. Hinrich originally committed to play basketball at Iowa State but when the coach at the time Tim Floyd took the head coaching position for the NBA's Chicago Bulls, Hinrich changed his mind and decided to attend the University of Kansas. While playing college basketball for Kansas, Hinrich helped his team reach the Final Four in the NCAA basketball tournament in 2002 and the championship game against the Carmelo Anthony led Syracuse University in 2003. Hinrich played all four years at Kansas before being drafted to the NBA. Hinrich is often referred to as "Captain Kirk" due to the fact that he has been voted a team captain for the Bulls for four consecutive years.
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Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama is an American lawyer and the wife of Illinois senator Barack Obama, who is a candidate for the 2008 Democratic Party nomination for U.S. President. She was born and raised on the South Side of Chicago, Illinois and then educated at Princeton University and Harvard Law School. She returned to Chicago after completing her formal education to work for the law firm Sidley Austin, on the staff of the Mayor of Chicago Richard M. Daley, and for the University of Chicago and the University of Chicago Hospitals. She is the sister of Craig Robinson, men's basketball coach at Brown University. She met Barack when he came to work for Sidley Austin. The Obamas live on Chicago's South Side in Cook County, Illinois, United States, choosing to remain in Chicago rather than moving to Washington, D.C.
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Norman Gary Finkelstein is an American political scientist and author, specialising in Jewish-related issues, especially the Holocaust and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A graduate of SUNY Binghamton, he received his Ph.D in Political Science from Princeton University. He has held faculty positions at Brooklyn College, Rutgers University, Hunter College, New York University, and most recently, DePaul University, where he was an assistant professor from 2001 to 2007. Finkelstein's career has been marked by controversy. A self-described 'forensic scholar,' he has written sharply critical academic reviews of several prominent writers and scholars whom he accuses of misrepresenting the documentary record in order to defend Israel’s policies and practices. His writings, noted for their support of the Palestinian cause have dealt with politically-charged topics such as Zionism, the demographic history of Palestine and his allegations of the existence of a "Holocaust Industry" that exploits the memory of the Holocaust to further Israeli and financial interests. Amidst considerable public debate, Finkelstein was denied tenure at DePaul in June 2007, and placed on administrative leave for the 2007-2008 academic year. Among the controversial aspects of this decision were attempts by Alan Dershowitz, a notable opponent of Finkelstein's, to derail Finkelstein's tenure bid. On September 5, 2007 Finkelstein announced his resignation after coming to a settlement with the university on generally undisclosed terms.
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Paul Cornell was an American lawyer and Chicago real estate speculator who founded the Hyde Park Township that included most of what are now known as the south and far southeast sides of Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States. He turned the south side Lake Michigan lakefront area, especially the Hyde Park community area and neighboring Kenwood and Woodlawn neighborhoods, into a resort community that had its heyday from the 1850s through the early 20th century. He was also an urban planner who paved the way for and preserved many of the parks that are now in the Chicago Park District. Additionally, he was a successful entrepreneur with interests in manufacturing, cemeteries, and hotels. His modern legacy includes several large parks now in the Chicago Park District: Jackson Park, Washington Park, Midway Plaisance and Harold Washington Park. Most of the South and Southeast Sides of Chicago were developed and eventually annexed into the City of Chicago as a result of his foresight.
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Percy Lavon Julian was an American research chemist and a pioneer in the chemical synthesis of medicinal drugs from plants. He was the first to synthesize the natural product physostigmine; and was an American pioneer in the industrial large-scale chemical synthesis of the human hormones, steroids, progesterone, and testosterone, from plant sterols such as stigmasterol and sitosterol. His work would lay the foundation for the steroid drug industry's production of cortisone, other corticosteroids, and birth control pills. He later started his own company to synthesize steroid intermediates from the Mexican wild yam. His work helped reduce the cost of steroid intermediates to large multinational pharmaceutical companies. During his lifetime he received more than 130 chemical patents. Julian was the one of the first African Americans to receive a doctorate in chemistry. He was the first African-American chemist inducted into the National Academy of Sciences, and the second African-American scientist inducted from any field.
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Pete Muldoon was a Canadian ice hockey pioneer in the western United States, particularly known for bringing a Stanley Cup championship to Seattle, Washington. He is known best for reportedly putting a curse on the Chicago Blackhawks, as well as team owner Major Frederic McLaughlin, after Muldoon was fired at the end of the 1927 season; however, it has been alleged that a Toronto sportswriter had come up with the "curse" due to a bout of writer's block in 1943. Muldoon was the Blackhawk's first head coach.
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Rex Daniel Grossman IIIis a quarterback of the National Football League for the Chicago Bears. He graduated from Bloomington High School South and attended the University of Florida on an athletic scholarship. Grossman led the Florida Gators to two championship games, and was the runner-up for the 2001 Heisman Trophy. Grossman began his professional career with the Bears as the twenty-second overall selection in the 2003 NFL Draft, but spent most of his first three seasons sidelined with injuries. He completed his first full season in 2006, leading the Bears to a National Football Conference Championship, and helping the team score the second most points in the league.
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Stephen Tyrone Colbert is an Emmy and Peabody award winning American comedian, satirist, actor, and writer known for his portrayal of uninformed opinion leaders and deadpan comedic delivery. Colbert became interested in improvisational theater when he met famed Second City director Del Close while attending Northwestern University. He first performed professionally as an understudy for Steve Carell at Second City Chicago. Colbert also wrote and performed on the short-lived Dana Carvey Show before collaborating with Paul Dinello and Amy Sedaris on the cult television series Strangers with Candy. He gained considerable attention for his role on the latter. It was his work as a correspondent on Comedy Central's news-parody series The Daily Show, however, that first introduced him to a wide audience. In 2005, he left The Daily Show to host The Colbert Report. The Colbert Report is a parody of personality-driven political opinion shows. The series has established itself as one of Comedy Central's highest-rated series, earning Colbert three Emmy nominations and an invitation to perform as featured entertainer at the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner in 2006. Colbert was named one of Time's 100 most influential people in 2006. His book, I Am America (And So Can You!) was No. 1 on The New York Times Bestseller List.
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Walter Jerry Payton was an American football player, who played for the Chicago Bears of the National Football League. He is remembered as one of the most prolific running backs in the history of American football. Payton, a nine-time Pro Bowl selection, once held the League’s record for most career rushing yards, touchdowns, carries, and many other categories. He was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1993. The NFL player and coach Mike Ditka described Payton as the greatest football player he had ever seen - but even greater as a human being. Payton began his football career in Mississippi, and went on to have an outstanding collegiate football career at Jackson State University . He started his professional career with the Bears in 1975, who selected him as the 1975 Draft’s fourth overall pick. Payton proceeded to win two NFL Player of the Year Awards, and won Super Bowl XX with the 1985 Chicago Bears. After struggling with a rare liver disease for several months, Payton died in 1999 at the age of 45.
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Francis Michael "Whitey" Wistert was an American football and baseball player. He played college football for the University of Michigan Wolverines. He was the first of the three Wistert brothers (Alvin, Albert (Al)) who were named All-American Tackles at Michigan and later inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame. He was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1967. He and his brothers are three of the seven players who have had their numbers retired by the Michigan Wolverines football program. During his time at Michigan, Wistert won three consecutive Big Ten football Championships, including back-to-back National Championships. He was also Big Ten conference MVP in baseball in college and later played for the Major League Baseball Cincinnati Reds.
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Joseph W. Tkach (pronounced "Ta-cotch") was the appointed successor of Herbert W. Armstrong, founder of the Worldwide Church of God. Tkach became President and Pastor General of the church upon the death of Armstrong in 1986. Tkach spearheaded a major doctrinal transformation of the Worldwide Church of God, abandoning Armstrong's unconventional doctrines and bringing the church into accord with mainstream evangelical Christianity. His son, Joseph Tkach Jr., continued his work and in 1997 the Worldwide Church of God became a member of the National Association of Evangelicals. During Tkach's tenure, the changes that he implemented stirred much controversy and significant dissent among those who continued to follow Armstrong's theology. The dissenters labelled the changes as heresy and many left to form new church organizations. Within the mainstream Christian community, some have hailed Tkach's reforms, which brought a church from the fringe to orthodoxy, as unprecedented in the history of the Christian church.
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Edward Urner Goodman, more familiarly E. Urner Goodman, was an influential leader in the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) movement for much of the twentieth century. Goodman was the national program director from 1931 until 1951, during the organization's formative years of significant growth when the Cub Scouting and Exploring programs were established. He developed the BSA's national training center in the early 1930s and was responsible for publication of the widely read Boy Scout Handbook and other Scouting books, writing the Leaders Handbook used by Scout leaders in the United States during the 1930s and 1940s. In the 1950s, Goodman was Executive Director of Men's Work for the National Council of Churches in New York City and active in church work. Goodman is best remembered today for having created the Order of the Arrow (OA), a popular and highly successful program of the BSA that continues to honor Scouts for their cheerful service. Since its founding in 1915, the Order of the Arrow has grown to become a nationwide program having thousands of members, which recognizes those Scouts who best exemplify the virtues of cheerful service, camping, and leadership by membership in BSA's honor society. As of 2007, the Order of the Arrow has more than 183,000 members.
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Emma Goldman was an anarchist known for her political activism, writing, and speeches. She was lionized as a free-thinking "rebel woman" by admirers, and derided as an advocate of politically-motivated murder and violent revolution by her critics. Born in Kaunas, Lithuania to an Orthodox Jewish family, Goldman suffered from a violent relationship with her father. Although she attended schools in Königsberg, her father refused to allow her further education when the family moved to St. Petersburg. Still, she read voraciously and educated herself . She moved with her sister Helena to Rochester, New York at sixteen. Married briefly in 1887, she divorced her husband quickly thereafter and moved to New York City. Attracted to anarchism after the Haymarket Riot, Goldman was trained by Johann Most in public speaking. Alexander Berkman became her lifelong intimate friend. They planned to assassinate Henry Clay Frick, but Frick survived. Goldman herself was imprisoned several times in the years that followed. Goldman also published an anarchist journal called Mother Earth. In 1917 Goldman and Berkman were sentenced to jail for disrupting the draft. After their release from prison, they were deported to Russia. Goldman quickly voiced her opposed to the Soviet use of violence and the repression. In 1923 she wrote a book about her experiences, My Disillusionment in Russia. She wrote an autobiography called Living My Life, and participated in that nation's civil war. She died in Toronto on 14 May 1940. Goldman played a pivotal role in the development of anarchist political philosophy in the United States and Europe in the first half of the twentieth century. Although she distanced herself from first-wave feminism and its efforts toward women's suffrage, she developed new ways of incorporating gender politics into anarchism.
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Steve Dahl has been an American radio personality for over thirty years. Dahl is currently on the air at WJMK (104.3 Jack FM), in Chicago, Illinois. Before WJMK, Dahl was with Chicago stations WCKG, WDAI, WLUP, WMVP and WLS. He also currently writes for the Chicago Tribune in the At Play section as the resident "vice advisor". Additionally, Dahl is currently serving on the Board of Trustees at Columbia College Chicago. Dahl often tells bucolic stories about his life and family on the air. Dahl is also famous for his song parodies and his impressions. He is considered a pioneer in talk radio and has been influential for many other radio personalities. He gained a measure of national attention after the Disco Demolition Night promotion at Comiskey Park, and he is also famous for his longstanding former role as one half of the "Steve and Garry" team (with Garry Meier). In addition to his radio career, Dahl is a singer, songwriter, and guitarist. His band, Teenage Radiation, recorded and performed a number of song parodies (which he often played on his show throughout the 1980s) and more recently he has performed and recorded as Steve Dahl and the Dahlfins, releasing several albums. Dahl played a large role in the comeback of Beach Boy Brian Wilson. Dahl has also dabbled in acting, appearing in the 1984 cult classic, Grandview, U.S.A. with John and Joan Cusack. He also appeared in the 2004 film Outing Riley, and in the 2006 indie comedy I Want Someone to Eat Cheese With.
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Devin Hester is an American football wide receiver and return specialist for the Chicago Bears of the National Football League. He is an alumnus of the University of Miami, where he became the first person in the university’s recent history to play on all three teams of American football (offense, defense, special teams). Hester began his professional career with the Bears in 2006, and quickly made an impact as a kick returner. Dubbed the "Windy City Flyer" and "Anytime", Hester holds the league's all-time record for most kicks returned for a touchdown in a season.
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Jeffrey Scott Tweedy is an American songwriter, musician, poet, and leader of the band Wilco. Tweedy joined rockabilly band The Plebs with high school friend Jay Farrar in the early 1980s, but Tweedy's musical interests caused one of Farrar's brothers to quit. The Plebs changed their name to The Primitives in 1984, and subsequently to Uncle Tupelo. Uncle Tupelo garnered enough support to earn a record deal and to tour nationally. After releasing four albums, conflicts between Tweedy and Farrar caused the band to break up in 1994. In 1994, Tweedy formed Wilco with John Stirratt, Max Johnston, and Ken Coomer. Wilco has found commercial success with their albums Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, A Ghost Is Born, and Sky Blue Sky. Jeff Tweedy has been the recipient of two Grammy Awards, including Best Alternative Album for A Ghost Is Born. Tweedy has also participated in a number of side groups including Golden Smog and Loose Fur, has released a book of poems, and has released a DVD of solo performances. He was originally influenced by punk and country music, but has recently reflected more experimental themes in his music. Tweedy has been afflicted with migraine headaches since childhood. Treatment for the migraines led to a dependency on painkillers, for which he underwent successful rehab in 2004. Tweedy also has been open about the fact that he suffers from clinical depression and panic attacks.
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Michael Patrick Barrett is a catcher for the San Diego Padres in Major League Baseball. He started his professional career with the Montreal Expos at the age of eighteen. Barrett spent three years playing in the Minor Leagues as a shortstop and catcher. He played with the Honolulu Sharks, West Palm Expos, and Delmarva Shorebirds, and was elected to two All-Star games. Barrett made his Major League debut in 1998 as a third baseman, but was shortly recalled to the Minor Leagues to play with the Harrisburg Senators for a season. Upon Barrett's return to the Major League in 1999, he ranked among the top offensive rookies in various statistical categories. Barrett failed to stay healthy during the 2003 season, which prompted the Expos to trade him to the Oakland Athletics, who in turn, traded him to the Chicago Cubs. During his tenure with the Cubs, Barrett won a Silver Slugger award in 2005, and recorded near career-high statistics in 2004 season. The Cubs traded Barrett to the San Diego Padres in June of 2007.
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John F. Stossel is a consumer reporter, author and co-anchor for the ABC News show 20/20. Stossel began his journalism career as a researcher for KGW-TV and later became a consumer reporter at WCBS-TV in New York City before joining ABC News as consumer editor and reporter on Good Morning America. Stossel went on to be an ABC News correspondent, joining the weekly news magazine program 20/20. In his decades as a reporter, Stossel has received numerous honors and awards. Stossel has also written two books entitled Give Me a Break and Myths, Lies, and Downright Stupidity. Stossel practices advocacy journalism where he often challenges "conventional wisdom". His reports, a blend of commentary and reporting, reflect a roughly libertarian political philosophy and his views on economics are largely supportive of the free market. This makes him a "contrarian" in American media; as such, he has a reputation for conflict with many groups, often politically liberal ones.
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David B. Falk is an American sports agent who primarily works with NBA players. He is best known for representing sports icon Michael Jordan for the entirety of Jordan's career. Besides Jordan, Falk has represented more than 90 other NBA players, and is generally considered to be the most influential player agent the NBA has seen. During the peak years of Falk's career in the 1990s, he was often considered the second-most powerful person in the NBA behind Commissioner David Stern, and in 2000 he had at least one client on all but two NBA teams. He was listed among the "100 Most Powerful People in Sports" for 12 straight years from 1990 to 2001 by The Sporting News, and was also named one of the Top 50 Marketers in the United States by Advertising Age in 1995. Falk is currently semi-retired, having left his position as Chairman of SFX Sports Group in 2001 to spend more time with his family. He represented only 7 players in 2007, a far cry from the prime of his sports agent career in the 1990s, when he represented as many as 40 players at a time.
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Kanye West (pronounced /ˈkɑnjɛj/) is an American rap artist and hip hop producer. He released his debut album The College Dropout in 2004, his second album Late Registration in 2005, and his third album Graduation in 2007. His first three albums have received numerous awards (including nine Grammys), critical acclaim, and commercial success. West also runs his own record label GOOD Music. West's mascot and trademark is "Dropout Bear," a teddy bear, which has appeared on the covers of his three albums as well as the singles cover for his songs "Stronger" and "Homecoming." West's parents divorced when he was three years old, and he and his mother moved to Chicago, Illinois. He enrolled at Chicago State University but later dropped out to continue pursuing his music career. He later gained fame by producing hit singles for musical artists including Jay-Z, Alicia Keys, and Janet Jackson. West's style of production often utilizes pitched-up vocal samples, usually from soul songs, with his own drums and instruments. Some controversy has also surrounded West, such as an incident during a live telecast of a benefit concert for Hurricane Katrina relief, when he deviated from the script and told the audience, "George Bush doesn't care about black people."
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Jesse Louis "Jesse Jr." Jackson, Jr. is a member of the United States House of Representatives representing Illinois's 2nd congressional district, which includes the southeast suburbs of Chicago, part of the Chicago South Side and a small portion of the southeast side of Chicago. (map). He has served the 2nd district since winning a special election on December 12, 1995 to fill the seat vacated by Mel Reynolds and is the Democratic son of activist and former presidential candidate Jesse Jackson. His wife, Sandi Jackson, serves on the Chicago City Council. He serves as a national co-chairman of the Barack Obama Presidential campaign. He was educated at Le Mans Academy, St. Albans School, North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University, Chicago Theological Seminary, and University of Illinois College of Law. Prior to elective politics Jackson was proactive in international civil rights activism. He participated in his father's presidential campaigns and then in the office of his National Rainbow Coalition. During his time in public office he has co-authored three books, two of them with his father.
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John Benjamin Murphy was an American physician and abdominal surgeon noted for advocating early surgical intervention in appendicitis appendectomy, and several eponyms: Murphy drip, Murphy’s button, Murphy’s punch, Murphy’s test, and Murphy-Lane bone skid. He is best remembered for the eponymous clinical sign that is used in evaluating patients with acute cholecystitis. His career spanned general surgery, orthopedics, neurosurgery, and cardiothoracic surgery, which helped him to gain international prominence in the surgical profession. Mayo Clinic co-founder, William James Mayo, described him as "the surgical genius of our generation". Over the course of his career he was renowned as a surgeon, a clinician, a teacher, an innovator, and an author. In addition to general surgical operatons, such as appendectomy,cholecystostomy,bowel resection for intestinal obstruction, and mastectomy, he performed and described innovative procedures in neurosurgery, orthopedics, gynecology, urology, plastic surgery, thoracic surgery, and vascular surgery. He also ventured into techniques such as neurorrhaphy, arthroplasty, prostatectomy, nephrectomy, hysterectomy, bone grafting, and thoracoplasty.
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