Born this week
Wednesday April 30th, 2025
Joseph Addison
May 1672 – June 17, 1719
Young men soon give, and soon forget, affronts old age is slow in both.
Joseph Addison was an English essayist, poet, playwright, and politician. He was the eldest son of The Reverend Lancelot Addison. His name ...
E. W. Howe
May 3, 1853 – October 3, 1937
For every quarrel a man and wife have before others, they have a hundred when alone.
Edgar Watson Howe, sometimes referred to as E. W. Howe, was an American novelist and newspaper and magazine editor in the late 19th and ...
Niccolo Machiavelli
May 3, 1469 – June 21, 1527
No enterprise is more likely to succeed than one concealed from the enemy until it is ripe for execution.
Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli was an Italian historian, politician, diplomat, philosopher, humanist, and writer based in Florence ...
James Dyson
May 2, 1947 – January 22, 1990
In the digital age of 'overnight' success stories such as Facebook, the hard slog is easily overlooked.
Sir James Dyson, CBE, FREng is a British inventor, industrial designer and founder of the Dyson company. He is best known as the inventor ...
Herbert Spencer
April 27, 1820 – December 8, 1903
In science the important thing is to modify and change one's ideas as science advances.
Herbert Spencer was an English philosopher, biologist, anthropologist, sociologist, and prominent classical liberal political theorist of ...
Edward Gibbon
April 27, 1737 – January 16, 1794
I was never less alone than when by myself.
Edward Gibbon was an English historian and Member of Parliament. His most important work, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman ...
Golda Meir
May 3, 1898 – December 8, 1978
I never did anything alone. Whatever was accomplished in this country was accomplished collectively.
Golda Meir was an Israeli teacher, kibbutznik, politician and the fourth Prime Minister of Israel. Meir was elected Prime Minister of ...
Novalis
May 2, 1772 – March 25, 1801
Where children are, there is the golden age.
Novalis was the pseudonym of Georg Philipp Friedrich Freiherr von Hardenberg, a poet, author, and philosopher of early German Romanticism.
Karl Kraus
April 28, 1874 – June 12, 1936
Science is spectral analysis. Art is light synthesis.
Karl Kraus was an Austrian writer and journalist, known as a satirist, essayist, aphorist, playwright and poet. He directed his satire at ...
Hosea Ballou
April 30, 1771 – June 6, 1852
Forty is the old age of youth, fifty is the youth of old age.
Hosea Ballou (April 30, 1771 - June 7, 1852) was an American Universalist clergyman and theological writer. Hosea Ballou was born in ...
Kate Smith
May 1907 – June 17, 1986
In 29 years, I had recorded over 2,200 songs. I was amazed.
Kathryn Elizabeth Smith known professionally as Kate Smith and The First Lady of Radio was an American singer, a contralto, best known for ...
Jerome K. Jerome
May 2, 1859 – June 14, 1927
We are so bound together that no man can labor for himself alone. Each blow he strikes in his own behalf helps to mold the universe.
Jerome Klapka Jerome was an English writer and humourist, best known for the comic travelogue Three Men in a Boat. Other works include the ...
Ulysses S. Grant
April 27, 1822 – July 23, 1885
Labor disgraces no man unfortunately, you occasionally find men who disgrace labor.
Ulysses S. Grant was the 18th President of the United States. In 1865, as commanding general, Grant led the Union Armies to victory over ...
Mary Wollstonecraft
April 27, 1759 – September 10, 1797
The divine right of husbands, like the divine right of kings, may, it is hoped, in this enlightened age, be contested without danger.
Mary Wollstonecraft was an eighteenth-century English writer, philosopher, and advocate of women's rights. During her brief career, she ...
Duke Ellington
April 29, 1899 – May 24, 1974
Art is dangerous. It is one of the attractions: when it ceases to be dangerous you don't want it.
Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist and bandleader of jazz orchestras. He led his orchestra from 1923 until ...
Catherine the Great
May 2, 1729 – November 17, 1796
I may be kindly, I am ordinarily gentle, but in my line of business I am obliged to will terribly what I will at all.
Catherine the Great is a 1934 British historical film based on the play The Czarina by Lajos Bíró and Melchior Lengyel, about the rise to ...
Benjamin Spock
May 2, 1903 – March 15, 1998
There are only two things a child will share willingly communicable diseases and its mother's age.
Benjamin McLane Spock was an American pediatrician whose book Baby and Child Care, published in 1946, is one of the best-sellers of all ...
Bernard Meltzer
May 2, 1916 – March 25, 1998
When you forgive, you in no way change the past - but you sure do change the future.
Bernard C. Meltzer was a United States radio host for several decades. His advice call-in show, "What's Your Problem?," aired from 1967 ...
Henri Poincare
April 29, 1854 – July 17, 1912
The mind uses its faculty for creativity only when experience forces it to do so.
Jules Henri Poincaré was a French mathematician, theoretical physicist, engineer, and a philosopher of science. He is often described as a ...
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
May 1881 – April 10, 1955
We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin SJ was a French philosopher and Jesuit priest who trained as a paleontologist and geologist and took part in the ...
Coretta Scott King
April 27, 1927 – January 30, 2006
Struggle is a never ending process. Freedom is never really won, you earn it and win it in every generation.
Coretta Scott King was an American author, activist, and civil rights leader. The widow of Martin Luther King, Jr., Coretta Scott King ...
Robert Hall
May 2, 1764 – February 21, 1831
In matters of conscience, first thoughts are best. In matters of prudence, last thoughts are best.
The Rev. Robert Hall was an English Baptist minister.
Carl Friedrich Gauss
April 30, 1777 – February 23, 1855
The enchanting charms of this sublime science reveal only to those who have the courage to go deeply into it.
Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss was a German mathematician, who contributed significantly to many fields, including number theory, algebra, ...
May Sarton
May 3, 1912 – July 16, 1995
In the country of pain we are each alone.
May Sarton is the pen name of Eleanore Marie Sarton, an American poet, novelist and memoirist.
Rogers Hornsby
April 27, 1896 – January 5, 1963
I don't want to play golf. When I hit a ball, I want someone else to go chase it.
Rogers Hornsby, Sr., nicknamed "The Rajah", was an American baseball infielder, manager, and coach who played 23 seasons in Major League ...
Oskar Schindler
April 28, 1908 – October 9, 1974
If you saw a dog going to be crushed under a car, wouldn't you help him?
Oskar Schindler was an ethnic German industrialist, German spy, and member of the Nazi Party who is credited with saving the lives of 1,200 ...
Joseph Heller
May 1923 – December 12, 1999
I want to keep my dreams, even bad ones, because without them, I might have nothing all night long.
Joseph Heller was an American satirical novelist, short story writer, and playwright. The title of one of his works, Catch-22, entered the ...
John McKinley
May 1780 – July 19, 1852
Technology has been, and always will be, my one true passion professionally.
John McKinley was a U.S. Senator from the state of Alabama and an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court. Born in Culpeper ...