Woodrow Wilson

President · 1882 – 1945

Franklin D. Roosevelt was the 32nd President of the United States who led the country through the Great Depression with the New Deal and through most of World War II, serving an unprecedented four terms and reshaping the role of the federal government in American life.

• The New Deal
• World War II leadership

Why His Democratic successor who learned from the League's failure and successfully built the United Nations after World War II.

Statesman · 1874 – 1965

Winston Churchill was the British statesman who led the United Kingdom to victory in World War II — and a prolific historian and writer whose books and speeches won him the Nobel Prize in Literature, a rare honour for a man of action.

• Leadership in World War II
• Historic wartime speeches

Why A contemporary world leader who shaped the same post-WWI settlement, though the two men had vastly different visions for the post-war world.

Statesman · 1815 – 1898

Otto von Bismarck was the Prussian statesman who unified the German states into the German Empire in 1871, serving as its first chancellor and reshaping the balance of power in Europe through ruthless realpolitik and diplomatic mastery.

• Unification of Germany
• Realpolitik

Why The German statesman whose unification of Germany and alliance system created the conditions that led to the very war Wilson had to manage.

President · 1809 – 1865

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, who led the nation through its Civil War, preserved the Union, and abolished slavery before his assassination in 1865.

• Leading the Union in the Civil War
• The Emancipation Proclamation

Why Also a president & politician · Active in the same era

Statesman · 1858 – 1919

Theodore Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States, a soldier, conservationist and reformer — and a remarkably prolific author who wrote around forty books on history, nature, politics and exploration alongside his public career.

• 26th U.S. President
• National parks and conservation

Why Also a president · Active in the same era

Statesman · 1743 – 1826

Thomas Jefferson was an American statesman, the principal author of the Declaration of Independence and third President of the United States, who was also a prolific writer, architect and scholar whose Notes on the State of Virginia was a landmark of early American letters.

• Declaration of Independence
• Third U.S. President

Why Also a president · Active in the same era

Revolutionary Leader · 1926 – 2016

Fidel Castro was the Cuban revolutionary leader who overthrew the Batista dictatorship in 1959 and then ruled Cuba as a communist state for nearly five decades, becoming the longest-serving non-royal head of government in the 20th century and a towering symbol of Cold War confrontation.

• Cuban Revolution
• Cuban Missile Crisis

Why Also a president · Active in the same era

Statesman · 1732 – 1799

George Washington was the commander of the Continental Army in the American Revolution and the first President of the United States, whose leadership and restraint shaped the new republic.

• Commanding the Continental Army
• First U.S. President

Why Also a president · Active in the same era

Military Leader · 1769 – 1821

Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader who rose during the French Revolution, crowned himself Emperor, and dominated European affairs for over a decade.

• Napoleonic Wars
• The Napoleonic Code

Why Also a politician · Active in the same era

Dictator · 1889 – 1945

Adolf Hitler was the dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945, whose ideology of racial supremacy and aggressive expansionism plunged the world into World War II and caused the Holocaust — the genocide of six million Jews and millions of others.

• Nazi Germany
• World War II

Why Also a politician · Active in the same era

Dictator · 1883 – 1945

Benito Mussolini was the Italian fascist dictator who founded fascism as a political movement, ruled Italy from 1922 to 1943, allied with Adolf Hitler in the Axis, and was killed by partisans in 1945 — the inventor of a totalitarian ideology that inspired and shaped the 20th century's darkest political movements.

• Founding fascism
• March on Rome

Why Also a politician · Active in the same era

General · 1890 – 1970

Charles de Gaulle was the French military and political leader who refused to accept France's defeat in 1940, led the Free French resistance from London, liberated Paris, and later founded the Fifth Republic as president, restoring French national pride and global standing.

• Free French resistance
• Liberation of Paris

Why Also a president · Active in the same era

General · 1807 – 1882

Giuseppe Garibaldi was the Italian nationalist military leader who united southern Italy with the north through his bold expedition of the Thousand, becoming the military hero of Italian unification and one of the most celebrated revolutionary figures of the 19th century.

• Expedition of the Thousand
• Italian unification

Why Also a politician · Active in the same era

Revolutionary Leader · 1890 – 1969

Ho Chi Minh was the Vietnamese revolutionary leader who led the resistance against French colonial rule and then American military intervention, founding the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and becoming the unifying symbol of Vietnamese independence.

• Vietnamese independence
• Defeat of France at Dien Bien Phu

Why Also a president · Active in the same era

Revolutionary · 1758 – 1794

Maximilien Robespierre was the French revolutionary leader who dominated the Committee of Public Safety during the Reign of Terror, using revolutionary justice to execute thousands including Louis XVI — before being overthrown and guillotined himself in Thermidor.

• Reign of Terror
• French Revolution

Why Also a politician · Active in the same era

General · 1881 – 1938

Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was the military commander who defeated the Allied partition of the Ottoman Empire after World War I, founded the Republic of Turkey in 1923, and then transformed it through sweeping secular modernization reforms that reshaped Turkish society.

• Founding the Republic of Turkey
• Turkish War of Independence

Why Also a president · Active in the same era

Emperor · 1808 – 1873

Napoleon III was the nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte who became the first elected president of France and then its last emperor, modernizing Paris and French industry before his empire collapsed with defeat in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870.

• Second French Empire
• Modernization of Paris

Why Also a president · Active in the same era

Statesman · 1918 – 2013

Nelson Mandela was a South African anti-apartheid revolutionary and statesman who, after 27 years in prison, became the country's first democratically elected president and a global symbol of reconciliation.

• Ending apartheid
• 27 years in prison

Why Also a president · Active in the same era

Statesman · 1755 – 1804

Alexander Hamilton was the American Founding Father who designed the United States financial system, co-wrote the Federalist Papers, founded the first national bank, served as the first Secretary of the Treasury, and was killed in a duel by Vice President Aaron Burr in 1804.

• US financial system
• Federalist Papers

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Aviator · 1897 – 1937

Amelia Earhart was the American aviator who became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic in 1932, setting multiple speed and altitude records, and who disappeared over the Pacific in 1937 while attempting to become the first woman to circumnavigate the globe.

• First woman to fly solo across the Atlantic
• Around-the-world flight attempt

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Human Rights Advocate · 1884 – 1962

Eleanor Roosevelt was the longest-serving First Lady of the United States, a human rights champion who chaired the UN commission that drafted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and redefined the role of first lady as an independent political force.

• Universal Declaration of Human Rights
• Longest-serving First Lady

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Military Leader · 1829 – 1909

Geronimo was the Apache leader whose decade-long guerrilla resistance against the United States and Mexico made him the most feared and pursued Native American fighter of the 19th century, requiring 5,000 US troops to finally capture 38 warriors.

• Apache resistance to US expansion
• Guerrilla warfare in the Southwest

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Emperor · 1892 – 1975

Haile Selassie was the Emperor of Ethiopia who modernized his country, became the symbol of African resistance to European colonialism after surviving Mussolini's invasion, championed African unity at the UN and as founder of the African Union, and is venerated as a messiah by the Rastafari movement.

• Symbol of African anti-colonialism
• Founder of the African Union

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization

Writer · 1811 – 1896

Harriet Beecher Stowe was the American author whose novel Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852) galvanized the abolitionist movement in the North and became the best-selling novel of the 19th century, helping precipitate the Civil War.

• Uncle Tom's Cabin
• Abolitionist movement

Why Active in the same era · From the same civilization