Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator

Cleopatra VII was born October 69 BC, Alexandria and died August 12, 30 BC, Alexandria. Cleopatra and her half-brother Ptolemy XIII both came into power at age 18 and her brother at age 10 after their father Ptolemy XII died. Her brother's advisers forced her to leave Egypt where she stayed in Syria until she formed an army of mercenaries, returning to Egypt and regaining the throne. Julius Caesar restored Cleopatra's power by helping her plunder Alexandria with his army, and then the Romans assisted, conquering the battle for the returning Queen. She had a son with Caesar named Ptolemy Caesar but the Egypt people called him Caesarion. When Julius Caesar died, Cleopatra's son held the stronghold by becoming co-regent. Cleopatra became the "Cicilian city of Tarsus" by Mark Antony after playing a major part in overpowering Caesar's assassins, Cassius and Brutus. He asked her assistance in battle against the Philippi and she did, winning. When Antony and Cleopatra met for the first time she was dressed in robes like the Greek goddess Isis (who she associated herself with) and he fell for her, leaving his third wife Fulvia and three children, traveling to Egypt. Antony returned to Rome and Cleopatra gave birth to their twins named Cleopatra Selene and Alexander Helios. He also protected Cleopatra from her younger half-sister Arsinoe, who was in exile who wanted her thrown. Antony married a Roman, Octavia, sister of Caesar's heir, Octavian, later known as Augustus. Then he divorced her when Octavian declared war on him.  Antony killed himself after hearing misinformed rumors of Cleopatra's death. It is rumored that she committed suicide by letting an asp bite her. Since her son was too young to rule Egypt, he was executed by being strangled by Octavian's men.  An interesting fact was that she bathed in donkey milk, probably with the belief it would make her skin youthful because of the nourishment in milk.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

One of my favorite writers because of his work and his view on life is Ralph Waldo Emerson. He was born May 25, 1803, Boston and died April 27, 1882, Concord Massachusetts. His education was from Boston Latin School and Harvard Divinity University. Being a prodigy, he attended Harvard at age 14, making him the youngest in his classes. After graduating, he became a Unitarian minister, but left the church because of philosophical differences. Emerson is a famous poet, essayist, and lecturer. A few books he's known for are Compensation, English traits, Spiritual Laws, and Father, we thank you. Emerson was the leader of the Transcendentalism movement in America. His colleagues and he believed religion was too limited and conventional. His view was that spirituality was through communion with nature. Transcendental writing is where the writer connects their writing to nature and both themselves and the readers instead of using the mechanics for writing. Because Transcendentalism was controversial at the time, Emerson published a book called "Nature" on the subject anonymously. A few of his friends who were also writers were Samuel Coleridge, William Wordsworth, and Henry Thoreau. His friends called him "The Sage of Concord" because they thought he was so wise. Emerson opposed slavery and favored women's rights, which was controversial at the time so he would be shouted at at public appearances. He didn't like Abraham Lincoln's view of preserving the union instead of freeing slaves, but after he went to speak to the president, his view softened and he even spoke at Lincoln's memorial service. As Emerson aged though, he began to lose his memory. He would be late to appointments, forget details of his life, and even forgot his name. At a funeral for his friend Henry Longfellow, he didn't remember his friend's name. 

Erzsebet Bathory

Erzsebet (Elizabeth) Bathory was born August 7, 1560, Nyirbator and died August 21, 1614, Cachtice. Bathory was commented on for her beauty but she adored her skin the most. She is known for slaughtering six hundred young women to bathe in their blood to keep her youthful complexion. She was seen evil enough to be recognized as one of the original "vampires." Bathory was married to a political at age sixteen and became lady of the Castle of Csejthe, a dark, dull castle located in the center of Romania. She became bored in her home as her husband was off fighting and invited many people into her home, such as claimed witches, seers, alchemists, and sorcerers and was captivated by their stories and teachings. In 1604 her husband died of imposed stab wounds, and Bathony craved power instead of marrying another man. The starting of her killings was when she slapped one of her servants hard enough to draw blood onto her skin and she swore it had made her complexion younger where the blood touched. She asked the witches and alchemists if it was true, and not wanting to disappoint, they told her the blood of virgins would give her youth. Dorotta Szentes was one of her helpers that found beautiful virgin girls for Bathory to bathe in and drink their blood. They would chain the girls upside down, still alive, and slit their throats so that the blood drained into her bath. Elizabeth would drink the blood of the more beautiful and young girls' blood. Her killings finally failed when she threw four drained bodies off the castle wall. The villagers recognized and told the Hungarian Emperor, Matthias II. He marched to the castle and put Bathory on trial but her status as being the cousin of prime minister Thurzoa, widowed of the Hungary's Black Hero, and niece Stephen Bathory, King of Poland made her a political enemy. Also, the fact that the girls she killed were just peasants made it so she couldn't be arrested. Dorotta and her witches were all burned but Elizabeth was imprisoned in her castle and died four years later. Her final count was 600 vanished girls but Bathory never admitted anything.

Vlad Tepes III

Vlad Tepes III or "Vlad the Impaler" or "Dracula" was born in 1431 in the Transylvanian city of Sighisoara and died in 1476, Bucharest. His home still stands today in a neighborhood of the nobility. When he was born his father, Vlad II was already living in exile in Transylvania. He had two brothers named Mircea and Radu the Handsome. His primary education was all taught by his mother, a noblewoman, and her family. He did finally get proper education after his father killed his Danesti rival and claimed the Wallachain throne. An elderly boyar who had fought against the Turks trained Vlad all the skills about war and peace for becoming a Christian knight. At the age of thirteen, his brother Radu and him were forced to Adrianople as hostages where they resided for four years. The Turks released them because they praised Vlad for the Wallachain throne. Vlad III ruled for only two months but after many years he returned to the throne. He was killed in a battle against the Turks. They decapitated his body and sent his head to Constantinople where the sultan had it on a stake to prove that Vlad the Impaler was finally dead.
The reason behind his name is because during his rule he was known for his inhuman cruelty. Vlad often used impalement as his means of execution, which was an extremely slow and painful death. The stake used was usually dull so that the person wouldn't die too rapidly from shock. Thousands would be impaled at a single time. Even infants were impaled on a stake. Vlad had some of his stakes arranged outside his city and the bodies on them were left out for months. It got the name "the Forest of the Impaled" from people who were too disgusted and horrified to enter Wallachain. He had other means of torture such as nails to heads, cutting off limbs, blinding, burning, mutilation of sexual organs, skinning, and exposure to wild animals. The surprising matter of it all is that most of his victims were also Wallachians'-- his people. The first time he killed was believed because of his wanting for revenge for his father, who was assassinated, and his eldest brother, Mircea, who was buried alive. He invited his boyars, who were apart of the conspiracy that led to their deaths, and their families for an Easter feast. He asked these nobles how many princes had ruled in their lifetimes. None had seen less than seven rulers. Vlad then had all the nobles arrested, and the older boyars and their families were impaled there. The healthier nobles and families were sent to work on the ruins of the castle. Very few survived the harsh labor.
Vlad Dracula's name came from an order of knights called the "Order of the Dragon" that defended the Empire against the Turks. The word Dragon in Romanian is "drac" and "ul" is the definitive article. Vlad's father became Vlad Dracul and Vlad became Vlad Dracula, meaning "the son of the dragon."

Alan Turing

Alan Turing was born June 23rd, 1912 in Maida Vale and died June 7th, 1954 in Wilmslow. He was a British mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst, and computer scientist and attended Campbridge and Princeton University. Turing is essentially known for inventing the computer by a paper he wrote in graduate school called "On Computable Numbers". He also worked as a cryptographer for the British Foreign Policy and broke a German Enigma code during WW2 that helped the path to the D-day invasion. Something not very known about Turing is that he was gay. In 1954 being homosexual was illegal and the government made him decide between imprisonment or hormonal treatment. He was then forced to take estrogen which made him develop breasts and other side effects to punish or "cure" him. He later committed suicide by biting into a cyanide apple. It is said that this was the inspiration for the logo of Apple computers.

Nikola Tesla

Nikola Tesla was born July 10, 1856 in Smiljan. He died January 7, 1943 in New York City. He attended the schools, Graz University of Technology and Charles University in Prague. The awards he received in sciences was the Edison Medal, Elliot Cresson Medal, and John Scott Award. Tesla was a Serbian-American inventor, electrical engineer, mechanical engineer, physicist, and is best known for his contributions to the design of the modern alternating current electrical supply system. The Edison Medal he received he thought of as an insult since he didn't like Thomas Edison because of verbal abuse he had taken from him. Tesla even thought of an idea of using energy waves(known as RADAR today) to detect German submarines but Edison thought that was a "ludicrous" idea. Many people told Tesla his inventions were impossible but he ended up making them anyway. His mind was also very good at holding large amounts of information. He could recite complete books from memory and all the ideas of his inventions were from his head, rather than writing them down. All the inventions conceived from Tesla were the radio, radar, the induction motor, the Tesla coil, alternating current dynamos, arc light systems, and electric vehicles. Also, many of his concepts we made real today were X-ray machines, telegeodynamics, robotics, and early computer-logic principles. Tesla thought of making a death ray that could destroy 10,000 airplanes 250 miles away. There are theories that he succeeded this invention, but knowing the power of it and how people would use it in war, he destroyed it. Our technology would be nowhere without Tesla. He's a genius and I'm glad he kept doing what he loved even if no one believed in him.

Dita Von Teese

Dita Von Tesse was born September 28th, 1972 in Rochester, Michigan. Her birth name is Heather Renee Sweet; she named herself after Dita Parlo. Dita is popular for being a dancer and pin-up model, but she is also an actor and artist. She was trained as a dancer from an early age and danced solo at age thirteen for a local ballet company. She moved to California because of her father's job and attended school in Irvine college, where she studied historic costuming with the goal to work as a stylist for period films. Right now she is trained in costume designing and often puts herself in the photos. She helped train the dance routines for the ending of Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle. Dita was married to the known Marilyn Manson but divorced for "irreconcilable differences." She also played in an episode of CSI but was asked to "take it down a notch" because of "offensive cleavage". Dita thought that was interesting considering how much blood and gore is on the series. I think Dita is gorgeous, intelligent, and a real inspiring individual. I can't believe she's turning forty and still performs as if she were twenty. She's herself and has a strong sense of her sexuality. It is said that her burlesque inspired style has revived the burlesque scene. "Some people say what I do isn't very liberating. I say it's pretty liberating to get $20,000 for 10 minutes work." -Dita Von Teese