⭐️ Significant people YOU’VE heard of who have done significant things but most people might not have heard of and should arguably be more famous than they actually are 1874

[Spoony]

I’ve been listening to a podcast called Real Dictators and they were talking briefly about Gavrilo Princip. If you don’t know who that is, he is the guy that shot Archduke Franz Ferdinand which is broadly accepted as the match that lit World War I. 
 

Granted everyone was looking for an excuse to kill the each other anyway, but it just occurred to me that the man that arguably triggered one of the deadliest conflicts in human history just isn’t a known name. 
 

Because there’s a break in Villa football and winter is boring, I was wondering what snippets people can offer up as people who are significant / ought on paper to be really well known by name but just aren’t. 

edit: title amended due to controversy and furious anger 

Edited January 17 by Spoony

[Seat68]

Bonnie Raitt. We had a fairly substantial discussion on Bonnie Raitt when she won a Grammy last year. A large number of people had never heard of her. I still think about that.

[blandy]

Vasily Arkhipov  Probably averted world war 3

[Seat68]

3 minutes ago, blandy said:

Vasily Arkhipov  Probably averted world war 3

Yeah, but Bonnie Raitt. 

Interestingly I was aware of a person that prevented WWIII, but not the name of them. He is a perfect example.

[Chindie]

4 minutes ago, blandy said:

Vasily Arkhipov  Probably averted world war 3

See also Stanislav Petrov.

[blandy]

4 minutes ago, Chindie said:

See also Stanislav Petrov.

Absolutely. I couldn’t remember his name, though. The incoming missile can’t be real guy?

[Chindie]

Thomas Midgeley Jr.

American chemical engineer who was instrumental in the development of leaded petrol and CFC gases, meaning he is largely responsible for the biggest environmentally damaging inventions in human history. Perhaps ironically he also killed himself with an invention of his own design - he got polio and was left partially disabled so created a hoist system to help getting out of bed, which strangled him. Some suspect this was actually the purpose of the machine but difficult to prove.

[Chindie]

1 minute ago, blandy said:

Absolutely. I couldn’t remember his name, though. The incoming missile can’t be real guy?

Indeed. He was manning an early warning centre, shortly after the Soviets had shot down the Korean Airlines jet and caused a massive leap in distrust between the US and Soviets, when the system went off showing a US launch, followed by a small number of others. He didn't believe this was correct, so disobeyed orders and didn't report it. It turned out the warning system was flawed and the system had been set off by a rare weather formation. Had he reported it's very possible the Soviet response would lead to all out nuclear war.

[bickster]

29 minutes ago, Chindie said:

Thomas Midgeley Jr.

He's the first one in here I didn't know about

[sidcow]

Pretty much any musician named in the deadpool thread. 

Edited January 17 by sidcow

[Chindie]

I knew about everyone in here.

[bickster]

It does beg the obvious question though, if you've never heard of them, how do you know how significant they are?

[Spoony]

13 minutes ago, bickster said:

It does beg the obvious question though, if you've never heard of them, how do you know how significant they are?

lol well I guess a better way to phrase it would be YOU know of them but it’s an obscure person who had an enormous impact and most people probably don’t know about them. Just isn’t quite as catchy. 

[mjmooney]

14 minutes ago, bickster said:

It does beg the obvious question though, if you've never heard of them, how do you know how significant they are?

Was just about to post that. It's like the 'Footballers you've completely forgotten about' thread in Other Football. Thread should have no posts. 

[tonyh29]

59 minutes ago, bickster said:

He's the first one in here I didn't know about

you'd heard of Bonnie Raitt  

 

 

[sidcow]

27 minutes ago, mjmooney said:

Was just about to post that. It's like the 'Footballers you've completely forgotten about' thread in Other Football. Thread should have no posts. 

I think I've been in there a couple of times and posted. "Ermmm....Errr...No" 

[Mandy Lifeboats]

Wiltold Pilecki

A Polish resistance fighter in WW2. He allowed himself to be captured and sent to a concentration camp.  Using smuggled radio parts to build a radio he reported what he saw and named those responsible.  He managed to escape and went back to fighting with the Polish resistance. 

 

 

[tonyh29]

45 minutes ago, bickster said:

It does beg the obvious question though, if you've never heard of them, how do you know how significant they are?

when they die and you question their level of significance in the dead pool thread and people start clutching their pearls over it   

[Mandy Lifeboats]

Liz Truss.  A British Member of Parliament

She stabbed the serving Prime Minister in the back before seizing power.  The Queen died in very mysterious circumstances shortly after meeting her.  She then crashed the economy, stated that she would not resign and then resigned. 

Today, still wanted by the Police, she survives as a soldier of fortune in the Los Angeles underground. 

[Mark Albrighton]

I think it could be, as suggested, people who you think should be more well known to the general public. I’d agree that we if said, say, five out of ten people have heard of the archduke Franz Ferdinand, I would wager that proportionally speaking, only one would have heard of Princip.

Said before, everyone knows Guy Fawkes. Very much not everyone knows Catesby.

There will be an obvious British bias for this, but it’s Scott of the Antarctic, not Amundsen of the Antarctic.

Or it could be about very famous people who you hadn’t heard of until later in life. I previously posted in the “On this day in history” thread about how I’d never heard of Nicolae Ceaușescu. But I’m reliably informed for a few years leading up to his festive demise he was a regular fixture in the news.

In terms of know people who should be more well known. I dare say Juan Garcia isn’t a household name and his role in Operation Fortitude isn’t well known. Receiving both an Iron Cross and an MBE isn’t something that many people manage.

Moving up the fame scale, Henry Cavendish probably should be more famous. They went through his writings years after he died and found that he’d independently discovered loads of things that would only be discovered later.

Robert Hooke did a tonne of work in various sciences. But we don’t know what he looked like and it’s only springs that he’s associated with. And Slinky from Toy Story has probably taken that title these days.