Arnold Palmer (1929)

One of golf’s most charismatic players, Palmer was instrumental in popularizing the sport in the US. After winning the US Amateur championship, Palmer turned professional in 1954 and won the Canadian Open in 1955. Between 1958 and 1964, he won the Masters four times, the British Open twice, and the US Open once. In 1967, he became the first golfer to earn more than $1 million in prize money. One of the first television-age golfing personalities, he attracted a loyal following known as what? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

William Bligh (1754)

Though he had a long and notable career in the British Royal Navy, Bligh is chiefly remembered for the 1787 mutiny on his ship, the HMS Bounty, during which he and those crew members who remained loyal to him were set adrift in a longboat. In a remarkable act of seamanship, with neither a map nor a compass, Bligh guided them across 3,618 mi (5,822 km) of ocean to the nearest European outpost, Timor. In the 1770s, Bligh served as the sailing master on what famous explorer’s final voyage? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

Peter Sellers (1925)

Sellers was a British actor who earned international stardom playing a wide range of characters at a time when rigid typecasting was the norm. The son of vaudeville performers, he began appearing with his parents as a boy. He started making films in the 1950s and later gained enormous popularity as the bumbling Inspector Clouseau in the Pink Panther series. In Dr. Strangelove, he plays three characters, including the titular role. What fourth character was he initially supposed to play? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

Buddy Holly (1936)

An early rock ‘n’ roll star, Holly began as a country-and-western singer and gradually added rhythm-and-blues elements to his innovative style. With his band, the Crickets, he established the standard rock instrumentation of two guitars, bass, and drums, and toured the US extensively for two years before his death in a plane crash. He became one of rock’s most enduring cult figures and much of his material was released posthumously. Who else died in the plane crash that killed him? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

Sir Alexander Tilloch Galt (1817)

Galt was a British-Canadian statesman. Born in London, he immigrated to Canada in his teens and began his political career there in 1849, eventually serving several terms as minister of finance. Although he signed the 1849 manifesto favoring the annexation of Canada by the US, he became one of the most persistent and influential leaders of the movement for confederation of the provinces and later advocated Canadian independence. He was a founding member of what company that still exists today? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

Werner Herzog (1942)

One of the leading filmmakers in contemporary German cinema, Herzog is a prolific director, screenwriter, and producer known for his vivid and poetic films. During the 1960s, he mostly made short films but completed his first feature, Signs of Life, in 1968. He went on to make a number of films noted for their acutely observed detail and tales of danger and escape. More recently, he has made several acclaimed documentaries. What criminal act started Herzog on his filmmaking career? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

Constantijn Huygens (1596)

Constantijn Huygens was a Dutch humanist and poet and the father of famed scientist Christiaan Huygens. His descriptive and satirical poems were highly esteemed, and both English and French monarchs knighted him in recognition of his genius. Thousands of his letters have survived to this day and attest to his wide acquaintance with contemporary scholars, including Descartes and Donne. Huygens was also an accomplished musician and composer. How old was he when he died? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

Urho Kekkonen (1900)

The leading spokesman of the Center Party, Kekkonen became Finland’s prime minister in 1950 and succeeded Juho Paasikivi as president in 1956. After his reelection in 1962 and 1968, the Finnish parliament voted to extend his term, which was to expire in 1974, until 1978, at which time he was elected to his final term as president. Throughout his career, Kekkonen succeeded in maintaining friendly neutrality with the USSR. What caused him to resign the presidency in 1981? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

Romare Bearden (1911)

Regarded as one of the most important African-American artists of the 20th century, Bearden first achieved recognition for his complex, semiabstract collages of photographs and painted paper on canvas in Europe following WWII. By the 1960s, he was the preeminent collagist in the US. A prolific artist, he created some 2,000 works, many of which focus on aspects of African-American culture, including music and family. A Bearden mural in a subway station in what city was once valued at $15 million? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary

Edgar Rice Burroughs (1875)

After working numerous odd jobs, Burroughs tried his hand at writing, publishing his first story under the pen name Normal Bean in 1912. Two years later, he published Tarzan of the Apes, a story about an English boy raised by apes in Africa. Wildly successful, the book was the first in a series of 27 Tarzan titles. Burroughs later moved to Hollywood to supervise the filming of the first of the extremely successful Tarzan films. What city is named after his most famous character? Discuss

Source: The Free Dictionary