From History: Today's Famous Birthdays

Hi Steemians,

This is an effort to provide some information on Five selected famous personalities born on this day.

Courtesy of this information goes to onthisday.com, famousbirthdays.com and wikipedia.org and image source is mentioned under "Source" just below each image.

1. Charles Babbage

Source

Charles Babbage was an English mathematician, philosopher, mechanical engineer who is called as "Father of the computer" since he was the first person to invent a mechanical computer.

Babbage was brilliant in Mathematics from his childhood and completed his degree from Cambridge university.

Once he lectured in Royal Institution on Astronomy and was selected as Fellow of Royal Society in 1816.

In 1820, Babbage founded Astronomical society with an aim to reduce the astronomical calculations and that was the initial thought of building a computer.

Though he started working on mechanical computers, those were no completed due to lack of funds and the models he build are available in Science Museum, London.

He was awarded Knighthood and baronetcy, but he rejected both.

2. Baba Amte

Source

Murlidhar Devidas Amte popularly known as Baba Amte was an Indian social worker and worked for rehabilitation and empowerment of poor people suffering from leprosy.

He along with his wife, started an organization under name "Anandwan" in 1950, which served for the people with leprosy.

Baba Amte was an law student and practiced law for some time and attracted by Mahatma Gandhi and other freedom fighters to fight against British rule.

He gave up his law practice and started following Mahatma Gandhi. During those days, leprosy was considered as something untouchable and people use to keep the one suffering with leprosy away.

That is when Amte strives to eradicate the belief about leprosy.

He was also prominent in Narmada Bachao Andolan(Save Narmada River movement).

Baba Amte has been awarded with second and fourth highest civilian awards Padma Vibhushan and Padma Shri respectively along with United Nations Prize in the field of Human Rights, Ramon Magsaysay Award, Gandhi Peace Prize, Templeton Prize to name a few.

3. John Bradfield

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John Bradfield was an Australian engineer who is famous for overseeing the work of designing and building of Sydney Harbour Bridge.

After his post graduation, Bradfield worked for Queensland Railways as draftsman since he had got his doctor of science for his thesis on electric railways and Sydney Harbour bridge.

He then started working as Chief Engineer for New South Wales Public Department.

That is when Bradfield started proposals on suburban railways, underground railway and Sydney Harbour Bridge, but those couldn't be realized until end of World War I.

In 1922, after the war, the bill related to his proposals passed and the work on Sydney Harbour Bridge.

Bradfield has been honoured with both Sydney and Brisbane highways named in his honour as Bradfield Highways.

He received Peter Nicol Russell Memorial Medal by Institution of Engineers Australia.

4. Rohan Kanhai

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Rohan Kanhai is a former Indo-Guyaneese cricketer and former captain of West Indies cricket team who is widely considered as one of the best batsmen of 1960's.

He was part of the Cricket World cup winning team that won the inaugural version in 1975.

He was famous for unorthodox shots.

After his retirement, he was called on to become the first coach of national team.

It is also notable that playing for Warwickshire county, he scored 11615 runs at an healthy average of 51+.

5. Yohan Blake

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Yohan Blake is a Jamaican sprinter of 100 and 200 meters who was the youngest ever to win an gold medal at World Championships when he won a gold medal in 2011.

He is second best ever in 100 and 200 meter sprints behind only to Usain Bolt.

Blake is 2 time gold and 2 time silver medalist in Olympics and has won 2 golds in World Championships.