25 Historical Badasses That Could Bring It in Any Era

We could use a few of these folks right about now
25 Historical Badasses That Could Bring It in Any Era
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Today, we feel inspired to really make something happen! We don’t exactly know what that something is, but when we figure it out, you better believe it’ll be a doozy. Something like taking a break from all these pop-culture facts to find facts about historical badasses.

Yeah, that’s what we’ll do! Displaying facts about badassery is badass enough for us. Badass adjacent, we’ll call it. This way we won’t have to leave the comfort of our office chair.

Alexander Hamilton

ALEXANDER HAMILTON was a champion of racial equality and created an advanced financial system for the U.S., which were revolutionary ideas for his time. Apparently there's even a musical or something about it. CRACKED

Ida Pfeiffer

IDA PFEIFFER was born in 1797 and, at 45, she set off on a solo journey to Istanbul, Palestine, Italy, and many other places, becoming the first woman to travel the world alone. During that one and other travels, she collected seeds, plants, and specimens. CRACKED

Al-Hasan Ibn Al-Haytham

Born in 965, AL-HASAN IBN AL-HAYTHAM made major discoveries about vision, optics and light, and is considered the Father of Modern Optics. His approach to research, which involved testing theories with experiments, was similar to the scientific method used today. CRACKED

Pete Seeger

Pete Seeger CRACKED.COM Folk singer Pete Seeger is perhaps best known for co-writing and popularizing the Civil Rights anthem We Shall Overcome, adapted from a hymn penned by Lucille Simmons which Seeger added a few verses to. All royalties from the song go to grants to African American activists organizing in the South. In addition, Seger founded the nonprofit Hudson River Sloop Clearwater which, after decades of activism and litigation, compelled General Electric to dredge toxins it had dumped into the river.

Benjamin Banneker

CRACKED BENJAMIN BANNEKER was a free African American who achieved great things in science and math at the turn of the 19th century, despite having only basic schooling. Не was even invited to join the survey team mapping out the new capital, Washington, D.C.

Sophie Germain

you the again property de clemon for et ات marrie be nombus Yun naturals paid depuid , p que cath propertities H 2) 2 A Born in 1776, SOPHIE GERMAIN was awarded a prize by the French Academy of Sciences for her paper on the patterns of vibration. Her work was crucial for applied mathematics, and is still used today in the construction of skyscrapers. a 4 too A CRACKED

Huda Sha’arawi

Huda Sha'arawí was a pioneer in feminist activism. She was the first Egyptian woman to found a philanthropic society, opened a school for girls, organized lectures, and founded the Egyptian Feminist Union, which still operates today. She began a movement to end the requirement that women wear veils by removing hers in public in Cairo. CRACKED.COM

Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo da Vinci fought for animal welfare. Leonardo had a habit of buying caged birds at the marketplace just to release them. Не was furious about the fact that humans raise animals just to slaughter them, and apparently refused to eat meat. CRACKED.COM

Mark Twain and Nikola Tesla

CRACKED MARK TWAIN AND NIKOLA TESLA Twain and Tesla were friends who got together in 1895. Tesla asked Twain to come to his lab and took a picture of him, which was published in a magazine. Twain was really interested in electricity and wrote about it in one of his books.

Percy Julian

In 1940, Percy Julian figured out how to isolate hormones so they could be used in medicine. These hormones are used in steroids, which are in everything from birth control pills to arthritis cream to asthma, eczema, and cancer treatments. His downfall came Yet he remains virtually when a disgruntled unknown. colleague leaked several snarky letters from Julian to the press. Couple that with an affair with his assistant's wife, and he became a pariah whom nobody noticed until 2004. CRACKED.COM http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/julian/producer.html

Alan Turning

ALAN TURING came up with the idea of a universal Turing machine, which was like a blueprint for a computer, and helped create the first electronic computer-all in the 1940s. CRACKED

Mary Shelley

MARY SHELLEY wrote a book at 19 that has become a classic - Frankenstein. Written in the 19th century, it was science fiction exploring themes of scientific progress, human dignity, and justice. CRACKED

Thomas Paine

THOMAS PAINE had some pretty forward-thinking ideas. In his pamphlet Agrarian Justice from the late 1700s, he proposed a social welfare system, a universal minimum income, and a tax on wealth and estates - ideas pretty radical even now. CRACKED

Ada Lovelace

ADA LOVELACE wrote about Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine, a computer he had designed, and showed that it could do complicated calculations by following a set of instructions (essentially, a program) in the early 1800s. CRACKED

Mary Edwards Walker

Born in 1832, MARY EDWARDS WALKER was a trailblazer for women's rights. She was the first woman to get the Medal of Honor, and she fought for women's clothing reform, health, temperance, and equal rights regardless of gender. CRACKED

Confucius

Confucius wasn't always popular. While Kong Qiu had some loyal students, he was relatively unknown in China during his lifetime. Only centuries later did his teachings become widespread, and he came to be known as Kong Fuzi, or Master Kong. CRACKED.COM

Vincent van Gogh

Vincent van Gogh died as he was starting to get attention. Some of van Gogh's most famous paintings were completed not too long before his death, when interest in his work was growing. CRACKED.COM

James Dean

James Dean's stardom lasted just one year. Other than bit parts, Dean was in only three movies. Two of those were released after his death, including Rebel Without a Cause, which turned him into a legend. CRACKED.COM

Belva Ann Lockwood

In 1876, Belva Ann Lockwood was forbidden from arguing before the U.S. Supreme Court because she was a woman. She then spent years lobbying for a law to fix that - submitting briefs, organizing petitions, and persuading senators. In 1879, she succeeded, and became the first woman lawyer heard by the Supreme Court. CRACKED.COM

Althea Gibson

CRACKED.COM Althea Gibson was the world's #1 tennis player in 1957, and was the first African-American to win the Wimbledon, French, and U.S. Opens. She was added to the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 1971, and had 11 championship titles under her belt.

Edith Cavell

Edith Cavell was a British nurse working in German- occupied Belgium during World War I. She healed, sheltered, and smuggled 75 injured British and French soldiers into Holland, as well as around 100 French and Belgian civilians. CRACKED COM

Zura Karuhimbi

Zura Karuhimbi saved more than 100 people during the Rwandan genocide, using her reputation as a witch to scare killers away. Whenever a militia neared her house, where she'd hidden would-be victims, she would shake her bracelets and threaten to curse them and their families. She would even touch them with a skin-irritating herb. They avoided her house. GRAGKED.COM

Yu Gwan-sun

In 1919, at the age of 16, Yu Gwan-sun fought for Korean independence, protesting Japanese colonial rule. She was sent to prison, where she organized a large-scale protest a year later. She kept fighting for independence despite torture which eventually led to her death. She's been called 4111 the Korean Joan of Arc. CRACKED.COM

Jeannette Rankin

CRACKED.COM Jeannette Rankin was elected as the first woman member of Congress in 1916, four years before American women were allowed to vote. I may be the first woman member of Congress, but I won't be the last. -Jeannette Rankin As a determined pacifist, she voted against the participation of the US in both world wars, despite knowing that it would damage her career. After her retirement, she continued to advocate for peace, denouncing the Vietnam War.

Beate Sirota Gordon

CRACKED.COM Beate Sirota Gordon secretly introduced equal rights and women's civil rights to post-WWII Japan - and got away with it. As a part of the subcommittee tasked to write Japan's new constitution, she included a few articles that denounced gender and racial discrimination without telling anyone about it, altering Japan's civil rights forever.

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