The quality people in history

I think all people like to look up to someone that provides all the qualities of being someone to admire. There have been many people who have traversed through the centuries into our history books, and some who we may know about and others we never meet in a lifetime. I was reading about Franklin Delano Roosevelt who served 3 terms as President of the United States from 1933 through to 1945. A period of just a little over 10 years. In his speeches to the nation during the Great Depression, Roosevelt spoke to his countrymen by radio broadcasts known as his 'fire side chats'. These chats were to provide comfort to the many millions of people affected by poverty, and depression. Franklin Roosevelt also suffered from Polio and history tells us that this was a debilitating disease causing paralysis of the legs and other limbs with the only real treatment of the time being confinement to an iron lung. I have always had an interest in history because in my opinion history reveals the failures, achievements and mistakes made by humans. Throughout life we have built things, destroyed things, competed against each other and seen the world plunge into wars. The construction of the RMS Titanic for instance was an exercise in human ego being the world's tallest ship and being sunk by a collision with an iceberg at mid sea in April 1912. Quality people in history are those who have performed with modesty in their roles and often they are simply forgotten about and not enough attention is really paid to their input into the world as too much focus can be on certain factors and events. While I sit writing this blog entry I am aware of the light bulb that casts light onto the computer screen in front of me which has existed longer as a simple everyday device than the computer. When Thomas Edison crafted the light bulb it took him several attempts to get it to work. He was blowing up bulbs more so than achieving his desired expectation with them and Edison famous quote "Genius is 1% inspiration 99% percent perspiration" is something that portrays his determination and frustration in life. When we live our lives we are reliant on objects that surround us but leading busy lives we are not always aware of their historical significance or perhaps the people who helped to bring to our lives the very necessities that we rely on today. Some of the quality people I admire in history are many but Theodore Roosevelt is one with his stirring speeches, Abraham Lincoln whom I believe was modest and suffered a lot of strain in his life and Helen Keller who despite her critics, succeeded in over coming all difficulties. I think too often that people of quality seem to fall away to those who take all of the lime light and one wonders why this is the case. Quality is something that perhaps needs to be crafted in people and sadly it is disappearing at a fast rate today.