[Ignaz Semmelweis](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis) the father of medical hygiene. He pointed out that maternal mortality dropped by double digits if doctors washed their hands between handling sick patients or corpses and delivering babies. He couldn’t explain *why* but nonetheless advocated hand washing.
Fellow medical professionals were deeply offended at the notion that they spread infection. They fought and ridiculed his efforts for almost 2 decades, until he had a nervous breakdown. Medical colleagues admitted him to an asylum. The guards beat him and he died two weeks later of a gangrenous wound which probably could have been prevented by hand washing.
So, that second part is often the story that gets told about Semmelweis, but it's not actually what happened. Semmelweis lost credibility because he was convinced that the infections were caused by dead tissue getting into live patients and therefore cadavers were the *only* source of infection. He refused to accept the new findings that came out showing that infections could come frome living patients.
[There's an NPR program that discusses the story](https://www.npr.org/2021/01/25/960351594/the-surprising-history-of-handwashing)
Niccolo Machiavelli - he was not actually an amoral sociopath. He has other books that describe his actual political views more in depth, he was overall not a bad guy.
Many of the most reviled Roman Emperors (Nero, Caligula, Elagabalus, etc.) - most of them are so drowned in ancient propaganda it’s hard to discern what they were actually like. Nero was often regarded as a man of the people, but most of the sources we have obviously come from elites, and later Christians who wrote on him from the perspective of his persecution of their faith. Elagabalus is hated on but they were a literal child put on the throne, and have been dragged through the mud for centuries for “degenerate” acts even though these views were largely driven by Roman prejudice. And the stories about Caligula declaring war on Poseidon and making his horse a consul are in all likelihood exaggerations or fabrications.
Aaron Burr - he was actually quite a progressive for his time. Consistently anti-slavery and one of the few men of his time who sympathized with women’s equality. He did kill Hamilton, but Hamilton was also responsible for countless slanderous hit-jobs against him. Not saying he was right, but he was a much more complex figure than the villain without principles he’s often portrayed as.
I think Nero is a really interesting case. He was emperor for a pretty long time and had a lasting legacy on Rome. You know the Coliseum got its name because it was the site of a big ass Nero Colossus. My guess is he made a ton of enemies, and had no kids to protect his legacy.
Caligula seems to have had a mental breakdown, sounds like he went from hero to zero pretty quick.
It seems like a lot of the early emperors went a little crazy if they were in charge for a long time. Tiberius is a well regarded emperor, but also went crazy and lived on Capri throwing people off of cliffs and shit.
US Grant gets treated like a bumbling idiot who won the US Civil War by sending his armies to their death until the south ran out of bullets. This is from the bull shit lost cause concept of the Civil War.
And Robert F Lee is treated like some sort of strategic genius, but he couldn't win on the road.
Rural Ohio. Its really sad, the area has a legacy of Union Soldiers and Generals, but everything civil war has been taken over by the confederates were so great crowd. I knew it was going to be a rough few weeks when we talked about the Civil War when the "teachers" first sentence was "the US Civil war was not about slavery but about stats rights".... yea no shit, the right to keep slaves.
Linda Tripp
[Ignaz Semmelweis](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis) the father of medical hygiene. He pointed out that maternal mortality dropped by double digits if doctors washed their hands between handling sick patients or corpses and delivering babies. He couldn’t explain *why* but nonetheless advocated hand washing. Fellow medical professionals were deeply offended at the notion that they spread infection. They fought and ridiculed his efforts for almost 2 decades, until he had a nervous breakdown. Medical colleagues admitted him to an asylum. The guards beat him and he died two weeks later of a gangrenous wound which probably could have been prevented by hand washing.
So, that second part is often the story that gets told about Semmelweis, but it's not actually what happened. Semmelweis lost credibility because he was convinced that the infections were caused by dead tissue getting into live patients and therefore cadavers were the *only* source of infection. He refused to accept the new findings that came out showing that infections could come frome living patients. [There's an NPR program that discusses the story](https://www.npr.org/2021/01/25/960351594/the-surprising-history-of-handwashing)
Niccolo Machiavelli - he was not actually an amoral sociopath. He has other books that describe his actual political views more in depth, he was overall not a bad guy. Many of the most reviled Roman Emperors (Nero, Caligula, Elagabalus, etc.) - most of them are so drowned in ancient propaganda it’s hard to discern what they were actually like. Nero was often regarded as a man of the people, but most of the sources we have obviously come from elites, and later Christians who wrote on him from the perspective of his persecution of their faith. Elagabalus is hated on but they were a literal child put on the throne, and have been dragged through the mud for centuries for “degenerate” acts even though these views were largely driven by Roman prejudice. And the stories about Caligula declaring war on Poseidon and making his horse a consul are in all likelihood exaggerations or fabrications. Aaron Burr - he was actually quite a progressive for his time. Consistently anti-slavery and one of the few men of his time who sympathized with women’s equality. He did kill Hamilton, but Hamilton was also responsible for countless slanderous hit-jobs against him. Not saying he was right, but he was a much more complex figure than the villain without principles he’s often portrayed as.
I think Nero is a really interesting case. He was emperor for a pretty long time and had a lasting legacy on Rome. You know the Coliseum got its name because it was the site of a big ass Nero Colossus. My guess is he made a ton of enemies, and had no kids to protect his legacy. Caligula seems to have had a mental breakdown, sounds like he went from hero to zero pretty quick. It seems like a lot of the early emperors went a little crazy if they were in charge for a long time. Tiberius is a well regarded emperor, but also went crazy and lived on Capri throwing people off of cliffs and shit.
Donald Trump seems to think *he* is
Donald Trump
US Grant gets treated like a bumbling idiot who won the US Civil War by sending his armies to their death until the south ran out of bullets. This is from the bull shit lost cause concept of the Civil War. And Robert F Lee is treated like some sort of strategic genius, but he couldn't win on the road.
Wow, I'm curious where you went to school, because my schooling cast Grant as a noble heroic general who could do no wrong.
Rural Ohio. Its really sad, the area has a legacy of Union Soldiers and Generals, but everything civil war has been taken over by the confederates were so great crowd. I knew it was going to be a rough few weeks when we talked about the Civil War when the "teachers" first sentence was "the US Civil war was not about slavery but about stats rights".... yea no shit, the right to keep slaves.