Born this week
Sunday February 15th, 2026
Erma Bombeck
February 21, 1927 – April 22, 1996
A friend never defends a husband who gets his wife an electric skillet for her birthday.
Erma Louise Bombeck was an American humorist who achieved great popularity for her newspaper column that described suburban home life from ...
Henry Adams
February 16, 1838 – March 27, 1918
The progress of evolution from President Washington to President Grant was alone evidence to upset Darwin.
Henry Brooks Adams was an American historian and member of the Adams political family, being descended from two U.S. Presidents. As a ...
W. H. Auden
February 21, 1907 – September 29, 1973
Now is the age of anxiety.
Wystan Hugh Auden, who published as W. H. Auden, was an Anglo-American poet, born in England, later an American citizen, and is regarded by ...
Anais Nin
February 21, 1903 – January 14, 1977
Age does not protect you from love. But love, to some extent, protects you from age.
Anaïs Nin was an author born to Cuban parents in France, where she was also raised. She spent some time in Spain and Cuba but lived most ...
Alfred North Whitehead
February 15, 1861 – December 30, 1947
Art attracts us only by what it reveals of our most secret self.
Alfred North Whitehead, OM FRS was an English mathematician and philosopher. He is best known as the defining figure of the philosophical ...
Susan B. Anthony
February 15, 1820 – March 13, 1906
Failure is impossible.
Susan Brownell Anthony was an American social reformer who played a pivotal role in the women's suffrage movement. Born into a Quaker ...
Ansel Adams
February 20, 1902 – April 22, 1984
Not everybody trusts paintings but people believe photographs.
Ansel Easton Adams was an American photographer and environmentalist. His black-and-white landscape photographs of the American West, ...
John Barrymore
February 15, 1882 – May 29, 1942
In Genesis, it says that it is not good for a man to be alone but sometimes it is a great relief.
John Barrymore was an American actor on stage, screen and radio. A member of the Drew and Barrymore theatrical dynasties, he initially ...
Ramakrishna
February 18, 1836 – August 16, 1886
Work, apart from devotion or love of God, is helpless and cannot stand alone.
Ramakrishna, born Gadadhar Chattopadhyay, was an Indian mystic during 19th-century. His religious school of thought led to the formation of ...
Audre Lorde
February 18, 1934 – November 17, 1992
I can't really define it in sexual terms alone although our sexuality is so energizing why not enjoy it too?
Audre Lorde was a Caribbean-American writer, radical feminist, womanist, lesbian, and civil rights activist. Lorde served as an inspiration ...
Jeremy Bentham
February 15, 1748 – June 6, 1832
The age we live in is a busy age in which knowledge is rapidly advancing towards perfection.
Jeremy Bentham was a British philosopher, jurist, and social reformer. He is regarded as the founder of modern utilitarianism. Bentham ...
Galileo Galilei
February 15, 1564 – January 8, 1642
If I were again beginning my studies, I would follow the advice of Plato and start with mathematics.
Galileo Galilei, often known mononymously as Galileo, was an Italian physicist, mathematician, engineer, astronomer, and philosopher who ...
Nikos Kazantzakis
February 18, 1883 – October 26, 1957
Beauty is merciless. You do not look at it, it looks at you and does not forgive.
Nikos Kazantzakis was a Greek writer and philosopher, celebrated for his novel Zorba the Greek, considered his magnum opus. He became known ...
Georges Bernanos
February 20, 1888 – July 5, 1948
Hell, madam, is to love no longer.
Georges Bernanos was a French author, and a soldier in World War I. Of Roman Catholic and monarchist leanings, he was critical of bourgeois ...
Huey Newton
February 17, 1942 – August 22, 1989
My fear was not of death itself, but a death without meaning.
Huey Percy Newton was an African-American political and urban activist who, along with Bobby Seale, co-founded the Black Panther Party in ...
Thomas J. Watson
February 17, 1874 – June 19, 1956
Design must reflect the practical and aesthetic in business but above all... good design must primarily serve people.
Thomas John Watson, Sr. was an American businessman. He served as the chairman and CEO of International Business Machines, and oversaw the ...
Ella Maillart
February 20, 1903 – March 27, 1997
The usual channels of university studies or secretarial work did not appeal to me. I cherished difficult dreams through confidence in myself.
Ella Maillart (or Ella K. Maillart; February 20, 1903, Geneva - March 27, 1997, Chandolin) was a French-speaking Swiss adventurer, travel ...
Barbara Jordan
February 21, 1936 – January 17, 1996
Education remains the key to both economic and political empowerment.
Barbara Charline Jordan was an American politician and a leader of the Civil Rights movement. She was the first African American elected to ...
Andre Breton
February 19, 1896 – September 28, 1966
Beauty will be convulsive or will not be at all.
André Breton was a French writer and poet. He is known best as the founder of Surrealism. His writings include the first Surrealist ...
Charles Eastman
February 19, 1858 – January 8, 1939
Friendship is held to be the severest test of character.
Charles Alexander Eastman was a Native American physician, writer, national lecturer, and reformer. In the early 20th century, he was "one ...
Sacha Guitry
February 21, 1885 – July 24, 1957
The best way to turn a woman's head is to tell her she has a beautiful profile.
Sacha Guitry was an actor, a film director, a playwright and a screenwriter.
G. M. Trevelyan
February 16, 1876 – July 21, 1962
Anger is a momentary madness, so control your passion or it will control you.
George Macaulay Trevelyan, OM, CBE, FRS, FBA, was a British historian. Trevelyan was the third son of Sir George Otto Trevelyan, 2nd ...
Charles M. Schwab
February 18, 1862 – September 18, 1939
The man who has done his best has done everything.
Charles Michael Schwab was an American steel magnate. Under his leadership, Bethlehem Steel became the second largest steel maker in the ...
Nicolaus Copernicus
February 19, 1473 – May 24, 1543
For it is the duty of an astronomer to compose the history of the celestial motions through careful and expert study.
Nicolaus Copernicus was a Renaissance mathematician and astronomer who formulated a model of the universe that placed the Sun rather than ...
Louis Kahn
February 20, 1901 – March 17, 1974
Architecture is the reaching out for the truth.
Louis Isadore Kahn was an American architect, based in Philadelphia. After working in various capacities for several firms in Philadelphia, ...
Jeanne Calment
February 21, 1875 – August 4, 1997
Death doesn't frighten me now I can think peacefully of ending a long life.
Jeanne Louise Calment was a French supercentenarian who had the longest confirmed human lifespan on record, living to the age of 122 years, ...
Robert Ley
February 15, 1890 – October 25, 1945
Only faith is sufficient.
Robert Ley was a Nazi politician and head of the German Labour Front from 1933 to 1945. He committed suicide while awaiting trial at ...
Elihu Root
February 15, 1845 – February 7, 1937
Men do not fail they give up trying.
Elihu Root was an American lawyer and statesman who served as the Secretary of War under two presidents, including President Theodore ...
Sonny Bono
February 16, 1935 – January 5, 1998
I'm not a lawyer, and maybe I should have used more specific legal language.
Salvatore Phillip "Sonny" Bono was an American recording artist and producer, who came to fame in partnership with his second wife Cher, as ...
Van Wyck Brooks
February 16, 1886 – May 2, 1963
The man who has the courage of his platitudes is always a successful man.
Van Wyck Brooks was an American literary critic, biographer, and historian.
Ernst Mach
February 18, 1838 – February 19, 1916
If our dreams were more regular, more connected, more stable, they would also have more practical importance for us.
Ernst Waldfried Josef Wenzel Mach was an Austrian physicist and philosopher, noted for his contributions to physics such as the Mach number ...
Wallace Stegner
February 18, 1909 – April 13, 1993
A teacher enlarges people in all sorts of ways besides just his subject matter.
Wallace Earle Stegner was an American historian, novelist, short story writer, and environmentalist, often called "The Dean of Western ...
Wendell Willkie
February 18, 1892 – October 8, 1944
Education is the mother of leadership.
Wendell Lewis Willkie was a corporate lawyer in the United States and a dark horse who became the Republican Party nominee for president in ...
Constantin Brancusi
February 19, 1876 – March 16, 1957
Architecture is inhabited sculpture.
Constantin BrâncuÈ™i was a Romanian sculptor, painter and photographer who made his career in France. Considered a pioneer of ...
Andres Segovia
February 21, 1893 – June 2, 1987
Among God's creatures two, the dog and the guitar, have taken all the sizes and all the shapes, in order not to be separated from the man.
Andrés Segovia Torres, 1st Marquis of Salobreña, known as Andrés Segovia, was a virtuoso Spanish classical guitarist from Linares, ...