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Friday, June 22, 2007 - 3:19pmSanction this postReply
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Steve Ditko!

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Post 1

Friday, June 22, 2007 - 4:39pmSanction this postReply
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At times, I wish I WAS Steve Ditko!

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(Edited by Rodney Rawlings on 6/22, 6:08pm)


Post 2

Friday, June 22, 2007 - 6:20pmSanction this postReply
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Tough choice, but having just read the Benjamin Franklin autobiography (the new one published from his letters) I vote for him, he seemed such a genuine, sincere, intelligent, and engaging person.

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Friday, June 22, 2007 - 11:05pmSanction this postReply
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Benjamin Franklin would be an excellent choice but at the moment I was thinking about a more obscure gentleman by the name of Heron and would like to learn more about him.

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Saturday, June 23, 2007 - 5:25pmSanction this postReply
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I voted for Aspasia.  I'd like to bring her to here and now and let her see it all.  We'd have to do that slowly across the centuries, of course, maybe take a few days touring Europe, you might say.  I mean, realize that for her, stuffed grape leaves were 1500 years in the future.  So, I couldn't just bring her to the local Parthenon restaurant for ouzo.  IN fact, she'd likely find restaurants bizarre: stuffed with people ignoring each other.  Think about that.  I'd probably arrange some kind of symposium -- literally drinking together.  Then, we could disuss the rest back at my place...


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Saturday, June 23, 2007 - 8:59pmSanction this postReply
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I would have Artemisia Gentileschi over. *smiles* She's one of my favorite artists, and I think living in a different standard than was expected of women during her time- furthermore, she made her way on her own terms as an individual, took pride in her capabilities, and we'd have a lot in common from what I know of her.



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Post 6

Sunday, June 24, 2007 - 9:05amSanction this postReply
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img156/821/leharfc4.jpg
Franz Lehár (see my two music articles on this site)


img412/2059/gishsuperstock486385zt9.jpg
Lillian Gish (enough said)

--but not on the same dinner date! (He was a rake in his younger years.)


Post 7

Sunday, June 24, 2007 - 2:12pmSanction this postReply
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Wishing the dinner with her as a young woman or as an elder actress?     Had the pleasure many years ago of meeting her, and listening to her tales of her days with Griffith and her sister, and how things had changed cinematically beyond sound and color in movies....  unfortunately, never occurred to me then to inquire on more philosophical issues, primarily because never thought to bother others on such, since often 'saw' how they felt about things in the way they mentioned this or that in their conversations.....

Ben Franklin, yes, would have inquired, since he was much as Teller was when met him, and the scientific viewpoint 'coloring' the rest of the person's view of life is fascinating....

In other words, would one be asking the same kinds of questions to the different persons, or would they be tailored specifically to that one individual, often then not mentioning what would otherwise be important questions to one but not to another...


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Sunday, June 24, 2007 - 2:22pmSanction this postReply
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Hm ... Robert, what person of consequence haven't you met besides me? 

What was the occasion of your conversation?


Post 9

Sunday, June 24, 2007 - 2:25pmSanction this postReply
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In her case, it came about as a consequence of her doing tours working from her book - The Movies, Mr Griffith, and Me..... and at the time, I knew a woman whose aunt knew her - so had an interesting dinner ....;-)

As to a 'person of consequence not met', LOL - there are many would have liked to have met and never did, and some still could meet, yet not care to.....

(Edited by robert malcom on 6/24, 2:29pm)


Post 10

Sunday, June 24, 2007 - 2:44pmSanction this postReply
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To answer your question, I would like to meet her at any age--she was a kind of genius--but to do so while she looked as in the picture would add a certain ... je sais quoi!

Post 11

Sunday, June 24, 2007 - 4:25pmSanction this postReply
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Bob, is Ditko dead? I would have made an entirely different list had I had living people in mind.

T

Post 12

Sunday, June 24, 2007 - 5:02pmSanction this postReply
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For me, it was a toss up between Herodotus and Claudius Caesar.

Claudius, before he became emperor, knew all the previous emperors intimately and had worked as an academic. He wrote a tract on the Etruscans which would have made their otherwise lost origins known to us.

Herodotus, ~500BC, wrote the greatest extant history of the Ancient known world. (The map is a reconstruction of his known world.) Supporters have called him the Father of History, detractors the Father of Lies. Modern historians have doubted his stories and been proven wrong in their doubt, time and time again. He noted the Phoenician circumnavigation of Africa 2,000 before the Portuguese. They had repolrted that in the extreme south, the Sun appeared on one's right as one travels westward. He told a story of giant mountain ants from India that dig gold from the ground. Only recently, his claim was shown to be factual - the mountain ants were ground-hogs (apparently a mistranslation, due to the similarity of the words in Persian) and until this day the locals gather their diggings to collect the gold dust. Herodotus is also our earliest source for many of the peoples of Siberia, Africa, and Europe. He knew of Kilimanjaro and its snows. Imagine the knowledge that could have been gleaned from him that is forever lost to history.

Ted Keer
(Edited by Ted Keer
on 6/25, 1:41pm)


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Post 13

Sunday, June 24, 2007 - 5:16pmSanction this postReply
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Sarah France: I would have Artemisia Gentileschi over.

Artemisia Gentileschi here.
Thanks for the reference, Sarah!


Post 14

Sunday, June 24, 2007 - 5:22pmSanction this postReply
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Part of the problem here is - for instance in my case - picking a person 'of consequence' would be someone in fields of interest to me, for instance like Howard Pyle or Richard Feynman or Tom Paine himself, or Lavoisier or Archemides, or John James Audubon - those who exhibited an expertise beyond just their reknown yet whose reknown was one of interest to me.....

[Feynman was one, like Norman Rockwell, whom could have met, but never did - to regrets.... think he would have been more interesting than Teller][but Teller was visiting a university was at, and Feynman wasn't, so met the one, not the other..]

If it seems odd that have met so many 'known' people, consider that the 'six degrees of separation' is very true, and in many cases, less than six - so unless ye a hermit with little getting around, meeting isn't as hard as first presumed - if it is something wanted very much to do, or be fortunate, like me, to stumble among them.....;-)


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Sunday, June 24, 2007 - 11:25pmSanction this postReply
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What about Thomas Jefferson?

(Edited by Chris Baker on 6/24, 11:25pm)


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Post 16

Monday, June 25, 2007 - 9:24amSanction this postReply
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Bob, is Ditko dead?
 He's alive and, from what I've heard, well.




Post 17

Monday, June 25, 2007 - 10:21amSanction this postReply
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What about Thomas Jefferson? (Chris)

I'm with Chris; I'd like to meet him, too. 

Good choice.




 



Post 18

Monday, June 25, 2007 - 10:35amSanction this postReply
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Put me down for Noel Coward.  To judge from the biographical data, he really was good company, and you asked us to spend an evening with our guest.

Garbo was famously not much of a talker, and people who knew her said she was given to ditzy conversational non-sequiturs.  See her in the flesh just once and meet her briefly, yes.  From the opposite direction, know her as a friend.  A few hours in a small gathering would be more difficult.

Frank Lloyd Wright was a well-known charmer, but my impression is that he worked too hard at it and came out sounding a little pompus, at least in later years.  Rand is one of many who picked up on this.

(Edited by Peter Reidy on 6/25, 12:30pm)


Post 19

Monday, June 25, 2007 - 1:33pmSanction this postReply
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My criteria in selecting proposed dinner guests was that they were interesting in and of themselves, that they also had some general impact on history, and that they also knew others of historical import. The person I was most tempted to omit was Oscar Wilde, as of little historical influence. But he was still widely travelled in the upper circles of his day, had a real impact on literature, and was, of course, one of the greatest wits ever.

Regarding Jefferson, of course he would be a good choice, but I figured that if I chose more than one of the Founding Fathers, there would be nowhere to draw the line. I chose Franklin since he was better travelled than Jefferson, more accomplished scientifically and entrepreneurally, and was a much more active character in the revolution. Jefferson has great characteristics, but without him, while we might have ended up with a Washingtonian monarchy or, at least, a much stronger executive, without Franklin I doubt there would have been a principled revolution - an anarchical rebellion perhaps - but not the reluctant revolution that we happily got.

Again, my ulterior motive is to get people to make suggestions like Ditko whom I would never have considered myself.

Ted

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