In Celebration of Fathers' Day - June 18, 2023 (Sunday): Fathers of Great Men and Women. Many great men and women came from humble birth.

In Celebration of Fathers' Day - June 18, 2023

Fathers of Great Men and Women

Many great men and women came from humble birth.

“His heritage to his children wasn’t words or possessions, but an unspoken treasure, the treasure of his example as a man and a father.” 

– Will Rogers, Jr.

"Greatness, they say, runs in the family. Not really. Many great men and women came from humble birth." - avr

Let's take these examples.

1. Abraham Lincoln's father was a poor farmer and laborer.
2. The father of the great explorer James Cook was a farm worker.
3. The father of France greatest heroine, Joan of Arc, was a farmer.
4. Christopher Columbus was the son of a weaver.
5. Sigmund Freud's father was a wool merchant.
6. The father of Henry Ford was a farmer.
7. Marco Polo's father was a traveling merchant.
8. Sir Francis Drake was brought up a Puritan, his father Edmund Drake was a clergyman. 
9. David Livingstone's parents were poor, David had to work in a factory at age 10.
10. The father of Lech Walesa, leader of Solidarity that freed Poland, was a carpenter.
11. Daniel Webster was the son of a poor farmer.
12. Benjamin Franklin was the son of a soap maker.
13. The father of Charles Dickens was a wage earner, clerk in the Navy Pay Office.
14. Joseph Haydn's father made and repaired wheels of all kinds.
15. Emperor Diocletian was the son of a slave.
16. Pablo Picasso's father was a painter, but handed over his brushes and paints to his son after discovering his artistic genius. PHOTO 
17. The father of Shakespeare was a wool merchant. 
18. Albert Einstein's father failed as a businessman 
19. Virgil's father was a porter and for years a slave.
20. Franz Schubert's father was a modest schoolmaster.
21. Nelson Mandela, South Africa's living hero, came from a family of herdsmen, born in a thatched hut.
22. The father of John Paul II was an army sergeant.
23. Mother Teresa (Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu) was a daughter of an Albanian grocer.
24. Maria Montessori, founder of the Montessori school, was the daughter of a civil servant
25. George Frederick Handel's father was a barber-surgeon.
26. Joseph Stalin's father was an alcoholic, beat the young Joseph, deserted the family.
27. Ludwig Beethoven's father was ruthless to the young Ludwig.
28. The father of Lyndon Johnson, US president, earned a teacher's certificate, went to farming and local politics.

29. Former US President Richard Nixon grew in poverty, family illness and endless work.
30. Mikhail Gorbachev, the man who "made the USSR disappear" was born from simple peasant parents, and grandparents.
31. Mao Zedong was the son of an obscure peasant from the vast hinterland of China.
32. Austrian composer Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) was the second of twelve children born to a kindly couple of music-loving peasants.  His father Matias Haydn made and repaired wheels of all kinds. 
33. Franz Schubert (1797-1828) was born into a family that regarded music very highly.  His father was a modest schoolmaster.                  
34. The father of John Wesley, founder of Methodism, was a rector of Epworth Rectory
35. Captain James Cook was born of poor parents in 1728 in a village in Yorkshire where his father worked on a farm.  
36. Jesus Christ's father - St Joseph - was a carpenter.

On the other hand, the following great men and women, in spite of their more fortunate  origins, followed the lives of humility, dedicated service, unfailing commitment, like their counterparts who had simpler origins.  

1. Charles Darwin's father was a medical doctor, his grandfather Erasmus Darwin was a renown scientist.
2. The father of Florence Nightingale (PHOTO) founder of the nursing profession was a rich man.  She was born in Florence (hence her name) but returned to England as a little girl.  
3. Leonardo da Vinci's father was a notary, or lawyer and his mother was a peasant girl.
4. Michelangelo's father, Ludovico, was a magistrate and proud of his noble ancestry.
5. The father of Renaissance painter Raphael, contemporary of Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo  was an artist of some reputation, employed by the dukes of Urbino near Florence
6. The father of George Frederick Handel (1685-1759) was a prominent barber-surgeon in the town of Halle, Germany. 

References: Living with Nature  AVRotor; Jokes, Quotes and One-Liners for Public Speakers, Prochnow HV and HV Prochnow Jr, 1897, 1931; Ladybird Book Series 

                   He never made a fortune, or a noise

He never made a fortune, or a noise

In the world where men are seeking after fame;
But he had a healthy brood of girls and boys
Who loved the very ground on which he trod.
They thought him just a little short of God;
Oh, you should have heard the way they said his name—‘Father.’

                        –Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850–1919)

* Father’s Day celebrates and honors the men who have embraced the essential role of fatherhood. On this day, we also thank fathers and father figures (uncles, grandfathers) for the sacrifices they make, for embracing the responsibility of nurturing and raising children, and for their devotion to their families. (From the Internet - (avr) ~