Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (10/2/1869-1/30/48) was the preeminent political & spiritual leader of India during its independence movement. He was the pioneer of satyagraha resistance to tyranny thru mass civil disobedience, founded upon ahimsa or total nonviolence which led the subcontinent to independence & inspired movements for civil rights & freedom worldwide. He's commonly known as Mahatma ("Great Soul", an honorific 1st applied to him by Rabindranath Tagore) & in India also as Bapu or "Father"). He's officially honored as the Father of the Indian Nation; his birthday is commemorated there as Gandhi Jayanti, a nat'l holiday, & worldwide as the Int'l Day of Nonviolence. He 1st employed nonviolent civil disobedience while an expatriate lawyer in S. Africa, during the resident Indian community's struggle for civil rights. After his return to India in 1915, he organized protests by peasants & workers concerning excessive land-tax & discrimination. After assuming Indian Nat'l Congress leadership in 1921, he led campaigns to ease poverty, expand women's rights, build religious & ethnic amity, end untouchability & increase economic self-reliance. Above all, he aimed to achieve Swaraj or independence. He famously led the Noncooperation movement protesting the British-imposed salt tax with the 240 mile Dandi Salt March in 1930. Later he campaigned against the British to Quit India. He spent a number of years in jail in both S. Africa & India. As an ahimsa practitioner, he swore to speak the truth & advocated others do the same. He lived modestly in a self-sufficient residential community & wore the traditional dhoti & shawl, woven with yarn he'd handspun on a charkha. He ate simple vegetarian food & undertook fasts as a means of both self-purification & social protest."
Wm Lawrence Shirer (2/23/04-12/28/93), journalist & historian, became known for his CBS broadcasts from Berlin thru the 1st year of WWII. He became famous by his account of those years in Berlin Diary (1941), but his greatest achievement was his 1960 book, The Rise & Fall of the 3rd Reich, 1st published by Simon & Schuster. This book of over 1000 pages remains in print & is a detailed examination of the 3rd Reich filled with historical information from captured German archives, along with impressions gained during days as a correspondent. Later, in 1969, his The Collapse of the Third Republic drew on his experience spent working in France from 1925 to 1933. It's filled with historical information about the Battle of France from the secret orders & reports of the High Command & of the commanding generals of the field. He also used the memoirs, journals & diaries of the prominent British, Italian, Spanish & French figures in government, Parliament & the Army.