Larger Than Life! Real people who could be pulp heroes.

[freakboy6117]

Reading some of Christopher Lees Obituaries after yesterday I find myself thinking about real people who would make for interesting pulp heroes.

 

In lee's case RAF intelligence officer seconded to the SAS (possibly one of the inspirations for James bond) , expert fencer, multilingual, professional actor and Stuntman direct descendant of Charlemagne.

 

Also 

 

Buster Keaton Physical Phenomenon pioneering stunt man jackie chan before there was a jackie chan Parkourist before parkour

 

watch this video and tell me he wouldn't be an amazing pulp hero

 

 

so who else would you suggest 

[Nothere]

World traveler and adventurer. He ran with bulls in Spain, survived two plane crashes while on safari in Africa. Was a war reporter.

 

Need someone to help you find a lost artifact in treacherous terriain. Ask Ernest Hemmingway.

[Roter Baron]

The Buster Keaton movie is REALLY IMPRESSIVE! What an athlete!

[death tribble]

Patrick Leigh Fermor is another one who might be a good idea. This is the guy who on his gap year walked from the Hook of Holland to Constantinople. He later successfully kidnapped and extricated a German general from Crete.

 

Teddy Roosevelt.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Roosevelt

[freakboy6117]

A contemporary one but certainly has potential Lonnie Johnson is an African American inventor and engineer who holds more than 80 patents who worked on the stealth bomber and for NASA Before becoming a multi-millionaire by inventing the Super Soaker and NERF guns. I'm imagining if he had been born a little under 20 years earlier and ended up as a genius inventor with the Tuskegee Airmen

[Narratio]

A man who invents a NERF gun has way too much time on his hands and would be better used advising SF film writers why laptops can't really inject computer virus' into alien computer systems.

[freakboy6117]

that's the beauty of it he developed one of the most successful toy line of all time(He just sued Hasbro for back royalties to the tune of $73million)  then used the money to develop Green power systems.

[Lucius]

 

I didn't go far to find this

 

http://www.herogames.com/forums/topic/66970-the-bloody-baron-of-mongolias-bio-is-out/

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary accuses me of being lazy.

[FrankL]

Hedy Lamarr. Seriously. Her work in jamming radio controlled torpedoes laid the groundwork for Bluetooth and WiFi.

[John Desmarais]

Hedy Lamarr. Seriously. Her work in jamming radio controlled torpedoes laid the groundwork for Bluetooth and WiFi.

She also held one of the key patents for how cellular networks function.

[Lucius]

The truly amazing thing is how many amazing people there are and have been. We could be here all year.

 

One of my personal favorite heroes is Eugene Bullard.

 

An African-American born in Georgia, he ran away from home as a teenager, supported himself as a jockey among other things, travelled for a time with gypsies, eventually stowed away to Scotland, in another year or two made it to France, became a boxer, enlisted in the French Foreign Legion during the First World War when Germany invaded France, was wounded in combat, while recovering seized an opportunity to train as a pilot (note on the famous Tuskegee Airmen who came later, in the next world war: the Tuskegee Airmen were the first African-Americans to fly for the U.S. - Bullard fought and flew for France, making him the first African-American combat aviator, and before him had been an African-NOT-American in the Ottoman Air Force.) He flew in combat and was shot down at least once, but when the U.S.A. entered the war, he was the only one of the American volunteer fliers who were NOT incorporated into the American Army Air Corps. Between the wars he was a jazz drummer, owned and managed both a night club and an athletic club (his wounds had ended his career as a boxer) and married into a wealthy French family, fathering two daughters. He had learned German (as well as obviously French, English being his native tongue) and his nightclub proved popular with Germans, making him valuable to French intelligence as the next war loomed on the horizon. The reason I personally consider him a hero I admire is that when everyone in Paris was fleeing before the German invasion of 1940, Bullard gave his daughters to a friend he trusted to get them out of the country while he packed up some food and money and headed TOWARD the fighting, to volunteer to fight the Germans again. He was no longer a young man, he still bore the wounds of the last war that had ended his athletic career, no one in France could have pointed to him and said "You, Bullard, you have not done enough for France!" but he went out and put his life on the line again. After being wounded yet again, to the point he really couldn't keep fighting (his back would give him trouble the rest of his life) he finally fell back, made his way to Spain and took passage back to America, the land he had left more than twenty years earlier. He spent his last two decades in America in relative poverty and obscurity in between trips back to France for little things like accepting their highest military honors and accolades or being invited to rekindle the flame at the Tomb of their Unknown Soldier, but even on his deathbed one of his friends remarked that he looked less like an old man dying of cancer, and more like a prizefighter just resting between bouts.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

I have an excellent biography of the man somewhere around here, if the palindromedary hasn't eaten it....

[st barbara]

 One of my favorites (I have used him in my campaign) is General Smedley Butler. Twice winner of the Congressional Medal Of Honor, may have been responsible for stopping a coup against the U S government, author of the anti war pamphlet "War Is A Racket". Nicknamed "Old Duckboard" and "Gimlet Eye".

[Sundog]

Joseph Greenstein, The Mighty Atom

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Greenstein

http://www.badassoftheweek.com/index.cgi?id=651068116795

 

'Nuff said.

[tkdguy]

Another strongman. He died before the pulp era, but he fits the mold.

 

Louis Cyr

[Lucius]

Another strongman. He died before the pulp era, but he fits the mold.

 

Louis Cyr

 

He BROKE the mold.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary observes that was one cyriously strong man

[st barbara]

I am sure that I have mentioned him before but Reg "Snowy" Baker. Multi sport phenomenon , represented Australia in international competition in five sports, took part in 29 different sports, silent movie star, hollywood stunt man. Olympic silver medal (boxing 1908, middleweight) . The circumstances of this were somewhat controversial as his oponent's(JWHT Douglas), father in law was the referee and had the deciding vote in a split decision !

[Lord Liaden]

Can't overlook Harry Houdini. A master escape artist and illusionist is bound to come in handy. Not to mention that his penchant for debunking fraudulent occultists could draw him into various mysteries.

[Badger]

A recent find.  Better fit as a villan, though

 

Violette Morris-  Top French female athlete and autoracer,  turned Gestapo agent.

[tkdguy]

A couple more

 

Sidney Reilly

 

Jim Thorpe

[megaplayboy]

Howard Hughes. Rich, eccentric, adventurous. Nuttier than a fruit bat. But definitely someone who might go gallivanting off on an adventure. Howard Stark's portrayal is obviously influenced by him.

[tkdguy]

If we can expand the list to animals

 

Lady Wonder

[Badger]

If we can expand the list to animals

 

Lady Wonder

 

well, if we do we have to add from WWI "Sgt." Stubby

[st barbara]

Possibly more useful as a villain (partly because He made himself out to be evil)  Aleister Crowley deserves a mention. Occultist and British secret agent ! Then there is F A Mitchell-Hedges explorer, adventurer and the man whose daughter discovered the most famous of the Crystal Skulls.

[st barbara]

I'm reading a book about this guy at the moment Colonel Percy Fawcett. Explorer who disappeared into the wilds of Brazil in the 1920's while searching for "The Lost City Of Z". (He got a mention in "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull" from memory). Also his great rival Dr Alexander Hamilton Rice.

[Badger]

They did a documentary on Fawcett on the 2nd History Channel I saw a while ago.   (I believe his son went with him to boot)

 

 

Edit: On another note, those are the things I'd like to see on a history channel, but they get thrown aside for another special episode of Ancient Aliens