Josiah Wedgwood famous for pottery

It is the birthday of the famous English potter Josiah Wedgwood (1730), whose unique pottery design is known throughout the world and is still manufactured today. Wedgwood was intensely interested in scientific advancements, and that curiosity fueled his improvement of the quality of his pottery and methods for producing it. Wedgwood also was a leader in the British abolitionist movement and is famous for producing an anti-slavery medallion titled “Am I Not a Man and a Brother?” The eldest of Wedgwood’s four daughters, Susannah, was Charles Darwin’s mother.

Joseph Hooker, leading British botanist

It is the birthday of great 19th century British botanist Joseph Dalton Hooker (1817), who was Charles Darwin’s closest friend, and was a sounding board as Darwin developed his theory of evolution. Hooker served as director of the Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew, and helped establish it as a leading center for botanical research. With voyages to Antarctica, the Himalayas, India, Palestine, Morocco, and the western United States, Hooker built his own reputation as a botanical authority. He trained Walter Hood Fitch, who became a renowned botanical artist and illustrated many of Hooker’s works. Hooker’s best known work is the seven-volume Flora of British India (1872-1897). He also published the three-volume Flora Antarctica: the botany of the Antarctic voyage (1844-1859), Himalayan Journals (1855), and Handbook of the British flora (1858), a project started by acclaimed botanist George Bentham and completed by Hooker. The book is known in botanical circles as “Bentham & Hooker.”

Julia Cameron photographed Victorian celebs

Portrait of Julia Cameron (1870) by her husband; inset: English actress Ellen Terry in a portrait titled Sadness (1864).

It is the birthday of pioneer British photographer Julia Margaret Cameron (1815), whose engaging portraits of Victorian celebrities like Charles Darwin and Alfred Lord Tennyson are considered valuable resources among art historians. Cameron met the rich and famous at salons on the Kensington Palace estate in London. She also lived on the Isle of Wight, where Tennyson was a neighbor and friend. Tennyson often brought famous friends over to visit. Cameron was known for her tightly cropped, soft focus images, a technique unusual for the time. Cameron also shot historical scenes and characters from literature. Tennyson asked her to create photographic illustrations for his massive narrative poem Idylls of the King (1859-1885).

Happy birthday, Thomas Huxley

It is the birthday of English biologist Thomas Huxley (1825), who became a well-known advocate of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, earning him the nickname Darwin's Bulldog. He was self-trained and did early study on invertebrates, contributing to the wider understanding of relationships between various groups. Later, he studied vertebrates, including humans and apes. His study of contemporary birds and small dinosaurs led him to the theory that the birds evolved from dinosaurs. He advocated energetically for scientific education. Famously he debated with Anglican Bishop Samuel Wilberforce about humans being descended from apes. Other scientists also participated in the debate, too, but the Wilberforce-Huxley exchange was said to be the most heated. Huxley's grandson was author Aldous Huxley.

Frank Norris wrote McTeague, The Octopus

Still from Erich von Stroheim's 1924 film Greed.

It is the birthday of writer Frank Norris (1870), whose novels McTeague (1899), The Octopus (1901), and The Pit (1903) are considered by scholars to be prime examples of naturalism in American literature. Norris was heavily influenced by the work of French naturalist writer Emile Zola and by the ideas of naturalist Charles Darwin. McTeague is set in San Francisco during the Gold Rush. It was the basis of Erich von Stroheim's 1924 film Greed, a 10-hour epic that has been lost. Foreign film translator Herman Weinberg compiled and edited a book, The Complete Greed of Erich von Stroheim (1972), containing a comprehensive collection of stills from the film. The Octopus dealt with the struggle between wheat farmers and the railroad monopolies in California at the end of the 19th century. The Pit, which was published after Norris died, was about wheat speculation and the trading pits of the Chicago Board of Trade. Norris died before he finished The Wolf: A Story of Empire, the third part of a planned trilogy on wheat.

Happy birthday, Charles Darwin

It is the birthday of English naturalist Charles Darwin (1809), whose book On the Origin of Species (1859) laid out his theory of the evolution and an explanation of the diversity of life on earth. sparked a debate about human existence that rages on today. Here is the beginning of an excellent 1991 documentary about Darwin's book and the ensuing clash of thought and belief.

Aldous Huxley wrote Brave New World

Aldous Huxley

It is the birthday of English writer Aldous Huxley (1894), whose science fiction novel Brave New World (1932) is considered among the best English-language novels of the 20th century.

The book predicted the loss of individual identity in a world of mass production. Huxley wrote it partly as a parody of H.G. Wells' A Modern Utopia (1905) and his Men Like Gods (1923), books that presented an upbeat vision of the future. Huxley took a dim view of what was to come. When it was published, Brave New World was widely panned by critics but has since come into favor in literary circles.

Huxley came from a family of overachievers. His father was an educator and writer. His grandfather was a prominent biologist and such a staunch advocate of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution that he earned the appellation "Darwin's Bulldog." His brother and half brother were also biologists.

Huxley first trained in his father's botanical lab and was taught by his mother until she died. Then he went to Eton College and later Oxford. He was exempted from military duty during World War I because of an illness that left him mostly blind, though in later years he recovered most of his eyesight.

He taught French at Eton for a year and proved to be a terrible teacher, unable to maintain discipline in his classes. Among his students was Eric Blair, who later became George Orwell. He eventually started writing and wrote several novels and many magazine articles. He was a regular contributor to Vanity Fair.

Huxley moved to Hollywood in 1937 and lived there until his death in 1963, though he lived for a brief time in Taos, New Mexico. He wrote Ends and Means (1937), a collection of essays on ethics, nationalism, religion, and war. He was a vocal pacifist.

 He tried writing for the movies, completing a screenplay for Madame Curie for MGM and contributing to the studio's 1940 version of Pride and Prejudice. He also worked on the 1943 production of Jane Eyre for 20th Century Fox. But his leisurely style didn't fit energetic Hollywood.

He later became interested in spiritualism and psychedelic drugs. He became associated with Swami Prabhavananda in Hollywood and became active with the Vedanta Society of Southern California. He wrote extensively for the organization.

Huxley died on the same day that John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Author C.S. Lewis also died that day. Christian theology writer Peter Kreeft was inspired by those events to write the novel Between Heaven and Hell: A Dialog Somewhere Beyond Death with John F. Kennedy, C.S. Lewis, and Aldous Huxley (1982), in which the three men discuss Jesus from different points of view.

Brave New World was adapted as a TV movie in 1998.

Thomas Huxley, early evolutionist

Thomas Huxley

It is the birthday of English biologist Thomas Huxley (1825), one of the most vociferous advocates of the theory of evolution and the premier advocate of science in 19th century Britain. He was largely self-educated but rose to become a prominent leader in British zoology. His Evidence as to Man's Place in Nature (1863) was the first book devoted to human evolution. It makes the case that man and apes came from a common ancestor. It was published four years after Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species but Darwin was careful to avoid dealing with human evolution in that book. (Darwin dealt with the subject in The Descent of Man, published in 1871.) Much of the material in Huxley's book had been published in his scientific papers and distributed to a very selected audience. His book marked the first time such theories had received the attention of a wider educated public. Huxley compares adult human anatomy with that of apes. He makes the case that humans should be considered primates. Author Aldous Huxley was Thomas' grandson.