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Contents 1 Historical Personalities 2 Locating Biographical Information

Historical Personalities

Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-78) or David Hume (1711-76), philosophers
Marie-Antoinette (1755-93, queen of France)
Louis Antoine de Saint-Just (1767-94) and Georges-Jacques Danton (1759-94), revolutionaries
Germaine De Staël (1766-1817), intellectual
Prince Klemens von Metternich (1773-1859), politician
Josiah Wedgwood (1730-1795), entrepreneur
Isaac Newton (1643-1742), scientist
Karl Marx (1818-1883), sociologist
George Sand (1804-1876), writer
Giuseppe Garibaldi (1807-1882), freedom fighter
Charles Darwin (180901882), scientist
David Livingstone (1813-1873), geographer
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), psychologist
Leon Trotsky (1879-1940), revolutionary
Rosa Luxemburg (1870-1919), revolutionary
Josef Stalin 1858-1953), dictator
Anne Frank (1929-1945), a girl
Klaus Graf Stauffenberg (1907-1944), German Officer and Resistance fighter
Joseph McCarthy, US-Senator (1908-19570
Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986), feminist
Bob Dylan, (1941*)
Michail Gorbachev (1931*), politician

Locating Biographical Information

Online Resources
The following resources offer brief biographical information about people from all times and places. This information is best used for deciding who to research further or for identifying other resources.
Located under Biography Research Databases.

Biography and Geneology Master Index 

No actual biographies, but it will tell you which books have biographical information on the person. Useful for difficult to locate names.

Discovering Collection 

Brief biographies.

Located under History Research Databases

History Study Center 

Contains somewhat more in-depth information.

Reference Books in the College of DuPage Library
There is a section for biography in the Library which contains general information on all people and time periods. Some recommended titles are:

• Dictionary of World Biography : Reference CT 104 .D54
• Encyclopedia of World Biography : Reference CT 103 .E56
• Great Lives from History : Reference CT 119 .G
• Historic World Leaders : Reference D 412 .H57
• Research Guide to European Historical Biography : Reference CT 759 .R4

More biographical material can be located in the reference collection in the individual subject sections. For example: if a person was from Germany, try the books in DD. If the person was a scientist, try the books in Q. If the person was a woman, try the books in HQ.
Books in the General Collection
To locate books in the General collection that can be checked out do a subject search on the person with the last name first.
For example: Livingstone, David
Or you could do a search on the occupation and or place. For example: Explorers -- Africa, Southern -- Biography If you are not finding enough information, please check with a Librarian.

This guide was last updated 21 January 2008.

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Librarian: Marianne Berger
Office: SRC 3036
Phone: (630) 942-2338
E-mail: berger@cod.edu

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