Unforgettable Legends: Part 3 of History’s 40 Most Epic Figures

Noted astronomer Tycho Brahe once had most of his nose chopped off by a broadsword during a duel with a rival mathematician. He lived on his own private island in a massive castle complete with trap doors, an army of astronomer henchmen, and a dungeon where he could extrajudicially imprison anyone who pissed him off whenever he wanted. He had a pet moose that got drunk at parties (so much so that one night the moose was so drunk it fell down stairs to its death). He was best friends with a psychic dwarf who lived under his dining room table. Brahe accurately predicted the cosmic trajectories of over 700 stars despite the fact that he was performing his observations with his naked eye because he was working before the invention of the telescope.

Desmond Doss was the first conscientious objector to receive the Medal of Honor for his numerous acts of valor as a medic in the Pacific theater of World War 2. He refused to carry a weapon into battle, not a rifle, not a knife, nothing. One time a grenade severely wounded his legs and Doss dressed the wounds himself en route to the hospital, gave up his stretcher and told his bearers to carry another wounded. He received the Medal of Honor without killing anyone.

Larry Thorne was a Finnish Army Captain who led an infantry company in the Finnish winter and Continuation Wars. During WW2, he joined a German unit to fight against Russians near Schwerin, Germany and eventually surrendered to British troops. He then served in U.S. Army Special Forces during the Vietnam War. He received two Purple Hearts, a Bronze Star, a 2nd class Iron Cross and a Mannerheim cross (1 out of 197).

During the Vietnam War, when Sergeant Bennie Adkins's camp came under heavy enemy fire, he manned a mortar position for two days without any sleep. He was wounded 18 times in various parts of his body, eluded the NVA for 48 hours through the dense jungles of Vietnam, survived a run-in with a man-eating tiger, dodged NVA patrols, and somehow made it back to a position where he could contact rescue and get out of there alive. He is personally credited with killing 145 enemy soldiers in his 86-hour battle.

In 2012, a 90-year-old Baltimore woman named Venus Green locked a police officer in her basement when he tried searching her home without a warrant. She sued and won a $95,000 settlement.

During Vietnam War American sniper Carlos Hathcock volunteered to crawl for 3 days across 2000m of the open field containing an enemy headquarters. He had bed sores from staying motionless for so long. He could only move when the wind blew the grass around him. Enemy patrols came so close that they actually stepped on his knuckles and stopped to smoke within feet of him. He took a single shot that killed an NVA General and he then had to backtrack the same way while enemy patrols were swarming looking for a sniper. He was only able to move inches at a time and made it back without being spotted.

On January 2014, Aitzaz Hasan, a 15year-old boy in Pakistan, died when he bravely confronted a suicide bomber walking towards his school, which resulted in the early detonation of the bomb. His action saved the lives of hundreds of students.

Liviu Librescu was a Romanian-born internationally renowned professor of aerospace engineering at Virginia Tech. He survived the Holocaust when he was young. At the age of 76, he held the door of his classroom shut while the gunman attempted to enter it. Most of his students managed to escape through the windows. He was shot 5 times through the door and managed to saved 22 out of the 23 students in his class. A shot to his head proved fatal.

There was a Jewish boxer named Salamo Arouch imprisoned at Auschwitz. He was forced to fight fellow prisoners. The losers were sent to the gas chambers or shot. He survived more than 2 years and 200 fights, eventually being released when the camp was liberated.

As an officer of the California highway patrol, Sgt. Kevin Briggs has stopped more than 200 people from committing suicide on the Golden Gate Bridge.