IN: Mickey Charles Mantle (October 20, 1931 - August 13, 1995), nicknamed The Commerce Comet and The Mick, was an American professional baseball player. Mantle played his entire Major League Baseball (MLB) career with the New York Yankees as a center fielder and first baseman, from 1951 through 1968. Mantle was one of the best players and sluggers, and is regarded by many as the greatest switch hitter in baseball history. Mantle was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1974 and was elected to the Major League Baseball All-Century Team in 1999.

Mantle was born on October 20, 1931 in Spavinaw, Oklahoma, the son of Lovell (nee Richardson) Mantle (1904-1995) and lead miner Elvin Charles "Mutt" Mantle (1912-1952). He was of at least partial English ancestry; his great-grandfather, George Mantle, left Brierley Hill, in England's Black Country, in 1848.  Mutt named his son in honor of Mickey Cochrane, a Hall of Fame catcher. Later in his life, Mantle expressed relief that his father had not known Cochrane's true first name, as he would have hated to be named Gordon. Mantle spoke warmly of his father, and said he was the bravest man he ever knew. "No boy ever loved his father more", he said. Mantle batted left-handed against his father when he practiced pitching to him right-handed and he batted right-handed against his grandfather, Charles Mantle, when he practiced throwing to him left-handed. His grandfather died at the age of 60 in 1944, and his father died of Hodgkin's disease at the age of 40 on May 7, 1952.  When Mantle was four years old, his family moved to the nearby town of Commerce, Oklahoma, where his father worked in lead and zinc mines. As a teenager, Mantle rooted for the St. Louis Cardinals. Mantle was an all-around athlete at Commerce High School, playing basketball as well as football (a halfback, he was offered a football scholarship by the University of Oklahoma) in addition to his first love, baseball. His football playing nearly ended his athletic career. Kicked in the left shin during a practice game during his sophomore year, Mantle developed osteomyelitis in his left ankle, a crippling disease that was incurable just a few years earlier. Mantle's parents drove him at midnight to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, where he was treated at the Children's Hospital with the newly available penicillin, which reduced the infection and saved his leg from requiring amputation.
QUESTION: What were his hobbies?
IN: Sam Houston was the fifth son of Major Samuel Houston and Elizabeth Paxton. Houston's paternal ancestry is often traced to his great-great grandfather Sir John Houston, who built a family estate in Scotland in the late seventeenth century. His second son John Houston emigrated to Ulster, Ireland, during the Ulster plantation period. Under the system of primogeniture, he did not inherit the estate.

Houston was twice elected President of the Republic of Texas. In the 1836 election, he defeated Stephen F. Austin and Henry Smith with a landslide of over 79% of the vote. Houston served from October 22, 1836, to December 10, 1838. The Constitution of the Republic of Texas stated that no president could succeed himself, but did not prohibit any non-consecutive multiple terms.  When his first term ended, he was elected to serve as a representative from San Augustine County in the Republic of Texas House of Representatives. After his term as representative ended, Houston again served as President of the Republic of Texas from December 12, 1841, to December 9, 1844.  While he initially sought annexation by the U.S., Houston dropped that goal during his first term. In his second term, he strove for fiscal prudence and worked to make peace with the various tribes of Native Americans in the Republic. He also struggled to avoid war with Mexico, whose forces invaded twice during 1842. In response to the Regulator-Moderator War of 1844, he sent in Republic militia to put down the feud.  Houston still believed that the U.S annexation of Texas was not a realistic goal and the U.S. Senate would never pass it because of the delicate situation between the recently independent Texas and Mexico. However, Houston was a politician and as such he sought to preserve his career by endorsing the support of annexation into the U.S. Without his endorsement, the Texas congress would have put the question to public election and upon its likely passing would have effectively destroyed Houston's career as a Texas politician. To help save his political reputation, Houston sent James Pinckney Henderson to Washington to help Isaac Van Zandt advocate the annexation of Texas.
QUESTION: What year did this begin?
IN: Ziaur Rahman, popularly known as Zia, was the second son of Mansur Rahman and Jahanara Khatun. His father was a chemist who specialised in paper and ink chemistry and worked for a government department at Writer's Building in Kolkata. As a child Ziaur Rahman, nicknamed Komol, was reserved, shy, quietly spoken, and intense in many respects. He was raised in Bagbari village, Bogra and studied in Bogra Zilla School.

Graduating from the Pakistan Military Academy at 12th PMA long course on 18 September 1955 in the top 10% of his class, Ziaur Rahman was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Pakistan Army. In the army, he received commando training, became a paratrooper and received training in a special intelligence course.  Zia went to East Pakistan on a short visit and was struck by the negative attitude of the Bengali middle class towards the military, which consumed a large chunk of the country's resources. The low representation of the Bengalis in the military was largely due to discrimination, but Ziaur Rahman felt that the Bengali attitude towards the military perhaps prevented promising young Bengali from seeking military careers. As a Bengali army officer he advocated military careers for Bengali youth. After serving for two years in Karachi, he was transferred to the East Bengal Regiment in 1957. He attended military training schools in West Germany and UK. He also worked in the military intelligence department from 1959 to 1964.  Ayub Khan's highly successful military rule from 1958 to 1968 convinced Zia of the need for a fundamental change in the Bengali attitude towards the military. During the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, Ziaur Rahman saw combat in the Khemkaran sector in Punjab as the commander of a company unit of 300-500 soldiers. Ziaur Rahman won the prestigious Hilal-i-Jur'at medal, Pakistan's second highest military award, and his unit won 2 Sitara-e-Jurat (Star of Courage) medals, and 9 Tamgha-e-Jurat (Medal of Courage) medals, for their role in the 1965 War with India. In 1966, Zia was appointed military instructor at the Pakistan Military Academy, later going on to attend the Command and Staff College in Quetta, Pakistan, he completed a course in command and tactical warfare. Zia helped raise two Bengali battalions called the 8th and 9th Bengals during his stint as instructor. Around the same time, his wife Khaleda Zia, now 23, gave birth to their first child Tarique Rahman on 20 November 1964. Zia joined the 2nd East Bengal regiment as its second-in-command at Joydebpur in Gazipur district, near Dhaka, in 1969, and travelled to West Germany to receive advanced military and command training with the German Army and later spent a few months with the British Army.
QUESTION:
How long was he in the military for?