Nominating Bill Gates to the Hall of Fame for Great Americans

Introduction

The purpose of this paper is to develop a relevant definition of what it means to be a "great American" today and to demonstrate what it takes to satisfy these definitional criteria. In the information technology field, one name stands above the rest in personifying the types of enduring contributions to the nation that make an individual a "great American." William "Bill" Henry Gates III is an exemplary model of a highly successful modern business leader, entrepreneur, and philanthropist. In support of this nomination, an informative summary of Gates's life and his contributions to the nation are followed by a summary of the biographical research and important findings in the conclusion.

The Hall of Fame for Great Americans

Established in 1900 to honor the best of the best in American leadership, the Hall of Fame for Great Americans features 98 bronze busts nestled in an outdoor colonnade at Bronx Community College and was the first "hall of fame" in the country. When it was established at the turn of the century, induction into the Hall of Fame for Great Americans was considered a major achievement, and even the elections for new nominees received nationwide press coverage (Dolnick 1). In fact, some contemporary observers suggest that the institution was so famous that it was referenced in the motion picture The Wizard of Oz, when the Munchkins proclaim that Dorothy will be ". . . a bust, be a bust, be a bust in the Hall of Fame!" (as cited in Dolnick 2).

Following the sale of the Hall of Fame in 1973, however, the collection of bronze busts of great Americans has been largely ignored and forgotten despite the luminaries honored there, and there have been no new inductees since 1976 (Dolnick 2). Clearly, what the Hall of Fame needs at present is fresh representation that reflects the increasing diversity of the nation as well as the latest enduring contributions individuals have made to American society and culture. One such individual who satisfies the definitional criteria for a great American is Bill Gates, whose life and contributions are discussed below.

Bill Gates: Early Life and Education

Businessman, entrepreneur, and philanthropist Bill Gates was born in Seattle, Washington on October 28, 1955 (Biography 1), the middle child of William H. Gates II, a successful attorney in Seattle, and Mary Gates, who had been an educator before becoming a mother. His older sister was Kristi; his younger sister, Libby (Biography 1). There were few signs from Bill's early youth that suggested he was destined for greatness — in many ways he was an exceedingly normal child who was fond of playing board games and reading science fiction (Biography 2).

Unlike many of his peers, Bill was a bright student who was genuinely good at math in elementary school, but these qualities contributed to his becoming easily bored with schoolwork, and he was frequently in trouble as a result (Biography 2). In an attempt to channel his energies into something more productive, his parents enrolled him in the Boy Scouts, where he also excelled, earning the coveted Eagle Scout award — achieved by just 4% of all Boy Scouts (Wendell 2). These early experiences contributed to Bill's competitiveness, a quality he would need when his parents transferred him to Lakeside Preparatory School, where he was introduced to computers as well as his future partner, Paul Allen (Biography 2).

It is important to keep in mind that the computers Bill encountered at this period in history bore no resemblance to modern personal computers or laptops. They were energy-hungry machines that occupied entire rooms — indeed, an ordinary cell phone today has far more processing power than those early computers. During this period, computer programmers used labor-intensive punched cards for data input. Nevertheless, Bill took to the technology immediately and wrote and compiled his first program — a game of tic-tac-toe — on a mainframe computer using time rented by his school (Biography 2).

His tendency to get into trouble followed him to Lakeside, where Bill and some friends were actually banned from future computer use after hacking the system in an effort to obtain additional time on the machine. Their privileges were restored when they agreed to help the school identify bugs in its computer system in exchange for extra computer time (Biography 2). Some indication of Bill's future began to emerge during this period: he wrote a scheduling program for Lakeside, a payroll program for a local company, and — together with his friend and early business associate Paul Allen — a program to facilitate traffic-pattern tracking in the city of Seattle, all while he was still in high school (Biography 2).

Following his graduation from high school in 1973, Bill enrolled at Harvard University with initial plans to follow in his father's footsteps as an attorney. His interests drew him back to computers, however, and he maintained close contact with Paul Allen, who was employed at Honeywell at the time (Biography 2). In 1974, the Altair personal computer was introduced, and this innovation convinced Bill and Paul that they could write compatible programs using BASIC despite their lack of hands-on experience with that machine. The pair contacted Altair and told company representatives that a BASIC program was already under development; they were surprised when the company requested a demonstration within just a few weeks. As one biographer recounts, "He worked hard over the next month or so and, when they finally went to New Mexico to run the software, it worked perfectly the first time" (Biography 2).

Conclusion

While times have changed since the Hall of Fame for Great Americans was founded more than a century ago, the definition of a great American remains essentially the same. Together with other great Americans such as several of the Founding Fathers, Susan B. Anthony, Alexander Graham Bell, Andrew Carnegie, and the Wright brothers, Bill Gates has earned his place in that hallowed institution by virtue of his intellect, his entrepreneurship, and — most especially — his philanthropy as administered through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Works Cited

"About the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation." Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, 2018. https://www.gatesfoundation.org/.

"Bill Gates Biography." Biography.com, A&E Networks Television, 15 Mar. 2018, www.biography.com/people/bill-gates-9307520.

"Bill Gates Biography: Success Story of Microsoft Co-Founder." Astrum People, 2018, astrumpeople.com/bill-gates-biography/.

Cumberland, Sarah. "Awareness to Action: Regina Rabinovich Manages a Portfolio of More Than US$ 1 Billion of Grants in Infectious Disease Work at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. She Talks with Sarah Cumberland about the Challenges and Successes of Working in Global Health." Bulletin of the World Health Organization, vol. 89, no. 6, June 2011, pp. 400–403.

Dolnick, Sam. "A Hall of Fame, Forgotten and Forlorn." The New York Times, 2009, https://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/05/nyregion/05metjournal.html.

Wendell, Bryan. "What Percentage of Boy Scouts Become Eagle Scouts?" Bryan on Scouting, 2018, https://blog.scoutingmagazine.org/2015/03/30/what-percentage-of-boy-scouts-become-eagle-scouts/.