Happy New Year from GT

Picking the “Person of the Year” Isn’t All that Easy or Flawless

Happy New Year! We at Guerrilla Trivia wish you and yours the very best for a great 2013.

Back in 1927, TIME magazine initiated a tradition that has survived criticism and adulation. The first selection of “Man of the Year” was the young dashing pilot, Charles Lindbergh. Over the years, the selections have typically been a single person. However, groups and multiple individuals have been chosen.

So…many Americans were pleased to see President Barack Obama selected as the TIME “Person of the Year” (for the second time).  Of course, there were plenty who weren’t. You can’t please everyone.

It must be a tough job, filtering out pros and cons, trying to fathom successes and failures, deciding who fits the definition of what qualifies one to be that special person.  So, what are the qualifications?

Back in 2001, Jim Kelly, TIME editor, interviewed on the Web, gave this classic definition of who qualifies: “…the person who most affected the events of the year, for better or for worse.” In 1938, Adolf Hiter made the cover (published Jan. 2, 1939) “before all his crimes became known to the world. When Hitler made ‘Man of the Year,’ the illustration was of him playing the Organ of Death with skeletons all over it. It was not meant to be an honor to Hitler. The reaction to it was surprisingly mute.”

The selection of the Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979 was controversial, and a few hundred people canceled their subscriptions. Women have been Person of the Year: Wallace Warfield-Simpson, who married the King of England; Queen Elizabeth has been Woman of the Year; Madame Chaing Kai-Shek and Cori Aquino also made the cut. In 1975, all American Women were the choice.

Here’s the list of the chosen few:

1927	Charles Augustus Lindbergh
1928	Walter P. Chrysler
1929	Owen D. Young
1930	Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
1931	Pierre Laval
1932	Franklin Delano Roosevelt
1933	Hugh Samuel Johnson
1934	Franklin Delano Roosevelt
1935	Haile Selassie
1936	Mrs. Wallis Warfield Simpson
1937	Generalissimo & Mme Chiang Kai-Shek
1938	Adolf Hitler
1939	Joseph Stalin
1940	Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill
1941	Franklin Delano Roosevelt
1942	Joseph Stalin
1943	George Catlett Marshall
1944	Dwight David Eisenhower
1945	Harry Truman
1946	James F. Byrnes
1947	George Catlett Marshall
1948	Harry Truman
1949	Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill
1950	American Fighting-Man
1951	Mohammed Mossadegh
1952	Elizabeth II
1953	Konrad Adenauer
1954	John Foster Dulles
1955	Harlow Herbert Curtice
1956	Hungarian Freedom Fighter
1957	Nikita Krushchev
1958	Charles De Gaulle
1959	Dwight David Eisenhower
1960	U.S. Scientists
1961	John Fitzgerald Kennedy
1962	Pope John XXIII
1963	Martin Luther King Jr.
1964	Lyndon B. Johnson
1965	General William Childs Westmoreland
1966	Twenty-Five and Under
1967	Lyndon B. Johnson
1968	Astronauts Anders, Borman and Lovell
1969	The Middle Americans
1970	Willy Brandt
1971	Richard Milhous Nixon
1972	Nixon and Kissinger
1973	John J. Sirica
1974	King Faisal
1975	American Women
1976	Jimmy Carter
1977	Anwar Sadat
1978	Teng Hsiao-P'ing
1979	Ayatullah Khomeini
1980	Ronald Reagan
1981	Lech Walesa
1982	The Computer
1983	Ronald Reagan & Yuri Andropov
1984	Peter Ueberroth
1985	Deng Xiaoping
1986	Corazon Aquino
1987	Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev
1988	Endangered Earth
1989	Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev
1990	The Two George Bushes
1991	Ted Turner
1992	Bill Clinton
1993	The Peacemakers
1994	Pope John Paul II
1995	Newt Gingrich
1996	Dr. David Ho
1997	Andy Grove
1998	Bill Clinton and Kenneth Starr
1999	Jeff Bezos
2000	George W. Bush
2001	Rudolph Giuliani
2002	The Whistleblowers
2003	The American Soldier
2004	George W. Bush
2005	Bill Gates, Melinda Gates, & Bono
2006	You
2007	Vladimir Putin
2008	Barack Obama
2009	Ben Bernanke
2010	Mark Zuckerberg

Did you notice which U.S. Presidents made it twice?

How quickly we all forget. Do you remember the cover selection for 2011?

Who would have been your choice for 2012?