James K. Polk
1795 – 1849 · 54 years · Washington, D.C. · Americas
Reign: 1845 – 1849 (US presidents)
In a single term he extended the US to the Pacific: the Oregon Treaty with Britain (1846) and the Mexican–American War (1846–1848), which brought California and New Mexico into the Union.
Wikipedia (Russian) · Wikipedia (English) · 19th century
Portrait: George Peter Alexander Healy · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
Contemporaries around the world
Europe
- Charles Darwin — naturalist, author of evolutionary theory, 14 years younger
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe — German poet and thinker, 46 years older
- Ludwig van Beethoven — German composer, 25 years older
- Karl Marx — philosopher and economist, 23 years younger
- Queen Victoria — Queen of the United Kingdom, 24 years younger
- Napoleon Bonaparte — Emperor of the French, 26 years older
Eastern Europe & Russia
- Alexander Pushkin — Russian poet, 4 years younger
- Fyodor Dostoevsky — novelist, 26 years younger
- Leo Tolstoy — novelist, 33 years younger
- Dmitri Mendeleev — chemist, creator of the periodic table, 39 years younger
- Nicholas I — emperor who crushed the Decembrist revolt, 1 year younger
- Alexander II of Russia — Emperor of Russia, 23 years younger
Middle East
- Mahmud II — sultan who destroyed the Janissaries, 10 years older
- Abdulmejid I — sultan of the Tanzimat reforms, 28 years younger
- Abdulaziz — first sultan to visit Western Europe, 35 years younger
- Selim III — reforming Ottoman sultan, 34 years older
- Mustafa IV — sultan who overthrew the reformer Selim III, 16 years older
Africa
- Muhammad Ali of Egypt — ruler of Egypt, 26 years older
- David Livingstone — explorer of Africa and missionary, 18 years younger
- Shaka — King of the Zulu, 8 years older
- Ranavalona I — Queen of Madagascar, 17 years older
- Moshoeshoe I — founder of Lesotho, 9 years older
- Usman dan Fodio — founder of the Sokoto Caliphate, 41 years older
Asia
- Katsushika Hokusai — Japanese artist, 35 years older
- Tokugawa Ienari — longest-serving shogun, for half a century, 22 years older
- Tokugawa Yoshinobu — last shogun, who handed power back to the emperor, 42 years younger
- Tokugawa Ieyoshi — shogun who died just after the Black Ships arrived, 2 years older
- Tokugawa Iesada — shogun under whom Japan opened its ports to the West, 29 years younger
- Empress Dowager Cixi — Empress Dowager of China, 40 years younger
Americas
- Abraham Lincoln — 16th President of the United States, 14 years younger
- Simón Bolívar — liberator of South America, 12 years older
- José de San Martín — liberator of Argentina, Chile and Peru, 17 years older
- Andrew Jackson — 7th US president, the Trail of Tears and the Jacksonian era, 28 years older
- Benito Juárez — President of Mexico, 11 years younger
- Thomas Jefferson — third President of the United States, 52 years older
Oceania
- Kamehameha I — first King of Hawaii, 37 years older
- Truganini — Aboriginal Tasmanian woman, 17 years younger
- Henry Parkes — Premier of New South Wales, 'Father of Federation', 20 years younger
- Hongi Hika — Ngāpuhi Māori chief, 23 years older
- Arthur Phillip — first Governor of New South Wales, 57 years older
- Bennelong — Aboriginal intermediary, 31 years older
The world in their lifetime
- 1796 Jenner's first vaccination — aged 1, Europe
- 1798 Battle of the Pyramids — aged 3, Africa
- 1803 Louisiana Purchase — aged 8, Americas
- 1804 Coronation of Napoleon — aged 9, Europe
- 1804–1813 First Serbian Uprising — aged 9, Europe
- 1804–1903 Usman dan Fodio's jihad and the Sokoto Caliphate — aged 9, Africa
- 1805–1848 Muhammad Ali becomes ruler of Egypt — aged 10, Africa
- 1805 Battle of Trafalgar — aged 10, Europe
- 1810–1826 Spanish American wars of independence — aged 15, Americas
- 1812 Napoleon's invasion of Russia — aged 17, Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1814–1815 Congress of Vienna — aged 19, Europe
- 1815 Eruption of Mount Tambora — aged 20, Asia
- 1815 Battle of Waterloo — aged 20, Europe
- 1816 Year Without a Summer — aged 21, Europe
- 1817–1824 First cholera pandemic — aged 22, Asia
- 1817 San Martín's Crossing of the Andes — aged 22, Americas
- 1819 Raffles founds modern Singapore — aged 24, Asia
- 1822 Independence of Brazil — aged 27, Americas
- 1828 Treaty of Turkmenchay — aged 33, Middle East
- c. 1831 Hokusai's Great Wave off Kanagawa — aged 36, Asia
- 1833 Abolition of slavery in the British Empire — aged 38, Europe
- c. 1835–1846 The Great Trek — aged 40, Africa
- 1835 Darwin in the Galápagos — aged 40, Americas
- 1838–1839 Trail of Tears — aged 43, Americas
- 1839–1842 First Opium War — aged 44, Asia
- 1839 Birth of photography: the daguerreotype — aged 44, Europe
- 1839 The Edict of Gülhane opens the Tanzimat — aged 44, Middle East
- 1839–1842 First Anglo-Afghan War — aged 44, Middle East
- 1845–1852 Great Famine in Ireland — aged 50, Europe
- 1846 First public demonstration of ether anaesthesia — aged 51, Americas
- 1846–1848 Mexican–American War — aged 51, Americas
- 1847 Liberia declares independence — aged 52, Africa
- 1848–1849 Revolutions of 1848 — aged 53, Europe
- 1848 The Communist Manifesto — aged 53, Europe