Parnag Shishigyan dedicated his life to reuniting hundreds of Armenian children with their heritage. After gaining the trust of local Arabs, he compiled lists of Armenian orphans, aiding in their return to Armenian communities. He eventually moved to Soviet Armenia, where his legacy continues, marked by a statue and family home preserved as a tribute. Parnag's efforts embody resilience and cultural preservation amidst tragedy.
Read MoreArdem Patapoutian is awarded the 2021 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, the first Armenian to do so! He shared the award with Dr. David Julius who, together and separately, discovered how our bodies feel the warmth of the sun or the hug of a loved one. Dr. Patapoutian is a professor of Neuro Science at Scripps Institute in California.
Read MoreArmenian immigrant Vahe Karapetyan revolutionized street food in the U.S. by designing the first mass-produceable food truck in 1968, enabling diverse cuisines to go mobile. His company, Vahe Enterprises, now employs 90 people. Dedicated to supporting his community, Karapetian funds Armenian institutions and created mobile emergency units during the 2020 Nagorno Karabagh war. He received the Ellis Island Medal of Honor in 2015.
Read MoreAline Kamakian’s father had a dream to open a restaurant in Lebanon that celebrated his Armenian culinary heritage. Unfortunately he died when she was 17 years old. She took a job with an insurance company to finance her university education and graduated with a Master’s degree in both Finance and Marketing. She began working as an insurance broker and soon opened her own brokerage firm. In 2001 Aline opened her first restaurant, Mayrig, (Little Mother) in downtown Beirut. It has become a favorite place to gather and eat for both locals and tourists.
Read MoreOscar Banker (Asadoor Sarafian) was the developer of the first practical automatic transmission in cars and buses and inventor of the first versatile needless inoculation gun along with 300 other patents. “When I see something doesn’t work quite right, I try to see what I can do to make it work a little better”.
Read MoreOnly person of Armenian descent to have been in space.
In 1980 Dr. Bagian applied again to the NASA Astronaut program was admitted along with 18 other candidates. He was part of the planning and provision emergency medical and rescue support for the first six shuttle flights.
Dr. Bagian’s first flight in space was the Discovery, March 13-18, 1989, the first shuttle mission after the Challenger disaster in 1986. After returning from this flight he said “The main thing is constant enthusiasm for learning – to learn and to strive to whatever you want. There’s no limit to what you can achieve once you set your mind to it.”
Read MoreAlex and Marie Manoogian were both born in Izmir, Ottoman Empire (later Turkey) one year apart and Alex left for America in 1920 with $50 in his pocket. He is known for the single-handed Delta faucet, but Alex and Marie Manoogian are most known in the Armenian community as the most generous Armenian philanthropists that donated over $80 million to schools and churches.
Read MoreNoubar Afeyan is one of America’s leading biotech and life sciences entrepreneurs. He has set up more than 35 companies from his base in Boston. He has done it by pioneering a new way of starting a business based on the idea of survival, constant adaptation and overcoming obstacles. In 1999 he founded Flagship Ventures which develops new companies through its in-house division VentureLabs. The most high-profile of Flagship’s portfolio companies’ efforts is that of Moderna Therapeutics, whose experimental COVID-19 vaccine candidate.
Read MoreDiana Apcar – Writer, Merchant, Advocate for Armenian rights, First Armenian Woman Diplomat and Humanitarian.
“The Armenian Massacres stand without their parallel in history. The human mind staggers to contemplate the fiendish orgies of which they have been the victims, and no pen can describe their horrors: and this helpless christian people are to-day in the same deadly peril as they have been since the famous Treaty of Berlin consigned them bound hand and foot to the mercy of their executioners. …
…I will allow that Liberty, Justice, Equality, Fraternity are the watchwords of Young Turkey, but Young Turkey is only a small minority; the great majority of the Turkish nation are not Young Turks.
The question therefore resolves itself into this critical point: “What will Christendom do even now?”
Read MoreDamadian built the world’s first magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machine and performed the first full-body scan in 1977, after he discovered that tumors and normal tissue emit response signals that differ in wavelength.
“I thought if we could do on a human what we just did in that test tube, maybe we could build a scanner that would go over the body to hunt down cancer. It was kind of preposterous,” Damadian admitted, “but I had hope.”
Read MoreHow does someone go from dishwasher to restauranteur to helping the American soldier? You begin with an immigrant who celebrates his birthday on the day he first saw the Statue of Liberty after fighting in his home country against the government which was trying to rid the world of his countrymen – the Armenians. He was imprisoned, worked in orphanages and eventually landed in the United States.
Read MoreYousuf Karsh (1908-2002) was an Armenian-Canadian master photographer. He photographed most of the very important people of the 20th century. How does a man from a small town in the Ottoman Empire meet and photograph the great figures of the last century?
Read MoreDr. Jane Mahakian is a gerontologist who has worked and advocated for adults with mental deterioration caused by Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias for over 30 years in San Francisco, California. She founded “Aging Matters” in 1998 to help those patients and their families by providing personalized care management and counseling.
Read MoreDr. Hampar Kelikian, Orthopedic Surgeon Emeritus, still performed as many as 10 operations a week at the age of 80. He was featured in People Magazine in September 1979 which emphasized the compassion he showed for his patients and his pioneering methods to improve surgeries which dealt with deformities of the foot and hand.
Read MoreEmik Alexander Avakian, the Armenian Stephen Hawking.
To Emik Alexander Avakian communication was the most important thing in the world and he spent his life brilliantly and laboriously solving problems in the field. He did this under an enormous handicap for his own personal communications were always disrupted. His nerves communicated incorrectly with his muscles.
Read MoreHow does $900 start an empire and generation of philanthropy?
Stephen Mugar, entrepreneur, innovative businessman and philanthropist founded the Star Market chain of grocery stores in the greater Boston area. He immigrated with his parents, Sarkis and Vosgitel, and his sisters from Kharpert in the Ottoman Empire (Turkey today) in 1906.
Read MoreWhen deciding on the first person to write about for Remarkable Armenians, it needed to be not only a “remarkable Armenian” but a person who spoke for Armenians around the world. That is why William Saroyan is the first choice for Remarkable Armenians.
Read MoreA blog to highlight Armenians that have led a truly remarkable life. From celebrities to inventors to others that have made a remarkable impact and have an amazing story.
Read MoreI’m Charlene Apigian a former music and social studies teacher and former host of HARC – The Heritage of Armenian Culture radio program. I have an innate curiosity about people who accomplish remarkable and extraordinary things in their lives, especially Armenians perhaps because there are so few of us…
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