Born on July 20

French Protestant reformer (1509–1564) who founded Calvinism, a major branch of the Protestant Reformation. He settled in Geneva, where he established a strict religious community and profoundly influenced European Protestantism.

Richard Owen was a 19th-century British palaeontologist and anatomist. He coined the term “Dinosauria” (dinosaurs) in 1842 and was the founder of the Natural History Museum in London. A famous opponent of Darwin's theories on evolution.

Moravian monk and naturalist (1822–1884), Gregor Mendel is the founder of modern genetics. Through his experiments with pea plants, he discovered the fundamental laws of heredity that govern the transmission of traits from one generation to the next.

New Zealand mountaineer and explorer, Edmund Hillary was the first man to reach the summit of Everest (8,849 m) on 29 May 1953, accompanied by Sherpa Tenzing Norgay. He then devoted his life to helping the people of Nepal.

Frantz Fanon (1925-1961) was a psychiatrist and essayist born in Martinique. A major thinker of anti-colonialism, he analyzed the psychological mechanisms of colonial oppression and supported the Algerian liberation struggle.

French sailor born in 1944, a crew member for Éric Tabarly before becoming the skipper of large multihulls. The holder of the crewed round-the-world sailing record, he won the Jules Verne Trophy and became a media figure known for his outspokenness.