Evel Knievel

Born Robert Craig Knievel in Butte, Montana, this self-proclaimed "last of the gladiators" certainly knew how to put on a show. His career was a spectacle of broken bones, dramatic pronouncements, and the kind of American exceptionalism that involves jumping over increasingly large arrays of buses.

Knievel’s stunts were legendary, or at least famously ill-advised. While he successfully cleared everything from rattlesnakes to vans, his most ambitious attempts, like the Snake River Canyon jump, ended with him floating down a gorge, parachute deployed. It made for great television, if not perfect execution.

Despite the frequent failures and medical bills, Knievel embodied a certain kind of reckless, all-American spirit. He courted danger, embraced the spotlight, and left a legacy of spectacle that few have matched. Jewish? Not even a little. But he certainly knew how to make a dramatic entrance and even more dramatic exit from a motorcycle.