Famous People from Denmark

Hans Christian Andersen

The world of children’s fiction would not be the same without Hans Christian Andersen’s fairytales. Born in Odense, Denmark in 1805, Andersen began publishing during the 1830. His fairytales were not popular when first published, but once recognized, they quickly became popular. Now there is not a child in the Western world who does not know of at least one of Andersen’s titles. Wheter it be “The Little Mermaid,” “Thumbelina,” or “The Ugly Duckling.” most of Andersen’s fairytales have been adapted into live action and animated films, stage plays, and ballets. Anderson’s legacy has recently been solidified in a very grand way; in 2006 a theme park based on Andersen’s fairytales and life was opened in Shanghai.

Viggo Mortensen

Viggo Mortensen is a famous American-Danish artist who is known for his acting. Though Mortensen was born in New York City in 1958, his father is from Denmark and his parents even met there on vacation during the early 1950s. He is known for his roles in David Cronenberg’s thriller, History of Violence and Peter Jackson’s adaptation of The Lord of the Rings. While Mortensen has been in over thirty films, he still finds time to be a painter, photographer, poet, and musician. He has released sixteen albums since 1994 that focus around moody soundscapes and spoken word.

Niels Bohr

Born in the late 1800s, Niels Bohr was one of the most prominent physicists of his day. His research on atomic structure and quantum mechanics helped change our understanding of the world and how life functions on at the most basic levels.

In 1922, Bohr relieved a Nobel Price in Physics for his work on atomic theory. Bohr’s most well known theory is his atomic model, which challenged and overthrew Rutherford’s atomic model. Bohr placed the nucleus of the atom in the center and said that it was positively charged, and that the electrons orbited around the nucleus in a series of levels.

His understanding of atomic theory led him to be one of the prominent nuclear physicists to work on the atomic bomb for the United States Government, known as the Manhattan Project.