7 The 100 Most Influential World Leaders of All Time 7

One reform of truly revolutionary proportions was the

replacement of the Arabic script—in which the Ottoman

Turkish language had been written for centuries—by the

Latin alphabet. This took place officially in November

1928. Education benefited from this reform, as the youth
      of Turkey were encouraged to take advantage of new edu-
      cational opportunities that gave access to the Western
      scientific and humanistic traditions.
      This ambitious program of forced modernization was
      not accomplished without strain and bloodshed. In
      February 1925 the Kurds of southwestern Anatolia raised
      the banner of revolt in the name of Islam. It took two
      months to put the revolt down; its leader Şeyh Said was
      then hanged. In June 1926, a plot by several disgruntled
      politicians to assassinate Atatürk was discovered, and the
      13 ringleaders were tried and hanged.
      In his later years Atatürk grew more remote from the
      Turkish people. He had the Dolmabahçe Palace in Istanbul,
      formerly a main residence of the sultans, refurbished and
      spent more time there. Always a heavy drinker who ate
      little, he began to decline in health. His illness, cirrhosis of
      the liver, was not diagnosed until too late. He bore the
      pain of the last few months of his life with great character
      and dignity.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

(b. Jan. 30, 1882, Hyde Park, N.Y., U.S.—d. April 12, 1945, Warm

Springs, Ga.)

F

ranklin Delano Roosevelt, known simply as FDR, was

the 32nd president of the United States, serving from

1933 to 1945. The only president elected to the office four

times, Roosevelt led the United States through two of the

greatest crises of the 20th century: the Great Depression

and World War II.