Hoover was a pretty amazing man and a pretty miserable president. A mining engineer who made his pile working in China. He claimed he was literally first Stanford University student (he showed up days early when the college first opened and he stayed in the dorms by himself.)<p>He and his wife (who was also a geologist) were fluent in Chinese and would speak in it if they wanted privacy.<p>He became known for international humanitarian missions during and after the first world war. He became a national figure by directing flood relief operations during the 1927 Mississippi Flood, which catapulted him into the White House a year later.<p>He was a much better humanitarian than he was a president. And pretty good geologist and linguist too.