As the Mayflower was crossing the Atlantic in 1620, passenger John Howland was swept overboard during a storm. He managed to sieze a trailing halyard and was pulled back to safety. His descendants in the New World have included:

• Franklin Roosevelt
• George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush
• Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
• Joseph Smith and Brigham Young
• Humphrey Bogart
• Benjamin Spock
• Sarah Palin
• Chevy Chase
• Christopher Lloyd
• Alec Baldwin

If Howland had lost his life in that storm, none of these people would have existed.