(1916 - ) Native of Brooklyn, NY, graduate of Dartmouth College, M.D. from Cornell school of medicine. Koop is most famous for serving as Surgeon General during the Reagan administration, and advocating sex education for kids and the use of condoms to prevent the spread of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. He was forced to resign after Reagan's fundamentalist supporters found Koop to be a little more progressive that they could deal with. It's worth noting that Koop isn't uniformly leftist -- he was nominated for Surgeon General in part because of his opposition to abortion.
Koop then went on to found the C. Everett Koop Institute at Dartmouth College (koop.dartmouth.edu) and lent his name to drkoop.com, which (at the time of this writing) is in danger of being delisted by NASDAQ.
Koop is also well known for having a really distinctive beard as well as his resemblance to Colonel Sanders.
Editors Note: Koop died on February 25, 2013, at the age of 96 at his home in Hanover, New Hampshire. No official determination of cause of death has been given.