Doppelgangers

While researching images as background for episodes of The Unfrozen Sea, my historical fiction serialized novel on Substack, I sometimes find remarkable likenesses between past individuals and people today—especially historic figures who seem to have actor doppelgangers. Given the infinite number of possible human faces and body types, and possible combinations of shared DNA, lookalikes come as no surprise—but they are fascinating. 

I use images of real people as inspiration for my historical fictional characters.

Leonardo DiCaprio cast as Robert Todd Lincoln, son of the 16th President.

The late Alan Arkin makes a perfect John Quincy Adams.

And of course, Liam Neeson as George Washington, a natural. Stick a wig and a little nose putty on him and he’s good to go. 

I have yet to find a lookalike for my fictional protagonist Temple Hayden in The Unfrozen Sea, but he’s out there somewhere. The closest is this image I adapted from an AI image. How do YOU picture Hayden?

Author's vision of former U.S. Marshal Temple Hayden in 1904, The Unfrozen Sea.