Googling well known names to find out more.

Apropos of the new series of Vanity Fair which has recently finished, I've just Googled William Makepeace Thackeray because apart from knowing he was a Victorian author who wrote Vanity Fair and Barry Lyndon, I didn't know much about him. It occurred to me I do this quite a lot these days mainly for actors, writers, politicians etc., just to know a bit about their credentials and background. Anyone else do this, and if so, who have you been researching recently ?