Kemal Atatürk (or alternatively written as Kamâl Atatürk or Mustafa Kemal , commonly referred to as Mustafa Kemal Atatürk; 1881 – 10 November 1938) was a Turkish field marshal and statesman who became the first President of Turkey from 1923 until his death in 1938. He is known for being a leader who freed his people from being controlled by other countries and later for starting changes that founded Turkish nation state based on social and economic nationalism, more modern and similar to Western civilization, mainly France (such as the French model of secularism called "laïcité").