You're right, no one remembers Galileo or Copernicus or Mozart or Bach or Archimedes or Aristotle. Just the rulers....
> Of course they do, the actual change has always been done by engineers and scientists
That is demonstrably false. Caesar brought lasting change around him, just like Napoleon did. Alexander the Great, though his empire crumbled after his death, brought Hellenic culture to many areas in the world. And I would like to know how the work of "scientists and engineers" triggered the Arab spring.
Of course they do, the actual change has always been done by engineers and scientists, however, history only remembers the rulers and recently entrepreneurs