Important Americans

Founders

Benjamin Rush• Founding father• Member of Sons of Liberty• Delegate of Continental

Congress in 1776• Signer of Declaration of

Independence• Supporter of adopting

Constitution in 1789

John Hancock• Founding father• Member of Boston

Assembly• Participated in Boston Tea

Party• Member and later

President of Continental Congress

• First signatory of Declaration of Independence

• Later Governor of Massachusetts

John Jay• Founding father• Member of First

Continental Congress• Preferred reconciliation

with England, rather than war

• First Chief Justice of the Supreme Court

John Witherspoon• Elected to Continental

Congress in 1776• Voted for and signed

Declaration in Independence

John Peter Muhlenberg

• “Fighting Pastor” in American Revolution

• Lutheran Minister who led 8th Virginia Regiment

• At the outbreak of war, said “There is a time to preach and a time to fight, and now is the time to fight!”

Charles Carroll• Strong supporter of

armed resistance and separation from England

• Member of 1776 Continental Congress

• Signed Declaration of Independence

• Served in Continental Congress throughout Revolution

Jonathan Trumbull, Sr.• Governor of

Connecticut colony; only colonial governor to support revolution

• Under Trumbull, Connecticut provided many supplies to army during Revolution

Political

Warren G. Harding

• 29th President • Republican• Involved in Teapot

Dome Scandal• Died in office

Sanford B. Dole

• Hawaiian businessman• Helped overthrow

Hawaiian Queen Liliuokalani

• Helped get USA to annex Hawaii as a territory

• First territorial governor of Hawaii

Look at that beard! Beautiful!

Theodore Roosevelt• 26th President (2 terms)• Leader of Rough Riders during

Spanish-American War• Trust-buster• Began construction of Panama

Canal• Created Roosevelt Corollary• Nobel Peace Prize for ending

Russo-Japanese War• Created many national parks• Ran for third term on

Progressive Bull Moose Party ticket (lost)

Bully!

Henry Cabot Lodge

• Served in US Senate for 31 years

• Strong supporter of US effort in World War I

• Opposed US involvement in League of Nations

• Due to Lodge’s opposition, Treaty of Versailles was defeated in Senate

Harry Truman

• 33rd President• Democrat• Made decision to use

atomic bomb on Japan• Ended WWII• Saw communists as

enemy and oversaw beginning of Cold War

• Desegregated armed forces

George Wallace• Governor of Alabama in 1960s• Strong supporter of

segregation in schools; refused to desegregate Alabama

• Was forced to desegregate when Eisenhower sent in National Guard to enforce desegregation

• Shot while campaigning for Democratic presidential nomination

Orval Faubus

• Governor of Arkansas in 1950s

• Used National Guard to prevent 9 African-American students from attending Little Rock Central High School

• Eisenhower sent troops in to force desegregation

Lester Maddox

• Owned a restaurant in Atlanta in early 1960s; refused to desegregate; closed instead

• Governor of Georgia in 1960s

• Did not fight desegregation as Governor

Joseph McCarthy

• US Senator from Wisconsin in 1950s-60s

• Accused government officials, Hollywood stars, and military officers of being Communists

John F. Kennedy

• 35th President• Democrat• Assassinated in 1963 by

Lee Harvey Oswald in Dallas

Barry Goldwater

• Senator from Arizona• Ran as Republican

against Lyndon Johnson; huge defeat

• Did not like labor unions, foreign aid, or unbalanced budgets

Richard Nixon

• 37th President• Republican• Ended USA involvement

in Vietnam• Caught in Watergate

Scandal• Only President to resign

from office

Ronald Reagan

• 40th President• Republican• Survived attempted

assassination• Policies helped bring

about fall of USSR and end of Cold War

Hillary Clinton

• Wife of Bill Clinton, First Lady of the USA 1992-2000

• Senator from New York• Secretary of State

Bill Clinton

• 42nd President• Democrat• Family & Medical Leave

Act• Attempted universal

health care; failed• 2nd term had several

scandals• Monica Lewinsky

Barack Obama

• First African-American President

• Elected 2008• Re-elected 2012• Democrat

Social

Alexis de Tocqueville

• French nobleman and politician

• Wrote Democracy in America, praising American governmental system, while warning of dangers of despotism and government centralization

Susan B. Anthony

• Abolitionist and suffragette

• Also involved in temperance movement

• Very involved in pushing for women to have voting rights

Frances Willard

• Leader of Women’s Christian Temperance Union and suffragette

Jane Addams

• Founder of Hull House; provided education, child care to the poor and immigrants

• First woman awarded Nobel Peace Prize in 1931

Ida B. Wells

• Anti-lynching and African-American civil rights activist

• Wrote articles about lynchings in Southern states

• Founding member of NAACP

W. E. B. DuBois

• First African-American to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard

• Co-founder of NAACP• Strong leader in push

for equal political and social rights for African Americans

Marcus Garvey

• African-American activist

• Wanted a separate black nation in USA

• Wanted blacks to return to Africa and create nations without European control

• Not supported by DuBois and NAACP

Martin Luther King, Jr.

• Civil rights activist; advocated non-violent resistance

• “I Have A Dream” speech

• Won Nobel Peace Prize• Assassinated in 1968

Rosa Parks

• Refused to give up her seat to a white man on the bus

• Arrested; led to the Montgomery Bus Boycott, part of the Civil Rights movement

Black Panthers

• 1960’s radical group• Wanted an armed

African-American population

• Wanted African-Americans exempt from Vietnam drafts

• Marxists

Thurgood Marshall

• Very involved in civil rights cases

• Argued the Brown v. Board of Education case

• Nominated to US Supreme Court by Lyndon Johnson

• First African-American Supreme Court Justice

Sandra Day O’Connor

• First female Supreme Court Justice

• Appointed by Ronald Reagan in 1981

Cesar Chavez

• Organized migrant farm workers into a union called the United Farm Workers for better pay and working conditions

Hector P. Garcia

• WWII veteran, medical doctor

• Fought for equal civil rights for Mexican-Americans in Texas

Betty Freidan

• Wrote The Feminine Mystique, urging women to find happiness beyond traditional roles as wife and mother.

• Co-founder of National Organization of Women, a pro-feminist organization

Phyllis Schlafly

• Leader in pro-family movement

• Opposed to more extreme parts of feminist movement

• Opposed Equal Rights Amendment

Upton Sinclair• Muckraker• Socialist• Wrote The Jungle about

the meatpacking industry, which led to Theodore Roosevelt passing the Pure Food and Drugs Act and the Meat Inspection Act

Clarence Darrow

• Attorney• Supporter of labor unions;

defended union leader Eugene Debs

• Became supporter of Socialist causes

• Defended John Scopes in Scopes Trial. Case ended in Darrow victory, allowing teaching of evolution in schools

William Jennings Bryan

• Democrat and Populist; ran 3 times for President

• Strong supporter of bimetallic Free Silver Movement

• Secretary of State under Woodrow Wilson

• Argued for Creationism in Scopes Trial; lost

Eleanor Roosevelt

• First Lady of the USA; wife of FDR

• Spoke out on civil rights, women’s and children’s issues

• After FDR died, she became UN delegate; served on UN Human Rights Committee

• Helped draft Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Dolores Huerta

• Co-founded United Farm Workers with Cesar Chavez

• Civil rights activist focusing on migrant workers

Sonia Sotomayor

• Appointed to US Supreme Court in 2009 by Barack Obama

• First Supreme Court Justice of Puerto Rican descent

Oprah Winfrey

• Started career as talk show host; acted in movies; started book club

• First female African-American billionaire

• Philanthropist who supports women’s and children’s charities

Henry Ford

• Founder of Ford Motor Co.

• Inventor of assembly line method of manufacturing

• Offered good wages and profit-sharing plans to keep employees loyal

• Philanthropist

Glenn Curtiss

• Aviation pioneer• Inventor of flying boats,

stronger engines

Charles A. Lindbergh

• Aviation pioneer• Completed first solo

transatlantic flight in plane Spirit of St. Louis

• Strong isolationist in years leading to World War II

Billy Graham

• Preacher• Leading religious

revivalist in USA

Military

Alfred Thayer Mahan

• Strong supporter of American sea power in late 19th and early 20th century

• Argued that a nation must have a strong navy to build and protect a strong nation

John J. Pershing

• Known as “Black Jack”• Commander of

American Expeditionary Force in World War I

Omar Bradley

• WWII General• Served under Patton in

N. Africa• Fought in N. Africa,

Sicily, Normandy, Germany

• Became 5-star General; commanded largest force ever fielded by USA

Dwight Eisenhower• Supreme Allied Commander

in Europe in WWII• First Supreme Allied

Commander of NATO post-WWII

• Elected 34th President• Worked to cool Cold War

tensions• Signed Interstate Highway Act

and 1957 Civil Rights Act• Desegregated schools per

Supreme Court decision

Douglas MacArthur

• Supreme Commander of Allied forces in Pacific in WWII

• Military Governor of Japan post-WWII

• Commanded UN forces in Korean War

• Criticized Truman’s decisions in Korean War, fired by Truman

Chester Nimitz

• Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Fleet in WWII

• Japan formally surrendered to Nimitz aboard USS Missouri, ending WWII.

George Marshall

• US Army Chief of Staff in WWII

• US Secretary of State 1947-49

• US Secretary of Defense 1950-51

• Created the Marshall Plan to aid Europe after WWII

• Won Nobel Peace Prize due to Marshall Plan

George Patton

• Pioneer in tank warfare• Fought in N. Africa and

Sicily in WWII• Led 3rd Army through

France and into Germany VERY successfully

• Died at end of WWII

Vernon J. Baker

• Member of 1st African-American regiment to see combat in WWII

• Only African-American officer in his company

• Earned Medal of Honor for actions in Italy

Alvin York

• Served as a sergeant in US Army in WWI.

• Fought in Battle of Argonne Forest

• On his own, killed 25 German soldiers and captured 132 more.

• Earned Medal of Honor

Roy Benavidez

• SSgt, served in Vietnam• Led mission to rescue

surrounded Special Forces unit.

• Wounded multiple times, he help fight off enemy troops and rescue US forces.

• Earned Medal of Honor

Tuskegee Airmen

• First African-American military pilots in WWII

• Flew missions protecting bombers; never lost a bomber under their care

• Their record help convince Truman to desegregate military

Flying Tigers

• Volunteer pilots who fought the Japanese in China in WWII

• First Americans to fight the Japanese

• Won over 300 victories

Navajo Code Talkers

• Part of Marines fighting in Pacific in WWII

• Used their native language to create a code to communicate on battlefield

• Code was never broken by Japanese

Business

Bill Gates

• Founder of Microsoft• Philanthropist

Sam Walton

• Founder of Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club

• Pioneer of big box supercenter retailers

• Pioneer of wholesale club stores

Estee Lauder

• Began her company with a skin cream

• Grew company with more products into multi-billion dollar business

• Pioneered idea of “free gift with purchase”

Robert Johnson

• Founder of Black Entertainment Television (BET) in 1979

• When he sold BET, he became the first African-American billionaire

Lionel Sosa

• Founder of largest Hispanic advertising agency in USA

• Hispanic consultant in 6 Republican Presidential campaigns

Andrew Carnegie

• Started Carnegie Steel Co.

• Became one of the richest men in America

• Preached “Gospel of Wealth”

• At the end of his life, donated hundreds of millions to charities