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100 Americans
Top 100 Significant Americans
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Abraham Lincoln | President of the US during the American Civil War. Issued the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing slaves. Assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald, a southern sympathizer |
| George Washington | Commander of the Continental Army during the Am Revolution. First President of the United States. |
| Thomas Jefferson | Author the the Declaration of Independence, third President of the US; negotiated the Louisiana Purchase. |
| Franklin D Roosevelt | President during the Great Depression and WWII; Famous for New Deal recovery program. Expanded the role of government after Dec. 7, 1941; "day which will live in infamy" |
| George Bush Jr | President of US who took US to war in Afghanistan and Iraq after the 9/11 attack. |
| Benjamin Franklin | Discovers electricity in kite experiment. Most famous statesman. Printed on $100bill |
| Anthony Fauci | Chief medical advisor leading the US during the COVID crisis. |
| Martin Luther King | Leader of] the Civil Rights Movement; preached nonviolent approach and demanded equal rights for African Americans |
| Thomas Edison | Invented the lightbulb and numerous other inventions. |
| Woodrow Wilson | President who set the stage for the US to become involved in the affairs of other nations. |
| John D Rockefeller | Business tycoon, owned Standard Oil Company and 90% of the industry. |
| Ulysses S Grant | Northern General in Civil War who became US President. Work to protect African Americans during Reconstruction. |
| Harriet Tubman | Escaped slave to created a network of of antislavery activists and safe houses; Underground Railroad. |
| Henry Ford | Founder of Ford Motor Company, innovated the auto industry with the assembly line; invented Model T car with an affordable price. |
| Theodore (Teddy) Roosevelt | President known for being a trustbuster and an environmental conservationist; established the National Park System. Big-stick policy. Built Panama Canal |
| Mark Twain | Great American author whose novels influenced many. Authored Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn with rich humor and colloquial speech |
| Steven Spielberg | American film director and producer. Famous works include Jaws, ET, Indiana Jones, Schindler's List and many more. |
| Andrew Jackson | Common man military general President who was directly responsible for Indian Removal Act. Fought against arrogant aristocracy |
| Thomas Paine | The defining voice encouraging America to fight for independence. Penned a pamphlet Common Sense. |
| Andrew Carnegie | First self-made American tycoon in steel industry. He was major patron for libraries and learning across the United States. |
| Harry S Truman | As President he ended segregation in the military, proposed a Fair Deal, employment protection bill. Dropped atomic bombs ending WWII with Japan. Convinced Congress to aid countries resisting Communism. |
| Steven King | American author of horror and supernatural fiction and crime stories. |
| Orville and Wilbur Wright | Changed modern transportation forever when they invented flight with the Kitty Hawk airplane. |
| Alexander Graham Bell | Inventor of telephone communication device changing the manner humans communicate from distance. |
| Dolly Parton | Country western musical artist who dedicates herself to literacy through books for children. At her core is a humanitarian with steadfast morals and values. |
| Walt Disney | Founder and influencer of Disney Kingdoms and major media corporation. Undisputed leader of children's dreams for generations. Creator of Mickey Mouse. |
| Eli Whitney | Inventor of the cotton gin which encouraged the continuation and growth of slavery. |
| Mark Zuckerberg | Founder of Facebook. Face of social media. |
| Cesar Chavez | Fought discrimination against migrant workers and Hispanics; Founded the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee Union |
| Elizabeth Cady Stanton | Leader of woman's suffrage movement; fought tirelessly for female rights and to reform traditional gender roles. |
| Rosa Parks | African American civil rights activist; refused to give up her seat on city bus to a white man. Led a boycott. |
| Albert Einstein | Game-changer scientific work in physics. German immigrant whose works earned him the Nobel Peace Prize. Atomic energy thoughts encouraged the nuclear age. |
| WEB Du Bois | Devoted his life to addressing the problem of racism. Black protest leader who helped found NAACP. |
| Jonas Salk | Responsible for ridding society of one of history's most debilitating plagues by founding the polio vaccine. |
| Jackie Robinson | Baseball player, brought an end to racial segregation in Major League Baseball. |
| William Jennings Bryan | 3x Presidential candidate who was a dominate force who claimed to lead the common people. Great orator who wanted focus on working middle class America |
| JP Morgan | Investment banker who was a driving force during industrialization and the Guiled Age. Transformed Wall Street and known as greatest American banker. |
| Susan B Anthony | Very active social reformer for women and freed slaves. Suffragist and supported prohibition. Founded Women Suffrage Association. |
| Al Gore | American politician and environmentalist who served as Vice President and a candidate for President. Devoted to solving the climate crisis. |
| Tom Hanks | Actor who is noted for working dramatic roles that retells American history through film. Movies include Forest Gump, Saving Private Ryan. |
| Harriet Beecher Stowe | Her book Uncle Tom's Cabin sparked inspiration for a generation of abolitionist that will encourage the Civil War and freeing slaves. |
| Eleanor Roosevelt | First Lady and appointed delegate to the United Nations; advocate for human rights. |
| Tupac Shakur | Influential American rapper noted for addressing social issues that plagued inner cities; a symbol of activism. |
| Lyndon B Johnson | Texan who became President after assassination of Kennedy; developed Great Society to address health care, civil rights, and urban decay. |
| Samuel FB Morse | Responsible for inventing Morse Code allowing communication across great distance. |
| Harvey Milk | Political activist for gay rights. Discharged from navy for sexual acts with men. Openly gay man elected to public office. Brash, outspoken and animated earning media attention. |
| Ronald Reagan | Conservative President in the 1980s, grew the US economy. Influenced the end of the Cold War and advocated for a strong military to deter the world, anti-abortion and pro-prayer |
| Robert Oppenheimer | Father of the Manhattan Project and the development of the Atomic bomb. Scientist who ushered in the nuclear age. |
| Maya Angelou | Popular African American poet and civil rights activist. Awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Confronted and challenged racism any time she saw injustice. |
| James K Polk | One-term President responsible for adding California, Texas and Am. southwest as permanent parts of our nation following the Mexican War. |
| Margaret Sanger | Nurse who worked to open the door to sexual freedom by championing women's right to birth control. |
| Upton Sinclair | Author of THE JUNGLE which exposed the conditions in the US meat packing industry. Encouraged investigative journalism. |
| Oliver Wendell Holmes | Supreme Court judge introduced the concept of "clear and present danger" as the only basis for limiting the first amendment, freedom of speech. |
| Bill Gates | Developed a small software business in his garage that eventually became Microsoft. Philanthropist for education and health |
| Nikola Tesla | Inventor and electrical engineer, mechanical engineer , physicist and futurist best known for his creation of current electricity supply. |
| Horace Mann | Father of American public education as we know it. |
| Robert E Lee | General of the Confederate forces in the Civil War. Admired American who fought with Virginia not in response to the underlying issue of slavery. |
| Malcolm X | African American leader and figure in the Nation of Islam. Articulated concepts of race pride and black nationalism; often supported violence as a means to force change. Opposed integration. |
| Marilyn Monroe | Actress and model and style icon, sex symbol of 1960s and the sexual revolution. |
| John F Kennedy | President during the 1960's Navigated the US through hostilities with the USSR; assassinated in 1963 |
| Samuel Gompers | Founder of the American Federation of Labor and the age of Unions. Focus on the rights and dignity of workers against corrupt industrial bosses. |
| Helen Keller | A blind and deaf woman who championed disability rights. Her teacher Anne Sullivan taught Keller to read and write leading to advocacy. |
| George Marshall | Namesake of the Marshall Plan who rebuilt Europe after WWII with the intention of promoting democracy and stopping the spread of Communism. |
| Jane Addams | Influence in America's social work. Founder of the Hull House, a settlement house supporting single-working women and a safe haven for immigrants to find community. |
| Henry David Thoreau | The "find yourself" author or writing such as Walden. Reflection of simple living and natural surroundings. |
| Elvis Presley | Great musical influence on what is known as rock-and roll. Icon of youth joining the musical tunes of be-bop and jazz/blues. |
| PT Barnum | Inventor of the circus. Changed the face of American entertainment forever thanks to his penchant for spectacle and propaganda. Used "freaks" for monetary gain. |
| James D Watson | Co-discoverer of DNA double helix and revolutionized modern medicine. |
| Elon Musk | Business magnate and investor who founded SpaceX and CEO product architect of Tesla. |
| Meriwether Lewis and William Clark | Led the expedition west to map and report about the land bought from France and the Louisiana Purchase. |
| Noah Webster | Organized the dictionary defining the American English language. |
| Sam Walton | The man behind the corporate giant Walmart. Starting as owner of local general store and expanding into the giant block-store of goods. |
| Cyrus McCormick | The brains behind the mechanical reaper, an invention that made industrial agriculture possible. |
| Amelia Earhart | Kansas native who was a famous naviator. First to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. Lost trying to follow equator around the world. |
| Babe Ruth | Celebrated baseball athlete known as "The Great Bambino". First celebrity athlete. |
| Frank Lloyd Wright | American architect with a creative and modern interpretation of design. |
| Betty Friedan | Advocate for the American housewife and made society think about established gender roles. |
| John Brown | Violent abolitionist who led a raid outside Lawrence, KS and again at Harper's Ferry hoping to start a slave uprising. |
| Louis Armstrong | Black musician who became influential in the jazz movement. |
| William Randolph Hearst | Credited with yellow journalism, sensational and crude exaggeration. Led to Spanish American War. |
| Margaret Mead | Advocate for women's rights, sexual freedom of 1960s revolution and writings about children learning and watching parents. |
| George Gallup | Inventor of the Gallup Poll, a successful statistical method to survey public opinion and encouraging change. |
| Michael Jordan | Professional basketball player who became American icon. Many believe the greatest basketball player of all time. Six National NBA Championships. |
| William F Cody - Buffalo Bill | American icon that brought cowboys, Indians, settlers and sharpshooters to the world through traveling entertainment. |
| Ernest Hemingway | American author and journalist with unique style. Adventurer who won notable prizes. Enjoyed portraying soldiers, hunters and people whose courage and honest are set against modern society. |
| Oprah Winfrey | Producer and host of award winning talk show that addressed and advocated for social issues; philanthropist |
| Steve Jobs | Entrepreneur, industrial designer and media proprietor of the Apple corporation. |
| Norman Rockwell | American painter and illustrator with broad popular appeal for paintings portraying America and rural humor and daily life. |
| John Philip Sousa | American composer and conductor of America's most famous military marches and 20th c. band music. |
| John Marshall | Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court and established the principal of judicial review. |
| John Wayne | Actor, nicknamed The Duke who became popular by starring in western and military macho roles. |
| George Eastman | The brilliant mind responsible for Kodak cameras and film and its profound influence on the way we take photos. |
| Sitting Bull | Native leader to led his people during year of resistance against US Government policy of taking native lands and forcing tribes on to reservations and reform schools. |
| Donald Trump | Former President who started a "Make America Great Again" conservative movement. |
| Al Capone | 1920s Chicago mob-boss. Criminal organization that made great wealth boot-legging, gambling, prostitution, and weapons. |
| Booker T Washington | Tireless worker to help Black Americans rise up against slavery by focusing on self-help. Dominant leader in African-American elite. |
| Richard Nixon | Scandalous President that led the nation during the chaos of the Vietnam War. Only President to resign from office after an investigation to his role in the Watergate break-in. |
| Neil Armstrong | NASA Astronaut who is the first man on the moon. |
| Billy Graham | Powerful, evangelical preacher; conducted many religious crusades and counseled many US Presidents |
| Michael Jackson | American singer, songwriter, and dancer; King of Pop. One of the most significant cultural figures in history contributing to music, dance and fashion. |
| Frank Sinatra | One of the most popular entertainers and musical artists. Italian immigrant who was a founding member of the Rat Pack. Career gave him the notoriety of lady's man, friend of gangsters, an actor and general 'cool' guy. |
| Jospeh McCarthy | Senator whom the term "McCarthyism" is named; the far of Communism increased and he accused innocent Americans of treason. |
| Barak Obama | First African American President. Democratic President who attempted to overhaul the Medical system. |
| Douglas MacArthur | Commander of the US Army in the Pacific in WWII |
| Dwight Eisenhower | 34th President who served as commander in WWII, led D-Day; created the interstate highway system. From Abilene, KS |
| John J Pershing | Commander of Am Expeditionary Force in WWI. His troops were instrumental in defeating Germany |
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