U.S. History – Most Significant People

Most Significant People in American History

Sacagawea Statue
Sacagawea, statue in Bismarck, North Dakota

1. Explorers

    1. Spanish Explorers
      • Christopher Columbus (1492) – U.S. Virgin Islands
      • Amerigo Vespucci (1497) – South America
      • Juan Ponce de León (1513) – Puerto Rico & Florida
      • Hernando de Soto (1539) – Florida & Southeast U.S.
      • Francisco Vázquez de Coronado (1540) – Southwest U.S.
    2. English & Dutch Explorers
      • John Cabot (1497) – East Coast of Canada
      • Francis Drake (1577) – California coast
      • Walter Raleigh (1585) – Roanoke Colony (NC)
      • John Smith (1607) – Virginia
      • Henry Hudson (1609 – Dutch) – East Coast; (1610 – English) – Hudson Bay
    3. French Explorers
      • Giovanni da Verrazzano (1523) East Coast U.S. & Canada
      • Jacques Cartier (1535) – Quebec
      • Samuel de Champlain (1603) Upper Canada
      • René-Robert Cavelier – Sieur de La Salle (1682) – Great Lakes, Illinois, & Lower Mississippi River
      • Jacques Marquette & Louis Joliet (1673) – Michigan UP, Wisconsin, & Mississippi River
    4. El Norte Explorers
      • Fray (Friar) Marcos de Niza & Mustafa Azemmouri (Esteban de Dorantes) (first black explorer in America) (1538) – searched for the Seven Cities of Cíbola (the mythical Seven Cities of Gold)
      • Juan de Oñate (1598) – El Paso, Texas and New Mexico; Acoma Massacre of 1599
      • Father Eusebio Francisco Kino (1691) – southern Arizona
      • Father Junípero Serra (1749) – California
      • Captain Juan Bautista de Anza II (1775) Arizona & California
    5. Corp of Discovery (1803)
      • Meriwether Lewis
      • William Clark
      • Sacagawea
      • York
      • Other Corp of Discovery members
    6. U.S. Frontier Explorers
      • Daniel Boone
      • David Crockett
      • Zebulon Pike
      • Jim Bridger
      • Kit Carson
    7. North Pole Expedition
      • Robert Peary
      • Matthew Henson
      • Inuit team members: Ootah, Egigingwah, Seegloo, & Ooqueah
    8. Space Explorers
      • Alan Shepard – first American in space (1961) & Virgil Ivan “Gus” Grissom – second American in space (1961)
      • John Glenn – first American in orbit (1962)
      • Neil Armstrong – first to walk on the Moon (1969) & Edwin (“Buzz”) Aldrin – second to walk on the Moon (1969)
      • Sally Ride – first American woman in space (1983)

  • George Washington
    George Washington (“Lansdowne” portrait) / Gilbert Stuart / 1796

2. Government Leaders

    1. Early Presidents
      • George Washington (organized Federal government)
      • John Adams (Quasi-War with France)
      • Thomas Jefferson (Louisiana Purchase)
      • James Madison (War of 1812)
      • James Monroe (Monroe Doctrine)
    2. Jackson Democratic Presidents
      • Andrew Jackson (Trail of Tears)
      • James K. Polk (Mexican-American War)
      • Woodrow Wilson (World War I)
    3. Lincoln Republican Presidents
      • Abraham Lincoln (American Civil War)
      • Ulysses S. Grant
      • William McKinley (Spanish-American War)
      • Theodore Roosevelt
      • Dwight D. Eisenhower
    4. FDR Democratic Presidents
      • Franklin Delano Roosevelt (New Deal & World War II)
      • John F. Kennedy
      • Lyndon B. Johnson
    5. Reagan Republican Presidents
      • Ronald Reagan (conservatism & Berlin Wall speech)
      • George W. Bush (War on Terror)
    6. Congressional Leaders
      • Daniel Webster
      • Henry Clay
    7. U.S. Supreme Court
      • Chief Justice John Marshall
      • Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
    8. Military Leaders
      • Ulysses S. Grant
      • George C. Marshall
    9. First Ladies
      • Abigail Adams
      • Dolley Madison
Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial
Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial

3. Reformers

    1. Religious Freedom Leaders
      • Anne Hutchinson & Roger Williams (Puritans)
      • William Penn (Quakers)
      • Joseph Smith & Brigham Young (Mormonism founded 1830 – Fayette, NY)
      • Ellen G. White (Seventh-day Adventist founded 1863 – Battle Creek, MI)
      • Wallace Fard Muhammad (Nation of Islam founded 1930 – Detroit, MI)
    2. Revolutionaries (1775-1783)
      • Thomas Paine
      • John Hancock
      • Patrick Henry
      • Samuel Adams
      • Lafayette (Gilbert du Motier – Marquis de Lafayette)
    3. Abolitionists (1830-1865)
      • Harriet Tubman (and suffragist)
      • Frederick Douglass (and suffragist)
      • John Brown
      • Harriet Beecher Stowe
      • Angelina Grimké (and suffragist)
    4. Suffragists (1849-1920)
      • Susan B. Anthony & father Daniel Anthony
      • Lucretia Mott & husband James Mott
      • Jane Addams
      • Adelina ‘Nina’ Otero-Warren
      • George Francis Train
    5. Civil Rights Movement Leaders (1954-1968)
      • Martin Luther King Jr.
      • Rosa Parks
      • John Lewis
      • W.E.B. Du Bois
      • Malcolm X
    6. LGBTQ+ Rights Leaders (1961-Present)
      • Edith Windsor – United States v. Windsor (which overturned Section 3 of Defense of Marriage Act)
      • Harvey Milk
      • Audre Lorde
      • Marsha P. Johnson
      • Billie Jean King
    7. Labor Rights Leaders
      • César Chávez
      • Mary Harris Jones ‘Mother Jones’
      • Eugene Victor Debs
      • Frances Perkins
      • Woody Guthrie
    8. Social Reformers
      • Horace Mann
      • Florence Kelley
      • Upton Sinclair
      • Jacob Riis
      • Eleanor Roosevelt
    9. Urban Reformers
      • Daniel Burnham
      • Benjamin Marsh & Henry George
      • Frederick Law Olmsted
      • Clarence Perry
      • Jane Jacobs
    10. Environmentalists
      • John Muir
      • Aldo Leopold
      • Rachel Carson
      • Winona LaDuke
      • Wangari Maathai
Drawing by Sitting Bull at the Fort Saint Joseph Museum in Niles, Michigan

4. First Nations: American Indians, Alaskan Natives, & Native Hawaiians

    1. Powhatan (Chesapeake Bay Algonquian confederacy)
      • Wahunsenacawh/Powhatan – confederation chief
      • Pocahontas
    2. Wampanoag (Northeast Algonquian confederacy of Patuxet, Massachusett, Nantucket, Chappaquiddick, et. al)
      • Squanto/Tisquantum – Patuxet guide
      • Massasoit (Ousamequin) – confederation chief
      • Metacomet (Metacom/Pometacom/King Philip) – confederation chief
    3. Lenape (Mid-Atlantic Algonquian Delaware Nation)
      • Tamanend (King Tammany) – peace chief
    4. Interior Algonquian (Ohio Valley & Great Lakes Algonquian)
      • Tecumseh – Shawnee chief
      • Pontiac – Odawa/Ottawa war chief
    5. Iroquois Confederacy (Iroquoian Five Nations: Mohawks, Onondaga, Cayuga, Oneida, & Seneca; Sixth: Tuscarora)
      • Hiawatha – precolonial leader and co-founder of the Iroquois Confederacy
      • Joseph Brant (Thayendanegea) – Mohawk chief
    6. Five Civilized Tribes (Southeast Iroquoian Cherokee and Muskogean tribes: Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, & Seminole)
      • Sequoyah – Cherokee writing system inventor
      • Wilma Mankiller – Cherokee chief
    7. Siouan (Great Plains)
      • Red Cloud – Oglala Lakota chief
      • Crazy Horse – Oglala Lakota war chief
      • Sitting Bull – Hunkpapa Lakota chief
      • Maria Tallchief – Osage – first U.S. major prima ballerina; part of “Five Moons” Oklahoma American Indian
    8. Na-Dene (Southwest)
      • Cochise – Chiricahua Apache leader
      • Geronimo – Chiricahua Apache leader and medicine man/shaman
      • Diné (Navajo) Code Talkers
    9. Nez Perce (Columbia Plateau Sahaptin)
      • Chief Joseph (Hin-mah-too-yah-lat-kekt) – leader
    10. Pueblo Peoples (Southwest Taos, Tewa, Acoma, Zuni, Hopi, et. al)
      • Popé – led Pueblo rebellion against Spanish in 1680
      • Maria Martinez – world-renowned artist for her black-on-black pottery
      • Deb Haaland – Secretary of the Interior
    11. Alaskan Natives
      • Molly Hootch & Anna Tibeluk – education activists
    12. Native Hawaiians
      • Kamehameha the Great
      • Queen Liliʻuokalani

5. Economy-Builders

    1. Finance
      • Alexander Hamilton
      • J.P. Morgan
      • Howard Hughes
      • Warren Buffett
    2. Industrialists
      • Andrew Carnegie (steel)
      • Henry Ford (automobiles)
    3. Transportation
      • Cornelius Vanderbilt (railroads & shipping)
    4. Non-Renewable Resource Extraction
      • John D. Rockefeller (oil)
    5. Publishing
      • William Randolph Hearst
    6. Retail
      • John Jacob Astor (fur trade monopoly+)
      • Sam Walton (Walmart)
      • Jeff Bezos (Amazon)
    7. Information Technology
      • Bill Gates (Microsoft)
      • Steve Jobs (Apple)
      • Larry Page & Sergey Brin (Google)
      • Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook)

6. Scientists

    1. Benjamin Franklin
    2. George Washington Carver
    3. Joseph Priestley
    4. Nikola Tesla
    5. Thomas Alva Edison
    6. Albert Einstein
    7. Abraham Maslow
    8. Dian Fossey & Jane Goodall
    9. Norman Borlaug
Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater
Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fallingwater, Mill Run, Pennsylvania – Organic Prairie School architecture

7. Artists

    1. Gilbert Stuart
    2. Edward Hopper
    3. Frank Lloyd Wright
    4. Andy Warhol
    5. Norman Rockwell
    6. Jacob Lawrence
    7. John James Audubon
    8. Georgia O’Keeffe
    9. Thomas Nast
    10. Ansel Adams

8. Pop Icons

    1. Mark Twain
    2. Elvis Presley
    3. Madonna
    4. Bob Dylan
    5. Charlie Chaplin
    6. Jimi Hendrix
    7. Marilyn Monroe
    8. Frank Sinatra
    9. Louis Armstrong
    10. Mary Pickford

9. Athletes

    1. Babe Ruth
    2. Muhammad Ali
    3. Jackie Robinson
    4. James Naismith
    5. Arnold Schwarzenegger
    6. Ty Cobb
    7. Michael Jordan
    8. Hulk Hogan
    9. Jim Thorpe
    10. Billie Jean King