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100 Most Influential Figures in U.S. History

The Atlantic magazine assembled a group of scholars to list the 100 most influential figures in U.S. history. How many can you name?
Quiz by Kestrana
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Last updated: October 6, 2016
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First submittedDecember 22, 2015
Times taken39,613
Average score42.2%
Rating4.18
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Rank
Known For
Answer
1
Emancipation
Abraham Lincoln
2
American Revolution
George Washington
3
Declaration of Indep.
Thomas Jefferson
4
Depression & WWII
Franklin D. Roosevelt
5
Treasury Dept
Alexander Hamilton
6
Diplomacy
Benjamin Franklin
7
Judicial Review
John Marshall
8
Having a Dream
Martin Luther King
9
Lightbulbs
Thomas Edison
10
Fourteen Points
Woodrow Wilson
11
Standard Oil
John D. Rockefeller
12
Union General
Ulysses S. Grant
13
Bill of Rights
James Madison
14
Model T
Henry Ford
15
Bull Moose Party
Theodore Roosevelt
16
Huckleberry Finn
Mark Twain
17
Cold War Ender
Ronald Reagan
18
Trail of Tears
Andrew Jackson
19
Common Sense
Thomas Paine
20
Philanthropy
Andrew Carnegie
21
WWII President
Harry S. Truman
22
American Poetry
Walt Whitman
23
Flight
Wilbur Wright
Orville Wright
24
Telephone
Alexander Graham Bell
25
Founding Father
John Adams
26
Mickey Mouse
Walt Disney
27
Cotton Gin
Eli Whitney
28
WWII & President
Dwight D. Eisenhower
29
Culture Wars
Earl Warren
30
Feminism
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
31
Political Compromise
Henry Clay
32
Relativity
Albert Einstein
33
Individualist Poetry
Ralph Waldo Emerson
34
Polio Vaccine
Jonas Salk
35
Baseball Integration
Jackie Robinson
36
Cross of Gold
William Jennings Bryan
37
Wall St. Banker
J. P. Morgan
38
Women's Suffrage
Susan B. Anthony
39
Silent Spring
Rachel Carson
40
Pragmatic Philosophy
John Dewey
41
Uncle Tom's Cabin
Harriet Beecher Stowe
42
First Lady
Eleanor Roosevelt
43
Civil Rights Author
W.E.B. Du Bois
44
Civil Rights/Vietnam
Lyndon B. Johnson
45
Telegraph Code
Samuel F.B. Morse
46
"The Liberator"
William Lloyd Garrison
47
Abolitionist/Slave
Frederick Douglass
48
Atomic Bomb
Robert Oppenheimer
49
Central Park
Frederick Law Olmstead
50
Mexican War
James K. Polk
Rank
Known For
Answer
51
Birth Control
Margaret Sanger
52
Mormonism
Joseph Smith
53
Supreme Court
Oliver Wendell Holmes
54
Microsoft
Bill Gates
55
6th President
John Quincy Adams
56
Education Reform
Horace Mann
57
US Civil War
Robert E. Lee
58
Southern Politics
John C. Calhoun
59
Skyscrapers
Louis Sullivan
60
Southern Novels
William Faulkner
61
Unions
Samuel Gompers
62
Pragmatism
William James
63
Rebuilding Europe
George Marshall
64
Hull House
Jane Addams
65
Civil Disobedience
Henry David Thoreau
66
Rock & Roll
Elvis Presley
67
Circus
P.T. Barnum
68
DNA
James D. Watson
69
Newspapers
James Gordon Bennett
70
Explorer
Meriwether Lewis
William Clark
71
Dictionaries
Noah Webster
72
Wal-Mart
Sam Walton
73
Reaper
Cyrus McCormick
74
Mormonism
Brigham Young
75
Home Runs
Babe Ruth
76
Architecture
Frank Lloyd Wright
77
Feminism
Betty Friedan
78
Harper's Ferry
John Brown
79
Trumpet
Louis Armstrong
80
Yellow Journalism
William Randolph Hearst
81
Anthropology
Margaret Mead
82
Opinion Polls
George Gallup
83
Mohicans
James Fenimore Cooper
84
Supreme Court
Thurgood Marshall
85
A Farewell to Arms
Ernest Hemingway
86
Christian Science
Mary Baker Eddy
87
Baby Advice
Benjamin Spock
88
Physics
Enrico Fermi
89
Opinions
Walter Lippmann
90
Fiery Sermons
Jonathan Edwards
91
Abolitionist
Lyman Beecher
92
Grapes of Wrath
John Steinbeck
93
Slave Uprising
Nat Turner
94
Kodak
George Eastman
95
MGM
Samuel Goldwyn
96
Green Party
Ralph Nader
97
O Susanna
Stephen Foster
98
Tuskegee
Booker T. Washington
99
Watergate
Richard Nixon
100
Moby Dick
Herman Melville
103 Recent Comments
+3
Level 65
Oct 5, 2016
Alexander Graham Bell was a British citizen, only taking up US citizenship some 6 years after patenting the telephone. Of course, both the UK, USA and Canada claim him as their own, but after living the first 23 years of his life in the UK, it would be hard to call him an American.
+1
Level 81
Oct 5, 2016
Maybe it's hard for you. But to an American, anyone born in the country regardless of parentage; anyone born to an American parent, regardless of their place of birth; and anyone who becomes a naturalized citizen by choice is definitely and wholly American! In reality, Bell was American. It's not so hard to accept reality if you just give it a shot.

Also, the guy lived to be 75. You're really going to discount the last 52 years?

+7
Level 70
Oct 5, 2016
Alexander Graham Bell was a Scotsman.

Even said so himself.

+2
Level 81
Oct 5, 2016
and George Washington was an Englishman. What's your point? Having one nationality or one ethnic heritage does not preclude having a second.
+6
Level 65
Oct 5, 2016
I suspect being 'Chief Electrician' of the Bell Telephone Company it would be easier if he became a US citizen.

For most rational people, Einstein will always be German, Rupert Murdoch will always be Australian, and Jim Carrey will always be Canadian.

While it makes more sense to become a citizen of the country your main business is based in (Bell, Murdoch etc), it does not alter your place of birth and upbringing which correctly defines your nationality.

+3
Level 81
Oct 11, 2016
So "rational" people are oblivious to facts and reality? Nationality definition 1: citizenship. Definition 2: ethnicity, if you believe in the concept of nation states. You are skipping over the first and primary definition, and also demeaning the struggles many went through to attain citizenship in a place they chose to call home.
+2
Level 70
Oct 6, 2018
@Bonzo, so the correct definition of nationality is where you were born and brought up - what if those are different places? Einstein was never a citizen of Germany because German citizenship didn't exist at that point - you had to be a citizen of a German kingdom. Einstein sometimes described himself as Swiss, and didn't agree with the concept of nationalism. He changed nationality six times. It makes sense to describe Einstein as any of the following: German, Swiss, American, Austro-Hungarian, subject of the Kingdom of Prussia, citizen of the Free State of Prussia, subject of the Kingdom of Württemberg, stateless, or of multiple nationalities. There are rational arguments for any of these, though some make more sense than others.
+2
Level 70
Apr 27, 2020
Have you forgotten something? This quiz is about INFLUENTIAL people in American history, not American influential people. If someone not from the USA does something revolutionary to the USA, they would probably come on this list.
+5
Level 65
Oct 5, 2016
This quiz is too USA-centric.
+1
Level 70
Apr 27, 2020
I know.
+1
Level 55
Dec 6, 2023
I sure wonder why
+1
Level 46
Oct 5, 2016
It's called, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. NOT mormonism!! Please switch it the the correct way, thank you. Great quiz otherwise.
+10
Level 81
Oct 5, 2016
it's called both. and it's only called the CoJCoLDS by Mormons. If they cared so much about everyone calling their church by the "correct" name then they should have picked a shorter name, and they probably also should have put that name on the front of all the books they distribute instead of "the Book of Mormon." This is Marketing 101, guys.
+3
Level 70
Oct 5, 2016
So many non americans
+2
Level 81
Oct 5, 2016
There's not a single non-American on this quiz. There are quite a few making ignorant comments below the quiz, though. So depending on what you mean you could be wrong or right.
+2
Level 56
Oct 5, 2016
The link to your source is broken.
+4
Level ∞
Oct 5, 2016
Removed the link. They removed their list and replaced it with a slideshow (shudder).
+1
Level 75
Jul 25, 2018
Oh the humanity
+1
Level 63
Oct 5, 2016
I think Supreme Court clues could be better (though keep them short). Also, isn't this quiz too US-based?
+2
Level 41
Mar 20, 2024
because the point of this is to name people famous in american history...
+1
Level 66
Oct 5, 2016
As others have mentioned, John Dewey did not invent the Dewey Decimal System. That was Melvil Dewey. John Dewey is a completely different person: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey
+2
Level 60
Oct 5, 2016
Makes sense. You need a good classification system when a white whale keeps eating your books.
+2
Level ∞
Oct 6, 2016
Haha. Fixed this error
+1
Level 40
Oct 5, 2016
Only 3 :(
+1
Level 67
Oct 5, 2016
I understand that the clues might come from the Atlantic as well but the clue for Wilson is hilariously bad. No one knows the man who brought the US into the first world war and attempted to get in involved in the League of Nations afterwards as an isolationist
+1
Level 64
Oct 6, 2016
Thank you! I was going to say the same thing about Wilson! I know that the list was picked by Atlantic Magazine, so most of my issues with this quiz (which I DID very much enjoy and rated quite highly) are with them - leaving off JFK or any Kennedy, leaving off Barack Obama as the nation's first Black president, etc. - but some of the hints written below are really bad. Reagan was known by enough things that he should not be given as politically charged a clue as being said to have won the Cold War. And Woodrow Wilson, he of the Fourteen Points and Wilsonian democracy, is said to be known for isolationism? He was the OPPOSITE of an isolationist! Are any of the other people linked to clues that are literally the opposite of what we know about them? If not, Wilson's MUST be changed and is by far the most inaccurate hint on the whole quiz.
+2
Level 60
Oct 6, 2016
Actually, I do know the president who used the slogan "He kept us out of war" for his 1916 election, and who, upon entering the war due to Congressional pressure, immediately brought up the 14 points as the solution to end it, as an isolationist. If you read the 14 points, the league of nations is almost an afterthought, and it's primary purpose was to preserve free trade, an extremely important concern for the US at that time.
+1
Level 64
Oct 6, 2016
I loved this quiz, but you BADLY need to fix the 'hint' for Woodrow Wilson, since that is the OPPOSITE of what he did and is known for. Say 'Fourteen Points,' or World War I, ANYTHING but 'isolationism.' If you're going to stick with that, why not call Eisenhower a pacifist, Edison a luddite, Franklin Delano Roosevelt a marathon enthusiast, and Ronald Reagan an intellectual.
+1
Level ∞
Oct 6, 2016
I changed the clue to Fourteen Points, since Wilson was only a sometimes isolationist.
+1
Level 71
Oct 6, 2016
Having Watson and omitting Crick is pretty unfair. Guys from the Atlantic magazine could have done a little more research
+2
Level ∞
Oct 6, 2016
Crick was British
+3
Level 30
Oct 6, 2016
That didn't stop Einstein or Alexander Graham Bell. Not that Einstein was British, but you get what I mean.
+1
Level 81
Oct 22, 2016
They were both American.
+1
Level 80
Apr 28, 2020
@kal Crick was British. @Possums Einstein and Bell gained U.S. citizenship later in their lives.
+1
Level 91
Aug 13, 2020
@JackintheBox kal was talking about Einstein and Bell. Not Crick.
+1
Level 81
Oct 11, 2020
@Jack, yes that's right. Thanks. @Jack I know Crick retained his British citizenship, even though he died in San Diego where he worked.
+6
Level 66
Oct 6, 2016
Malcolm X? Rosa Parks? Stunned....but then again.....
+1
Level 73
Oct 6, 2016
Interesting quiz. As a Brit there are a lot of people on there i've never heard of, but that's to be expected.

I'd love to see a split of how Americans and non Americans scored, as I suspect the average is dragged down by us non Americans.

+1
Level 30
Oct 6, 2016
Angry Scot here... Since when was A.G Bell American???

Born: March 3, 1847, Edinburgh. Unless Scotland is now part of the USA I am quite confused to see how he got on this list... Did he get American citizenship in later life? Am I missing something here?

+2
Level 30
Oct 6, 2016
Saw Einstein, read title carefully. Taking it back. Remember kids, always read the title carefully.
+2
Level 81
Oct 11, 2016
Bell and Einstein were both naturalized American citizens.
+1
Level 81
Oct 11, 2016
In the case of Bell, in 1882 he gave up his British citizenship and became American. He was 35 years old.
+2
Level 21
Jan 13, 2019
Don't blame him for where he was born. He couldn't control that. He chose to improve himself.
+1
Level 90
Oct 11, 2019
Bell Telephone Company, Boston, Massachusetts, U.

.

.

.

.

S.A., not K.

+1
Level 74
Jul 26, 2022
I never knew he got American citizenship until I took this quiz either
+1
Level 79
Oct 9, 2016
It's not Myanmar. It's BURMA ;)
+3
Level 93
Oct 9, 2016
I was expecting some variety in race and gender. This was "Some presidents, and other famous white people"
+9
Level 81
Oct 11, 2016
Who do you feel was overlooked? Or do you think the list makers should have ignored a person's influence on history in favor of focusing on what "race" they were when devising a list of most influential figures?
+4
Level 49
Jan 26, 2020
Just stop
+2
Level 80
Apr 28, 2020
And perhaps species too?
+3
Level 67
Dec 30, 2016
What about JFK and Rosa Parks
+1
Level 36
Mar 8, 2017
Though I believe that Bobby and Teddy Kennedy deserve the accolades more so than JFK (He is revered as an assassinated President, but what exactly did he accomplish as Presidents?) I

much rather have JFK here than Clarence Thomas. PLEASE!

The man is an affront to humanity.

+2
Level 66
Nov 2, 2017
@divantilya Well, JFK successfully backed the US and Soviet Union down from the brink of nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis, so there's that.
+1
Level 44
Mar 21, 2017
All Rosa Parks did was say no
+7
Level 51
May 1, 2017
First, if Lewis and Clark are on this list, Sacagawea certainly should as well.
+1
Level 21
Jan 13, 2019
Who?
+3
Level 91
Aug 13, 2020
Lewis and Clark's guide.
+1
Level 55
May 22, 2017
Though Samuel Goldwyn co-founded both Paramount and MGM, he left the latter rather quickly and spent the rest of his career as an independent producer. Louis B. Mayer would be a much more appropriate representative for MGM.
+1
Level 83
Apr 30, 2020
I don't think either deserves to be on the 100 most influential.
+1
Level 69
Jul 6, 2017
I don't get sometimes how people can put Thomas Edison so high up but not include Nikola Tesla at all. Wasn't it Tesla who improved Edison's lacking product?. Edison caused more trouble than he did good from the documentaries I've seen.

JFK should also be on this list.

+3
Level 81
Aug 13, 2017
You've probably seen some documentaries with questionable historical accuracy. Tesla was a cool guy but the Edison v. Tesla meme has really taken on a life of its own in the last decade or so since it was born.
+3
Level 76
Sep 8, 2020
Edison wasn't the great inventor his marketers claimed he was, but by running the laboratories he ran and commercialising the inventions he commercialised he was pretty influential
+4
Level 71
Mar 10, 2021
I'm pretty sure Tesla invented alternating current (and Wikipedia supports that). I'd say that's certainly a very significant achievement. Agree with Sirlandlord, Tesla should probably be on here/get more credit.
+2
Level 55
Aug 13, 2017
Both Frederick Law Olmstead and Calvert Vaux designed Central Park. Both made different but equally invaluable contributions.

Also, while Samuel Goldwyn helped start MGM pictures he was only involved at the very begining. He also helped start Paramount back when he was known as Saumuel Goldfish. Most of his career he was an independent producer, one of the most successful in Hollywood history.

+1
Level 59
Oct 9, 2017
I stopped taking this quiz because Kennedy is not in it. I think he should.
+2
Level 65
Jan 19, 2018
Margaret Sanger believed in eugenics.
+5
Level 41
Mar 16, 2018
Okay, maybe all Rosa Parks did was say no, but she set off a major movement that changed the the whole course of civil rights in the USA. She was brave to say it, a lot of us would have been too intimidated.
+4
Level 83
Jun 8, 2023
Plus it wasn't just a random act. She was actively working as a campaigner and the bus incident was semi-planned.
+1
Level 63
Aug 23, 2018
JFK?
+1
Level 66
Feb 9, 2019
Important to emphasize this is from the Atlantic. Many authors, activists, social justice figures, etc... I did not do well on this quiz, but the Atlantic has a much different world view of American History than I do. 1/3 of the list is authors. Many are civil rights leaders, feminists, political activists, and cultural figures, musicians, etc... And Ralf Nader? Seriously? Top 100 in USA history? But few civil war leaders, few inventors, few military figures, and plays to a very partisan mindset of American History. Not criticizing the quiz author, just the Atlantic. It's a big, fat polito-pop-fest of a publication.
+2
Level 63
Mar 11, 2019
I can assure you Kennedy had a bigger influence than Jane Addams
+2
Level 48
Nov 6, 2019
I know you didn't make this I'm shocked that Harriet Tubman wasn't on here
+2
Level 63
Nov 21, 2019
I know you didn't make this list, but as far as Americans from the 20th century, I would have included:

Margaret Mitchell

Billy Graham

Gene Roddenberry

Leon Uris

and toss up between George and Ira Gershwin/Aaron Copeland

+3
Level 81
Apr 21, 2020
Should include Rupert Murdoch, Ted Turner, Mark Zuckerburg, Ray Kroc, Lucille Ball, Rush Limbaugh, Barack Obama, Karl Rove, Wayne LaPierre, Stan Lee, Colonel Sanders, George Lucas, and Donald Trump, for better or worse.
+2
Level 81
Apr 21, 2020
Maybe throw on Madonna and Kim Kardashian, too.
+2
Level 81
Apr 21, 2020
On this attempt I misread "individualist poetry" as "industrialist poetry"... the former makes more sense. I tried "Skinny Puppy."
+1
Level 69
Apr 27, 2020
James K. Polk? Really? C'mon.
+3
Level 80
Apr 28, 2020
Yes, really.
+2
Level 67
Apr 27, 2020
I like how there's this dude known for 'opinions'

Must've been pretty good opinions to have shaped America so

+1
Level 83
Apr 30, 2020
Where's Wilbur and Orville?
+2
Level 40
Jul 16, 2020
they're here, but Kennedy somehow isn't...
+2
Level 76
Sep 8, 2020
Albert Einstein wasn't an Influential Figure in American History. He ended up becoming a US citizen, but none of the stuff he is particularly famous or influential for was done in the US or part of US history.
+2
Level 81
Oct 11, 2020
Manhattan Project? Ring a bell?
+1
Level 68
Oct 15, 2020
"Woe is me." Albert Einstein, upon hearing the news of the Hiroshima bombing
+1
Level 67
Jan 28, 2021
Funny: the quiz says scholars and people influential to American history. Does not say Americans.... Read the parameters of the quiz before you start correcting them lol
+1
Level 60
Jun 14, 2021
The wrights weren’t the first to fly. Also, the trail of tears is horrible.
+4
Level 67
Oct 12, 2021
A bit weird that the list includes Babe Ruth, yet doesn't conclude neither Rosa Parks nor Malcom X. Not to undermine the actions of Babe Ruth, but the civil rights movement should get more attention in this list, for sure if the list includes baseball players.
+1
Level 73
Nov 22, 2021
I know it's hard to analyze history as it happens, but there's no doubt that Clinton, G. W. Bush, and Obama are all in the top 100 most influential figures in American history. Also, if we're going to pick an anthropologist then I think Franz Boas was more influential than Margaret Mead.
+4
Level 83
Jun 8, 2022
I know this quiz is opinion-based, but the omission of Rosa Parks and Harriet Tubman shocked me incredibly, especially when we have multiple authors and poets on the list (not that those aren't important and necessary for culture, but are we really saying Melville's Moby Dick is more important than many amazing Civil Rights leaders like Rosa Parks and Malcolm X, or fearless abolitionaries like Tubman?) . Tubman in particular is (in my opinion) one of the most amazing women in history. It makes me sad that she wasn't included on this list
+1
Level 72
Dec 17, 2022
You cannot claim Einstein as American hahaha
+4
Level ∞
Dec 17, 2022
The Germans loved him so much he was forced to flee for his life.
+2
Level 80
Dec 21, 2022
Hard to believe Armstrong isn't in here...and Reagan is.
+3
Level 92
Jan 2, 2023
Love this quiz. In re #33, "indivudualist poetry" is kind of misleading. He wrote poetry but he's not really known as a poet. Definitely known for his individualist philosophy. So maybe that (or "Transcendentalism," if it wouldn't be too much of a giveaway)? And in re #49, there's no A in his last name. Mere quibbles. Fun quiz.
+1
Level 88
Oct 7, 2023
Just saw this, I definitely agree. I would personally prefer "Transcendentalist poet" as a clue for Emerson.
+2
Level 66
Jan 5, 2023
What about Steve Jobs? I'm pretty sure the guy who came up with the iPhone has had a greater influence on us than over half of the people on this list. The same could be said about the creators of social media networks, like Mark Zuckerberg. The average % correct for most of the people on this list is below 50%.
+1
Level 74
Feb 13, 2023
What a quiz! I was right on all of the top 30 and I scored 77/102 overall. Thanks for the quiz!
+2
Level 59
May 9, 2023
Muhammad Ali?
+2
Level 88
Jul 9, 2023
Great and fun quiz (I loved grinding it!). Even though the list is bad, it was still really interesting as there were some people here I’d never even learned of in school or in my free time.

That being said, there is a typo for Frederick Law Olmsted: it should be “Olmsted”, not “Olmstead”.

+4
Level 70
Aug 4, 2023
"Culture Wars" was a terrible prompt for Earl Warren when this quiz was published in 2016. It's even worse now. FDR had the most vetoes of any President, does that make him famous for cancel culture?
+1
Level 70
Aug 9, 2023
Still have to watch Oppenheimer
+2
Level 44
Aug 31, 2023
A pet peeve of mine is people forget about Margaret Mitchell, a woman who in the 1930's wrote the best novel in American history, and the only novel in American literature which is equal to Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Charles Dickens. Gone with the Wind is one of the greatest books ever written, and by far the greatest book ever written by a woman.

Instead people talk about Moby Dick which is nothing but a master class in word filling. Bleah...

+2
Level 55
Dec 6, 2023
I would say that Herbert Hoover messing up the Great Depression had massive ripples through American history.
+1
Level 69
Jan 31, 2024
James Monroe and George W Bush should arguably be here