| Suggestions: People to Read and Learn About! | ||||||||||
| The Norine Gann Salmon Bay School Library has biographies on those names marked with an asterisk. | ||||||||||
| Most of these are quality newer books; some may be picture books or shorter titles. | ||||||||||
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Try these biography links, too! http://www.biography.com Type in the last name of the person you want to learn about. http://www.pbs.org/neighborhoods/history/ Scroll down to an alphabetical list of biographies of prominent people. Each person has a website devoted to him or her, with photos and other cool graphics!
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| *What other famous, admirable people can you suggest for our list? | ||||||||||
| Artists, Authors, Athletes & Entertainers | ||||||||||
| * | Hank Aaron | Baseball player regarded as one of the best hitters of all time, grew up in Mobile, Alabama, poor, black and crazy about baseball ("I had a Hammer") | ||||||||
| * | Louisa May Alcott | Author of the Little Women books | ||||||||
| * | Muhammad Ali | Heavyweight champion of the world (boxer) | ||||||||
| * | Maya Angelou | African-American novelist and poet | ||||||||
| Piers Anthony | Journey into the mind of a gifted science fiction writer (autobio: "Bio of an Ogre") | |||||||||
| Hannah Arendt | Leading thinker of postwar world-- an extraordinary intellect and author | |||||||||
| * | James Baldwin | Great African-American author, author of Native Son and Another Country | ||||||||
| * | Leonard Bernstein | Great American sympony conductor and composer | ||||||||
| * | Ruben Blades | Hispanic songwriter and social activist | ||||||||
| * | Charlie Chaplin | Brilliant film director, famous for his character "the Little Tramp" | ||||||||
| * | Beverly Cleary | Author of Ramona books and Henry Huggins books | ||||||||
| * | Roald Dahl | Author of BFG, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, etc. | ||||||||
| * | Walt Disney | Founder of Disney studios | ||||||||
| * | Ralph Ellison | Black American writer, author of "Invisible Man" | ||||||||
| * | Zlata Filipovic | "Zlata's Diary" Schoolgirl who wrote about life in Sarajevo | ||||||||
| * | Ella Fitzgerald | African-American jazz singer | ||||||||
| * | Sid Fleischman | Wonderful children's book author who started out wanting to be a magician (Biography entitled "The Abracadabra Kid") | ||||||||
| * | Robert Frost | One of the greatest American poets-- author of "The Road Not Taken" | ||||||||
| * | Theodore Geisel | A.K.A. Dr. Seuss! | ||||||||
| * | Woody Guthrie | Famous American folk singer of the 30's | ||||||||
| * | Mia Hamm | American soccer star | ||||||||
| * | Tony Hawk | Mr. Skateboard | ||||||||
| * | Harry Houdini | Great magician and escape artist | ||||||||
| * | Langston Hughes | African American poet, major figure in the Harlem Renaissance | ||||||||
| * | Zora Neale Hurston | Enigmatic and controversial African American author and anthropologist | ||||||||
| * | Frida Kahlo | Remarkable Mexican woman painter | ||||||||
| * | Helen Keller | Author and educator who overcame deafness and blindness from infancy | ||||||||
| * | Jack London | Author of such favorites as White Fang and Call of the Wild | ||||||||
| * | Pablo Neruda | Chilean Nobel-prize winning poet and Communist leader | ||||||||
| * | Georgia O'Keefe | American painter known for New Mexican themes | ||||||||
| * | Gary Paulsen | Author of such young adult favorites as Hatchet | ||||||||
| * | Pablo Picasso | Prolific artist of the 20th century | ||||||||
| Edgar Allen Poe | American author of early horror stories | |||||||||
| * | Diego Rivera | Mexian painter known for his murals | ||||||||
| * | Wilma Rudolph | American Olympic gold medalist in track and field | ||||||||
| * | Antoine de Saint-Exupery | French author and aviator, author of "The Little Prince" | ||||||||
| * | William Shakesepeare | The greatest author in the history of the English language! | ||||||||
| Henry David Thoreau | Author who valued the natural world before his time | |||||||||
| Henri Toulouse-Lautrec | 20th century French artist | |||||||||
| * | Mark Twain | American humorist and author of "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" | ||||||||
| Adeline Yen Mah | Auhor of the memoir Chinese Cinderella | |||||||||
| * | Babe Didrickson Zeharias | Groundbreaking woman athlete and Olympian | ||||||||
| Government and military leaders, spies and judges | ||||||||||
| * | Madeline Albright | Secretary of State of the United States during the Clinton Administration | ||||||||
| * | Corazon Aquino | President of the Philippines | ||||||||
| * | Yasir Arafat | Leader of the struggle for Palestinian liberation | ||||||||
| * | Simon Bolivar | Leader of South American independence from Spain | ||||||||
| * | Willie Brandt | West German statesman and chancellor, fervent anti-Nazi | ||||||||
| * | Jimmy Carter | Thirty-ninth president of the United States | ||||||||
| * | Fidel Castro | Military dictator of Cuba since 1959 | ||||||||
| * | Cleopatra | Ruler of Egypt from 51 BC to 30 BC | ||||||||
| * | Princess Diana | Princess of Wales, killed in car crash | ||||||||
| * | Dwight D. Eisenhower | General in WWII, then president of the U.S. | ||||||||
| * | Elizabeth 1 | Queen of England during Shakespeare's time | ||||||||
| * | Benjamin Franklin | American statesman, printer, scientist and writer | ||||||||
| * | Mohandas Gandhi | Leader of Indian independence from Great Britain | ||||||||
| * | Geronimo | Apache chief who led one of the last great American Indian uprisings | ||||||||
| * | Mikhail Gorbachev | Soviet leader; had a major role in the modern era | ||||||||
| * | Henry VIII | King of England from 1509 to 1547 | ||||||||
| * | Thomas Jefferson | 3rd president of the U.S.; author of the Declaration of Independence | ||||||||
| * | Joan of Arc | 15th century girl who became a French national hero | ||||||||
| * | Chief Joseph | Leader of the Nez Perce Indians | ||||||||
| * | Princess Ka' iulani | Hawaii's last heir to the throne | ||||||||
| * | John F. Kennedy | Youngest man elected to be U.S. president | ||||||||
| Vladimir Lenin | Leader of the Bolshevik Revolution; first leader of the Soviet Union | |||||||||
| * | Abraham Lincoln | President of the U.S.during Civil War | ||||||||
| * | Nelson Mandela | Jailed for 26 years for fighting for racial equality in South Africa | ||||||||
| * | Thurgood Marshall | First black Supreme Court Justice | ||||||||
| * | Richard Nixon | 37th President of the U.S. | ||||||||
| Sandra Day O'Connor | First woman Supreme Court Justice | |||||||||
| George Patton | "Soldier of Destiny" U.S. General in WWII | |||||||||
| * | Pocahontas | Peacemaker between the Powhatan tribes and the Jamestown colony | ||||||||
| * | Paul Revere | American revolutionary patriot whose "midnight ride" was immortalized by Longellow | ||||||||
| * | Eleanor Roosevelt | First U.S. First Lady to develop a public life and career of her own. U.S. delegate to the U.N, Democratic Party leader | ||||||||
| * | Theodore Roosevelt | 26th president of the U.S.; important for "trust busting" and conservation legislations | ||||||||
| * | Franklin D. Roosevelt | 32nd president of the U.S. (1933-45) | ||||||||
| * | Sacajawea | Guide of the Lewis & Clark expedition | ||||||||
| * | Anwar Sadat | Egyptian leader who worked for peace in the Middle East | ||||||||
| * | Sitting Bull | Sioux Indian chief and victor in the battle of Little Bighorn against Custer | ||||||||
| * | Margaret Thatcher | Former prime minister of Great Britain | ||||||||
| Mary, Queen of Scots | Queen of Scotland until executed in 1587 | |||||||||
| Religious Leaders and Leaders in the fight for human rights | ||||||||||
| * | Abigail Adams | Wife of 2nd president; advocate for women's rights | ||||||||
| * | Jane Addams | Early social worker; opened Hull House to help Chicago's poor in 1889 | ||||||||
| Susan B. Anthony | Crusader for human rights; worked to give women the right to vote | |||||||||
| Melba Beals | One of the nine black teenagers to integrate Little Rock's Central High School in 1957 (find her account in "Warriors Don't Cry") | |||||||||
| * | Buddha | Founder of Buddhism; great spiritual leader | ||||||||
| * | Frederick Douglass | Black American abolitionist who escaped from slavery | ||||||||
| * | Anne Frank | Jewish girl, victim of the Nazi holocaust | ||||||||
| * | Marcus Garvey | American proponent of black nationalism | ||||||||
| * | Tensing Gyatso | the 14th Dalai Lama, winner of the Nobel Prize for his non-violent struggle for Tibet | ||||||||
| * | Jesse Jackson | African-American civil rights leader | ||||||||
| * | Mother Jones | Fought for workers' rights in coal mines, factories, and mills | ||||||||
| * | Martin Luther King Jr. | Greatest American civil rights leader | ||||||||
| Irene Gut Opdyke | Young Polish woman who hid and rescued Jews during the Holocaust (memoir entitled In My hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer) | |||||||||
| * | Nat Turner | Black American slave and revolutionary, led famous slave uprising | ||||||||
| * | Father Junipero Serra | Spanish Franciscan missionary in N. America, founded nine missions in CA in late 1700's | ||||||||
| * | Margaret Sanger | Nurse and leader of birth control movement | ||||||||
| * | Oskar Schindler | Industrialist and humanitarian-- famous Spielberg movie about him is called "Schindler's List" | ||||||||
| * | Tecumseh | "These Lands Are Ours" Fought for rights of Native Americans | ||||||||
| * | Mother Teresa | Nun who founded a mission to aid the poor | ||||||||
| * | Leon Tillage | Son of a North Carolina sharecropper who recalls hard times before civil rights ("Leon's Story") | ||||||||
| * | Sojourner Truth | Former slave who became abolitionis and advocate of women's rights | ||||||||
| * | Harriet Tubman | Antislavery activist, called "the Moses of her people" | ||||||||
| Scientists, Explorers, and Entrepreneurs | ||||||||||
| Tamia Aebi | First American woman and youngest person to circumnavigate the globe ("Maiden Voyage") | |||||||||
| * | Elizabeth Blackwell | First woman doctor | ||||||||
| * | Louis Braille | Blind Frenchman who developed the alphabet of raised dots (braille) | ||||||||
| * | Rachel Carson | Author of "Silent Spring" and a pioneering environmentalist | ||||||||
| * | George Washington Carver | Black American agricultural chemist | ||||||||
| Jacques Cousteau | French oceanographer, pioneer in underwater exploration | |||||||||
| * | Marie Curie | Polish scientist who discovered radium and pioneered X-ray technology | ||||||||
| * | Charles Darwin | Naturalist who developed the theory of evolution by natural selection | ||||||||
| * | Amelia Earhart | First woman to fly across the Atlantic Ocean alone | ||||||||
| * | George Eastman | Inventor, businessman, and founder of Kodak | ||||||||
| * | Thomas A. Edison | Inventor of phonograph, electric light, and motion pictures | ||||||||
| * | Albert Einstein | Great 20th Century scientist--special theory of relativity | ||||||||
| * | Richard P. Feynman | Nobel prize-winning physicist; read the autobiography "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman" | ||||||||
| * | Alexander Fleming | British scientist who discovered penicillin | ||||||||
| * | Sigmund Freud | Father of psychoanalysis | ||||||||
| * | Galileo Galilei | Astronomer and mathematician, he challenged traditional beliefs | ||||||||
| * | Bill Gates | Richest man in America; founder of Microsoft | ||||||||
| John Glenn | U.S. Astronaut, then senator | |||||||||
| * | Jane Goodall | "My Life with the Chimpanzees" Naturalist in Africa | ||||||||
| * | Stephen Hawking | Winner of a Nobel Prize in physics, modern genius with crippling disease | ||||||||
| * | Florence Nightingale | Englishwoman who founded modern nursing | ||||||||
| * | Louis Pasteur | French scientist who discovered rabies vaccine and pasteurization | ||||||||
| * | Sally Ride | American astronaut | ||||||||
| * | Jonas Salk | Scientist who developed the polio vaccine | ||||||||
| Albert Schweitzer | Medical missionary in the jungles of Africa | |||||||||
| Ernest Shackleton | Captain of the Endurance, polar explorer | |||||||||
| * | Nikola Tesla | Croatian electrical engineer and inventor | ||||||||
| James Watson | With Crick, discovered double-helix structure of DNA | |||||||||
| * | Steve Wozniak | Inventor of the Apple computer | ||||||||
| * | Wright Brothers | Inventors of the first airplane | ||||||||