Peggy Lee, Actress and Award-Winning Jazz-Pop Singer
Peggy Lee was a prolific, Grammy Award-winning vocalist, Academy Award-nominated actress and songwriter. Renowned for her emotive voice and sensual delivery, her most famous...
Nelson Mandela, First Black President of South Africa
Nelson Mandela was elected during the first election when South African blacks were allowed to vote. A leader of the resistance for years, Mandela...
William Faulkner, American Novelist
William Faulkner, revered modernist writer, historian and sociologist, is known for capturing the raw beauty of the rural South in all its dark complexity....
Thurgood Marshall, Civil Rights Lawyer and Supreme Court Justice
Before Thurgood Marshall became the first African-American justice of the Supreme Court, he was also the most successful person to argue cases before the...
Sonia Sotomayor, First Hispanic Supreme Court Justice
Sonia Sotomayor is the first Hispanic and the third female justice to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court. Hailing from a working-class background, Sotomayor...
Martin Luther King Jr., Civil Rights Pioneer
Born into a life of religion, Martin Luther King Jr. used his faith to help guide a divided nation toward racial equality, breaking barriers...
Margaret Sanger, Founder of Birth Control League (Planned Parenthood)
After seeing what she felt were too many women dying a result of unintended pregnancy, Margaret Sanger decided it was time for a revolution....
George Pullman, Inventor of the Sleeper Car
Inventor and industrialist George Pullman literally raised Chicago from the sewer and built luxury railroad cars for the elite. The media praised his “utopian”...
Berry Gordy Jr., Founder of Motown Records
Motown Records founder Berry Gordy Jr. brought black music to white audiences. He premiered a new sound, and launched the careers of such artists...
Stephen Crane, Author of “The Red Badge of Courage”
Although he is considered one of the most influential writers of the 20th century, Stephen Crane’s life and career were cut short before his...
