Hall of Heroes

Orphaned in Yorkshire, he joined the Separatist church as a teenager and followed it into exile in Holland. Chosen governor when Carver died in April 1621, he led Plymouth for about 30 of the next 36 years and wrote its history in his own hand.

A deacon of the Leiden church who worked from 1617 to arrange the voyage. Confirmed governor the day the Compact was signed, he carried the colony through its first winter and made the peace with Massasoit before he died in April 1621.

A Cambridge man who once served Queen Elizabeth’s secretary of state, then the Separatists’ ruling elder from 1609. In Leiden his press printed books smuggled into England, and he escaped arrest. The first winter, he was one of the few nursing the sick.

A soldier who had fought in the Low Countries, hired to defend the colony. He led the first armed scouting parties on Cape Cod, nursed the sick through the first winter, and was elected militia captain in February 1621, a post he held for life.

Boston physician and the leading Son of Liberty still in town. He gathered the reports on the regulars, sent Revere and Dawes into the night, then rode out and fought along Battle Road himself. Killed at Bunker Hill eight weeks later.

Boston silversmith and engraver who had carried the patriots’ dispatches to New York and Philadelphia. He set up the lantern signal, rode to Lexington with the alarm and woke nearly every house on the way.

Veteran of the French and Indian War who fought at Louisbourg and Quebec. Sick with tuberculosis, he stood his company on the Green at dawn, then led the survivors back out to hit the regulars again that afternoon. He died that September.

Concord farmer whose land overlooked the North Bridge. He led the march on the bridge and gave the first order for Americans to fire on the King’s troops. He served again in the Saratoga campaign.

A 33-year-old Virginia lawyer and planter who wrote the draft in rented rooms in Philadelphia. He went on to serve as the third President, doubled the nation with the Louisiana Purchase, and founded the University of Virginia.

Braintree lawyer who proposed Washington to command the army and led the floor fight for independence on 1 July. Sat on the Committee of Five and edited Jefferson’s draft. Later the first Vice President and the second President.

Printer, scientist and inventor of the lightning rod. At 70 the oldest signer, he edited Jefferson’s draft on the Committee of Five. That fall he sailed for France and won the 1778 alliance that helped win the war.

Boston merchant and President of the Continental Congress. A year earlier the British governor had offered pardons to every rebel but him and Samuel Adams. The first printing went out over his name, and he signed the parchment first.

Virginia planter and veteran of the French and Indian War, named commander in chief by Congress in June 1775. At 44 he staked the Revolution on one night. He crossed with the first boats and led the charge at Princeton himself.

Boston bookseller who taught himself gunnery. In the winter of 1775–76 he hauled 60 tons of cannon about 300 miles from Fort Ticonderoga to Boston. At 26 he ran the crossing. Promoted to general two days after Trenton; later President Washington’s Secretary of War.

Marblehead fisherman, merchant and shipowner who led a regiment of seamen. In August 1776 his men rowed the trapped army off Brooklyn in a single night. On Christmas night they rowed it across the Delaware. Brigadier general in the Saratoga campaign.

A King’s College student who took command of a New York artillery company in 1776. His guns crossed with Knox and fought at Trenton and Princeton. Washington made him an aide-de-camp in 1777. First Secretary of the Treasury.

Frontier wagoner who carried the scars of a British flogging. Captured at Quebec in 1775, he came back to lead Washington’s picked riflemen. They opened both battles at Saratoga and broke the British flank on 7 October. Later he won at Cowpens.

English-born British Army veteran, wounded at Braddock’s defeat in 1755, who settled in Virginia and joined the Continental Army in 1775. He took the Northern Army on 19 August 1777, dug in on Bemis Heights and took Burgoyne’s surrender. Congress voted him a gold medal.

New Hampshire woodsman, veteran of Rogers’ Rangers, Bunker Hill, Trenton and Princeton. Passed over for promotion, he resigned, then raised the militia that crushed Burgoyne’s raid at Bennington. Congress made him a Continental brigadier. He wrote the words Live Free or Die.

Polish-born engineer, trained in Warsaw and Paris, who volunteered in 1776 and was made a colonel by Congress. He chose Bemis Heights and built the lines Burgoyne could not get past. Next he fortified West Point and chained the Hudson.

Prussian army veteran and aide to Frederick the Great who came to America as a volunteer. He trained the army in weeks and wrote the drill into the Blue Book. Made a major general in May 1778, and later an American citizen.

Raised a Quaker in Rhode Island, he ran his family’s iron forge, taught himself war from books and was a general at 32. He took the supply job no one wanted, rebuilt it in three months and got the army fed and ready to march.

Born in Kirkcudbright, Scotland, he went to sea at 12 and made America his country. Commissioned a lieutenant in the first Continental Navy in 1775. Raided Whitehaven, took the Drake, then fought Serapis to a finish from a sinking ship.

Virginian. Captured in the brig Lexington in 1777 and locked in England’s Mill Prison, he escaped to France and joined Jones. Commanded Richard’s main battery, was first aboard Serapis to take Pearson’s surrender, and was badly wounded. Later commodore against Tripoli.

Philadelphia merchant from Maryland’s Eastern Shore who joined Washington’s staff in August 1776 and served for years without pay. Washington chose him to carry the surrender news to Congress, which voted him a horse and an elegant sword. He died in 1786, aged 41.

Virginian who shaped the Virginia Plan. He sat in front of the chair, never missed a day and kept the fullest record of the debates. Later co-wrote The Federalist, drafted the Bill of Rights and served as fourth President.

New York-born lawyer who walked on a wooden leg and rose to speak 173 times, more than anyone in the hall. The Committee of Style gave him the pen. He wrote the final text and its opening words: We the People of the United States.

New York’s chancellor and a member of the committee that drafted the Declaration. On 30 April 1789 he swore in George Washington as president. He drew Talleyrand’s offer of the whole territory, and the treaty he negotiated is dated fourteen years later to the day.

Continental Army lieutenant wounded at Trenton in 1776, then senator, minister to France and governor of Virginia. He reached Paris the day after Talleyrand’s offer and, with Livingston, bought far more than his orders allowed. Later the fifth president.

Born in Geneva, he came to America at 19 and served as Treasury secretary longer than anyone. In January 1803 he gave Jefferson the legal case for buying territory by treaty. His Treasury issued the $11.25 million in 6 percent stock that paid France.

Army captain from Albemarle County, Virginia, and Jefferson’s private secretary. Studied botany, medicine and celestial navigation in Philadelphia before setting out. Filled his journals with the first descriptions of the West’s plants and animals. Became governor of the Louisiana Territory in 1807.

Virginia-born, Kentucky-raised Army officer who led riflemen at Fallen Timbers in 1794. Lewis once served in his company. Ran the boats and drew the maps. By dead reckoning he put the Pacific 4,142 miles from the mouth of the Missouri.

Lemhi Shoshone, about 16 when she joined, carrying her infant son the whole way. Saved papers and instruments from a swamped boat and found her brother’s people when the Corps needed horses. No portrait exists; shown is Leonard Crunelle’s statue.

Pennsylvania carpenter and Army veteran, elected sergeant by the men after Floyd’s death. Led the building of Fort Mandan and Fort Clatsop. Published the first account of the journey in 1807 and died in 1870, the last of the Corps.

Connecticut merchant master who joined the Navy in 1798 as a lieutenant in Constitution herself and fought Tripoli in Enterprize and Argus. In 1812 he outran a British squadron in July and took Guerriere in August. Congress voted him a gold medal.

Connecticut-born officer whose idea to kedge in 24 fathoms saved the ship in the July calm. Shot through the body against Guerriere, he survived. Hull praised him in both reports. Promoted captain in 1813, he rose to commodore and Navy commissioner.

Philadelphia Quaker shipbuilder appointed naval constructor in 1794. He argued a small navy needed frigates strong enough to beat bigger ships in heavy weather and fast enough to escape them in light winds. Constitution’s iron sides are his design.

Philadelphia-born veteran of the Quasi-War and the fight against Tripoli. On 20 February 1815 he fought Cyane and Levant at once, outmaneuvered both and captured both. Congress voted him a gold medal. He died a rear admiral in 1869, aged 91.

Virginian, one of five brothers who served in the war. In 1813 he helped take Fort George and carried the captured British flags to President Madison. Given Fort McHenry that June, he ordered the giant flag and held the fort through 25 hours of fire.

Revolutionary War officer who held Fort Mifflin on the Delaware against British bombardment in 1777. A sitting U.S. senator, he took command of Baltimore’s defense, put the whole city to work on its earthworks and had the line manned when the British came.

Georgetown lawyer who served as a volunteer aide at Bladensburg. Sent with John Skinner to win the release of Dr. William Beanes, he was held with the British fleet through the attack. At dawn he saw the flag still flying and began to write.

Philadelphia-born widow who learned flagmaking from her mother and sold ships’ colors in Baltimore. With her daughter, two nieces and apprentice Grace Wisher, she sewed the 30-by-42-foot flag in about seven weeks, often working until midnight.

Carolina frontiersman who carried messages for the Patriots at 13 and lost his mother and both brothers to the Revolution. Broke the Red Stick Creeks at Horseshoe Bend. At New Orleans he attacked the night the British landed and built the line that stopped them.

Master of the smuggling and privateering base at Barataria. He turned down a British offer of $30,000 and a captaincy, warned Louisiana, and gave Jackson his gunners and his knowledge of the bayous. President Madison pardoned the Baratarians in February 1815.

Virginia-born surveyor, married to the niece of Jackson’s wife. Won the Creek War’s first victory at Tallushatchee. Rode 135 miles in just over three days to reach New Orleans, led the flank attack on the British camp on 23 December, and held the line in the swamp.

Nashville merchant, badly wounded at Horseshoe Bend. He drilled his Tennesseans on flatboats all the way down the Mississippi. On 8 January his men held the stretch of line Gibbs’s column struck, and helped throw it back twice. Later governor of Tennessee for 12 years.

Former New York City mayor and U.S. senator. He sat on the canal commission from 1810, wrote the 1816 memorial that rallied the state and drove it through as governor. Thrown off the canal board in 1824, he was elected governor again and opened it.

Connecticut-born surveyor and county judge from Rome, New York, with no formal engineering training. He surveyed the route, ran construction of the middle section and then took charge of the eastern section too. The canal’s first boat was named Chief Engineer in his honor.

Self-taught engineer from Whitestown, New York. In 1817 he crossed to England at his own expense and walked more than 2,000 miles of canals to learn the trade. Back home he perfected a cement that hardens underwater, and the canal’s locks were built with it.

Schoolteacher with a gift for mathematics, hired by Benjamin Wright in 1816 with no surveying experience. He solved the canal’s hardest problem, the Niagara Escarpment, with a double flight of five locks at Lockport. He later served as chief engineer on Pennsylvania’s state canals.

South Carolina-born lawyer who led the 1835 move on Anahuac. Commissioned lieutenant colonel of Texas cavalry, he reached the Alamo on 3 February with about 30 men. He wrote the letter that called Texas to arms and died on the north wall.

Kentucky-born frontiersman whose name rides on the Bowie knife. He fought at Concepción and the Grass Fight in 1835. He came to the Alamo on 19 January, vowed to die in its ditches rather than give it up, and kept that vow from his sickbed.

Creek War scout and three-term congressman from Tennessee. Beaten for reelection in 1835, he told the voters they could go to hell and he would go to Texas. He swore to defend the new republic, rode into the Alamo in early February and died there.

Wounded three times at Horseshoe Bend in 1814, later governor of Tennessee. Texas declared independence on his 43rd birthday. He took the army that was left, fell back, picked his ground and won San Jacinto in 18 minutes with a shattered ankle.

Yale graduate and portrait painter who founded the National Academy of Design and served as its first president. At 41 he conceived the electromagnetic telegraph at sea, then spent twelve years proving it. He tapped out the first message himself.

Son of the Speedwell Ironworks family of Morristown, New Jersey. He built Morse’s working instruments at his own expense, including the sending key, and worked with Morse as the dot-and-dash code took shape. He received the first message and sent it back.

Scientist whose 1831 electromagnet for Yale held more than 2,000 pounds. His relay showed how to renew a signal along a long line. In 1842 he wrote that science was now fully ripe for the telegraph. In 1846 he became the first Secretary of the Smithsonian.

Ithaca carpenter and mechanic who designed a plow to lay telegraph wire. Morse hired him at $1,000 a year. When the buried wire failed, Cornell put the line on poles in time for May 1844. He became Western Union’s largest stockholder and founded Cornell University.

Virginia lawyer turned soldier, badly wounded at Lundy’s Lane in 1814 and commanding general of the Army since 1841. He planned the Veracruz landing, cut loose from his supply line at Puebla and took Mexico City without losing a battle.

Scott’s aide in the War of 1812, badly wounded at Lundy’s Lane, later Commandant of Cadets at West Point. His division led the first wave onto the Veracruz beach, took Puebla, stormed Molino del Rey and broke through the San Cosme gate.

Ohio-born West Pointer, class of 1843, serving as regimental quartermaster. He climbed to the roof at Molino del Rey and put a howitzer in a church belfry at San Cosme. Brevetted twice for gallantry. Later commanded the Union armies and served two terms as president.

Georgia-born Marine commissioned in 1813, captured at sea aboard the frigate President in the War of 1812 and a veteran of the Seminole wars. Second in command of the Marine battalion, he led a storming party at Chapultepec and fell leading it forward.

Vermont-born merchant who built the country’s leading freight line with Majors and Waddell. He talked his doubtful partners into the Pony Express, had it running in about two months, and handed the first mochila to the first rider at St. Joseph.

Kentucky-born freighter who once took an ox train to Santa Fe and back in a record 92 days. He bought up to 500 horses, hired the station men and riders, and had every rider swear an oath against cursing, drinking and fighting.

London-born rider who helped build the Nevada stations. In May 1860 he rode some 380 miles through war country when his relief refused to go. On the record Lincoln run in 1861 he covered 120 miles in a little over eight hours.

Wiry young rider of under 125 pounds who ran the 80-mile leg out of St. Joseph at about 12½ miles an hour. Many accounts make him the first rider of all; others name Billy Richardson. He fell fighting for the Union in 1863.

Born in a Kentucky log cabin and raised on a frontier farm in Indiana. His father left Kentucky, Lincoln wrote, chiefly on account of the difficulty in land titles. He ran on a homestead platform in 1860 and signed the Act in May 1862.

Connecticut-born and raised in Pennsylvania, elected to Congress in 1850. His first speech, in 1852, was for free homesteads, and he pressed the cause for ten years. As Speaker he saw his own bill pass the House 107 to 16. Called the Father of the Homestead Law.

Ohio-born physician who came to Nebraska from Illinois. A Union Army scout, he filed minutes after midnight on the law’s first day. He and his wife Agnes raised eight children on the Cub Creek claim, which Congress made a national monument in 1936.

Southern California native and Vietnam veteran, wounded in action, with a degree in geography. In 1974 he claimed 80 acres on Alaska’s Stony River, built his own log cabin by hand, and in 1988 received the last patent ever issued under the Act.

Bowdoin College professor of languages who went to war in 1862 with no military training. He held the extreme left, then led the charge. Wounded six times, he commanded the troops at the surrender at Appomattox and served four terms as Maine’s governor.

Harvard-educated lawyer from Erie, Pennsylvania, who joined up in 1861. He took his brigade to Little Round Top on his own authority and placed every regiment himself. Mortally wounded rallying his right, he was promoted brigadier general and died on 7 July.

Graduated second in the West Point class of 1850. He spotted the empty hill, sent for troops, and pulled the 140th New York onto the crest himself, taking a wound in the neck. Promoted major general that summer, he later commanded the V Corps.

Born in Ireland and raised in Rochester, New York, he graduated first in the West Point class of June 1861. Warren sent his regiment over the crest as the Texans broke through. O’Rorke led the charge and was killed at its head.

Former governor of Massachusetts, U.S. senator, secretary of state and president of Harvard, and the most famous speaker in America. He spoke for two hours from memory, then wrote Lincoln the next day that the president had said it better in two minutes.

Studied law under Thaddeus Stevens and practiced in Gettysburg. After the battle he led the drive for a national cemetery, organized the dedication, invited the president, and gave Lincoln the upstairs bedroom where he finished the Address.

Scottish-born horticulturist who served the Department of Agriculture for 38 years. He laid out the cemetery in semicircles by state around a central monument, officers and privates side by side. In 1867 he helped found the National Grange.

Governor of New York, senator, and secretary of state to Lincoln and Johnson. He survived a knife attack on the night Lincoln was shot. When Russia offered Alaska, he negotiated through the night and signed the treaty at 4 a.m.

Massachusetts senator since 1851 and the Senate’s leading foreign-policy voice. He came back from a near-fatal beating at his Senate desk in 1856. His three-hour speech carried the treaty 37 to 2 and gave Alaska its name.

A tailor from Tennessee who rose to governor and senator. In 1861 he was the only senator from a seceding state to stay loyal to the Union. He authorized the talks, sent the treaty to the Senate and signed the act that paid for it.

Connecticut-born engineer who built the first common carrier railroad west of the Mississippi. He found the route over Donner Pass, sold four Sacramento merchants on it and helped steer the Pacific Railway Act through Congress. Yellow fever killed him in 1863.

New York-born lawyer who came to California in the Gold Rush and became its governor in 1862. He turned the first shovel in Sacramento and swung at the last spike at Promontory. He and his wife Jane later founded Stanford University.

Norwich-trained engineer and Union major general, wounded at Pea Ridge and shot in the head at Atlanta. Escaping a war party in 1865, he found a pass over Wyoming’s Black Hills. From 1866 he located the Union Pacific’s line to Promontory.

Union colonel whose brigade held the center of the line at Franklin. Brevetted brigadier general in 1865. With his brother Dan he ran the Union Pacific’s track gangs from Nebraska to Promontory. His men called him General Jack.

Born in Dunfermline, Scotland, he came to America in 1848 and went to work as a bobbin boy. Telegraph operator, railroad man, then ironmaker. He bet his fortune on Bessemer steel, cut costs for a quarter century, and then gave it away.

A machinist’s apprentice at ten, he enlisted as a private in 1862, fought at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, and came home a captain. He ran Edgar Thomson from its first blow, invented the Jones mixer and led Braddock men to the Johnstown flood rescue.

A farm boy from West Overton, Pennsylvania, he started a coke business in 1871 at 21 and made it the leader of the Connellsville field. Carnegie bought in in 1882. As chairman from 1889 he ran the company while its pig iron output tripled.

He started at Edgar Thomson as a teenage stake driver at a dollar a day, and Bill Jones trained him. He ran the works at 27 and Carnegie Steel at 35. At 39 he became the first president of U.S. Steel.

Edinburgh-born teacher of the deaf who came to Boston in 1871 and taught vocal physiology at Boston University. He worked out how a current could carry the shape of a voice, won the patent and spoke the first sentence. U.S. citizen from 1882.

Salem-born machinist from Charles Williams Jr.’s Boston shop. He built every one of Bell’s early instruments, heard the first sentence ever spoken over a wire and ran the young company’s engineering. Later he founded the Fore River shipyard in Massachusetts.

Boston lawyer and president of the Clarke School for the Deaf. With Thomas Sanders he paid for Bell’s experiments, then organized the Bell Telephone Company in 1877 and chose to lease telephones, not sell them. First president of the National Geographic Society.

Ohio-born telegrapher who rose to run the federal Railway Mail Service. Hubbard hired him in 1878 to manage the Bell company. He defended the patents, became AT&T’s first president in 1885, returned to lead it in 1907 and drove the line coast to coast.

Ohio-born telegraph operator who taught himself electricity and became the country’s top telegraph inventor. Built the Menlo Park laboratory at 29 and invented the phonograph there. Then designed the whole lighting system and served as his own chief engineer at Pearl Street.

Manchester-trained machinist who joined Edison in Newark in 1871 and became his hands at the bench. On 22 October 1879 he carbonized the thread for Lamp No. 9 and logged the run that proved carbon worked. In 1881 he took the system to Paris.

Bowdoin and Princeton graduate who studied in Berlin under Hermann von Helmholtz. Hired in 1878 to put Edison’s ideas into numbers, he ran the calculations on lamps, dynamos and copper. At the end of 1880 he took charge of the Menlo Park lamp factory.

Swiss-born machinist who turned Edison’s sketches into working machines, the tinfoil phonograph among them. He drove the shop to finish the New Year’s Eve demonstration, then in 1881 took over the Edison Electric Tube Company and laid the mains under the First District.

Prussian-born engineer who came to America in 1831, made wire rope in Pennsylvania and built the great suspension bridges at Niagara and Cincinnati. He designed the Brooklyn Bridge in 1867 and gave his life surveying its site.

Rensselaer-trained engineer who was among the first Union officers on Little Round Top at Gettysburg. Took charge at 32, fought the caisson fire himself, and finished the bridge from his sickroom after the bends crippled him.

Learned higher mathematics and bridge engineering so she could carry her husband’s orders to the job. For the rest of the build she was the link between the chief engineer and his men. Abram Hewitt honored her by name on opening day.

Quit as Assistant Secretary of the Navy to help raise the 1st U.S. Volunteer Cavalry. Took command of the regiment days before the battle, led the charge up Kettle Hill on horseback and the rush on to the San Juan Heights.

Army surgeon who won the Medal of Honor in the 1886 campaign against Geronimo. Raised and trained the Rough Riders with Roosevelt, then led their brigade, with the 1st and 10th Cavalry, onto the heights on 1 July.

West Point, 1892. Argued before the war that machine guns could attack, then proved it. His three Gatlings covered the final rush up San Juan Hill, and the heights fell eight and a half minutes after they opened fire.

Civil War veteran and former commandant of cadets at West Point. At 63 he led Kent’s infantry up the open slope of San Juan Hill behind Parker’s covering fire and was wounded near the crest.

Born at Sabine Pass, Texas. A one-armed Beaumont businessman and self-taught geologist, he founded the Gladys City company in 1892, insisted oil lay under the salt dome when experts said no, and advertised nationwide until Lucas answered.

Born in Split on the Dalmatian coast. Austrian naval officer turned American citizen and mining engineer, the nation’s foremost salt-dome expert. He staked everything on the hill and drilled the well that started the Texas oil age.

Corsicana driller who ran the rotary rig with his brother Curt and hand Peck Byrd. Fought sand, gas and rock for eleven weeks, struck oil at 1,139 feet, then helped cap the gusher with a valve rig the brothers built on the spot.

Veteran Pennsylvania oil producer who, with partner James M. Guffey, brought Mellon money to Lucas’s venture. He came to Beaumont, picked the spot on the hill, and directed the drilling by telegraph when the first oil showed.

Born in Indiana in 1867, the elder brother and the strategist. He wrote to the Smithsonian in 1899, flew the 852-foot flight at Kitty Hawk and amazed France with his flying at Le Mans in 1908. Died of typhoid in 1912, age 45.

Born in Dayton in 1871. Ran a print shop before the bicycle business. Proposed the movable rudder, set up the camera and flew the first twelve seconds. In 1908 at Fort Myer, Virginia, he flew for more than an hour. Lived until 1948.

Born in Illinois in 1868. Hired in 1901 to run the shop while the brothers were at Kitty Hawk. Built the 1903 engine in six weeks and kept Wright engines running for years. The FAA’s highest award for aviation mechanics bears his name.

Sac and Fox, born in Indian Territory and schooled at Haskell and Carlisle. First-team All-American running back in 1911 and 1912. At Stockholm he won the pentathlon and the decathlon. Later starred in major league baseball and pro football.

Cornell guard turned coach who led Carlisle from 1899 to 1903 and 1907 to 1914. He built the school into a national football power, coached Thorpe in football and track, and went with him to Stockholm. He retired with 319 wins.

A Michigan farm boy who became chief engineer at Detroit’s Edison Illuminating Company, built his first car in 1896 and founded Ford Motor Company in 1903. He demanded one car, cheaper every year, and backed every experiment that got there.

Born in Copenhagen in 1881, he came to America at four and joined Ford as a patternmaker in 1905. He drove the chassis line through its trials at Highland Park. Thirty years later he built Willow Run on the same idea.

A Michigan shop teacher whose student, Edsel Ford, introduced him to his father. Hired in 1912 as Sorensen’s assistant, he worked eight months in every department, then led the design of the moving lines. The men who built them called him its guiding light.

Born in Chatham, Ontario, he put $2,500 into the new Ford Motor Company and ran its business side. He stood with Ford to announce the five-dollar day. He later served as mayor of Detroit and as a United States senator from Michigan.

Brooklyn-born Army engineer, second in the West Point class of 1880. On the Tennessee River he built the Riverton Lock, with a world-record lift of 26 feet. He finished the canal, became the first governor of the Canal Zone and received the thanks of Congress.

Alabama-born Army doctor who caught yellow fever as a young officer in Texas and lived. He drove it out of Havana, then out of Panama by November 1905, by going after the mosquito that carried it. He became Surgeon General of the Army in 1914.

Self-taught engineer from Maine who found Marias Pass through the Rockies for the Great Northern Railway. In Panama he rebuilt the railroad, housed and fed the workforce, backed Gorgas, and convinced Roosevelt and Congress to build a lock canal.

Tennessee blacksmith, farmer and church elder who tried to stay out of the war on grounds of faith. At 30, he took command of what was left of his patrol and broke a German machine-gun position with a rifle and a pistol.

Rhode Island businessman who led York's battalion. He sat up with York debating the Bible until York was ready to fight. As the 82nd's official historian he gathered the patrol's sworn affidavits. In World War II he was assistant director of the OSS.

Kentuckian, West Point class of 1886, veteran of Cuba and the Philippines. He took the 82nd in October 1918 and led it through the Argonne. His headquarters checked York's story in every detail and sent it up for the Medal of Honor.

Missouri-born cavalryman, West Point class of 1886. He built the American army in France from almost nothing and sent more than 1.2 million Americans into the Meuse-Argonne. In 1919 Congress made him General of the Armies.

Virginia Tech class of 1907, commissioned a Marine in 1909. Told by the French to fall back, he refused. Wounded leading his men in the wood on 11 June, he died the next day and was promoted to major.

Earned the Medal of Honor at Peking in 1900 and again in Haiti in 1915. At Belleau Wood he put out a burning ammunition dump, took a German machine gun alone and carried in wounded under fire.

Served nearly ten years in the Army before joining the Marines in 1910, and fought in France as Charles F. Hoffman. Charged twelve Germans on Hill 142 and drove them off. Awarded both the Army and Navy Medals of Honor.

Enlisted as an Army private in 1889 and rose to be Pershing’s chief of staff. In May 1918 he took command of the Marine Brigade. In July he led the whole 2nd Division into the attack at Soissons.

Norwegian-born Alaskan who came to Nome in the 1900 gold rush and won the All Alaska Sweepstakes three years running. With 12-year-old Togo in lead, he carried the serum 91 miles across Norton Bay’s ice and ran about 260 miles that week.

Norwegian-born Alaskan who came to Nome in 1903 for the gold. Behind lead dog Balto he drove 53 miles through a blizzard, dug the spilled serum out of a drift bare-handed, and brought it into Nome at 5:30 a.m.

Nome’s only doctor, with four nurses and a 24-bed hospital. He diagnosed diphtheria, quarantined the town and wired for help. When the frozen serum arrived he thawed it and began treating patients that day.

Athabaskan musher, 21 years old. He ran 30 miles through ice fog off the Koyukuk River at 64 below, the coldest reading of the relay. When two of his dogs froze, he led the team into Nulato on foot.

Born in Detroit in 1902. Barnstormer, Army-trained pilot and reserve captain, then chief pilot on the St. Louis to Chicago air mail. Planned the Spirit, plotted his own course and flew it to Paris alone.

Brooklyn-born engineer trained at Pratt Institute, with time at Curtiss and Douglas. Joined Ryan in January 1927, three weeks before Lindbergh called. Designed the Spirit around one demand: fuel. Once worked 36 hours straight at his drafting table.

San Diego businessman who owned the small company that built the Spirit. When Lindbergh said three months was too long, Mahoney promised the plane in two. His shop delivered it sixty days after the order, ready to fly.

Came to New York from France in 1882, age 12, and rose to run the Lafayette and Brevoort hotels. Put up $25,000 in 1919 for the first nonstop flight between New York and Paris. Handed Lindbergh the check on 16 June 1927.

Born in 1873 on the Lower East Side, he watched the Brooklyn Bridge go up from his boyhood home. Never went to high school. Worked the Fulton Fish Market for $12 a week, then won four terms as Governor of New York. He was the building's face.

Cigar maker's son from Lockport, New York. Started as Pierre du Pont's secretary and rose to run the money at DuPont and General Motors. He sold his GM stock to pay for the building and pushed its height to 1,250 feet.

Kansas-born builder. In 1917 he chaired the Emergency Construction Committee that built the Army's training camps for more than a million soldiers. His firm took the Empire State from the Waldorf's demolition to opening day. He called skyscraper building “the nearest peacetime equivalent of war.”

Born in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, in 1874. His photographs of children in mills and mines helped win America's first child labor laws. In his mid-fifties he climbed the steel with the ironworkers and swung out over Fifth Avenue to show the country who built its tallest building.

Born in Quebec in 1882 and trained at the University of Maine, he built dams for the Reclamation Service for twenty years. He strung the cableways, ran the job around the clock and finished two years early. “I was wild to build this dam.”

Purdue-trained engineer who wrote Wyoming’s water law and ran the irrigation works of Victoria, Australia. As Commissioner from 1924, he carried the dam from bid to dedication. He died in office in January 1936, and the lake behind it bears his name.

He rode a bosun’s chair down the walls of Black Canyon, setting charges and prying loose rock high above the river. The bronze high scaler that stands at the dam, unveiled for its 60th anniversary in 1995, is modeled on him.

Norwegian-born sailor turned American sculptor. He made the dam’s art: the two 30-foot bronze Winged Figures of the Republic, a star chart in the terrazzo that fixes the date of the dedication, and the memorial to the men who died building it.

Born in Oakville, Alabama, to sharecroppers and raised in Cleveland. Won a record eight individual NCAA titles in two seasons for Ohio State. In Berlin he ran ten races, won all ten, and took four gold medals in seven days.

Canton, Ohio, native and World War I flight instructor who hurdled for Ohio State, then coached there from 1932 to 1965. He refined Owens’s technique and got him to the line at Ann Arbor. His athletes set 14 world records.

Atlanta-born, Chicago-raised sprinter who won silver in the 100 metres and bronze in the 200 at the 1932 Olympics. In Berlin he took silver behind Owens and ran the relay’s second leg to a world record. Later an Army officer and congressman.

Cincinnati-born engineer whose Chicago firm built drawbridges from Portland to St. Petersburg. He spent more than a decade selling the Golden Gate to voters, bankers and the War Department, set its safety code and drove the job home. He died a year after it opened.

Maine-born mathematician and engineer who wrote a standard textbook on framed structures. He made the computations and the structural design for the bridge and wrote the specifications for its contracts. Strauss dismissed him in December 1931. In 2007 the bridge district formally credited his work.

Oakland-born architect trained at Berkeley and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. He gave the towers their stepped Art Deco lines, designed the railings and streetlights, and chose International Orange because it suits the hills and stands out against sea and sky.

Left school at about 13, then built roads and helped build the Hoover, Bonneville and Grand Coulee dams. He had never built a ship before 1940. His seven wartime yards turned out 1,490 ships, more than a quarter of the Maritime Commission’s total.

Henry’s son. Started as a shovel foreman on Boulder Dam and rose to superintendent of canyon excavation. Ran Oregon Shipbuilding in Portland, where his crews built the Joseph N. Teal in ten days and set the record Richmond went after.

Naval constructor, Naval Academy class of 1902, awarded the Navy Cross for his submarine design work in the First World War. Chaired the Maritime Commission from 1938 and ran the War Shipping Administration from 1942, steering the whole Liberty ship program.

Born at Camp Lewis, Washington. In July 1942 she became one of the first six women welders at the Richmond yards, and her two sisters and mother followed. She welded until the war ended, then fought for decades to honor the Rosies.

Enlisted in 1917 and earned his commission without Annapolis. Studied Japanese for three years in Japan. His codebreakers read enough of the Japanese navy’s code to tell Nimitz where the enemy would strike and when.

Texan and career submariner who took command of a shattered fleet on 31 December 1941. He trusted his codebreakers, rushed Yorktown back to sea, and sent three carriers to ambush four under the principle of calculated risk.

Naval Academy 1926 and a fighter pilot for most of his career. With fuel low and no enemy in sight, he followed a lone destroyer to the Japanese carriers. Wounded by a Zero on the way out, he landed back aboard Enterprise.

Naval Academy 1932 and the commander of Bombing Six. He hit Akagi in the morning and Hiryu in the evening, two carriers in one day. Fumes from a faulty oxygen system wrecked his lungs and ended his flying.

Enlisted in 1917, won the Schneider, Bendix and Thompson trophies, and flew the first blind flight in 1929. Planned the raid, trained the crews and flew the first bomber off Hornet. Earned the Medal of Honor and a jump straight to brigadier general.

Naval Academy, class of 1904. Took half the Navy’s Pacific carrier force to within 650 miles of Japan. When a picket boat spotted him, he launched at once, ten hours early. Later commanded the Third Fleet and became a five-star fleet admiral.

Naval Aviator No. 33, winged in 1916. Took the brand-new Hornet to sea in daylight with sixteen Army bombers lashed to her deck, turned her into a gale and launched every one. Later led the Fast Carrier Task Force across the Pacific.

Worked at Douglas Aircraft, then earned his Army wings in 1940. Flew the seventh bomber off Hornet and hit Tokyo’s industrial district. Crashed in the surf off China and lost his left leg. His 1943 book, Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, told the nation the story.

Henry Ford’s only son and the company’s president from 1919. He went to San Diego with Sorensen, backed the plan to build whole bombers, and answered for the plant when Senator Truman came to inspect it. He died in May 1943, at 49.

Born in Pulaski County, Kentucky, in 1920 and widowed with two small daughters, she came to Michigan to rivet bombers. Walter Pidgeon put her in a war bond film, and she became a real-life Rosie the Riveter. She later ran her own construction company.

Texas A&M graduate, teacher and football coach before the war. Took command of the 2nd Rangers in 1943 and led the climb at Pointe du Hoc himself. Wounded twice, he ran the fight from a crater on the cliff edge until relief came.

Shot in the side wading ashore, he climbed anyway and led D Company to the highway. With Kuhn covering him, he found the five hidden 155s in an orchard and wrecked them with thermite. Distinguished Service Cross; Silver Star at Hill 400.

At about 16:00 on D-Day he spotted a German squad with a machine gun closing on the Point. He opened up with his BAR at 40 yards, broke up the lead group and bought the mortar crew time to finish the attack.

Pediatrician who volunteered for the Rangers in 1943. Waded in at Pointe du Hoc with medical supplies packed in a waterproofed mortar shell case and treated the wounded under fire for two days. Killed tending wounded at Hill 400 in December 1944.

West Point artilleryman from Washington, D.C. As the 101st’s artillery chief he jumped into Normandy on D-Day and landed by glider in Holland. At Bastogne he led the division in Taylor’s absence, answered the Germans in one word, and retired a four-star general.

West Point class of 1936. Led the 4th Armored’s spearhead across France from Shermans he named Thunderbolt. Earned two Distinguished Service Crosses in 1944, the second for the dash through Assenois. Later Army Chief of Staff. The M1 Abrams tank carries his name.

Cavalryman who led America’s first tank brigade into battle in 1918. At Verdun on 19 December he told Eisenhower he could attack north with three divisions on the 22nd. He jumped off on schedule, and his 4th Armored broke through to Bastogne on the 26th.

Indiana-born microbiologist with a doctorate from the University of Maryland. In Peoria he replaced sugar with lactose and added corn steep liquor, and penicillin yields jumped tenfold. Most wartime plants used his recipe. National Inventors Hall of Fame, 1987.

Seventh of eight children from a North Carolina farm, with a Harvard doctorate. He ran the Peoria lab’s mold collection and led the worldwide hunt for a better strain. The winner, NRRL 1951 from a Peoria cantaloupe, fathered the strains industry used.

Started at Pfizer as a 16-year-old lab assistant and grew up on its fermentation lines. In 1942 he proposed making penicillin in deep tanks. The Marcy Avenue plant that followed made most of the penicillin that went ashore on D-Day. Lived to 101.

University of Illinois chemist and the War Production Board’s “penicillin czar.” His program picked 21 firms out of 175, gave them top priority for materials and pushed rivals to share know-how so the D-Day supply would be there. Later president of the American Chemical Society.

West Virginia dairy farm boy, first turned away as too short to enlist. On 23 February he fought four hours with a flamethrower against a belt of pillboxes. He was the last surviving Medal of Honor recipient of World War II.

Enlisted at 14 on a forged signature and stowed away to reach Iwo Jima. On D+1 he covered two grenades with his body to save his fire team. At 17, the youngest Marine ever to receive the Medal of Honor.

Earned the Medal of Honor holding the line at Guadalcanal with his machine guns. Turned down a commission and a stateside job to go back to the fight. Killed on D-Day at Iwo Jima and awarded the Navy Cross.

Born in Czechoslovakia and raised in a Pennsylvania coal town. Fought as a Marine Raider on Bougainville. Led the team that raised the second flag on Suribachi. Killed in action on 1 March 1945 and buried at Arlington.

Graduated fourth in his West Point class of 1918. Army engineer who finished the Pentagon in under a year and a half. Took the bomb project on 17 September 1942 and drove every site, contract and dollar of it to victory.

New Yorker who finished Harvard in three years and earned his doctorate at Göttingen at 23. Groves picked him in October 1942 to lead the bomb laboratory. He built Los Alamos from a ranch school into the place that designed both bombs.

Nobel laureate who left Fascist Italy in 1938 and became an American citizen in 1944. Led the team that ran the first nuclear reactor, took personal charge of starting Hanford’s B Reactor, and at Trinity measured the blast with scraps of paper.

Flew the lead bomber on the first American heavy-bomber raid on occupied Europe in August 1942, then logged more B-29 time than any other pilot. Built and trained the 509th to deliver the bomb, and flew it to Hiroshima himself.

Born in Myra, West Virginia, he enlisted as a private in 1941. Shot down over France in 1944, he escaped to Spain, went back to combat and downed five German fighters in one day. First to fly faster than sound. Retired a brigadier general.

Oklahoma-born engineer and test pilot with a Caltech master’s degree. He turned aerodynamics into plain words for Yeager, found the stabilizer fix that kept the X-1 under control, and cut the broom handle. Edwards Air Force Base named its mission control center for him.

Spitfire pilot shot down in 1944. After 16 months as a prisoner, he escaped by stealing a German Fw 190 and flying it to Holland. Backup pilot for the X-1, he flew chase in a P-80 that day, then flew air shows for decades.

Founded Bell Aircraft in Buffalo, New York, in 1935. His company built America’s first jet airplane, the P-59, and then the X-1. His Bell 47 became the first helicopter certified for civilian use. Shared the Collier Trophy for the X-1 with Yeager and Stack.

Born in Madison, Wisconsin, in 1908 and in college at 15. Led mine and torpedo countermeasures at the Naval Ordnance Laboratory in the war. Explained the surface barrier and guided the experiments. In 1972 he became the only person to win the physics Nobel twice.

Born in China in 1902 and raised on a cattle ranch in eastern Washington. Joined Bell Labs in 1929 and built magnetometers to find submarines in the war. Made the gold-foil wedge with his own hands. Later taught at Whitman College, his alma mater.

Born in London to American parents in 1910 and raised in California. Led antisubmarine operations research for the Navy in the war and won the Medal for Merit. Invented the junction transistor, the sturdy design that made transistors practical to mass-produce.

Born in Princeton, Missouri, in 1894. Earned his doctorate in Chicago as an assistant to Robert Millikan. Built vacuum tubes for the phone network, then set out to replace them. Formed the solid-state group in 1945 and was president of Bell Labs from 1951 to 1959.

Artillery captain in France in 1918, then senator, then president when Roosevelt died. In June 1948 some advisers wanted out of Berlin. He refused to leave, backed the airlift and kept it flying for fifteen months.

Georgia-born Army engineer, West Point class of 1918. One day into the blockade he ordered the airlift on his own authority, before Washington approved it. Berlin later made him an honorary citizen and named a boulevard for him.

West Point class of 1928. In World War II he ran the airlift over the Himalayas to China and more than doubled its tonnage. In Berlin he turned the airlift into an assembly line: fixed altitudes, three-minute spacing, one try to land.

Utah farm boy who learned to fly in 1941 and flew wartime transports over the South Atlantic. Dropped candy to Berlin’s children on his own until Tunner made it official. Came back in 1970 to command Tempelhof. Lived to 101.

VMI graduate and Army Chief of Staff through World War II, when he built the Army from fewer than 200,000 soldiers to 8 million. As Secretary of State he proposed the plan at Harvard and sold it to Congress.

Grand Rapids newspaper editor turned senator, and once a leading isolationist. In January 1945 he told the Senate isolationism had been the wrong course. As chairman he shaped the bill, opened the debate and carried the Senate 69 to 17.

Left the University of Chicago to sell Studebakers in Los Angeles and rose to president of the company in 1935. Sworn in as the Marshall Plan’s first administrator six days after the act became law, he ran it until 1950.

Texas-born, Berkeley-educated, known in the Corps as “the Professor.” He slowed the drive north, stockpiled supplies and built the Hagaru-ri airstrip despite pressure from above. He refused to fly out a single able-bodied man and brought his division out as a fighting unit.

Enlisted in 1918 and came to Korea already holding four Navy Crosses. His 1st Marines held Koto-ri, the last base on the plateau, while the division fought down to him, then came down Funchilin Pass last. Chosin earned him a fifth Navy Cross.

Kentucky-born, enlisted in 1940, trained as a paramarine and won the Silver Star on Iwo Jima. He took Fox Company three weeks before Toktong Pass. Shot in the leg on the second night, he held the pass for five days and six nights.

Georgia Tech chemical engineer who earned the Navy Cross at Peleliu. He led his battalion over the mountains at night to relieve Fox Company and open the road to Hagaru-ri. He later commanded the 3d Marine Division in Vietnam and retired a four-star general.

First in his West Point class of 1903, he earned the Medal of Honor defending the Philippines and accepted Japan’s surrender in 1945. He chose Inchon, talked down the doubters in Tokyo and watched the landing from USS Mount McKinley.

A former enlisted man and veteran amphibious sailor from South Dakota. He spent two weeks on the islands off Inchon scouting the mud, the seawall and the guns, then relit the Palmi-do lighthouse to guide the fleet in. Navy Cross and Silver Star.

Born in Tampa to a father from Asturias, Spain. Enlisted in the Navy at 17, went on to the Naval Academy and served with the Marines in China. He took his platoon at Pusan days before the landing and died on Red Beach. Medal of Honor.

New York-born physician who learned killed-virus vaccines from Thomas Francis on the wartime flu vaccine. In Pittsburgh he led the team that built the polio vaccine, tested it on himself and his own sons, and refused to patent it.

Yale-trained virologist and the first American to isolate the human flu virus. Ran the Army’s influenza commission in World War II. He designed the 1954 field trial, insisted on a blind placebo test, and delivered the verdict.

Newsboy at ten who paid for college playing the fiddle, then became Roosevelt’s law partner. He ran the March of Dimes from its first day, chaired the American Red Cross, and bet the Foundation’s money on Salk’s trial.

Struck by polio at 39, he built Warm Springs into a treatment center and in 1938 founded the National Foundation that paid for Salk’s lab and the field trial. He died on 12 April 1945, ten years to the day before the announcement.

West Point class of 1915. Crossed the country with the 1919 Army convoy as a 28-year-old observer, then commanded the Allied armies that drove into Germany and saw its autobahns. As President he pushed the Interstate through Congress and signed it in a hospital room.

Iowa's state highway engineer before he ran the federal roads bureau for 34 years. His 1939 report, Toll Roads and Free Roads, written with Herbert Fairbank, first drew the toll-free national network, and in 1947 he recommended its first 37,700 miles.

Texas A&M engineer who joined the Bureau of Public Roads in 1929 and worked the Alaska Highway in World War II. He supplied the numbers behind the Clay plan and the House highway bills, then served as chief engineer and Federal Highway Administrator.

Came to America at six, a tailor’s son raised in Chicago. Naval Academy, Class of 1922. In less than seven years he built the industry, the prototype reactor and the training program, and put Nautilus to sea. Led naval nuclear propulsion for 33 years.

World War II submariner who earned the Silver Star in USS Darter. Joined Rickover’s team at Oak Ridge and worked the reactor physics. Took Nautilus to sea in 1955 and signaled “Underway on nuclear power.” Later the first captain of the nuclear cruiser Long Beach.

Tennessean and Naval Academy graduate who made eleven combat patrols in World War II and won the Bronze Star. Rickover picked him to command Nautilus in 1957. He told the White House the crossing could be done, then took her under the ice to the Pole.

Physicist at the Navy Electronics Laboratory in San Diego who spent a decade learning how sea ice behaves. He built the upward-looking sonar that let Nautilus see the ice above her and rode along as ice pilot. His ashes were scattered at the North Pole.

Raised in Great Bend, Kansas. In the war he served as an Army radio operator with OSS Detachment 101 in Asia. Built the first integrated circuit four months after joining TI. Co-invented the handheld calculator. Nobel Prize in Physics, 2000.

A minister’s son from Iowa, raised in Grinnell, with a physics doctorate from MIT. Conceived the silicon chip that could be made by the batch, the design nearly every chip since has followed. Co-founded Intel in 1968. National Medal of Technology, 1987.

Born in Geneva, Switzerland, with doctorates from Geneva and Cambridge. Came to Caltech in 1952 and co-founded Fairchild in 1957. Invented the planar process, which seals a chip’s parts under a layer of oxide. Chips are still made this way.

Son of a San Mateo County lawman, with a chemistry doctorate from Caltech. As Fairchild’s research director he predicted in 1965 that chips would keep doubling in complexity. Co-founded Intel and later led it. Presidential Medal of Freedom, 2002.

Marine fighter pilot with 59 combat missions in World War II and 90 in Korea, where he shot down three MiGs in the war’s last nine days. In 1957 he flew coast to coast at supersonic average speed. First American to orbit the Earth.

Navy patrol pilot in the Korean War and one of the original seven Mercury astronauts. He trained beside Glenn for months, worked the launch from the blockhouse and sent him off with “Godspeed, John Glenn.” He flew Aurora 7 three months later.

NACA flight-test engineer from 1945 and NASA’s first flight director. He built the way Mission Control runs a flight. In the heat-shield scare he ordered the switch test that narrowed the problem and judged the warning a faulty sensor. He was right.

NACA engineer who led the X-1 flight-test team when Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier. He ran operations for America’s first three manned flights. For Glenn’s, he scrubbed the clouded first try, had the broken hatch bolt fixed and made the retropack call.

Mount Rainier guide from Seattle who taught mountaineering and skiing in the Army, then became the first full-time employee of REI in 1955. At 6 feet 5, he broke trail through the storm with Nawang Gombu and planted the flag on top.

Navy anesthesiologist from St. Louis, released early from duty at San Diego Naval Hospital to make the climb. He redesigned the team’s oxygen mask, pushed hard for the West Ridge, and climbed the couloir that now bears his name.

Physics graduate of Oregon State, Teton guide and teacher of philosophy and religion, serving with the Peace Corps in Nepal. He made the first ascent of Masherbrum in 1960. On Everest he ran the West Ridge effort and climbed it to the top with Hornbein.

Filmmaker who came to America in 1937 and served in the U.S. Army. After Everest in 1952 and Lhotse in 1955, he won the permit, raised the money and picked the team. On 1 May he hauled a movie camera high above Camp VI.

Born in Ishpeming, Michigan, in 1910. Joined Lockheed in 1933 and helped create about 40 aircraft, including the P-38, the P-80, the F-104 and the U-2. Led the Blackbird from first sketch to first flight. Two Collier Trophies and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

West Point class of 1953 and a jet fighter pilot. On 21 March 1968 he and his RSO, Ed Payne, flew the first operational SR-71 mission, over North Vietnam from Kadena, Okinawa. Flew 116 combat missions in Phantoms and rose to four-star general, commanding Tactical Air Command.

Grew up in Hazen, North Dakota, and was commissioned through ROTC at North Dakota State in 1966. Flew more than 450 combat hours in the F-105 over Vietnam and Laos, then SR-71s at Beale. Flew 2,193 mph on 28 July 1976. Retired a major general.

Auburn electrical engineering graduate from Florence, Alabama. Flew RF-4 and F-4E Phantoms, then joined the SR-71 program in 1982 and flew 93 overseas reconnaissance missions. On 6 March 1990 he and J.T. Vida flew Los Angeles to Washington in 64 minutes 20 seconds.

West Point, 1945, and a company commander in Korea. At X-Ray he jumped from the lead Huey, ran the fight from the clearing for three days and turned down a summons to brief headquarters in Saigon before it was over. Distinguished Service Cross.

Call sign Ancient Serpent 6. A former Army mapping pilot, he led the sixteen Hueys that carried Moore’s battalion in. When medevac ships would not land, he flew in anyway: 22 flights in an unarmed Huey on 14 November. Medal of Honor, 2007.

Nicknamed “Too Tall” at six foot four. Second in command of Crandall’s sixteen-ship unit, he volunteered to fly with him into the fire. He flew 14 rescue missions into X-Ray and carried out an estimated 30 seriously wounded men. Medal of Honor, 2001.

Led his platoon toward Herrick’s cut-off men until a machine gun pinned them down. He drew its fire, hit it with a rocket, then charged 30 meters alone and wiped out the crew. Shot in the face, he lived. Medal of Honor, 1966.

Iowa farm boy and Minnesota wrestler with a Ph.D. in plant pathology. He spent twenty years in Mexico breeding rust-proof dwarf wheat, then carried it to India and Pakistan himself. Nobel Peace Prize, 1970.

Nebraska-born USDA agronomist who spent his whole career at Washington State. He crossed Japan’s Norin 10 dwarf into American wheat, bred the semi-dwarf Gaines, and in 1953 sent Borlaug the lines that made the Mexican dwarfs.

Head of plant pathology at Minnesota and a pioneer in the war on wheat rust. His lecture pulled Borlaug out of forestry, he trained him for his doctorate, and he co-directed the Mexican program that brought Borlaug south.

West Point graduate, Air Force fighter pilot and test pilot. Commanded Gemini 7’s record two weeks in orbit. After the 1967 fire he led the team that rebuilt the Apollo spacecraft. Offered the Moon in August 1968, he said yes on the spot.

Naval Academy graduate and Navy test pilot who flew Gemini 7 with Borman and commanded Gemini 12. On Apollo 8 he was the navigator, fixing their path to the Moon and home with star sightings through the sextant.

Naval Academy graduate who flew Air Force all-weather interceptors and earned a master’s in nuclear engineering. A rookie on Apollo 8, he ran the photography and took Earthrise. Later first chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and ambassador to Norway.

Born in Vienna, he came to America in 1940 and served in the U.S. Army. After the 1967 fire he took over the Apollo spacecraft and made it flightworthy. In August 1968 he proposed sending Apollo 8 to the Moon.

Navy fighter pilot with 78 combat missions over Korea, then an X-15 test pilot who flew it to 207,500 feet. In 1966 he saved Gemini 8 from a violent spin. First human to walk on the Moon.

Air Force fighter pilot who flew 66 combat missions in Korea and shot down two MiGs. Earned a doctorate at MIT in orbital rendezvous, the technique spacecraft still use to meet in space.

Air Force test pilot and Gemini 10 spacewalker. Flew Columbia alone around the Moon and brought his crewmates home. Later ran the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum and opened its building on the Mall.

Former Air Force fighter pilot who led the team that landed Eagle. He polled the room for go or no-go and held his controllers steady through the alarms.

Born in St. Louis in 1915. A psychologist who studied human hearing, he argued in 1960’s “Man-Computer Symbiosis” that computers should work alongside people. At ARPA he funded the labs and wrote the memo that imagined one network linking them all.

Born in Westport, Connecticut, in 1937. Earned three degrees at MIT and linked computers across the country by phone line in 1965. Designed the ARPANET, wrote its specifications and ran ARPA’s computer office from 1969 to 1973. Shared the 2001 Draper Prize.

Born in New York City in 1934, a Bronx High School of Science graduate. His MIT doctoral work laid out the mathematics of messages flowing through networks. His UCLA lab got IMP No. 1 and sent the first message. National Medal of Science, 2007.

Born in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1943. As a graduate student in Kleinrock’s UCLA lab he worked on the first host-to-host protocols. With Bob Kahn he designed TCP/IP, the language every internet device still speaks. Presidential Medal of Freedom, 2005.

Air Force fighter pilot in Japan and Korea, then a test pilot for Pratt & Whitney and North American. A command module specialist, he joined the crew two days before launch, shut Odyssey down to save it, then brought it back to life for reentry.

Marine Corps fighter pilot and NASA research pilot, backup lunar module pilot for Apollo 8 and 11. He knew Aquarius switch by switch, brought it to life as a lifeboat and kept it running for three and a half days. Later flew the shuttle Enterprise.

Naval Academy class of 1957, commissioned in the Air Force. Flew more than 170 hours of combat missions in AC-130 gunships and earned the Bronze Star. As a colonel he led the 1973 design and ran the program through 1978. Later a Stanford professor.

Born in Vermont in 1921, joined the Naval Research Laboratory in 1943. Helped build the tracking system for Project Vanguard, then led Timation, which put precise clocks in orbit to find position by time. Awarded the National Medal of Technology for the work.

Born in Sutherland, Virginia, in 1930. Joined the Navy’s Dahlgren lab in 1956. From the 1970s into the 1980s she programmed computers to model the Earth’s exact shape from satellite data, work that helped lay the groundwork for GPS. Retired in 1998 after 42 years.

St. Paul native and the last man cut from the 1960 gold-medal team. Played in the 1964 and 1968 Olympics, then coached Minnesota to three NCAA titles. He hand-picked the 1980 roster, drove it hard for months and believed in it first.

Winthrop, Massachusetts, native who averaged more than 20 goals a season at Boston University. Scored the winning goal against the Soviets with ten minutes left, then waved his teammates onto the gold-medal podium. Retired from playing at 25.

North Easton, Massachusetts, goalie who won the 1978 NCAA title with Boston University. Played every minute of the Olympic tournament. Stopped 36 of 39 Soviet shots in the Miracle game and all ten Finnish shots in the third period of the final.

Son of Wisconsin coach Bob Johnson and an NCAA champion with the Badgers in 1977. Led the 1980 team with 11 points. Scored both tying goals against the Soviets, the first with one second left in the period, then played 669 NHL games.

Navy test pilot who set two world time-to-climb records in the F-4 Phantom in 1962. Flew Gemini 3 and Gemini 10, orbited the Moon on Apollo 10 and walked on it on Apollo 16. Then commanded the shuttle’s first flight.

Navy pilot who flew A-4 Skyhawks from the carrier Independence and trained for the Air Force’s Manned Orbiting Laboratory. Joined NASA when it was canceled in 1969 and waited twelve years for this flight. Later commanded three more shuttle missions.

Navy officer and Langley engineer who ran spacecraft landing and recovery for Mercury and Gemini. Managed the Space Shuttle Program from 1970 through the first flight, and pushed for the first launch to carry a crew.

Apollo and Skylab flight director, one of three Gene Kranz chose to run the shuttle’s first flight. His Silver Team took over in Houston the moment Columbia cleared the tower and ran the climb to orbit.

Lifeguard, radio announcer, film star and two-term governor of California. As President he rebuilt American strength and called the Soviet Union an evil empire. In Berlin he overruled his own diplomats and delivered the line himself.

Dartmouth and Oxford graduate who wrote speeches for Vice President Bush, then more than 300 for President Reagan. He took a Berlin hostess’s challenge to Gorbachev, made it the heart of the speech and defended it against seven rival drafts.

Navy PT boat skipper who saved his crew after a Japanese destroyer cut PT-109 in half in 1943. As President he reinforced West Berlin when the Wall went up and told its people in 1963 that he was one of them.

West Point, Class of 1956. Two combat tours in Vietnam with three Silver Stars and two Purple Hearts. Led all coalition forces in the Gulf and planned both the 38-day air war and the Left Hook that ended it in 100 hours.

Son of Jamaican immigrants, raised in the South Bronx, commissioned through ROTC at City College of New York. Two tours in Vietnam. The youngest Chairman ever at 52. His plan for Iraq’s army was simple: cut it off, then kill it.

Iowa-born fighter pilot who flew F-105s over North Vietnam, including Wild Weasel missions hunting missile sites, and won the Silver Star. In the Gulf he commanded every coalition aircraft under a single plan and won the sky in days.

West Point, Class of 1984. At 73 Easting he led nine Abrams and twelve Bradleys through a sandstorm into the Republican Guard and won in 23 minutes without a casualty. Silver Star. Later a lieutenant general and National Security Advisor.

Marine Corps aircraft crew chief in Korea and Japan, then a surgeon with six degrees. Made the space shuttle’s first spacewalk in 1983. Flew three of the five Hubble spacewalks and, with Hoffman, put in the camera that fixed its vision.

Harvard-trained astrophysicist who built gamma-ray and X-ray telescopes before NASA picked him in 1978. Made the shuttle’s first unplanned spacewalk in 1985. Riding the robot arm, he pulled Hubble’s old camera and slid WFPC2 into place.

Physicist from Montgomery, Alabama, with a doctorate from the University of Virginia. Spacewalked on Endeavour’s first flight in 1992. On Hubble she released the damaged solar array by hand and installed COSTAR with Tom Akers.

Air Force fighter pilot who flew 339 combat missions in Southeast Asia, then a test pilot. Piloted the first shuttle flight after Challenger. Commanded Endeavour, flew the rendezvous with Hubble and landed the crew at night in Florida.

Oracle account manager from Cranbury, New Jersey, a Wheaton College graduate with two young sons and a third child on the way. He kept an open line to an Airfone operator, prayed with her, then turned to the others: “Let’s roll.”

Minnesota native, chief operating officer of the heart-pump maker Thoratec and father of three daughters. His calls to his wife Deena brought the news of the World Trade Center aboard. He told her a group of them was getting ready to do something.

Former national collegiate judo champion and University of Rochester graduate from Hewitt, New Jersey, father of a three-month-old girl. He told his wife Lyz the passengers were voting on whether to storm the cockpit, and that he was going to rush the hijackers.

Eleven-year United flight attendant from Greensboro, North Carolina, mother of two toddlers and married to an airline pilot. She calmly reported the hijacking to United, then helped the passengers prepare, boiling water to throw on the hijackers.

Raised on his family’s cattle ranch near Washington, Kansas, he rode college rodeo at Kansas State. He was the best horseman in the 5th Special Forces Group. He led ODA 595 from the Darya Suf to Mazar-i-Sharif and brought all twelve men home.

Born in Clovis, New Mexico, commissioned from Furman University in 1978, and a Green Beret since 1983. He took command of the 5th Group two months before 9/11, built Task Force Dagger in Uzbekistan and sent the first A-teams into Afghanistan.

Grew up in Winfield, Alabama, graduated from Auburn and served eight years in the Marines, rising to captain. He went in with Team Alpha two days ahead of the Green Berets. Killed at Qala-i-Jangi, the first American to fall in combat in Afghanistan.

Buffalo-born infantryman who enlisted in 1999 and served in Kosovo before Iraq. On his 29th birthday he cleared a fortified house in Fallujah, killing four insurgents and badly wounding a fifth. First living Iraq War veteran awarded the Medal of Honor.

Iowa high school wrestler who served 34 years in the Corps. In Hell House he was shot seven times in the legs, then rolled onto a wounded Marine to shield him from a grenade and refused evacuation until the others were out. Navy Cross.

Commissioned in 1973. Led Task Force Tarawa through Nasiriyah in 2003. Took the 1st Marine Division in August 2004, called for the Army armor the fight would need and planned the assault on the city. Retired in 2010 as a lieutenant general.

Eastern Kentucky University swimmer commissioned through ROTC in 1987. His tanks and Bradleys spearheaded Regimental Combat Team 1 into Fallujah and reached Route 10 on the first full day of the assault. He rose to four-star general and led Army Futures Command.

Co-founded Apple in 1976 and launched the Macintosh in 1984. Forced out in 1985, he came back in 1997 and turned the company around with the iMac and the iPod. He drove the iPhone from idea to stage and sold it himself.

Stanford-trained engineer who came to Apple from NeXT in 1997. Jobs gave him the iPhone’s software. He recruited the Purple team from inside Apple, put OS X on a phone, and built the developer kit that filled the App Store.

University of Michigan computer engineer who led the team that built the first iPod in 2001 and went on to run Apple’s iPod division. He led hardware engineering for the first three generations of iPhone, then founded Nest Labs, which Google bought for $3.2 billion.

Designer who joined Apple in 1992 and led its design team from the late 1990s, from the iMac to the iPod. Working side by side with Jobs, he shaped the iPhone into its form: a slab of glass with a single button.

Air Force Academy class of 1973 and an F-4 Phantom fighter pilot, then nearly 29 years flying airliners, with 19,663 hours in his logbook. Chose the river, kept the airplane under control without power and set it down whole.

Son of two pilots, he started flying at 16 in Wisconsin. He had 15,643 hours, only 37 of them in the A320. Ran the engine restart checklist in the time he had and called out height and speed all the way down.

Montclair, New Jersey, native who worked his way up from deckhand to ferry captain. Turned the Thomas Jefferson toward the airliner on his own call, was first on scene and took 56 people off the wing. Played himself in the 2016 film Sully.

The 44th President and a former U.S. senator from Illinois. In 2009 he made bin Laden the CIA’s top priority. He chaired five National Security Council meetings on Abbottabad, weighed odds he called 55/45, chose the raid over a bombing and gave the order.

Son of Italian immigrants in Monterey, California. Army officer, 16 years in Congress, then budget director and White House chief of staff. As CIA Director he drove the hunt, ran the raid under the President’s covert-action order and watched it from Langley.

Commissioned through the University of Texas in 1977, then a Navy SEAL. Commanded SEAL Team Three and wrote Spec Ops, a study of eight classic commando raids. He planned this one, briefed the President on it and commanded it from Afghanistan.

Galveston-born son of a Greek immigrant who had tended goats before coming to America. First in his Texas A&M petroleum engineering class, he co-founded his oil company in 1947 and spent seventeen years and a fortune proving the Barnett would pay.

University of Texas petroleum engineer, class of 1987, hired by Mitchell during an oil bust. Took charge of the Barnett wells in 1995 and was told the play would likely be dropped. His slickwater frac on the S.H. Griffin made shale gas pay.

Princeton geologist and Michigan lawyer who clerked for Chief Justice Earl Warren, then built Devon Energy with his father. He bought Mitchell Energy for $3.5 billion in 2002, and Devon paired slickwater fracs with horizontal wells.

Youngest of thirteen children of Oklahoma cotton sharecroppers. Pumped gas at 16 and founded his own oil company at 21. Proved horizontal drilling at Cedar Hills in 1995, then made the North Dakota Bakken pay in 2004.

Kansas-raised physician and Vanderbilt-trained virologist who helped found the Vaccine Research Center in 2000. He spent years learning to lock viral spikes in shape, starting with RSV. When the new virus came, his team designed the vaccine within 48 hours.

North Carolina native with a doctorate from UNC Chapel Hill, at the VRC since 2014. She led the coronavirus team that turned the new spike sequence into mRNA-1273 with Moderna and helped drive the preclinical work that cleared it for human trials.

Former VRC postdoctoral fellow who maps viral proteins atom by atom. His lab co-discovered the 2P spike in 2017 and published the first atomic map of the new virus’s spike in February 2020. Moderna, Pfizer-BioNTech, Johnson & Johnson and Novavax all use 2P.

New Jersey native commissioned in 1981 who rose to four stars and command of Army Materiel Command. He ran Warp Speed’s production and distribution and delivered the first 2.9 million doses to every state and territory in one week.

Born in Illinois to Burmese parents, she returned to America at 16 to study and earned two electrical engineering degrees at the University of Illinois. A Deep Space Network veteran, she led Ingenuity from early development through its first flights.

Grew up in south India following Apollo on the radio, then earned his doctorate at Rensselaer and spent 35 years in robotics at JPL. He conceived a Mars helicopter in the 1990s and kept the idea alive until NASA said yes.

Norwegian engineer with a doctorate in engineering cybernetics. Joined the project in 2013 as aerodynamics and flight control lead and wrote the models and control algorithms Ingenuity flies by. As chief pilot, he flew the first flight.

MIT-trained engineer who ran engineering at the Drone Racing League before joining JPL in 2017. Worked the helicopter’s test flights on Earth, then led the Ingenuity team on Mars from spring 2021 through flight 72.

Became an American citizen in 2002, the year he founded SpaceX with money from the sale of PayPal. Chief executive and chief engineer. Had about $100 million of his own in the company when he ordered a fourth Falcon 1 after three failures.

Northwestern mechanical engineer who spent ten years at The Aerospace Corporation. Joined SpaceX in 2002 to win its customers. Helped close NASA’s 2008 cargo contract and has run the company day to day as president ever since.

A logger’s son from St. Maries, Idaho, who built rocket engines in his garage. Became SpaceX employee No. 1 in 2002 and led the team that built the Merlin, the engine that took Falcon 1 to orbit and powers every Falcon 9.

Earned his doctorate in guidance and control at MIT, then worked at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Joined SpaceX in 2011 and took charge of entry, descent and landing for Falcon 9. His team built the guidance that steers each booster home.