I have an old and dear friend* who asked me to ask my new and equally dear friends the following question: who’s the most important — meaning influential, as in, could play the lead in the book or movie version of, [Insert Name]: And How S/he Changed America** — historical figure about whom most people know nothing?
Well friends, what say you? I suggested James Eads, a nineteenth-century engineer who invented and built: a diving-bell(ish) device that allowed him to walk on the bed of the Mississippi; salvage boats with which he pulled wrecks from the bottom of the same river; gunboats that helped the Union Navy control the same river (are you detecting a theme?) during the Civil War; a bridge in St. Louis that spanned the same river (okay, now you’re getting it, right?); and jetties that solved the problem of silting at the mouth of the same river (don’t make me hit you over the head).
James Buchanan Eads is someone about whom many specialists — historians of science and technology, for example — know a great deal. But most adult general readers***** would not have heard of him. And honestly, the fact that there hasn’t been a good Eads biography ever is at least a little bit stunning. But whatever.
So who’s your James Eads? Seriously. I’m genuinely curious. As is my friend. Do you know who invented the grape? Or made Hitler famous? Or changed the way we think about towels? Don’t be shy. Spill. Tell us all about it. Step up, people.
* No, I’m not making said friend up. Unlike my other old and dear friend who has this persistent rash. What should I he do about that, while we’re on the subject? Seriously, is there an ointment or something? He’s really itchy.
** A book for which an author receives a large*** advance and then earns out on said advance after book climbs to #3**** on the NYT Non-fiction bestseller list
*** How large? That’s not really your business, is it? Back away from the blog.
**** We shouldn’t be unrealistic, right? So let’s stick with #3. Anything more than that would be quite unlikely. And also greedy. We’re not greedy here. Really.
***** This is, if you don’t already know, a desirable market to reach. As in: $$$.
The Edge of the American West 
122 comments
January 23, 2008 at 10:56 pm
teofilo
Edmund Andros.
January 23, 2008 at 11:07 pm
ari
Two words, Teo: expo sition. But actually, Andros is a good one.
January 24, 2008 at 3:11 am
drip
Luther Martin. I don’t know if he changed anything, so the subtitle would have to be “On the Wrong Side of Everything.” He was a delegate from Maryland to the constitutional convention where he refused to sign. He hounded Loyalists, attacked the idea of a federal government, represented Chase in his impeachment trial, defended Aaron Burr, and lost McColluch vs. Maryland (The Bank Case) to Daniel Webster . He was witty and brave, but a drunkard and died penniless in Burr’s house. No sex that I know of but he makes up for it with violence, substance abuse and anti-establishment politics. A small advance but you won’t need to make a book tour.
January 24, 2008 at 5:54 am
jhm
The reason I knew Mr. Eads was a PBS documentary well worth watching.
As for the question: Coming from Western Massachusetts, I might be biased, but I’ll nominate Daniel Shays.
January 24, 2008 at 5:58 am
eric
I really liked the Daniel Shays episode of Ten Days of a Title that Just Kept Going in a Less than Euphonious Cadence.
January 24, 2008 at 6:06 am
Historiann
Ari, there is a major flaw in your (your friend’s?) question. It assumes that the American history book-buying audience wants something new. I don’t think it does–or, at least, publishers are MUCH more comfortable selling buyers the same old biographies and histories (especially of the Revolution and Civil War era, and now perhaps about WWII.) Americans don’t even want new, challenging interpretations of these people or events–they want the same heroic Whig narrative, in which we pretend that all Americans responded to the call for sacrifice, and all benefitted equally from the Rev/Civil War/WWII.
This gets back to the old question, “why don’t academic historians write books that people want to read?” Well, since academic historians rarely find stories that are not complex and ambiguous (that little thing called *research*, you know), the stories we tell tend not to be so flattering or heroic as those by the McCullough/Ellis crew. So, i would argue that this is a problem with the American book-buying public, not the writing or expository skills of most publishing academic historians. Americans want history to make them feel good, which is a really weird thing to look for in history. (Unless one just feels relief that one is alive today instead of an era without penicillin, vaccination, sterile surgical techniques, etc.)
That said: Sir Edmund Andros? Whew. Colonial historians don’t even know who he is any more. Good luck selling a book about him to a trade publisher!
January 24, 2008 at 6:15 am
eric
i would argue that this is a problem with the American book-buying public, not the writing or expository skills of most publishing academic historians
I profoundly disagree. I look at our counterparts across the pond, who write interesting trade books that get bought — it may partly be a difference in the education of the British book-buying public, but only partly.
If you read one of those books, you will instantly see why it would sell much better to a Platonic book-buying public than its American counterpart: it is written in clear language about a subject of obvious import. Or if the subject is not of obvious import, the author will happily explain to the reader why it should be seen to be of import.
This willingness to write clearly and explain has ramifications, such as Radio 4’s willingness in turn to have historians come on the air and tout their books. It’s a virtuous circle.
January 24, 2008 at 7:29 am
CharleyCarp
Albert Gallatin could use a modern treatment. And I think it could be written for a mass audience.
January 24, 2008 at 7:30 am
rootlesscosmo
I think a case can be made that Earl Browder was an important actor in the process by which the wave of labor militancy in the 30’s got channeled into a quasi-official labor movement under the Wagner Act and the War Labor Board, leading in turn to the postwar social compact, labor participation in the Cold War etc. A Kansas-born WASP, he was the perfect poster boy for the Popular Front line to which he gave the slogan “Communism is Twentieth Century Americanism.” Browder is also a good illustration of the complex relationship between the US Communist Party and the USSR, trusted enough to be kept informed about espionage operations, but unceremoniously dumped when his wartime policies (faultlessly matched to Soviet strategy) abruptly fell out of favor. Could he be called a premature American Gorbachev? Hmm.
January 24, 2008 at 7:37 am
eric
Gallatin’s a great figure. You have to accept that he’s going to be right, but lose his arguments anyway. Does “unheeded prophet” sell?
January 24, 2008 at 7:37 am
driver911
Well, I would suggest William Higinbotham. I have no idea how much you can find out about him but he certainly changed America. He created one of the very first videogames to use a graphical display. Though I say one of the first he is certainly is the best remembered.
January 24, 2008 at 7:48 am
Historiann
Sorry, Charley–it’s not the lack of writing skills, although I grant you that writing for a popular audience is different from writing an explicitly argument-driven book. As someone who has appeared in a BBC 4 documentary and who collaborates with a popular historian based in England, I know what you’re saying. Non-fiction writing is a bigger business in Britain than it is here. But I think the barrier to academics crossing over is that in the main, many of us are telling stories that don’t portray white U.S. Americans in a flattering light, and the (majority) white book-buying public doesn’t want that landing in their Christmas stockings. But, telling people what a great, big hero John Adams is, well, that’s something to curl up with by the fire!
January 24, 2008 at 7:54 am
eric
That was me, H. Can’t blame Charley.
January 24, 2008 at 7:58 am
Historiann
Sorry, Eric–I still disagree, but with you, then! (One thing I agree with the OTHER Charlie on is that I can’t always tell from the formatting who’s commenting. I couldn’t figure out why your photo was popping up all over the page, when your name didn’t, and the lines dividing comments seem to appear in the middle of comments.)
January 24, 2008 at 8:00 am
eric
Whoo — that’s a new one on me, for the formatting problem.
There shouldn’t be any avatars — photos of people — on the pages now. Are there?
And the lines dividing comments are between comments… on my browser. But not yours? oh, hell.
January 24, 2008 at 8:10 am
Historiann
Yes–no avatars, but the lines are still messed up. I’m using Explorer and Windows (arggghhh!), FYI. This was a problem in the comments thread yesterday too.
In any case, let me say that there are obvious exceptions that get published despite the incurious book-buying public. Jill Lepore’s _The Name of War_ is one from my field, and your new book on globalization looks like it’s not at all flattering to Gilded Age/Progressive Era Americans. Perhaps this is more a thing in early American history, for which there is a smaller market anyway, but unless you’re schlepping a comfortable tale about a Founding Father (or unless you’re somehow connected to Jane Garrett), then it’s not happening.
January 24, 2008 at 8:14 am
CharleyCarp
There’s an “ie” Charlie and an “ey” Charley. I suppose I ought to just use the pseud I use over at Unfogged, but then Ari will think I think he’s a liar. (Which I don’t think in either guise!)
With Gallatin, I think it would be pretty interesting to know more about his role in the 1800 campaign, including assurances he gave to Burr (who apparently felt burned in ’96). Among a great many other things.
Looking to the darker side, maybe Gen. Wilkinson is worth making a household name. I bet there are treasures yet unmined in foreign archives, and scandals yet undisclosed.
I’d buy a book about Edward Watkins — inventor of the time clock — but I’m related, so that doesn’t count.
January 24, 2008 at 8:44 am
lw
David Sarnoff, maybe. Philo Farnsworth’s story is pretty interesting too. Smedley Butler?
January 24, 2008 at 8:47 am
eric
The tale of Philo Farnsworth and David Sarnoff is interesting, but has recently been done and done.
January 24, 2008 at 8:48 am
eric
Charley, you’re clear; I told Ari you’re okay.
January 24, 2008 at 8:58 am
teofilo
Two words, Teo: expo sition.
But if I explain who he is now, no one will buy the book!
Sir Edmund Andros? Whew. Colonial historians don’t even know who he is any more.
Their loss, I guess.
Good luck selling a book about him to a trade publisher!
He was a white male with some admirable qualities, but on the other hand he did mostly stand against some trends that are popularly interpreted as foreshadowing the Revolution, so maybe not so good for the American market.
Another idea, which Ari probably remembers me mentioning in a previous conversation at Unfogged: Timothy Pickering.
January 24, 2008 at 9:26 am
Cala
The trouble with thinking of someone the average American hasn’t heard of is that I’m the average American in this regard. O noes paradox!
January 24, 2008 at 9:30 am
teofilo
Oh good, we can use Cala as a sounding board to make sure we hit just the right note of obscurity.
January 24, 2008 at 9:35 am
Greg Miller
Smedley Butler, in light of recent events–cough, Iraq, cough–would be be a great choice. Two-time Medal of Honor winner who became to believe that “war is a racket.”
January 24, 2008 at 9:38 am
Cala
I don’t recognize anyone in this thread, for what it’s worth. My history education is practically non-existent: the downside of being a bright history student in high school meant (though it didn’t look like a downside at the time) was that I walked into college with a ridiculous amount of AP credit and had no reason to take any collegiate-level history courses.
January 24, 2008 at 9:41 am
Crooked Timber » » National Histories
[…] at Edge of the West asks, … who’s the most important … [American] historical figure about whom most […]
January 24, 2008 at 9:44 am
Kieran
I’m surprised that no-one has suggested, e.g., George Washington or Abraham Lincoln yet.
January 24, 2008 at 9:48 am
rootlesscosmo
Another candidate: General Hugh “Iron Pants” Johnson, first director of Roosevelt’s National Recovery Administration (NRA) and, for a brief while, the likeliest personification of a real fascist danger in the US.
January 24, 2008 at 9:52 am
teofilo
I actually only took one history course in college, but it was quite a course.
January 24, 2008 at 9:54 am
Doctor Slack
James Forten, honkies. James Forten.
January 24, 2008 at 9:55 am
SamChevre
I wandered over from Crooked Timber.
My nominee would be Charles Finney. His preaching and theology shaped the American church to such a degree that it is very hard to imagine modern American politics or religion without him.
January 24, 2008 at 9:57 am
soup biscuit
Well Kieran, he did specify important
January 24, 2008 at 10:09 am
John Emerson
Hannah Dustin, patron saint of American genocide, and her unmarried sister Elizabeth Emerson, martyred for lewdness.
January 24, 2008 at 10:20 am
Historiann
Man–talk about a He-Man Woman-Haters Club! Not a single XX person in the list so far. Well, I suppose I should try to come up with some names, but the women who are deserving of biographies with the sub-title “And How S/he Changed America” will probably elicit only a “whhhuuuhhh??” from most of you!
Molly Brant
Mercy Otis Warren (deserves a trade bio, but Rosemarie Zagarri’s 1995 book aimed at undergrads is a very good one.)
Harriet Livermore
My favorite XY suggestion so far is Charles Finney. But, he’s had a number of biographies, so he’s hardly been overlooked:
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_b/103-9182969-0741423?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=charles+grandison+finney
January 24, 2008 at 10:21 am
Historiann
Sorry–I was writing my comment when John Emerson wrote his, but Hannah Dustin didn’t change America, nor did Elizabeth Emerson. But, kudos to you for bringing them up!
January 24, 2008 at 10:23 am
John Emerson
In truth I was pretty much kidding, and promoting the murderous Emerson brand.
January 24, 2008 at 10:24 am
ari
Wait, look one comment above yours. Two women. Both, apparently, John Emerson’s mom. (Emerson has two mommies.)
January 24, 2008 at 10:24 am
ari
I’m pwned so many times that I’m hiding my head in shame.
January 24, 2008 at 10:28 am
eric
Hugh Johnson and Smedley Butler are both good choices. (Though it’s Johnson whose threateningness would have been limited by his drunkenness, right?)
Butler’s tale about a planned coup against FDR is a good story.
January 24, 2008 at 10:28 am
Rob_in_Hawaii
Edward Bellamy. His novel _Looking Backward_ (1888) was a look at a futuristic, socialist American utopia set in the year 2000. It was only outsold in the 19th century by Harriet Beecher Stowe’s _Uncle Tom’s Cabin_. The book was not only a bestseller, it also set off a national colloquy about the future of the U.S., helping Americans conceptualize the role of government in ameliorating the brutal side effects of capitalism. Bellamy influenced a generation of reformers. (BTW, if any university press editors are logged on, I have the manuscript for the book on Bellamy ready to go.)
January 24, 2008 at 10:31 am
eric
Hey, and as long as we’re self-promoting, Gallatin’s influence gets a look-in here, Bellamy’s here, and Johnson’s here.
January 24, 2008 at 10:32 am
Historiann
Hannah Dustin/History’s Dustbin–I get it!!
January 24, 2008 at 10:33 am
jeet
RE: persistent rash
See doctor.
Failing that, antihistamines.
January 24, 2008 at 10:36 am
ari
Bellamy got a good treatment in this book, by Jack Thomas, mentioned in my post of a few days ago. That said, Alternative America is an old book and hard to read (some would say), so Rob’s manuscript remains a hot property.
January 24, 2008 at 10:40 am
ari
Also: Eric deals with Bellamy in Murdering McKinley. Still, if we can drum up a bidding war for Rob’s book-to-be, we’ll have done good work today.
January 24, 2008 at 10:41 am
ari
Ugh, pwned again. Dratted quick-fingered co-blogger.
January 24, 2008 at 10:57 am
John Emerson
Rob in Hawaii, there’s a guy in Minneapolis (Tom Turnipseed) shopping a book on Smedley Butler around. Looks interesting — the story is pretty complicated.
January 24, 2008 at 10:59 am
Jamie T.
Chief Bender, pitcher for the Philadelphia A’s in the early 1900s. He was a complicated man who dealt with Native American stereotypes and was one of the best pitchers in the game. (Crap, looks like Tom Swift has written a book on Bender, but it’s not out until April)
January 24, 2008 at 11:01 am
eric
Not the George Wallace Tom Turnipseed?
January 24, 2008 at 11:12 am
John Emerson
No, he wrote a book about Iraq and does a lot of journalism.
January 24, 2008 at 11:12 am
CN
The tough part is knowing where to draw the line in the phrase “historical figure about whom most people know nothing.”
Al Smith has been the subject of biographies (none of them great) and was very well rendered in the Ric Burns documentary on New York, but it feels like he’s never received his due — a forefather of the New Deal whose great and ultimately tragic life story said much about the immigrant experience in America and the functions of a political machine, and whose failed 1928 presidential campaign still seem like a chilling story about the hurdles of an ethnic outsider pursuing national office. As I track the 2008 primaries, I keep thinking back to Al Smith and how revolutionary it was at the time for an Irish Catholic from New York to run for president. The scorching attacks he suffered make “swiftboating” look like a pimple.
Justice Robert Jackson also needs a great biographer.
Smith and Jackson are both well known in limited circles, but in terms of people who deserve a bigger place in the public conscience, they’re overdue.
January 24, 2008 at 11:15 am
Neil Maher
Ari, this is good stuff. I’m getting a bit addicted to your blog. As for my un-noted noteworthy historic figure, I put forth Joseph Glidden, inventor of barbed wire. His invention not only altered the landscape of the American West, but one hundred years later resulted in golden arches, with their high cholesterol beef patties, popping up all over the world.
Keep up the good work.
January 24, 2008 at 11:18 am
John Emerson
I was just speculating over Orcinus that after Al Smith there seems to have been some kind of fairly stable truce in the Democratic Party regarding Catholicism, with no more Catholic Presidential candidates for 32 years, but with less KKK influence too. Wish I knew more about that.
Prohibitionism was in many respects an anti-Catholic movement, and was resisted as such by Catholics. The end of prohibition was a defeat for the KKK.
January 24, 2008 at 11:19 am
rdale
I agree with some earlier that Philo Farnsworth has been done to death; TV, children’s books, bios, yadda yadda. I know because in the archive I work in, we have all of his papers and photos, and hardly a week goes by without some breathless request for photos of him.
I’d nominate what’s-his-name, someone Taylor, who came up with the idea of scientific management. The one who studied mill workers and said if everyone did this exact motion in this exact way, production, that holy grail of the Industrial Revolution, would be increased! And all those Gilded Age Robber Barons will get richer! Seriously, I studied him in some long ago graduate history seminar and have never forgotten him, other than his name of course! I think he affected industry in ways that are still evident.
Frederick W. Taylor; had to look it up after all.
January 24, 2008 at 11:24 am
eric
But Al Smith has also been recently done and done.
And I don’t think he’d take kindly to being called forefather of the New Deal, and all.
January 24, 2008 at 11:28 am
Leslie Madsen-Brooks
How about the scientists at UCD who have invented really hard fruits that can be shipped to the Midwest? Roma tomatoes, certain kinds of strawberries, etc.–they’re the guys who helped shape, I imagine, the bland Midwestern tastebud. And since Des Moines is one of the test marketing capitals of the U.S., a downturn in tastebud quality there affects us all.
When I lived in Iowa, no one there seemed to believe me that strawberries were actually supposed to be juicy and have flavor. How sad is that?
On the women’s history side of things, I nominate agrostologist and suffragist Agnes Chase. Yes, I’m feeling very ag-minded today.
January 24, 2008 at 11:29 am
teofilo
Samuel Sewall is another undeservedly obscure figure, but he’s also been done recently.
The challenge is really the balance between importance and obscurity. It’s hard to find people who both were very important and are now very obscure, so it’s hard to decide where to draw the line.
January 24, 2008 at 11:32 am
eric
The Neil Maher whose book was helpful to me? Hey, Neil! Welcome.
January 24, 2008 at 11:34 am
Matt W
The Smedley Butler guy is named Joel Turnipseed.
January 24, 2008 at 11:35 am
John Emerson
Whoops, sorry. Sorry, Joel. Sounds like a great book.
January 24, 2008 at 11:51 am
ari
Teo, one of the things I’ve realized in writing this blog is that most people don’t know what I know.* Which isn’t to say that I know very much. Really, that’s not what I mean at all. But I have a tendency to assume that if someone as ill-informed as I am knows something, than said nugget of knowledge must be of the common variety.** In other words, I think most figures, outside of the founders, are pretty darn obscure (see Cala’s comment way upthread). So keep ’em coming people.
* This is a lesson I have to keep learning — again and again, it seems — as I’m writing up my current book project. In which I keep assuming that everything I know is common knowledge and therefore doesn’t bear mentioning. Only to realize later that I’m quite wrong. And therefore need to rewrite whole sections of the book. Speaking of which, I’d better get back to work. Otherwise, I’ll never finish.
** I think this is true for most people. Except pompous jerks, who believe that nobody knows what they know. And also that everybody cares about what they know. Which is why they natter on for so long at cocktail parties. About things that bore me.
January 24, 2008 at 12:00 pm
Pershing
Chester Carlson is the most important inventor no one has ever heard of.
He invented xerography and the Xerox machine and turned document reproduction from a highly specialized ordeal into a task that anyone could do quickly and easily.
A good book about him is Copies In Seconds
January 24, 2008 at 12:00 pm
teofilo
I think the harder part is actually judging importance. There are tons of obscure historical figures, many of whom are very interesting, but it’s hard to say how many were really important in the “changed America” sense. Did Pickering change America? In some ways, yes, but it’s hard to explain how and why it matters.
This may be why there are so many scientists and inventors mentioned in this thread. When there’s a specific tangible object or useful concept that wouldn’t exist if a particular person hadn’t come up with it it’s easier to make a case for the importance of that person.
January 24, 2008 at 12:01 pm
Ben Alpers
He’s had a number of bios written about him, but Henry Wallace is a fascinating figure. In many ways the hybrid-corn angle is as significant as the Popular Front angle.
And speaking of agriculture policy, how about Earl Butz? Michael Pollan in The Omnivore’s Dilemma (one of the great books of the decade, IMO) makes a pretty strong case for the importance of the revolution in farm policy that Butz led during the Nixon and Ford years. And the ending of the book would write itself!
January 24, 2008 at 12:12 pm
ari
How about Julia Packard? And also: Vine Deloria? Or maybe even Dee Brown?
January 24, 2008 at 12:25 pm
teofilo
How ’bout ’em?
January 24, 2008 at 12:39 pm
ari
Teo, is this what you’re after? Packard is helping to change the way people eat, the way people think about oceans, and, perhaps, the way people think about the nature/culture divide; Deloria was a key player in the Red Power movement and helped change the way that people perceive Native Americans; and Dee Brown popularized much of what Deloria, and other activists, were writing and talking about.
In other words: a little bit of exposition. Turnabout is fair play. I suppose.
January 24, 2008 at 1:10 pm
Jamie T.
I’d like to also nominate Senator Ken Wherry from Nebraska. He was the Republican minority leader 1949-51. He was buddies with Sen. McCarthy and played the lead role in purging homosexuals from public service.
January 24, 2008 at 1:57 pm
teofilo
I think Packard, Deloria and Brown are all too recent for it to really be possible to judge either their importance or their obscurity.
January 24, 2008 at 1:58 pm
John Emerson
Governor Floyd B. Olson of Minnesota. Avowed socialist, and probably the most successful left politician in American history.
January 24, 2008 at 2:42 pm
urbino
Book-sales-wise, the name “Smedley” is not likely to help. Just sayin’.
A ruling from the parliamentarian, please: does the figure need to be American, or just important to and overlooked in American history?
January 24, 2008 at 2:43 pm
Early Modern Notes » Rescue them from obscurity!
[…] Ari asks: who’s the most important historical figure about whom most people know nothing? (Hat-tip: popping all over the place.) […]
January 24, 2008 at 4:31 pm
Tyrone Slothrop
If Vine Deloria, why not Vine Deloria Sr. or Ella Deloria?
January 24, 2008 at 4:44 pm
ari
Indeed, why not? Somebody should really write a book about the whole Deloria family, including Phil, who’s a great historian and student of American culture.
January 24, 2008 at 5:23 pm
Jeremy Young
Do John Quincy Adams or Henry Clay count as “overlooked”? Adams, in particular, is someone I’d characterize as easily one of the five most influential Americans of his century.
A related one (literally!) would be Charles Francis Adams.
And finally, one from my own research: Jean-Jules Jusserand (not really an American, but being president of the American Historical Association counts, right?)
January 24, 2008 at 6:22 pm
JR
Although very famous, I don’t think folks (especially the younger demographic) appreciates Teddy Roosevelt.
His story and life is almost fiction-like.
January 24, 2008 at 6:30 pm
ari
No, I call shenanigans on both Adams and Clay. It may be that a president could be both overlooked and important. But Adams, he of the super-duper bestselling David McCullough biography has had plenty of attention. And isn’t there some weird advertising campaign going on right now for a documentary about him? Clay is in all the surveys. If he doesn’t quite have top billing, it’s only because his agent has done a very good job. Between Nullification and the Compromise of 1850, Clay gets more screen time than almost anyone else.
C.F. Adams is intriguing (particularly if you mean Sr. — there are a bunch, right, including a defense contractor, in that clan). And I’m not sure about Jusserand. What did he do? I think he won the first Pulitzer in history. Or one of the first. But what else?
January 24, 2008 at 6:31 pm
ari
JR, sucking up to Eric will get you nowhere. He’s a cold fish, that one.
January 24, 2008 at 7:56 pm
Joshua Buhs
Smedley Butler.
January 24, 2008 at 8:20 pm
urbino
John Dewey. Thurgood Marshall. John Hay.
Also, I think James Madison gets way short shrift among the Founders. When thinking of the creation of our constitutional system, most people think of Washington, Jefferson, and Adams. Then Madison, maybe, or Franklin or Hamilton. Then anybody else. But the truth is Madison had more to do with it than any of those cats, and for sheer bleeding brilliance as an American political theorist, he was without equal.
None of my nominees is exactly obscure, but we’re not going for raw obscurity, right? It’s about the distance between how well known and how well they should be known, given their influence, right?
January 24, 2008 at 8:21 pm
ari
Joshua Buhs! Author of this very fine book. In case anyone wants to circle back to agricultural.
January 24, 2008 at 8:25 pm
urbino
CharleyCarp.
January 24, 2008 at 8:37 pm
Spike
Our real first president, John Hanson.
January 24, 2008 at 8:39 pm
ari
Plus, Jim Henson. Though: too well known.
January 24, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Spike
Jim Henson would have been a great president.
January 24, 2008 at 8:42 pm
bitchphd
we’re not going for raw obscurity, right? It’s about the distance between how well known and how well they should be known, given their influence, right?
If that’s the case, Margaret Sanger.
January 24, 2008 at 8:48 pm
urbino
Oooo, yes. Sanger. Good one.
January 24, 2008 at 8:53 pm
CharleyCarp
??!!
January 24, 2008 at 8:55 pm
bitchphd
Let’s see. Also Shirley Chisolm. Amelia Bloomer and Lucy Stone. Lucretia Whatsername Mott. Ida B. Wells. Mary McLeod Bethune. Malinche. Dolores Huerta.
January 24, 2008 at 9:03 pm
urbino
??!!
For stepping into the breach. You’re my new hero. Seriously. I want to be you when I grow up.
January 24, 2008 at 9:05 pm
bitchphd
The Grimke sisters. Mercy Otis Warren. C.J. Walker. Rachel Carson. Clara Barton. Nellie Bly. Marion Wright Edelman.
Margaret Mead and honestly, Gloria Steinem–their names are pretty well-known, but few people really have a good sense of how they changed the country.
January 24, 2008 at 9:05 pm
Spike
Jonathan Edwards
January 24, 2008 at 9:07 pm
CharleyCarp
Thanks Urbino, but I couldn’t even shine the shoes of the women Dr. B has listed in those last two comments.
January 24, 2008 at 9:27 pm
eloriane
Ada Lovelace would be my pick– I saw a documentary recently, and it was fascinating to see how much she did. Brilliant woman. And her family was pretty fascinating.
January 24, 2008 at 9:31 pm
bitchphd
Aw, CC, I bet Steinem would let you shine her shoes.
January 24, 2008 at 11:00 pm
Joshua Buhs
Yes. Thanks, Ari.
January 24, 2008 at 11:20 pm
ari
You’re welcome. And you’re welcome. Here, that is. We’re very pleased to have you join us.
January 24, 2008 at 11:51 pm
herbert browne
How about Adelle Davis? changed My diet… or Leslie Groves, or Ruth Benedict… does everyone know too much about Gene Debs, already?
That guy- the Other John Muir- wrote the first “Compleat Idiot’s Guide” for the VW amateurs… how about him?
Maybe people are tired of naturalist/explorers, but there were some cool guys, like JK Townsend & Thomas Nuttall, that walked out to Oregon ahead of a wagon party in the 1830s. One was an ornithologist, & the other a botanist… and both have their names in a lot of scientific reference works. A guy named William Finley came out West around 1900, & looked over a lot of unstudied places which he described so well that they ended up as Fed wildlife refuges… grist?.. or no? ^..^
January 25, 2008 at 12:04 am
herbert browne
Dr. b reminded me of a stamp that I found in some garbage (all paper stuff- & dry- I remind myself)… it was on a price list of indian relics from Arkansas… anyhow a 3-cent commemorating “100 years of progress of women” that shows Elizabeth Stanton, Lucretia Mott and someone named Carrie C. Catt- of whom I know nothing but a name. (stamp issued in 1948) ^..^
January 25, 2008 at 1:40 am
Who’s the most important Chinese historical figure that most people have never heard of?
[…] Kelman* of the American history blog, Edge of the American West has sparked a a fascinating little debate with this question: “Who’s the most important […]
January 25, 2008 at 3:32 am
Jeremy Young
Ari, the John Adams about whom both the biography and the documentary are written is the father of the one I’m talking about. Re: John QUINCY Adams, how can we not focus on a guy who:
– Wrote the Monroe Doctrine
– Intimidated Russia into giving up its claims to Oregon Territory, thus paving the way for the US to get Oregon and Washington
– Forced through a bill accepting the gift of one James Smithson, created the Smithsonian Institution, and later spearheaded a successful drive to purchase the George Catlin collection
– Served as one of the major antislavery voices in the U.S. House for over a decade AFTER he was President?
On the other hand, he has had a lot of biographies, including a Pulitzer-winning one in the ’40’s by Samuel Flagg Bemis (ugh). Though interest in him has waned over time, he’s had three biographies in the past ten years, most recently by Gary V. Wood.
I do mean Sr. for Charles F. Adams, though his son Brooks would be a fascinating candidate as well. And re: Jusserand, he won the first Pulitzer in history, is the only non-American to serve as President of the AHA (the year before Woodrow Wilson, coincidentally), and, more importantly, was a preeminent force in the New York diplomatic corps for twenty-two years, including during the leadup to World War I. He’s probably the most important French diplomat of the twentieth century who has not had a biography, either in English or French.
January 25, 2008 at 4:53 am
Bill Harshaw
Was going to say Julius Rosenwald, but I see Wikipedia cites a 2006 biography. How about Cyrus McCormick, John Deere, or Sam Walton? No recent bios listed in Wikipedia.
(I’d agree on Earl Butz, not for his importance but only to correct Pollan’s errors.)
January 25, 2008 at 6:09 am
Richard Oliver
Vannevar Bush the daddy of the Military-Industrial-Academic Complex and indirectly the progenitor of Silicon Valley
January 25, 2008 at 7:53 am
ari
Jeremy, I’m not sure how I missed the Quincy in your John Adams comment. So: yes, I deshenanigans Adams. And I also apologize. I expect JQA receives less attention for precisely the reason that I made my mistake: he’s overshadowed by family. But you’re right; he’s a very important and often ignored figure. While we’re on the subject, has there been no book about the Adams family. Surely it would be a story of declension (as John Sr. would want). I think such a book would do very well.
And: I remain unconvinced about Jusserand, though you make a better case than I would have thought possible. Still, it’s hard to imagine that the book-buying public would, well, buy a book about him: French, diplomat, historian. I don’t see the volume flying off the shelves. Or even a bidding war for the manuscript. For a scholarly volume, though, he sounds fascinating.
Bill, McCormick is a great choice. Well known by scholars, so the research will be easy, huge name recognition, but no real understanding of what he means to America. Same with Deere. Sam Walton? I think there’s too much out there already.
And Richard, I’m guessing that there will be, before too long, books Vannevar Bush. I’m surprised there aren’t already (but can’t use Google right now, as I have to swing into parenting action). More later, I hope. Until then, thanks for the comment.
January 25, 2008 at 9:15 am
S.G.E.W.
I’ve gotta say it: Thomas Paine.
Sure, there are a good number of biographies (all more or less hashing over the same paltry documents; Craig Nelson’s recent one is pretty comprehensive), but I would say that “most Americans” know next to nothing (truthful) about him. And who can argue that he wasn’t “influential”?
Also, he fought pirates when he was younger. And invented the iron bridge and the smokeless candle. And was nearly executed via guillotine during the Terror. And had a rather tragic personal life. Good dramatic stuff.
January 25, 2008 at 9:17 am
eric
You don’t rate the recent Thomas Paine by Harvey Kaye?
January 25, 2008 at 10:04 am
S.G.E.W.
Kaye’s book (which was quite good, don’t get me wrong!) dealt more with Paine’s legacy in the 19th and 20th century; not as much original research into the man’s life itself. To tell the truth, I probably referenced Nelson’s book mainly because I just read it.
Also: The Trouble With Tom, by Paul Collins, is invaluable for the bizarre tale of Paine’s mortal remains, post-mortem (long story short: we know were his brain is!).
January 25, 2008 at 11:58 am
bitchphd
Carrie Chapman Catt.
January 25, 2008 at 12:03 pm
ari
Racist.
January 25, 2008 at 1:37 pm
rdale
In the you-never-heard-of-this-guy-but-he-deserves-a-biography (so much so that I’ve toyed with the idea myself): Preston Nutter. No, he didn’t change the world or even the US, but he did predate today’s agribusiness by about a hundred years, and totally knocks the stereotype of the rootin’ tootin’ cattle baron on its butt. He *was* a cattle baron; when he died in 1936 he was eulogized as such by the Salt Lake Tribune and Deseret News, but he was way ahead of his time. He carried a gun in his saddlebags, not on his belt, because he believed in either buying out his enemies or hiring lawyers and suing them out of existence. For that matter, he didn’t ride horses, because mules were better mounts. He didn’t wear cowboy boots, because brogans didn’t get stuck in a stirrup. He came west in 1863, tried his hand at prospecting, then made money as a freighter with the great Otto Mears. Bought his first cattle and had a place near Thompson, Utah; during the Great Cow Extinction (the hard winter of 1884 or so) he kept his cattle by the railroad and then bought out everyone who had only a few head left. He filed on all the waterholes on the Arizona Strip at a time of great anti-Mormon feeling (he wasn’t LDS) so he in effect controlled the entire strip, about the size of, oh, New England, and that doesn’t even count his Utah holdings. He was ahead of every major trend and event from the coming of the railroads in Colorado mining towns to the opening of the Ute reservation in 1903 to World War I. And on and on; I won’t try to write his bio here but he was a very interesting guy.
Ari, do you do the Western History Association? I’m doin’ a paper this year.
January 25, 2008 at 1:54 pm
ari
No, I usually skip the WHA. Not on principle, or anything, but because more travel means more travel. When it’s in the neighborhood, I go — the last time was when I was at the University of Denver and the conference in Colorado Springs.
January 25, 2008 at 2:27 pm
SamChevre
In the “important” AND “female” category, here’s one for bitchPhd. (“Important” AND “female” as opposed to “notable female”)
Florence Nightingale, the Lady with the Lamp.
Made nursing a profession.
Made Army medical care beneficial rather than harmful.
Amazingly good at presenting information (sfaik, created the first pie chart-based presentation.)
January 25, 2008 at 7:48 pm
herbert browne
If “Carrie Chapman Catt” = “racist”, then
“Aaron Burr” = “murderer”?
One-word characterizations are… what they are.
chow ^..^
January 25, 2008 at 8:00 pm
herbert browne
Re “persistent rash”- I treated one of two near-simultaneous eruptions of shingles last Summer (2 different peeps) topically with a 4:1 st. John’s wort/ olive oil extract… and it was at the “mildly itchy” phase in 5 days- & dry in another week (just shrinking spots). The other sufferant was still tender after 2 weeks, and just drying out at the end of 5 weeks. Both white women in their 50s, good diets, neighbors, non-smokers… who can know? ^..^
January 25, 2008 at 8:24 pm
ari
Thanks, Herbert. I was kidding around with B, as I agree with your cautionary comment about one-word characterizations. That said, your reaction is a useful corrective about inside baseball on a blog.
All the best,
Ari
January 25, 2008 at 8:52 pm
herbert browne
acknowledged… and I shoulda picked up on the snap… one of those “i’m touchy about”… thingies… ^..^
January 26, 2008 at 1:56 pm
urbino
How about Moses Yale Beach, organizer of the original Associated Press?
January 26, 2008 at 4:08 pm
Henry
(1) Ella Baker–who not only was there throughout every critical stage of the civil rights movement, but played a critical role in more ways than one.
(2) E.D. Nixon of Montgomery, Alabama. A. Philip Randolph already has a movie and a shelf of books about him. Nixon exemplifies what being a member of the Brotherhood allowed activists to do in the depths of the Deep South during the 40’s and 50’s.
(3) Rose Schneiderman, whose life traces the arc from sweatshops and the Uprising of the 20,000 to New Deal reformism, with some detours through the class-based fissures in early feminism. Yes she has an autobiography and some books about her and she’s hardly unknown in the Eads sense (although no one connected to the Civil War can be truly unknown), but she’s an interesting person who worked for years after the great struggles she had been a part of petered out in defeat and disillusionment.
January 26, 2008 at 10:45 pm
andrew
While we’re on the subject, has there been no book about the Adams family. Surely it would be a story of declension (as John Sr. would want).
Descent from Glory seems like a good title.
January 30, 2008 at 9:13 am
Historiann » Original Zins: Little thoughts on biography and women’s history
[…] men of action and vision are the great actors on history’s stage. (See for example this thread over at Edge of the American West asking for names of heretofore obscure people who have changed […]
January 30, 2008 at 10:02 am
Bing McGhandi
Hildreth Meiere.
The American National Biography has an entry on her.
HJ
February 25, 2008 at 10:29 am
HM Inspired
Thanks for mentioning Hildreth Meiere, she is a contemporary role model for not only modern artists but anybody who has a dream and believes they can make it come true. I have so much to say as I am a great-grand-child.