The 100 greatest Americans of the 20th century : a social justice hall of fame

587 Pages·2013·4.47 MB·English

by  Dreier

THE 100
GREATEST AMERICANS
OF THE 20TH CENTURY
ALSO BY PETER DREIER
Jewish Radicalism: A Selected Anthology
(New York: Grove Press, 1973), coeditor with Jack Nusan Porter The Next Los
Angeles:
The Struggle for a Livable City, 2nd ed.
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006), coauthor with Regina Freer,
Bob Gottlieb, and Mark Vallianatos Place Matters: Metropolitics for the 21st
Century,
2nd ed. (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2004), coauthor with John
Mollenkopf and Todd Swanstrom Regions That Work:
How Cities and Suburbs Can Grow Together
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2000), coauthor with Manuel
Pastor, Eugene Grigsby, and Marta Lopez-Garza Up Against the Sprawl:
Public Policy and the Making of Southern California
(Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004), coeditor with Jennifer
Wolch and Manuel Pastor
The 100
GREATEST
AMERICANS
of the 20TH
CENTURY
A SOCIAL JUSTICE
HALL of FAME
PETER DREIER
Copyright © 2012 by Peter Dreier Published by Nation Books, A Member of the Perseus Books Group 116
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Designed by Trish Wilkinson Set in 10.5 point Adobe Garamond Pro Library of Congress Cataloging-in-
Publication Data Dreier, Peter, 1948– The 100 greatest Americans of the 20th century : a social justice hall
of fame / Peter Dreier.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical reference.
ISBN 978-1-56858-694-6 (e-book) 1. Social reformers—United States—Biography. 2. Political activists
—United States—Biography. 3. Social change—United States—History—20th century. 4. Social justice—
United States—History—20th century. 5. United States—Social conditions—20th century. 6. United States
—History—20th century—Biography. I. Title. II. Title: One hundred greatest Americans of the twentieth
century.
E747.D74 2012
920.073—dc23
[B] 2012004704
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To my daughters, Amelia and Sarah
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
20th-Century Timeline
The 100 Greatest Americans of the 20th Century
Tom Johnson (1854–1911)
Robert M. La Follette Sr. (1855–1925)
Eugene Debs (1855–1926)
Louis Brandeis (1856–1941)
Clarence Darrow (1857–1938)
Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919)
Florence Kelley (1859–1932)
John Dewey (1859–1952)
Victor Berger (1860–1929)
Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860–1935)
Jane Addams (1860–1935)
Lincoln Steffens (1866–1936)
Hiram Johnson (1866–1945)
W. E. B. Du Bois (1868–1963)
William “Big Bill” Haywood (1869–1928)
Alice Hamilton (1869–1970)
Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
Lewis Hine (1874–1940)
Robert F. Wagner Sr. (1877–1953)
Upton Sinclair (1878–1968)
Albert Einstein (1879–1955)
Margaret Sanger (1879–1966)
John L. Lewis (1880–1969)
Helen Keller (1880–1968)
Frances Perkins (1880–1965)
Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)
Rose Schneiderman (1882–1972)
Fiorello La Guardia (1882–1947)
Roger Baldwin (1884–1981)
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962)
Norman Thomas (1884–1968)
A. J. Muste (1885–1967)
Alice Stokes Paul (1885–1977)
Sidney Hillman (1887–1946)
Henry Wallace (1888–1965)
A. Philip Randolph (1889–1979)
Earl Warren (1891–1974)
Floyd Olson (1891–1936)
Dorothy Day (1897–1980)
Paul Robeson (1898–1976)
William O. Douglas (1898–1980)
Harry Bridges (1901–1990)
Langston Hughes (1902–1967)
Vito Marcantonio (1902–1954)
Virginia F. Durr (1903–1999)
Ella Baker (1903–1986)
Theodor Geisel (Dr. Seuss) (1904–1991)
Myles Horton (1905–1990)
Carey McWilliams (1905–1980)
William J. Brennan Jr. (1906–1997)
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907–1972)
Rachel Carson (1907–1964)
Walter Reuther (1907–1970)
I. F. Stone (1907–1989)
Thurgood Marshall (1908–1993)
Lyndon B. Johnson (1908–1973)
John Kenneth Galbraith (1908–2006)
Saul Alinsky (1909–1972)
Bayard Rustin (1912–1987)
Harry Hay (1912–2002)
Studs Terkel (1912–2008)
David Brower (1912–2000)
Woody Guthrie (1912–1967)
Arthur Miller (1915–2005)
Jane Jacobs (1916–2006)
C. Wright Mills (1916–1962)
Barry Commoner (1917–)
Fannie Lou Hamer (1917–1977)
Jackie Robinson (1919–1972)
Pete Seeger (1919–)