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Larry Joe Bird (born December 7, 1956) is an American former NBAbasketball player, widely considered one of the greatest players to ever play, and one of the best clutch performers in the history of sports. Drafted into the NBA sixth overall by the Boston Celtics in 1978, Bird played small forward and power forward for thirteen seasons. He retired as a player from the NBA in 1992. Bird was voted to the NBA's 50th Anniversary All-Time Team in 1996 and inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1998. After working as an assistant in the Celtics front office from 1992 to 1997, Bird served as head coach of the Indiana Pacers from 1998 to 2000. In 2003, he assumed the role of president of basketball operations for the Pacers, which he currently still holds.
Portal:Indiana/Selected biography/3 James Byron Dean (February 8, 1931 – September 30, 1955) was an American filmactor. Dean's mainstream status as a cultural icon is best embodied in the title of his most cited role in Rebel Without a Cause. His enduring fame and popularity rests on only three films, his entire starring output. He was the first person to receive a posthumous Academy Award nomination for Best Actor and remains the only person to have two such nominations posthumously. Dean began his professional acting career with a Coca Colatelevision commercial, followed by a stint as a stunt tester for the Beat the Clockgame show.
John Herbert Dillinger (June 22, 1903 – July 22, 1934) was an American bank robber, considered by some to be a dangerous criminal, while others idealized him as a latter-day Robin Hood. He gained this reputation (and the nickname "Jackrabbit") for his graceful movements during bank heists, e.g. leaping over the counter, and narrow getaways from police. His exploits, along with those of other criminals of the 1930s Depression era, such as Bonnie and Clyde and Ma Barker, dominated the attentions of the American press and its readers during what is sometimes referred to as the public enemy era, between 1931 and 1935.
Benjamin Harrison (August 20, 1833 – March 13, 1901) was the 23rd President of the United States, serving one term from 1889 to 1893. He had previously served as a senator from Indiana. His administration is best known for a series of legislation including the McKinley Tariff and federal spending that reached a billion dollars. Democrats attacked the "Billion Dollar Congress" and defeated the GOP in 1890 and defeated Harrison's bid for reelection in 1892. A grandson of President William Henry Harrison and great-grandson of Benjamin Harrison V, Benjamin was born in North Bend, Hamilton County, Ohio as the second of eight children of John Scott Harrison and Elizabeth Ramsey Irwin.
Michael Joseph Jackson (born August 29, 1958), also known as the "King of Pop," is an Americanmusician, entertainer and pop icon, whose successful music career and controversial personal life have been a part of pop culture for the last quarter-century. Michael Jackson is widely regarded as one of the greatest entertainers and popular recording artists in modern times, heralding and displaying new physical techniques, like the robot and the moonwalk, that have redefined mainstream entertainment. At his height, he was characterized as "an unstoppable juggernaut, possessed of all the tools to dominate the charts seemingly at will: an instantly identifiable voice, eye-popping dance moves, stunning musical versatility, and loads of sheer star power."
Portal:Indiana/Selected biography/12 Steve McQueen (March 24, 1930 – November 7, 1980) was an American movie actor, nicknamed "The King of Cool". He was one of the biggest box-office draws of the 1960s and 1970s due to a popular "anti-hero" persona. He was born Terence Steven McQueen in Beech Grove, Indiana. His father was a stunt pilot for an aerial circus and abandoned Steve and his mother shortly after McQueen was born. His mother left him at an early age to be raised in Slater, Missouri by his Uncle Claude. At the age of 12, he was unhappily reunited with his mother and a new, abusive step-father and went to live with them in Los Angeles.
Portal:Indiana/Selected biography/13 Richard Bernard "Red" Skelton (July 18, 1913 – September 17, 1997) was an American comedian who was best known as a top radio and television star from 1937 to 1971. Skelton's show business career began in his teens as a circus clown and went on to vaudeville, Broadway, films, radio, TV, clubs and casinos, while pursuing another career as a painter. Born in Vincennes, Indiana, Skelton was the son of a Hagenbeck-Wallace Circus clown who died in 1913 shortly before the birth of his son. Skelton himself got one of his earliest tastes of show business with the same circus as a teenager.
Tecumseh (c.1768? - October 5, 1813), Tecumseh whose given name might be more accurately rendered as Tecumtha or Tekamthi, was a famous Shawnee leader. He spent much of his life attempting to rally disparate Native American tribes in a mutual defense of their lands, which eventually culminated in his death in the War of 1812. Tecumseh remains a respected icon for Native Americans and is considered a national hero in Canada. Even his longtime adversary William Henry Harrison considered Tecumseh to be "one of those uncommon geniuses which spring up occasionally to produce revolutions and overturn the established order of things."
Portal:Indiana/Selected biography/16 KeKe Wyatt (born as Ketara Shavon Wyatt, March 10, 1982, Indianapolis, Indiana), is a multi-talented Multiracial-American R&B recording artist mostly noted for her soulful vocal style and exotic looks. She became popular after a highly successful collaboration with R&B singer Avant on his platinum album My Thoughts. This led to her debut Certified Gold album Soul Sista in 2001, and a promising solo career with MCA Records. Her career experienced a temporary halt in 2002, however, after she allegedly stabbed her road manager-husband.
Ryan Wayne White (December 6, 1971 – April 8, 1990) was a young man from Kokomo, Indiana who became a national poster child for HIV/AIDS, after being expelled from school because of his infection. A hemophiliac, he became infected with HIV from a tainted blood treatment and, when diagnosed in 1984, was given six months to live. Though doctors said he posed no risk to other students, AIDS was poorly understood at the time and when White tried to return to school, many parents and teachers in Kokomo rallied against him. A lengthy legal battle with the school system ensued, and media coverage of the struggle made White into a national celebrity and spokesman for AIDS research and public education. He appeared frequently in the media with celebrities such as singer Elton John, pop star Michael Jackson and talk show host Phil Donahue. Surprising his doctors, White lived five years longer than predicted and died shortly before completing high school in April 1990.
Portal:Indiana/Selected biography/18 James Riddle "Jimmy" Hoffa (born February 14, 1913 in Brazil, Indiana, disappeared July 30, 1975), was an American labor leader. As the president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s, Hoffa wielded considerable influence. After he was convicted of attempted bribery of a grand juror, he served nearly a decade in prison. He is also well known in popular culture for the mysterious circumstances surrounding his unexplained disappearance and presumed death. His son James P. Hoffa is the current president of the Teamsters.
John Robert Wooden (born October 14, 1910) is a retired Americanbasketball coach. He is a member of the Basketball Hall of Fame as both a player (class of 1961) and a coach (class of 1973). He was the first person ever enshrined in both categories; only Lenny Wilkens and Bill Sharman have since been so honored. His 10 NCAA National Championships while at UCLA are unmatched. Born in the small town of Hall, Indiana to Roxie Anna and Joshua Hugh Wooden, his family moved to a small farm in Centerton in 1918. After his family moved to the town of Martinsville when he was 14, he led the High School team to the state championship finals for three consecutive years, winning the tournament in 1927. He was a three time All-State selection. After graduating in 1928. He attended Purdue University, located in West Lafayette, Indiana, where he was a three-time All-American guard.
Eli Lilly (July 8, 1838 – June 6, 1898) was a soldier, pharmaceuticalchemist, industrialist, and founder of the eponymous Eli Lilly and Company pharmaceutical corporation. Lilly enlisted in the Union Army during the American Civil War, he recruited a company of men to serve with him, and was later promoted to colonel and given command of a force of cavalry. Using his wealth, Lilly engaged in numerous philanthropic pursuits. The company he founded has since grown into one of the largest and most influential pharmaceutical corporations in the world, and the largest corporation in Indiana. His son and grandsons created the Lilly Endowment to continue Lilly's legacy of philanthropy.
Elwood P. Haynes (October 14, 1857 – April 12, 1925) was an American inventor, metallurgist, automotive pioneer, entrepreneur, and industrialist. He invented the metal alloys stellite and martensiticstainless steel, and designed one of the first automobiles in the United States. His design is recognized to be the first that was viable for mass production and, with the Apperson brothers, he formed the first profitable company in the United States to commercially produce automobiles. Because of his many advances in the automotive industry, he is sometimes called the Father of the Automobile. After his death from complications arising from influenza, his Kokomo mansion was converted into the Elwood Haynes Museum and is open to the public where many of his original inventions and automobiles are on display.
Jonathan Jennings (1784 – July 26, 1834) was a Democratic-Republican governor and congressman from Indiana. Born in Readington, New Jersey, he immigrated to Indiana in 1806 and became the Indiana Territory's representative to Congress for three terms. The leader of the anti-slavery moment in Indiana, Jennings became one of the post popular figures in the territory and served as president of Indiana's constitutional convention where he and his partisans were able to instate a constitutional ban on slavery. After statehood was granted, Jennings was elected to serve as the first Governor of Indiana. After his governorship, he returned to Congress, representing Indiana for five terms.
Oliver Hazard Perry Throck Morton (August 4, 1823–November 1, 1877) was a U.S. Republican Party politician from Indiana. He served as Governor of Indiana in the American Civil War, and was a stalwart ally of President Abraham Lincoln. During the war, Morton suppressed the Democrat-controlled Indiana General Assembly. He exceeded his constitutional authority by calling out the militia without approval, and during the period of legislative suppression he privately financed the state government through unapproved federal and private loans. He was criticized for arresting and detaining political enemies and suspected southern sympathizers, but is remembered as one of Indiana's most successful governors who led the state during its most challenging period.
George Rogers Clark (November 19, 1752 – February 13, 1818) was a soldier from Virginia and the highest ranking American military officer on the northwestern frontier during the American Revolutionary War. He served as leader of the Kentuckymilitia throughout much of the war, Clark is best-known for his celebrated capture of Kaskaskia (1778) and Vincennes (1779), which greatly weakened British influence in the Northwest Territory. Because the British ceded the entire Northwest Territory to the United States in the 1783 Treaty of Paris, Clark has often been hailed as the "Conqueror of the Old Northwest." As a reward for his service, he granted 150,000 acres of land in Southern Indiana where he formed the first American settlement in modern Indiana, Clarksville.
Levi Coffin (October 28, 1798–September 16, 1877) was an American Quaker, abolitionist, and businessman. Coffin was deeply involved in the Underground Railroad in Indiana and Ohio and his home is often called "Grand Central Station of the Underground Railroad". He was nicknamed "President of the Underground Railroad" because of the thousands of slaves that are reported to have passed through his care while escaping their masters. Coffin was a local business leader who was a director of the Bank of Indiana, a merchant, and farmer. His position in the community allowed him to provide much of the funds necessary to supply food, clothing, and transportation for the Underground Railroad operations in his region. After slavery was abolished following the American Civil War, Coffin traveled across the Midwestern United States and abroad to France and Great Britain where he was instrumental in forming aid societies to provide food, clothing, funds, and education to the freed slaves.
Thomas Riley Marshall (March 14, 1854—June 1, 1925) was an AmericanDemocraticpolitician who served as the 28thVice President of the United States of America under Woodrow Wilson from 1913 to 1921. A prominent lawyer in Indiana, he initially gained popularity in the state through his legal representation in several high profile cases. He became an active and well known member of the Indiana Democratic Party by stumping across the state for other candidates and organizing party rallies that helped him later secure the nomination and win the election to serve as Governor of Indiana. In office, he attempted to have a new and controversial progressive state constitution adopted and pressed for other progressive era reforms. The Republican minority blocked the attempt to change the constitution in the state courts. His popularity as a governor and Indiana's status as a critical swing state aided him in securing the Democratic vice presidential nomination in 1912 and in winning the subsequent general election. During Marshall's two terms he delivered moral boosting speeches across the nation during World War I and became the first Vice-President to hold cabinet meetings, which he did while Wilson was in Europe. The event for which Marshall's vice presidency is most remembered was a leadership crisis following a stroke that incapacitated President Wilson in October 1919. Because of their personal dislike of Marshall and their policy disagreements with him, Wilson's advisers and wife sought to keep Marshall uninformed about the President's condition in an attempt to prevent him from easily assuming the Presidency. Marshall refused to forcibly assume the Presidency for fear of setting a precedent.
Sherman Minton (October 20, 1890 – April 9, 1965) was a DemocraticUnited States Senator from Indiana and an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Born in rural southern Indiana, he was impoverished during his youth after his father was disabled and his mother died of breast cancer. He worked to pay his way through high school and went on to attend Indiana University, Yale and the Sorbonne, served as a Captain in World War I, and then launched his legal and political career. After two failed attempts to be elected to the United States House of Representatives, Minton became involved in the administration of Governor of IndianaPaul V. McNutt where he earned a reputation for saving the government and the public money through his oversight of utility regulations. He won election to the United States Senate in 1934. As part of the New Deal Coalition, he was fiercely partisan and championed PresidentFranklin D. Roosevelt's unsuccessful court packing plans in the Senate. After failing to be reelected to the Senate in 1940 and briefly serving as an administrative aid at the White House, he was appointed by Roosevelt to a federal judgeship on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, where he served for eight years and authored over 250 opinions. Minton was nominated by President Harry Truman and confirmed to replace a deceased Justice in 1949, becoming the last member of Congress to be appointed to the Supreme Court. He served on the Supreme Court for seven years where he advocated judicial restraint and opposed judicial activism. Initially a regular supporter of the majority opinions, he became a regular dissenter after the makeup of the court was altered due to the deaths and replacements of three of his fellow jurists. He retired from the court in 1956 due his worsening anemia. Minton was memorialized in southern Indiana when the Sherman Minton Bridge was named in his honor in 1962.
English retired from the House in 1861, but remained involved in party affairs. In the American Civil War he was a War Democrat, supporting the Union war effort. As well as pursuing a political career, he was an author and businessman. He owned an opera house, was president of a bank, and developed many residential properties. English was successful in business, and became one of the wealthiest men in Indiana. After nearly two decades in the private sector, English returned to political life as the Democratic nominee for vice president in 1880. English and his presidential running mate, Winfield Scott Hancock, lost narrowly to their Republican opponents, James A. Garfield and Chester A. Arthur. (Full article...)
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Richard Lieber - founded Indiana State Park system, and helped the National park Service.
I would like to see alittle more of a bio than just early life, and legacy. But the founding of the parks could make an appealing summary. If you could find alittle more to add to the article, I wouldn't have any reservations. JoeI 04:04, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
I'd like to see the addition of the following notable Hoosiers:
David Michael Letterman (born April 12, 1947) is an award-winning American television personality, late night talk show host, television producer, Indy Racing League car owner and philanthropist. His first major success was on the long-running NBC television program Late Night with David Letterman, before he transferred to CBS in 1993 to his current position on The Late Show. Letterman's ironic, often absurd comedy is heavily influenced by comedians Steve Allen, Andy Kaufman and Johnny Carson.
Larry Joe Bird (born December 7, 1956) is an American former NBA basketball player, widely considered one of the greatest players to ever play, and one of the best clutch performers in the history of sports. Drafted into the NBA sixth overall by the Boston Celtics in 1978, Bird played small forward and power forward for thirteen seasons. He retired as a player from the NBA in 1992. Bird was voted to the NBA's 50th Anniversary All-Time Team in 1996 and inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1998. After working as an assistant in the Celtics front office from 1992 to 1997, Bird served as head coach of the Indiana Pacers from 1998 to 2000. In 2003, he assumed the role of president of basketball operations for the Pacers, which he currently still holds.
John Herbert Dillinger (June 22, 1903 – July 22, 1934) was an American bank robber, considered by some to be a dangerous criminal, while others idealized him as a latter-day Robin Hood. He gained this reputation (and the nickname "Jackrabbit") for his graceful movements during bank heists, e.g. leaping over the counter, and narrow getaways from police. His exploits, along with those of other criminals of the 1930s Depression era, such as Bonnie and Clyde and Ma Barker, dominated the attentions of the American press and its readers during what is sometimes referred to as the public enemy era, between 1931 and 1935.
Rex Grossman (born August 23, 1980) is a quarterback for the Chicago Bears of the National Football League. An Indiana native, Grossman graduated from Bloomington High School South and attended the University of Florida on an athletic scholarship. He led the Florida Gators to two championship games, and was the runner-up for the 2001 Heisman Trophy. Grossman began his professional career with the Chicago Bears as the twenty-second overall selection in the 2003 NFL Draft, but spent most of his first three seasons sidelined with injuries. He completed his first full season in 2006, leading the Bears to a National Football Conference Championship, and helping the team score the second most points in the league.
William Henry Harrison (February 9, 1773 – April 4, 1841) was an American military leader, politician, and the ninth President of the United States. He served as the first Governor of the Indiana Territory and later as a U.S. Representative and Senator from Ohio. Harrison first gained national fame as a war hero, defeating American Indians at the Battle of Tippecanoe in 1811 and earning the nickname "Tippecanoe" (or "Old Tippecanoe"). As a general in the subsequent War of 1812, his most notable contribution was a victory at the Battle of the Thames, which brought the war in his region to a successful conclusion.
Benjamin Harrison (August 20, 1833 – March 13, 1901) was the 23rd President of the United States, serving one term from 1889 to 1893. He had previously served as a senator from Indiana. His administration is best known for a series of legislation including the McKinley Tariff and federal spending that reached a billion dollars. Democrats attacked the "Billion Dollar Congress" and defeated the GOP in 1890 and defeated Harrison's bid for reelection in 1892. A grandson of President William Henry Harrison and great-grandson of Benjamin Harrison V, Benjamin was born in North Bend, Hamilton County, Ohio as the second of eight children of John Scott Harrison and Elizabeth Ramsey Irwin.
Michael Joseph Jackson (born August 29, 1958), also known as the "King of Pop," is an American musician, entertainer and pop icon, whose successful music career and controversial personal life have been a part of pop culture for the last quarter-century. Michael Jackson is widely regarded as one of the greatest entertainers and popular recording artists in modern times, heralding and displaying new physical techniques, like the robot and the moonwalk, that have redefined mainstream entertainment. At his height, he was characterized as "an unstoppable juggernaut, possessed of all the tools to dominate the charts seemingly at will: an instantly identifiable voice, eye-popping dance moves, stunning musical versatility, and loads of sheer star power."
Don Mattingly (nicknamed "Donnie Baseball" and "The Hit Man") (born April 20, 1961) is a retired first baseman who played for the New York Yankees of the American League from 1982–1995. He is currently one of Joe Torre's coaches for the Los Angeles Dodgers. His popularity is comparable to that of Yankee greats like Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra and Joe DiMaggio. Mattingly grew up in Evansville, Indiana and was one of the nation's top prospects as a high school player at Reitz Memorial High School in 1979, earning a brief write-up in Sports Illustrated magazine.
John Mellencamp (born October 7, 1951 in Seymour, Indiana) is an American rock/roots rock singer, songwriter, and guitarist, known for a long and successful recording and performing career highlighted by a series of 1980s hits, including "Jack and Diane", "Pink Houses" and others, and by his role in the Farm Aid charity event. Mellencamp lives in Bloomington, Indiana and married former supermodel Elaine Irwin on September 5, 1992. Mellencamp has five children from three marriages. He is known to be a rabid Indiana University basketball fan (he often attends games), and has been a staunch supporter of the university itself for a number of years.
Tecumseh (c.1768? - October 5, 1813), Tecumseh whose given name might be more accurately rendered as Tecumtha or Tekamthi, was a famous Shawnee leader. He spent much of his life attempting to rally disparate Native American tribes in a mutual defense of their lands, which eventually culminated in his death in the War of 1812. Tecumseh remains a respected icon for Native Americans and is considered a national hero in Canada. Even his longtime adversary William Henry Harrison considered Tecumseh to be "one of those uncommon geniuses which spring up occasionally to produce revolutions and overturn the established order of things."
Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom (April 3, 1926 – January 27, 1967) was a United States Air Force pilot and the second American astronaut to fly in space. He was killed during a training exercise for the Apollo One mission on January 27, 1967, at Launch Complex 34 at Cape Kennedy. A native of Mitchell, Indiana, Grissom earned a B.S. from Purdue University in 1950 and joined the United States Air Force. Receiving his wings in March 1951, during the Korean War he flew 100 combat missions in F-86s with the 334th Fighter Interceptor Squadron. Grissom rose to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. In 1959, after physical and psychological tests, Grissom was chosen as one of the seven Project Mercury astronauts.
Ryan Wayne White (December 6, 1971 – April 8, 1990) was a young man from Kokomo, Indiana who became a national poster child for HIV/AIDS, after being expelled from school because of his infection. A hemophiliac, he became infected with HIV from a tainted blood treatment and, when diagnosed in 1984, was given six months to live. Though doctors said he posed no risk to other students, AIDS was poorly understood at the time and when White tried to return to school, many parents and teachers in Kokomo rallied against him. A lengthy legal battle with the school system ensued, and media coverage of the struggle made White into a national celebrity and spokesman for AIDS research and public education. He appeared frequently in the media with celebrities such as singer Elton John, pop star Michael Jackson and talk show host Phil Donahue. Surprising his doctors, White lived five years longer than predicted and died shortly before completing high school in April 1990.
John Robert Wooden (born October 14, 1910) is a retired American basketball coach. He is a member of the Basketball Hall of Fame as both a player (class of 1961) and a coach (class of 1973). He was the first person ever enshrined in both categories; only Lenny Wilkens and Bill Sharman have since been so honored. His 10 NCAA National Championships while at UCLA are unmatched. Born in the small town of Hall, Indiana to Roxie Anna and Joshua Hugh Wooden, his family moved to a small farm in Centerton in 1918. After his family moved to the town of Martinsville when he was 14, he led the High School team to the state championship finals for three consecutive years, winning the tournament in 1927. He was a three time All-State selection. After graduating in 1928. He attended Purdue University, located in West Lafayette, Indiana, where he was a three-time All-American guard.
Florence Agnes Henderson (born February 14, 1934) is an American actress and singer, perhaps best known for playing the role of Carol Brady in the television program The Brady Bunch, which ran from 1969 to 1974. Henderson, one of ten children, was born on Valentine's Day in Dale, Indiana, the daughter of Elizabeth (née Elder), a homemaker, and Joseph Henderson, a tobacco sharecropper. Raised as a Catholic, she graduated from St. Francis Academy in Owensboro, Kentucky in 1951; shortly thereafter, she went to New York City, enrolling in the prestigious American Academy of Dramatic Arts. She is an Aluma Initiate of the Alpha Chi chapter of Delta Zeta Sorority.
Eli Lilly (July 8, 1838 – June 6, 1898) was a soldier, pharmaceutical chemist, industrialist, and founder of the eponymous Eli Lilly and Company pharmaceutical corporation. Lilly enlisted in the Union Army during the American Civil War, he recruited a company of men to serve with him, and was later promoted to colonel and given command of a force of cavalry. Using his wealth, Lilly engaged in numerous philanthropic pursuits. The company he founded has since grown into one of the largest and most influential pharmaceutical corporations in the world, and the largest corporation in Indiana. His son and grandsons created the Lilly Endowment to continue Lilly's legacy of philanthropy.
Elwood P. Haynes (October 14, 1857 – April 12, 1925) was an American inventor, metallurgist, automotive pioneer, entrepreneur, and industrialist. He invented the metal alloys stellite and martensitic stainless steel, and designed one of the first automobiles in the United States. His design is recognized to be the first that was viable for mass production and, with the Apperson brothers, he formed the first profitable company in the United States to commercially produce automobiles. Because of his many advances in the automotive industry, he is sometimes called the Father of the Automobile. After his death from complications arising from influenza, his Kokomo mansion was converted into the Elwood Haynes Museum and is open to the public where many of his original inventions and automobiles are on display.
Jonathan Jennings (1784 – July 26, 1834) was a Democratic-Republican governor and congressman from Indiana. Born in Readington, New Jersey, he immigrated to Indiana in 1806 and became the Indiana Territory's representative to Congress for three terms. The leader of the anti-slavery moment in Indiana, Jennings became one of the post popular figures in the territory and served as president of Indiana's constitutional convention where he and his partisans were able to instate a constitutional ban on slavery. After statehood was granted, Jennings was elected to serve as the first Governor of Indiana. After his governorship, he returned to Congress, representing Indiana for five terms.
Oliver Hazard Perry Throck Morton (August 4, 1823–November 1, 1877) was a U.S. Republican Party politician from Indiana. He served as Governor of Indiana in the American Civil War, and was a stalwart ally of President Abraham Lincoln. During the war, Morton suppressed the Democrat-controlled Indiana General Assembly. He exceeded his constitutional authority by calling out the militia without approval, and during the period of legislative suppression he privately financed the state government through unapproved federal and private loans. He was criticized for arresting and detaining political enemies and suspected southern sympathizers, but is remembered as one of Indiana's most successful governors who led the state during its most challenging period.
George Rogers Clark (November 19, 1752 – February 13, 1818) was a soldier from Virginia and the highest ranking American military officer on the northwestern frontier during the American Revolutionary War. He served as leader of the Kentucky militia throughout much of the war, Clark is best-known for his celebrated capture of Kaskaskia (1778) and Vincennes (1779), which greatly weakened British influence in the Northwest Territory. Because the British ceded the entire Northwest Territory to the United States in the 1783 Treaty of Paris, Clark has often been hailed as the "Conqueror of the Old Northwest." As a reward for his service, he granted 150,000 acres of land in Southern Indiana where he formed the first American settlement in modern Indiana, Clarksville.
Levi Coffin (October 28, 1798–September 16, 1877) was an American Quaker, abolitionist, and businessman. Coffin was deeply involved in the Underground Railroad in Indiana and Ohio and his home is often called "Grand Central Station of the Underground Railroad". He was nicknamed "President of the Underground Railroad" because of the thousands of slaves that are reported to have passed through his care while escaping their masters. Coffin was a local business leader who was a director of the Bank of Indiana, a merchant, and farmer. His position in the community allowed him to provide much of the funds necessary to supply food, clothing, and transportation for the Underground Railroad operations in his region. After slavery was abolished following the American Civil War, Coffin traveled across the Midwestern United States and abroad to France and Great Britain where he was instrumental in forming aid societies to provide food, clothing, funds, and education to the freed slaves.
John Glover Roberts Jr. (born January 27, 1955) is the seventeenth and current Chief Justice of the United States. He has served since 2005, having been nominated by President George W. Bush after the death of William Rehnquist. He is a judicial conservative and constructionist wing of the Supreme Court, ruling based primarily on the founder's intent and originalism forms of judicial philosophy. He grew up in northern Indiana where he was educated in a private boarding school before attending Harvard University where he was managing editor of the Harvard Law Review. After being admitted to the bar, Roberts became a clerk for William Rehnquist before taking a position in Attorney General's office during the Reagan Administration. He later became an Associate Counsel to President Ronald Reagan, and was appointed by President George H. W. Bush as a judge on the D.C. Circuit, but resigned after two years on the bench. He spent fourteen years in private law practice and served in the Department of Justice and Office of the White House Counsel and argued thirty-nine cases before the Supreme Court before being nominated to join the court as an associate justice. Chief Justice Requisite died during his confirmation hearings, and he was renominated to fill the newly vacant seat.
Thomas Riley Marshall (March 14, 1854—June 1, 1925) was an American Democratic politician who served as the 28th Vice President of the United States of America under Woodrow Wilson from 1913 to 1921. A prominent lawyer in Indiana, he initially gained popularity in the state through his legal representation in several high profile cases. He became an active and well known member of the Indiana Democratic Party by stumping across the state for other candidates and organizing party rallies that helped him later secure the nomination and win the election to serve as Governor of Indiana. In office, he attempted to have a new and controversial progressive state constitution adopted and pressed for other progressive era reforms. The Republican minority blocked the attempt to change the constitution in the state courts. His popularity as a governor and Indiana's status as a critical swing state aided him in securing the Democratic vice presidential nomination in 1912 and in winning the subsequent general election. During Marshall's two terms he delivered moral boosting speeches across the nation during World War I and became the first Vice-President to hold cabinet meetings, which he did while Wilson was in Europe. The event for which Marshall's vice presidency is most remembered was a leadership crisis following a stroke that incapacitated President Wilson in October 1919. Because of their personal dislike of Marshall and their policy disagreements with him, Wilson's advisers and wife sought to keep Marshall uninformed about the President's condition in an attempt to prevent him from easily assuming the Presidency. Marshall refused to forcibly assume the Presidency for fear of setting a precedent.
Sherman Minton (October 20, 1890 – April 9, 1965) was a Democratic United States Senator from Indiana and an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Born in rural southern Indiana, he was impoverished during his youth after his father was disabled and his mother died of breast cancer. He worked to pay his way through high school and went on to attend Indiana University, Yale and the Sorbonne, served as a Captain in World War I, and then launched his legal and political career. After two failed attempts to be elected to the United States House of Representatives, Minton became involved in the administration of Governor of Indiana Paul V. McNutt where he earned a reputation for saving the government and the public money through his oversight of utility regulations. He won election to the United States Senate in 1934. As part of the New Deal Coalition, he was fiercely partisan and championed President Franklin D. Roosevelt's unsuccessful court packing plans in the Senate. After failing to be reelected to the Senate in 1940 and briefly serving as an administrative aid at the White House, he was appointed by Roosevelt to a federal judgeship on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, where he served for eight years and authored over 250 opinions. Minton was nominated by President Harry Truman and confirmed to replace a deceased Justice in 1949, becoming the last member of Congress to be appointed to the Supreme Court. He served on the Supreme Court for seven years where he advocated judicial restraint and opposed judicial activism. Initially a regular supporter of the majority opinions, he became a regular dissenter after the makeup of the court was altered due to the deaths and replacements of three of his fellow jurists. He retired from the court in 1956 due his worsening anemia. Minton was memorialized in southern Indiana when the Sherman Minton Bridge was named in his honor in 1962.
