actorBorn: 5/24/1965Birthplace: Chicago Reilly has avoided the scorching gaze of the media despite significant roles in several recent hit movies. Reilly's acting career began inauspiciously in…
attorney, former state supreme court justiceBorn: 7/1/1955Birthplace: Saginaw, Mich. Selby served as an associate justice on the Indiana Supreme Court from Jan. 1995 to Oct. 1999. She was the…
Comer Vann Woodwardhistorian Born: 11/13/1908Birthplace: Vanndale, Arkansas Pulitzer Prize-winning storyteller and historian who chronicled the upheaval of the turbulent South, as well as its…
Charles KenzieCivil rights activistBorn: February 17, 1914Birthplace: Bluefield, W. Va. Steele decided he wanted to become a preacher at an early age. In 1938 he began attending Morehouse…
manufacturerBorn: 12/8/1861Birthplace: Boston, Mass. He quit high school to begin work in his grandfather's Flint, Michigan, lumberyard. By 1885 he had organized the Flint Road Cart Company, which…
scientist, activistBorn: 2/28/1901Birthplace: Portland, Oregon Although he earned a Ph.D. in physical chemistry (1925), Linus Pauling's willingness and ability to cross disciplinary boundaries…
physician, astronautBorn: 10/17/1956Birthplace: Decatur, Ala. Astronaut Mae Jemison became the first African-American woman to enter space when she served on the crew of the Space Shuttle Endeavor…
politicianBorn: 11/18/1957Birthplace: Eufaula, Oklahoma A former University of Oklahoma quarterback, Watts worked as a Baptist minister before being elected to Congress in 1994. In 1999 he was…
Born: 1915Birthplace: Battle Creek, Mich. Semi-synthetic penicillin—For almost 30 years after Sir Alexander Fleming's discovery of penicillin, the process for harvesting the drug took months to…
Born: 1932 Ground Proximity Warning System (GPWS). In response to tragic airline crashes during the 1960s, Bateman invented a device that automatically warned pilots if their aircraft was…
