Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines
Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.
Students and researchers now have a fast and reliable way to find influential thinkers from 24 disciplines and 300 sub-disciplines (and growing). If you want to find history’s most influential philsosophers, or the world’s most influential mathematicians currently, now you can.
We also provide custom rankings of people by discipline as well as interviews with influential academics who are currently active.
To use this tool, select the discipline (and optional subdiscipline) relevant to your research, and specify influential academics by history, world, or US. Even results that are counterintuitive are often enlightening (our algorithm always picks up a signal).
Methodology: How and Why We Rank by Influence …
List of the most influential people
#1
Kathleen Antonelli
1921 - 2006 (85 years)
Kathleen Rita Antonelli , known as Kay McNulty, was an Irish computer programmer and one of the six original programmers of the ENIAC, one of the first general-purpose electronic digital computers. The other five ENIAC programmers were Betty Holberton, Ruth Teitelbaum, Frances Spence, Marlyn Meltzer, and Jean Bartik.
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John Lukacs
1924 - 2019 (95 years)
John Adalbert Lukacs was a Hungarian-born American historian and author of more than thirty books. Lukacs described himself as a reactionary. Life and career Lukacs was born in Budapest, Hungary, the son of Magdaléna Glück and Pál Lukács , a physician. His parents, Jewish converts to Roman Catholicism, were divorced before World War II. Lukacs attended a classical gymnasium, had an English language tutor, and spent two summers at a private school in England. He studied history at the University of Budapest.
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Frances Spence
1922 - 2012 (90 years)
Frances V. Spence was one of the original programmers for the ENIAC . She is considered one of the first computer programmers in history. The other five ENIAC programmers were Betty Holberton, Ruth Teitelbaum, Kathleen Antonelli, Marlyn Meltzer, and Jean Bartik.
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Frederica Massiah-Jackson
1951 - Present (73 years)
Frederica Massiah-Jackson is a Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas judge. She served as President Judge from November 2000 to January 2006. Life and career Massiah-Jackson graduated from the Philadelphia High School for Girls in three years at the age of 16. She also graduated from Chestnut Hill College in three years and the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1974 at the age of 23.
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Kathleen Byerly
1944 - 2020 (76 years)
Kathleen Mae Bruyere was a captain in the United States Navy. She was one of the twelve women named by Time magazine as Time Person of the Year in 1975, representing American women . In May 1975, she became the first female officer in the Navy to serve as the flag secretary to an admiral commanding an operational staff. In 1977, Byerly was one of six officers who sued the United States Secretary of the Navy and the United States Secretary of Defense over their being restricted from serving on combat aircraft and ships. This led to the 1948 Women's Armed Services Integration Act being struck ...
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Margaret McKenna
1940 - Present (84 years)
Margaret McKenna is an American religious sister and anti-militarist activist. Raised in Hackensack, New Jersey, she earned her PhD in the origins and religious thought of Christianity from the University of Pennsylvania. In the 1970s, McKenna began participating in non-violent civil disobedience with the Plowshares Movement, sometimes being arrested or imprisoned for her actions. Her activism has continued through recent years.
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Catherine L. Albanese
1940 - Present (84 years)
Catherine L. Albanese is an American religious studies scholar, professor, lecturer, and author. Born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, she graduated summa cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts from Chestnut Hill College in 1962. She received her Master’s Degree in History from Duquesne University in 1968, and completed her Doctorate for History of Christianity at the University of Chicago in 1972.
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