Free
Year over year, the population of New York State has grown.
Hundreds of millions of people have spent some or all of their lives in the state. Most were private citizens, not known beyond their friends and family. Some were political figures with national reputations. And some had the courage to be trailblazers. A few of them are here, in this gallery of New Yorkers who led.
Sybil Ludington
Reports are mixed, but according to a widely accepted story, Sybil Ludington rode 40 miles through the night to alert American soldiers under the command of her father, Colonel Henry Ludington, that the British were planning an attack. The date was April 26, 1777. Sybil Ludington was just 16 years old. She’s been called “the female Paul Revere.” Poet Berton Braley wrote a poem about her. It was fashioned after Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s famous poem “Paul Revere’s Ride.” Here’s the first part of the poem:
Listen my children, and you shall hear
Of a lovely feminine Paul Revere
Who rode an equally famous ride
Through a different part of the countryside,
Where Sybil Ludington’s name recalls
A ride as daring as that of Paul’s.
Martin Van Buren
Martin Van Buren was the eighth president of the United States (1837–1841). When he took office, he was the first president to have been born a U.S. citizen. Van Buren opposed making Texas part of the United States. That was because Texas would have been admitted as a slave state. Van Buren wanted to avoid regional conflicts about the issue of enslavement. Several months into Van Buren’s presidency, a panic took hold. Banks failed. Businesses failed. People lost their land. The bad times lasted about five years. Van Buren was not elected for a second term.
Millard Fillmore
Millard Fillmore was the 13th president of the United States (1850–1853). Fillmore signed legislation known as the Compromise of 1850. The compromise included five bills. The bills were intended to satisfy both sides on the issue of enslavement. The idea was to keep the country from splitting apart. The Fugitive Slave Act was part of the compromise. The act made the federal government responsible for finding and returning runaways who had been enslaved. It was enforced even in free states. Fillmore was a member of a political party known as the Whigs. Party members who were against the Fugitive Slave Act refused to let him run for reelection.
Elizabeth Jennings Graham
Elizabeth Jennings Graham was a teacher in New York City. On July 16, 1854, she boarded a horse-drawn streetcar for Whites only. It was the start of a saga that included a huge rally and a court trial. The trial ended in Graham’s favor. By 1860, all public transit vehicles in New York City were no longer segregated. They were open to everyone, regardless of race. An article in the New York Tribune described the situation this way:
She got upon one of the company’s cars on the Sabbath, to ride to church. The conductor undertook to get her off, first alleging the car was full; when that was shown to be false, he pretended the other passengers were displeased at her presence; but when she insisted on her rights, he took hold of her by force to expel her. She resisted.
Think Piece!
Elizabeth Jennings Graham has been called “the 19th-century Rosa Parks.” In the 1950s, Parks refused to give up her seat to a White man on a segregated city bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Why might some people feel what these two people did was similar?
Chester A. Arthur
Chester A. Arthur was the 21st president of the United States (1881–1885). Before entering politics, Arthur was Elizabeth Jennings Graham’s lawyer in her trial about the segregated streetcar. Arthur took office as vice president in March 1881. He was sworn in as president that September after President James Garfield was assassinated. Arthur signed an important law. It was intended to guarantee all citizens the right to compete fairly for government jobs without consideration of politics, race, and religion. This is what novelist Mark Twain had to say about him:
I am but one in 55,000,000; still, in the opinion of this one-fifty-five- millionth of the country’s population, it would be hard to better President Arthur’s administration.
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt was the 26th president of the United States (1901–1909). Taking office at the age of 43, Roosevelt became the youngest American president, before or since. He was known for his strong views about conservation. Roosevelt doubled the number of national parks. He created the first 50 national wildlife refuges. He also helped make sure the Panama Canal would be built. He wanted American goods to be shipped more quickly and cheaply between the Atlantic and Pacific Coasts. Roosevelt also involved the United States in global politics. About his policy ideas, Roosevelt would comment, “speak softly and carry a big stick.” The saying is borrowed from an African proverb. It became very famous.
Josephine Clara Goldmark
Josephine Clara Goldmark was a reformer. She focused on changing working conditions for women and children. She researched and wrote several books on the topic. In 1912, she wrote Fatigue and Efficiency. The book explained how extremely long working hours injured workers and affected their productivity. The National Consumer League often used the facts and figures she included in her work to write papers that supported its goals for federal legislation. Its goals included establishing minimum wages and shorter working hours.
Margaret Dreier Robins
Margaret Dreier Robins was president of the National Women’s Trade Union League (NWTUL) from 1907 to 1922. With Robins’s leadership, the NWTUL was able to achieve several goals. They included an eight-hour workday. Plus, a minimum wage and the elimination of child labor. After the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in Manhattan (which killed 146 people within 18 minutes), Robins led the organization in helping to establish new safety rules for factories.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin D. Roosevelt was the 32nd president of the United States (1933–1945). He took office during the Great Depression. At the time, more than 13 million people were out of work. Roosevelt passed far-reaching programs to bring people back to work. The programs were known as the New Deal. They employed millions of workers. The workers completed huge construction projects. In New York City, the projects included building the Triborough Bridge and the Lincoln Tunnel. The Holland Tunnel was also built then. As was LaGuardia Airport.
Think Piece!
Roosevelt is known for these words from the speech he gave on the day he took office: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” What do you think he meant? How might these words have affected people?
Shirley Chisholm
Shirley Chisholm was the first Black woman elected to the U.S. Congress. She served seven two-year terms. They were from 1969 to 1983. Chisholm was a strong supporter of women and people of color. Known as “Fighting Shirley” to her coworkers, she wanted to be the first Black person and the first woman to be nominated for president. She was not successful. But she carved a path for others to follow. This is what Chisholm said when she announced her plan:
I am not the candidate of Black America, although I am Black and proud. I am not the candidate of the women’s movement of this country, although I am a woman and I am equally proud of that. I am the candidate of the people, and my presence before you now symbolizes a new era in American political history.
David Dinkins
David Dinkins was the first Black mayor of New York City (1990–1993). He promised to be “the mayor of all the people.” He called New York City “a gorgeous mosaic.” To Dinkins, New York City was “the greatest city of a great nation, to which my ancestors were brought, chained and whipped, in the hold of a slave ship.” Dinkins governed during a time of racial tension, corruption, and financial difficulties. Even so, he had several accomplishments. He increased library hours from five days a week to six. He began the planned “facelift” for the part of the city known as Times Square. And he reduced the number of unhoused people to the lowest total in 20 years.
Colin Powell
Colin Powell was the first Black secretary of state (2001–2005), under President George W. Bush. The secretary of state advises the president on matters of foreign affairs. He or she carries out the president’s policies in this area. Earlier, Powell had blazed trails as the first Black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. That was from 1989 to 1993. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is the highest-ranking military officer in the U.S. Armed Forces. President Joe Biden said this about Powell:
Colin embodied the highest ideals of both warrior and diplomat. He was committed to our nation’s strength and security above all . . . advising presidents and shaping our nation’s policies, Colin led with his personal commitment to the democratic values that make our country strong. Time and again, he put country before self, before party, before all else – in uniform and out – and it earned him the universal respect of the American people.
Donald Trump
Donald Trump was the 45th president of the United States (2017–2021). Although he lost the popular vote in the election, he won the majority of electoral votes. The popular vote is the actual number of people who vote for a candidate. Electoral votes are cast by people called electors. Electors are the ones who actually elect a candidate to office. Each state has a specific number of electors based on the state’s population. Trump is the son of a real estate developer. As an adult, he inherited wealth from his father and himself became a successful real estate developer. In 2004, he became the star of a popular reality television show called The Apprentice. Trump’s presidency was very controversial. He ran for reelection in 2020 but questioned the results when they showed that he had lost.
