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20 Famous Harvard Alumni Who Made History

More than 40,000 graduates from 200 different countries are included on the Harvard University graduates Roll, including some of the most renowned alumni in the world.

The top university in the globe, North America, and the US is Harvard University. It was established in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1636, making it the country’s oldest university. We all recognize thousands of names from Harvard University.

Distinguished individuals, who made America proud, changed the world for the better, excelled in their areas, and trod the halls of the institution. The golden list is populated with American presidents, billionaires, celebrities, academicians, and philanthropists.

Numerous areas and spheres of life, including physics, chemistry, physiology, medicine, and economics, have benefited from the contributions of Harvard University students. So here are the 20 famous Harvard alumni who made history:

1. Ruth Bader Ginsburg 

Ruth Bader Ginsburg, sometimes known as “the Notorious R.B.G.,” is one of the most renowned and courageous Harvard graduates amid a long list of prominent alumni. She was an advocate for civil rights and a representation of feminism.

A lawyer who had no fear and made history by becoming the first Jewish woman to hold a judicial position in the United States. She was an American lawyer and jurist. From 1993 until 2020, she worked as an associate judge on the Supreme Court of the United States of America.

Additionally, she was proposed by Bill Clinton, the American president, to succeed Justice Byron White, a moderate consensus builder.  She participated in important cases on the Court, such as United States v. Virginia, and offered opinions in such instances.

The iron lady of the American judiciary also wrote the majority decision in a number of significant cases, including City of Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation of New York, Friends of the Earth, Inc. v. Laidlaw Environmental Services, Inc., and United States v. Virginia. Her liberal stance on the law has long been admired.

2. John F Kennedy

In 1961, John F. Kennedy was elected as the 35th President of the United States. He was killed in the middle of his second term. In American political history, he was the youngest man to be elected to the position of President.

In Harvard graduate studies in International Relations, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in the academic year 1936–1940. Government and international relations were Jack’s aka John F Kennedy’s areas of concentration. He is one of the most recognizable graduates and is well-known worldwide.

3. Mark Zuckerberg

Business tycoon Mark Zuckerberg has changed networking and communication through his firm by using the internet to transcend geographical boundaries. With a total net worth of approximately 695.60 billion US dollars, Facebook enjoys being among the largest corporations.

Through Facebook, which he established when he was enrolled in Harvard University’s graduate programs with degrees in psychology and computer science, people from all over the world can now communicate, engage, and remain in contact. 

Mark Elliot Zuckerberg, also known as Mark Zuckerberg, continuously raises the bar for his charisma through several breakthroughs in his business. The 2004-founded Facebook has emerged as a significant presence in our lives and has lately branded itself with its ground-breaking recent rebranding as Meta Platforms Inc. in 2021.

He is Meta’s executive chairman, CEO, and majority shareholder at the moment. The course was never completed since he left Harvard to go on his quest as the creator of Facebook. But in 2017, he received an Honorary Doctor of Laws, one of the most prestigious degrees Harvard University offers to its finest students who have earned a Harvard Masters.

4. Barack Obama

One of the most well-known Harvard University graduates is him. He received a Juris Doctor from 1988 to 1991. Barack Hussein Obama II presided over the United States as its 44th president. His presidency spanned the years from 2009 to 2017.

Being the country’s first African-American president, it was a proud moment for the black race in America. His ardent statesmanship was used from 2009 to 2017 when he served as president, taking on the Great Recession during the 2008–2009 period.

He became the fourth US President to earn the Noble Peace Prize in 2009 for his outstanding efforts to advance global diplomacy and inter-human collaboration. Additionally, he served as the Harvard Law Review’s first-ever black president. Lastly, Obama stepped down from the President in 2021, but he has been involved in democratic politics ever since.

5. Matt Damon

After receiving an offer for the main part in the film Geronimo: An American Legend, Matt Damon left Harvard in 1992, where he had enrolled. Matt Damon is a well-known actor and a celebrity with several talents.

In 1997, he won an Academy Award for writing the best original screenplay for the film Good Will Hunting. He is also among the highest-paid actors of all time, according to Forbes, and has a net worth of more than $3.88 billion US dollars in North America.

6. William Henry Gates III

Microsoft’s CEO and well-known alumnus of Harvard University is William Henry Gates III. Bill Gates attended school from 1973 to 1975, originally enrolling as a pre-law student before packing his coursework with graduate-level computer science and mathematics.

He is a business magnet and had a significant role in the 1970s and 1980s microcomputer revolution. He serves as Microsoft’s president, and chief software architect, and was the company’s largest (individual) shareholder until 2014. Microsoft was founded as a result of the combined intellect of Bill Gates and Paul Allen, and it is now a well-known brand on a global scale.

7. E. B.Du Bois

Born in the United States, William Edward Burghardt Du Bois was a sociologist, socialist, historian, civil rights activist, Pan-Africanist, author, writer, and editor.

Du Bois enrolled as a junior at Harvard College and graduated with his second bachelor’s degree in 1890. In 1895, he graduated from Harvard University with a Ph.D., making him the first African American to do so.

8. Conan O’Brien

Conan Christopher O’Brien is an American comedian, writer, podcaster, and producer. He graduated from Harvard University with a degree in History and Literature and went on to work on the Simpsons sets and hosts his own American talk show, Late Night with Conan O’Brien.

Harvard University awarded O’Brien a bachelor’s degree in American history. The only other person to have the title was comic Robert Benchley in 1912. He was twice elected president of The Harvard Lampoon, a renowned parody journal.

9. Natalie Portman

American actress Natalie Portman, also known by her stage name Natalie Hershlag, is a well-known Harvard University alumna. She is hailed from Jerusalem, Israel, and her innovative performances have helped her stand out in the cutthroat industry of Hollywood.

She studied psychology at Harvard from 1999 to 2003, graduating at that time. She has received several awards, including the Golden Globe and British Academy Film Awards. For her work as the finest actress in the 2010 film Black Swan, she was honored with an Academy Award and a Golden Globe.

She has a flourishing acting career and is well known for a number of outstanding Hollywood and independent films. After high school, she began her studies to graduate from Harvard University. Within a year after her graduation, she also won her first Oscar.

10. Tommy Lee Jones

Actor and filmmaker Tommy Lee Jones is well-known in the United States. He was nominated for four Academy Awards for his performance as US Marshal Samuel Gerard in the suspenseful movie The Fugitive, for which he won Best Supporting Actor in 1993.

Jones completed his final thesis on “the mechanics of Catholicism” in Flannery O’Connor’s works, earning a Bachelor of Arts in English with honors in 1969. At Harvard, he studied the playwright Robert Chapman.

11. Neil deGrasse Tyson

American astronomer, planetary scientist, author, and scientific communicator Neil deGrasse Tyson is well-known. Tyson attended Columbia University, Harvard University, and the University of Texas in Austin, among other institutions.

From 1991 to 1994, he was a postdoctoral research associate at Princeton University. Tyson earned a bachelor’s degree in physics from Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1980.

12. Michael Bloomberg

Michael “Mike” Rubens Bloomberg is an American author, politician, and philanthropist. He is the principal shareholder and co-founder of Bloomberg L.P.

He held the office of mayor of New York City from 2002 to 2013, and in 2020, he ran as a Democrat for president of the United States. In 1966, he graduated from Harvard Business School with a Master of Business Administration.

13. Margaret Atwood

Margaret Eleanor Atwood was born in Canada and is a poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist, teacher, environmental activist, and inventor. She is the author of The Handmaid’s Tale, a popular book that has been adapted into a television series.

With a Woodrow Wilson grant, she graduated from Harvard University’s Radcliffe College. She earned a Bachelor of Arts in English (honors) with majors in philosophy and French in 1961. In 1961, Atwood began graduate studies at Radcliffe College of Harvard University, with a Woodrow Wilson fellowship.

14. Franklin Delano Roosevelt

The 32nd president of the United States, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, also known as FDR, was an American politician and political figure who presided over the country from 1933 until his death in 1945.

He had previously held positions as the 44th governor of New York in the year 1929–1933, the Assistant Secretary of the Navy during 1913–1920, and a senator for the state of New York in the year 1911–1913.

Furthermore, he earned an A.B. in history from Harvard in 1903 after three years of study. He stayed on for a fourth year, taking graduate classes and working as the Harvard Crimson’s editor. He enrolled at Columbia University’s law school in 1904 but left after passing the New York Bar Exam in 1907.

 15. Theodore Roosevelt

As the 26th president of the United States from 1901 to 1909, Theodore Roosevelt Jr., also known as Teddy or by his initials T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer.

Prior to that, he served as the 33rd governor of New York from 1899 to 1900, as well as the 25th vice president under President William McKinley from March to September 1901.

Upon taking office following McKinley’s murder, Roosevelt established himself as the leader of the Republican Party and became a proponent of Progressive and anti-trust measures. He excelled in his classes in physics, philosophy, and rhetoric but struggled in Latin and Greek.

He was an experienced naturalist and published ornithologist who had diligently studied biology. He had an almost photographic memory and read prodigiously. Roosevelt competed in rowing and boxing when a student at Harvard; he once finished second in an intramural boxing match.

In addition to being an editor of The Harvard Advocate, Roosevelt was a member of the exclusive Porcellian Club, the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity, and the Alpha Delta Phi literary group, afterward known as the Fly Club.

16. Michelle Obama

As the wife of President Barack Obama, Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama is an American lawyer and author who held the office of first lady of the United States from 2009 to 2017.

She held this post for the first time as an African-American woman. Obama, who was up in Chicago’s South Side, is Princeton and Harvard Law School alum. She met Barack Obama while working at the law firm Sidley Austin early in her professional career.

17. Noam Chomsky

American public intellectual Avram Noam Chomsky is renowned for his contributions to linguistics, political activism, and social critique. Chomsky, who is referred to as “the father of modern linguistics” at times, is also a significant figure in analytic philosophy and one of the creators of the discipline of cognitive science.

He has written more than 150 books on subjects including linguistics, war, and politics. He is a laureate professor of linguistics at the University of Arizona and an institute professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He supports libertarian socialism and anarcho-syndicalism as ideologies.

18. Rashida Jones

Actress Rashida Leah Jones is American. Jones did push through, finally earning a degree in religion and philosophy from Harvard in 1997. She also realized that she wanted to pursue acting as a profession.

As Louisa Fenn on the Fox drama series Boston Public from 2000 to 2002, as Karen Filippelli on the NBC comedy The Office from 2006 to 2009; 2011, and as Ann Perkins on the NBC comedy Parks and Recreation from 2009 to 2015, Jones portrayed these characters.

Jones played the title character in the TBS comedy series Angie Tribeca from 2016 to 2019. In 2020, Jones played Joya Barris in the Netflix series #blackAF. 

19. Jared Kushner

Jared Corey Kushner is an American businessman, investor, and former government official. Kushner earned a Bachelor of Arts in government with honors from Harvard in 2003.

He was a key counselor to Donald Trump from 2017 to 2021 and is the son-in-law of the president through his union with Ivanka Trump. Additionally, he oversaw the Office of American Innovation.

20. Henry Kissinger

Under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, Henry Alfred Kissinger held the positions of Secretary of State and National Security Advisor for the United States. He is an American politician, geopolitical advisor, and diplomat.

In 1950, Kissinger graduated from Harvard College with a BA in political science, summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, where he resided in Adams House and studied under William Yandell Elliott. Kissinger was controversially awarded the 1973 Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts in brokering a cease-fire in Vietnam.