List of Swiss Americans

This is a list of notable Swiss Americans, including both original immigrants who obtained American citizenship and their American descendants.

Pioneers

 * Theobald (Diebold) von Erlach (1541–1565), first Swiss person known to have settled in North America.
 * John Joachim Zubly (1724–1781) of St. Gallen, pastor, planter, and statesman during the American Revolution
 * Hans Peter and Christian Tritt, Swiss-French who immigrated to Pennsylvania in 1739.
 * John Sutter (1803–1880), born in Germany of a Swiss father, Californian famous for his association with the California Gold Rush (in that gold was discovered by James W. Marshall in Sutter's Mill) and for establishing Sutter's Fort in an area that would later become the capital of California, Sacramento
 * John Augustus Sutter, Jr. (1826–1897), his son, a U.S. Consul to Acapulco, Mexico and the founder and planner of the City of Sacramento, California
 * Peter Luginbill (1818–1886), born in France as the son of Mennonite parents exiled from the Emmental, early settler in Indiana and founder of the city of Berne

Business

 * Robert Abplanalp (1922–2003), businessman, inventor of the aerosol valve
 * Steve Ballmer (born 1956), businessman and CEO of Microsoft Corporation
 * Henry Clay Frick (1849–1919), industrialist and art patron, once known as "America's most hated man". as per CNBC one of the "Worst American CEOs of All Time".
 * Meyer Guggenheim (1828–1905), statesman, patriarch of Guggenheim family
 * Simon Guggenheim (1867–1941), businessman, politician, and philanthropist
 * Milton Hershey (1857–1945), confectioner, philanthropist, and founder of The Hershey Chocolate Company
 * Otto Frederick Hunziker (1873–1959), pioneer in the American and international dairy industry
 * S. S. Kresge (1867–1966), merchant, philanthropist and founder of the S. S. Kresge Company, now Sears Holdings Corporation.
 * Robert Lutz (born 1932), General Motors Vice Chairman of Product Development and Chairman of GM North America, the world's largest automaker
 * Mark Spitznagel (born 1971), hedge fund manager
 * James G. Sterchi (1867–1932), furniture store magnate
 * Bruce Tognazzini (born 1945), usability consultant in partnership the Nielsen Norman Group
 * Steve Jobs, information technology entrepreneur and inventor

Actors and directors

 * René Murat Auberjonois (born 1940), film actor
 * Theda Bara (1885–1955), silent film actress and sex symbol
 * Wallace Beery (1885–1949), film actor
 * Berry Berenson (1948–2001), photographer, actress, and model, mother of part Swiss descent
 * Amy Brenneman (born 1964), film and TV actress, father of part Swiss descent
 * Yul Brynner (1920–1985), actor, father of part Swiss descent
 * James Caviezel (born 1968), film actor, paternal grandfather of Swiss descent
 * Billie Dove (1903–1997), film actress
 * Tyler Hoechlin (born 1987), film actor, father of part Swiss descent
 * Q'Orianka Kilcher (born 1990), singer and actress, of part Swiss descent
 * George Lucas (born 1944), film director, of part Swiss descent
 * Bridget Marquardt (born 1975), model, actress
 * Victor Mature (1913–1999), film actor
 * Jeremy Maxwell (born 1973), film actor
 * Jodi Ann Paterson (born 1975), model, actress and former beauty queen
 * Michelle Pfeiffer (born 1958), film actress, maternal grandfather of Swiss descent
 * Kelly Rohrbach (born 1990), model and actress
 * Ryan Seacrest (born 1974), television and radio host, television producer, and entrepreneur, of part Swiss descent
 * August Schellenberg (born 1936), actor
 * Liev Schreiber (born 1967), film actor, father of part Swiss descent
 * Meryl Streep (born 1949), film actress, father of part Swiss descent
 * William Wyler (1902–1981), film director
 * Darryl F. Zanuck (1902–1979), film producer and director
 * Renée Zellweger (born 1969), film actress, Swiss-born father

Visual artists

 * Jeremiah Theus (1716–1774) of Chur, painter
 * Adolfo Müller-Ury (1862–1947), portrait and impressionistic still-life painter
 * Herbert Matter (1907–1984), photographer and graphic designer

Writers and publicists

 * Fernand Auberjonois (1910–2004), journalist, foreign correspondent of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and the Toledo Blade
 * William Frank Buckley (1925–2008), writer
 * Henry J. Eyring, author, educator, president of Brigham Young University-Idaho
 * A. C. Frieden (born 1966), novelist
 * Lorin Morgan-Richards, author and illustrator
 * Wendy Watson Nelson, Canadian-American, author, lecturer, educator, associate professor at University of Calgary
 * Tessa Gräfin von Walderdorff (born 1994), writer and socialite
 * Eudora Alice Welty (1909–2001), writer; ancestry can be traced to Emmental Valley of Switzerland; Swiss ancestral name Wälti

Musicians

 * Melissa Auf der Maur (born 1972), singer
 * Rudolph Ganz (1877–1972), pianist, conductor and composer
 * Jewel (born 1974), singer-songwriter, actress, philanthropist, and author
 * Cyndi Lauper (born 1953), singer-songwriter and actress
 * Karina Lombard (born 1969), singer and actress
 * Elvis Perkins (born 1976), singer-songwriter

Other

 * Mary Katherine Campbell (1905–1990), only Miss America winner to hold beauty title twice, 1922 & 1923; mother was of partial Swiss ancestry
 * Gary Gygax (1938–2008), writer and game designer, co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons

Governors and presidents

 * Anthony G. Brown (born 1961), Governor of Maryland
 * Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890–1969), 34th President of the United States
 * Herbert Hoover (1874–1964), 31st President of the United States
 * Robert B. Meyner (1908–1990), Governor of New Jersey
 * Barack Obama (born 1961), 44th President of the United States, (Swiss distant ancestors).
 * Emanuel L. Philipp (1861–1925), Governor of Wisconsin

Congressmen and senators

 * James L. Buckley (born 1923), Senator of New York
 * Albert Gallatin (1761–1849), U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Senator of Pennsylvania, diplomat
 * James William Good (1866–1929), Congressman Iowa
 * Amy Klobuchar (born 1960), Senator of Minnesota
 * James S. Negley (1826–1901), Congressman Pennsylvania
 * Robert Portman (born 1955), Senator of Ohio
 * Benjamin F. Welty (1870–1962), Congressman from Allen County, Ohio; ancestry traced back to Emmental Valley, Switzerland; Swiss ancestral name Wälti

Other

 * William Wirt (1772–1834), author and statesman who is credited with turning the position of United States Attorney General into one of influence; Swiss father.
 * J. Edgar Hoover (1935–1972), first Director of the FBI
 * Warren E. Burger (1907–1995), Chief Justice of the United States from 1969 to 1986
 * August Claessens (1885–1954), politician, best known as one of the five New York Assemblymen
 * Albert Gallatin (1761–1849), politician, ethnologist, linguist, founder of New York University, diplomat, and United States Secretary of the Treasury
 * Fred Iklé (1924–2011), Under Secretary of Defense for Policy
 * Wally Schirra (1923–2007), astronaut, only person to fly in all of America's first three space programs (Mercury, Gemini and Apollo)
 * Samuel F. Snively (1859–1952), Mayor of Duluth, Minnesota
 * Peter Staub (1827–1904), Mayor of Knoxville, Tennessee
 * William Wirt (1772–1834), US Attorney General
 * Dan Zumbach (born 1960), Iowa Senator

Military

 * Henry Bouquet, prominent Army officer in the French and Indian War and Pontiac's War
 * Edward Walter Eberle (1864–1929), admiral in the United States Navy, served as Superintendent of the United States Naval Academy and third Chief of Naval Operations
 * Felix Zollicoffer (1812–1862), newspaperman, three-term US Congressman from Tennessee, officer in the United States Army, and a Confederate brigadier general during the American Civil War
 * Henry Wirz (1822–1865), only Confederate soldier executed in the aftermath of the American Civil War for war crimes

Religion

 * Henry B. Eyring (born 1933), educator, Stanford University professor, Presiding Elder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
 * Daniel Kumler Flickinger (1824–1911), Bishop of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ
 * Martin Marty (1834–1886), Benedictine priest
 * Philip Schaff (1819–1893), Protestant theologian and a historian of the Christian church

Scientists and engineers

 * Alexander Emanuel Agassiz (1835–1910), geologist and zoologist
 * Louis Agassiz (1807–1873), zoologist, glaciologist, and geologist, the husband of educator Elizabeth Cabot Cary Agassiz, and one of the first world-class American scientists
 * Berni Alder (born 1925), physicist
 * David Alter (1807–1881), inventor, almost discovered spectroscopy
 * Othmar Ammann (1879–1965), civil engineer
 * Adolph Francis Alphonse Bandelier (1840–1914), archeologist
 * Felix Bloch (1905–1983), physicist
 * Armand Borel (1923–2003), mathematician
 * Hans R. Camenzind (1934–2012), inventor of the 555 timer IC
 * Florian Cajori (1859–1930), mathematician
 * Robert Frank (born 1924), important figure in American photography and film
 * Albert Einstein (1879–1955), theoretical physicist widely regarded as the most important scientist of the 20th century and one of the greatest physicists of all time
 * Henry Eyring (1901–1981), Mexican born American, theoretical chemist, associate of Albert Einstein
 * Edmond H. Fischer (born 1920), biochemist
 * Walter Gautschi (born 1927), mathematician
 * Otto Frederick Hunziker (1873–1959), dairy educator and technologist
 * Josias Joesler (1895–1927), architect
 * John Kruesi (1843–1899), inventor and close associate of Thomas Edison
 * Adolf Meyer (1866–1950), psychiatrist
 * Jean Piccard (1884–1963), scientist and high-altitude balloonist
 * Louis Fran& (1824–80), naturalist
 * Max Theiler (1899–1972), virologist, awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for developing a vaccine against yellow fever
 * Robert Julius Trumpler (1886–1956), astronomer
 * Etienne Wenger (born 1952), educational researcher
 * Orville and Wilbur Wright, Orville (1871–1948) and Wilbur (1867–1912), aviation pioneers, inventors
 * Fritz Zwicky (1898–1974), astronomer
 * Adolph Rickenbacker (1886–1976), pioneer of the electric guitar; founder of the Rickenbacker guitar company, whose products would be an important influence on 1960s music through, among others, The Beatles, The Who and The Byrds
 * Eddie Rickenbacker (1890–1973), automobile race car driver and automotive designer, hero of World War I, government consultant in military matters and a pioneer in air transportation

Sports

 * Martin Buser (born 1958), champion of sled dog racing
 * Louis Chevrolet (1878–1941), racing driver; founder of the Chevrolet Motor Car Company, now the most famous brand of General Motors
 * Phil Dalhausser (born 1980), Olympic beach volleyball champion; born in Baden to German father and Swiss mother
 * Bobby Fischer (1943–2008), controversial world chess champion
 * William "Pudge" Heffelfinger (1867–1954), first professional football player
 * Jeff Hostetler (born 1961), quarterback in the NFL for the New York Giants, Los Angeles/Oakland Raiders, and Washington Redskins.
 * Fred Merkle (1888–1956), baseball player
 * Ben Roethlisberger (born 1982), quarterback in the NFL for the Pittsburgh Steelers
 * Rudolph "Minnesota Fats" Wanderone (1913–1996), perhaps the best known pool player in the United States
 * Ben Zobrist, second baseman in Major League Baseball

Other

 * Helen Keller (1880–1968), author, political activist and lecturer; first deafblind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree
 * Christoph Meili (born 1968), whistleblower
 * Chesley Sullenberger (born 1951), airline transport pilot who successfully carried out the emergency ditching of US Airways Flight 1549 in the Hudson River, saving the lives of the 155 people on the aircraft