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Arch Ward was sports editor for the ChiTrib, created the MLB All-Star Game.
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John Rutledge is the God of South Carolina. Served in the Continential Congress, helped draft SC’s state Constitution, served as SC Governor, signed the Declaration of Independence, Chief Justice of the SC Supreme Court, nominated to replace John Jay as CJ of the SCOTUS but not confirmed by the Senate.
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Adah Menken was Mazeppa, darling of late-19th century San Francisco theater.
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Gladys Emerson Cook was a 20th century American artist known for realistic paintings of animals (especially pets).
And I’m pretty sure Simon Rodia was the guy who designed the Watts Towers . . . but I might be thinking of someone else.
7 - Sam Ervin (as someone else said) headed the Watergate investigation.
I believe its proper title was The Senate Select Subcommittee (I forget the rest.)
Sam Ervin was a Senator from one of the Carolinas - can’t narrow it down though.
Sam Ervin, with his affable Southern demeanor, surprisingly graduated from Harvard Law School.
5 - Robert Webber - Character actor - I know he was in “10”, “SOB”, “Private Benjamin” and a zillion other movies and TV shows.
From memory, without checking other responses:
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Supreme Court justice. Nominated by Johnson to be Chief Justice. Not confirmed, as questionable business dealings came to light. Resigned.
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Mouseketeer.
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Midget. (Okay, Little Person, but they called him a midget.) Hired by Bill Veeck to bat for the White Sox. Small strike zone led to walk. Baseball rules changed.
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Frustratingly familiar. Cannot place.
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dunno
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dunno
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dunno
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Groundbreaking computer scientist. Navy admiral.
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Black female former slave. After escaping to north, went back to slave territory many times to lead others to freedom.
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Children’s author. Henry Huggins. Beezus and Ramona.
Admiral Hopper was clearly joking when she identified the first computer “bug,” punning on the fact that she had found an actual insect in the wiring. The word “bug” to indicate a problem in a device predates her birth. The OED has a citation dating to the 1880s in which a reporter quotes Thomas Edison describing a “bug” in his phonograph and the wording of the story indicates that while the coinage may have been somewhat recent, it predated the story.
She was also a narcoleptic (due to a blow to the head while still a slave) and one of the first women U.S. born women ever to lead troops into battle (Combahee River campaign, S.C.).
Well and good, except Gaedel “batted” when he was with the Browns, in the early 50s. Will Harridge’s bigotry is unamusing.
Incidentally, children are also “little people.”
I saw Robert Webber in 12 Angry Men, in which he played the adman juror.
Here are ten more:
- Jeff MacKay
- P. Hal Sims
- Carter Glass
- Earle “Greasy” Neale
- Jeanette Rankin
- Bree Walker
- Betty Weider
- Alice Terwilliger
- Diego Rivera
- Dudley Field Malone
Jeannette Rankin was, I believe, the first woman to serve in the US Congress, and Diego Rivera was an importan Mexican painter and husband of Frida Kahlo.
- Antoine Lavoisier
- Louis Buade, sieur de Frontenac et de Palluau
- Carl von Linné
- Sanford Fleming
- Harry Hay
- Laura Secord
- Elijah Harper
- Lise Meitner
- Ngugi wa Thiong’o
- Paul Okalik
I may be wrong but I think Jeff MacKay is an actor who played Magnum’s friend in the Navy (whose character’s name I can’t remember) in Magnum, PI.
I believe Bree Walker is a reporter who has a birth defect affecting her hands and maybe her feet. I think there was some controversy when she decided to have children because she could and did pass the defect on to them.
We’re supposed to do this from memory, correct, no googling or other research?
You can Ask Jeeves for all I care. 
And why not? I refer to books I have when I answer something on the SDMB…
Antoine Lavoisier was a French chemist at the time of the Revolution–he went to the guillotine. (the Directory said, “The Republic has no need of savants.” 
)
Linné was a Swedish scientist.
I’ve heard the name Laura Second somewhere… 
Lise Meitner was a nuclear scientist.
Standard Time
Notified British North American generals of plans she overheard for an invasion by United States forces.
First premier of Nunavut
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Simon Rodia --architect of amazing church in Spain
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Sam Ervin --Senator Sam
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Diego Rivera --Mexican muralist
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Antoine Lavoisier --French chemist
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Carl von Linné --Linnaeus, forget the word, categorized relationships among living things
Couple more are on the tip of my tongue
Nope, but of an American structure (Nuestro Pueblo, a.k.a. the Watts Towers in Los Angeles) that looks vaguely like an amazing church in Spain (Antoni Gaudí’s Sagrada Familia in Barcelona).
Glass was a politician from either Virginia or Mississippi, as I recall – I know his name came up in a History of the South class I took in college.
Neale coached the Philadelphia Eagles of the NFL. If my memory (I’m avoiding Google) is correct, he was at the helm when the upstart Cleveland Browns, who had dominated the All-America Conference before it folded, entered the NFL and beat the defending champion Eagles in the 1950 season opener.
Rankin was a U.S. representative form Montana, and is famous for voting against entry into World Wars I and II.
To add to what Wile E said, Walker is (or at least was) married to sportscaster Jim Lampley.
As for Louis Buade, sieur de Frontenac et de Palluau (mentioned by matt_mcl), I’m guessing the Chateau Frontenac (Quebec City landmark) is named for Louis, whatever his specific claim to fame may be…
High representation of scientists in this one. Lavoisier was the first to isolate oxygen from the air. Carl von Linne is better known as Carolus Linneaus, the taxonomist who developed the system of binomial nomenclature (scientific names) for animals. And Lise Meitner was the nuclear chemist who escaped from Germany and brought warning to the Allies of the Nazi nuclear weapons program.
Incidentally, I knew the last three on the first list, and none at all on the others.
Yup. And he also played for the Cincinnati Reds in the 1919 World Series, and had the Reds’ top batting average for the Series, .357.
Incidentally, Carter Glass was from Virginia.
When dial phones first appeared in 1930, Glass tried to push a resolution through Congress to ban the dial. “I refuse to be transformed into an employee of the telephone company without compensation,” he said. (Carter Glass, thou should’st be living at this hour.)–Source: The (What to Do While You’re Holding the) Phone Book, by Gary Owens, 1973.