39.9292° N, 75.2300° W
PHILADELPHIA
Most Famous People Born in Philadelphia, USA
- Notable people
- 5,575
- Peak decade
- 1940s
- Median birth year
- 1928
- Most distinctive
- Baseball 6.0×
The original American capital, then the capital of nothing in particular, then a sports town. Philadelphia's notables run thick through the 18th century — lawyers, philanthropists, financiers — and then settle into a long, steady output of baseball players, basketball players, jazz bandleaders, and character actors. The city has one of the highest shares of notables in organized labor of the early 20th century and one of the deepest benches of soul singers of the late 20th.
Standouts
Notable Births by Decade
Click a decade to filter the list below. Peak: 1940s with 556 notable births.
What Philadelphia Is Known For
Click any row to filter the list of people below.
Politician is Philadelphia's biggest profession — 9% of all notables (482).
Philadelphia over-indexes on baseball — 6.0× the global rate.
Philadelphia under-produces football — only 0.4× the global rate.
Profession Mix Over Time
Each band shows a profession family's share of Philadelphia's notable births by decade. Hover the chart for the breakdown at any decade.
- Sports
- Politics & Law
- Film & TV
- Music
- Writing
- Art & Design
- Other
- Filtered to 1760s Clear ×
Richard Allen (bishop)
1760 - 1831
James Forten
1766 - 1842
James A. Bayard (elder)
1767 - 1815
William Jones (statesman)
1760 - 1831
Caspar Wistar (physician)
1761 - 1818
Michael Leib
1760 - 1822
Peggy Shippen
1760 - 1804
Franklin Wharton
1767 - 1818
Benjamin Franklin Bache (journalist)
1769 - 1798
William Milnor
1769 - 1848
Ann Willing Bingham
1764 - 1801
Samuel Sitgreaves
1764 - 1827
Joseph Clay
1769 - 1811
Robert Waln
1765 - 1836
Philip Syng Physick
1768 - 1837
Sally Wister
1761 - 1804
Adam Eckfeldt
1769 - 1852
Sarah Ewing Hall
1761 - 1830
James Peller Malcolm
1767 - 1815
Elizabeth Marshall (pharmacist)
1768 - 1836
Rebecca Franks
1760 - 1823