American History Midterm Study Guide

Vocabulary study cards identifying prominent historical figures and their key achievements or historical roles from late 19th and early 20th century American history.

Booker T. Washington

Black educator who believed education would need to come before social equality.

James G. Blaine

Republican congressman known for "waving the bloody shirt," he was ruined by the "Mulligan Letters," and lost the presidential election of 1884.

Samuel J. Tilden

Democrat candidate for president in 1876, who lost a disputed presidential election.

Rutherford B. Hayes

Republican candidate for president in 1876, who won a disputed presidential election.

James A. Garfield

President assassinated by a disappointed office-seeker in June of 1881.

Chester A. Arthur

President who proposed the creation of a civil service system to hire federal workers based on merit.

Grover Cleveland (1884)

Democrat governor of New York who won a close presidential election in 1884.

Benjamin Harrison

Republican from Ohio elected president in 1888.

Grover Cleveland (1892)

Former president who won the presidential election of 1892.

James J. Hill

Built the Great Northern Railroad without any subsidy from the federal government.

Thomas Edison

Inventor of the phonograph, the microphone, the electric light bulb, and the motion picture camera.

Samuel Gompers

Founder and long-time president of the American Federation of Labor.

Dwight L. Moody

Involved in urban preaching services and a leader in the founding of the YMCA.

Mark Twain

Pen name of Samuel Clemens, who authored Huckleberry Finn, Tom Sawyer, and The Prince and the Pauper.

Jesse James

Leader of the gang that conducted the first daytime bank robbery in U.S. history.

John Deere

Inventor of the steel plow.

John Wesley Hardin

Gunslinger who killed 44 men, one just for snoring too loud.

Andrew Carnegie

Steel tycoon.

Upton Sinclair

Condemned labor practices in the meatpacking industry, in his book The Jungle.

William McKinley

President assassinated in 1901.

Theodore Roosevelt

President who transformed the office with his progressive reforms, "the Square Deal."

William Jennings Bryan

Democrat presidential candidate in 1896, 1900, and 1908---leader of silver forces with his "Cross of Gold" speech.

William Howard Taft

Republican elected in 1908, but defeated in 1912---was too progressive for conservatives and too conservative for progressives.

Woodrow Wilson

Democrat candidate for president elected in 1912, and re-elected in 1916.

William Randolph Hearst

Publisher of the New York Journal, who generated public excitement against Spain in "Yellow Press" sensationalistic articles.

Sanford B. Dole

Leader of American community in Hawaii who overthrew Queen Lil.

John J. Pershing

Top American general in the First World War.