List of United States Navy people

This page contains a list of notable officers and sailors of the U.S. Navy

Officers

• Andrew Baldwin – doctor and the bachelor for Season 10 of The Bachelor
• Commodore John Barry – "Father of the American Navy"
• W. W. Behrens, Jr. – earth-sciences futurist
• Jeremy Michael Boorda – Admiral, former Chief of Naval Operations
• Henry L. Brandon – Naval Aviator and Oil Executive
• Bill Branon – Captain and Naval medical officer, novelist
• Don Brown (author) – former US Navy JAG Officer, author of the Navy Justice Series
• Arleigh Burke – destroyer captain
• Richard Evelyn Byrd – polar explorer
• James F. Cahill – one of the first scuba divers and first Navy SEALs
• Vern Clark – former Chief of Naval Operations
• Donnie Cochran – first African-American aviator assigned to the U.S. Navy Flight Demonstration Squadron (Blue Angels)
• Thomas Preston Davis – notable surgeon
• Stephen Decatur – Hero of Tripoli
• Terry Deitz – Naval Aviator; TV Presenter and former Survivor contestant
• Robert Dennison – retired Admiral, presidential aide
• P. T. Deutermann – author, former United States Navy captain
• George Dewey – Hero of the Battle of Manila Bay in Spanish–American War; first and only Admiral of the Navy
• Hunter Ellis – Naval Aviator; TV Presenter and former Survivor contestant
• David Farragut – American Civil War Admiral, first officer to become an Admiral
• Lillian E. Fishburne – first African-American female to hold the rank of Rear Admiral
• Wilson Flagg – retired Admiral, killed in Sept 11 attack
• Edmund Giambastiani – 7th Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
• Samuel L. Gravely, Jr. – first African-American to be promoted to flag rank
• William Halsey, Jr. – Third Fleet Commander, won battles off Guadalcanal and the Solomons; Fleet Admiral (5 stars)
• Owen P. Honors, Jr. Captain, former CO of USS Enterprise (CVN-65)
• Esek Hopkins – first Commander in Chief of the Navy during the Revolutionary War
• Grace Hopper – futurist, early computing pioneer, Rear Admiral in the Navy Reserve
• Isaac Hull – captain of USS Constitution
• John Paul Jones – commander during the American Revolutionary War, considered to be the founder of the American Naval tradition
• Charles Keating – Naval Aviator; real estate developer and banker.
• Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. – Naval Aviator; elder brother of future President John F. Kennedy, killed in World War II.
• Ernest King – Fleet Admiral; former Chief of Naval Operations
• Nile Kinnick – Naval Aviator; Heisman Trophy winner
• William D. Leahy – first Fleet Admiral; first head of the Chiefs of Staff (before the post was renamed Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff); former Chief of Naval Operations; former Governor of Puerto Rico; former U.S. ambassador to France
• Thomas McClelland – Captain; served as Commander, Amphibious Squadron FIVE, conducting advance force operations with the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit against the Iraqi Army during Desert Storm
• Alfred Thayer Mahan – military strategist
• J. W. Marriott, Jr. – Chairman and CEO of Marriott International
• Richard Marcinko – author, founder and commander of SEAL Team Six
• Homer A. McCrerey – earth sciences futurist, Fleet Meteorologist and oceanographer
• Michael Mullen – 28th Chief of Naval Operations; 17th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
• Chester Nimitz – Fleet Admiral; former Chief of Naval Operations; signed for the U.S. when Japan formally surrendered on board USS Missouri (BB-63); class of carriers named after him
• Rear Admiral William S. "Deak" Parsons, USN, Assistant Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance, known for assembling (in flight) the triggering mechanism of the atomic bomb "Little Boy" aboard the Enola Gay.
• Matthew Perry – Commodore who forced the opening of Japan
• Oliver Hazard Perry – Commanded the Battle of Lake Erie
• John Poindexter – served as National Security Advisor
• Eli Thomas Reich – Vice Admiral, only submariner to sink a Japanese battleship unaided during WW2
• Hyman G. Rickover – Admiral, "Father of the Nuclear Navy"
• David Robinson – former NBA star (San Antonio Spurs), commonly nicknamed "The Admiral"
• George Lincoln Rockwell – U.S. Navy Commander and founder of the American Nazi Party
• Theodore Roosevelt IV – Special Warfare, great grandson of President Theodore Roosevelt and a prominent conservationist and environmentalist
• Donald Rumsfeld – Naval Aviator; served two times as Secretary of Defense
• Rodger W. Simpson – distinguished himself during World War II, recipient of 2 Navy Crosses
• Paul Spangler – Naval surgeon, senior long distance runner
• Raymond A. Spruance – Commander at the Battle of Midway, led the Fifth Fleet in the Central Pacific and Okinawa. Rebuilt the Naval War College after World War II
• Roger Staubach – football hall of Famer, Vietnam veteran
• Jackson T. Stephens – investment banker
• James Stockdale – one of the most highly decorated officers in the history of the Navy
• Patrick M. Walsh – Admiral, Vice Chief of Naval Operations
• Robert F. Willard – Admiral, former Vice Chief of Naval Operations
• John Wooden – famous college basketball coach
• Bruce Bromley – Associate Judge of the New York Court of Appeals, prominent trial lawyer at Cravath, Swaine & Moore
• George H. W. Bush – former U.S. President; former director of the Central Intelligence Agency
• Jimmy Carter – former U.S. President; Cold War submariner and Peace Prize laureate
• Cesar Chavez – civil rights activist who co-founded the National Farm Workers Association, which later became the United Farm Workers
• Duke Cunningham – United States Naval Aviator; A former member of the US House of Representatives
• Glenn Robert Davis – former member of the U.S. House of Representatives
• Gerald Ford – former U.S. President; served aboard carrier during World War II
• George Howard, Jr. – first African-American federal judge in Arkansas history; served in World War II.
• Lyndon B. Johnson – former U.S. President; worked as a bomb observer with the Army during World War II
• Robert Kerrey – former U.S. Senator; Navy SEAL commander during Vietnam War and first SEAL officer to win the Medal of Honor for classified raid in which he lost his lower leg by a Viet Cong grenade.
• John F. Kennedy – former U.S. President; decorated PT Boat commander in World War II
• John McCain – senior U.S. Senator from Arizona and Republican presidential candidate in 2008; former naval aviator and POW
• Harvey Milk – First openly gay San Francisco supervisor. Assassinated November 27, 1978. Subject of the Academy Award winning documentary "The Times of Harvey Milk ", as well as the bestselling book "The Mayor of Castro Street"
• Richard M. Nixon – former U.S. President; supply officer in World War II
• Larry Seaquist – current Democratic member in the Washington House of Representatives; Former Captain of the Battleship USS Iowa (BB-61)

Astronauts

• Neil Armstrong – naval aviator (Korean War), X-15 pilot, astronaut Gemini 8 and Apollo 11, first man on the moon
• Alan Bean – astronaut (Apollo 12 and Skylab 3)
• Malcolm Carpenter – naval aviator, astronaut, Mercury 7
• Christopher Cassidy – Navy SEAL
• Eugene Cernan – naval aviator, astronaut (Gemini 9), Lunar Module Pilot (Apollo 10), Commander of Apollo 17 (last man on moon)
• Laurel Clark – astronaut
• Pete Conrad – naval aviator, astronaut (Gemini 5 and 11, Apollo 12 and Skylab 2)
• Robert Crippen – naval aviator, astronaut (STS-1, STS-7, STS-41C and STS-41G)
• Ronald Evans – naval aviator, astronaut (Apollo 17)
• Owen Garriott – astronaut (Skylab 3)
• Richard Gordon, Jr. – naval aviator, astronaut (Gemini 11 and Apollo 12)
• Fred Haise, Jr. – naval aviator, astronaut (Apollo 13)
• Joseph Kerwin – astronaut (Skylab 2)
• Susan Kilrain – astronaut
• Wendy Lawrence – astronaut
• Jim Lovell – naval aviator, astronaut (Gemini 7 and 12, Apollo 8 and 13)
• Thomas Mattingly, Jr. – naval aviator, astronaut (Apollo 16)
• William C. McCool – naval aviator, astronaut, pilot of Columbia mission STS-107
• Edgar Mitchell – naval aviator, astronaut (Apollo 14)
• Lisa Nowak – astronaut
• Alan G. Poindexter – Aviation – Son of John Poindexter and a NASA astronaut.
• Walter Schirra, Jr. – naval aviator, astronaut (Mercury 8, Gemini 6A and Apollo 7)
• Alan Shepard – naval aviator and flag officer (Rear Admiral), first American in space (Mercury-Redstone 3) and Apollo 14 commander
• William Shepherd – Navy SEAL, astronaut (STS-27, STS-41, STS-52)
• Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper – astronaut
• Richard Truly – naval aviator and flag officer (Vice Admiral), Manned Orbiting Laboratory and Space Shuttle astronaut, serving as pilot for both Space Shuttle Enterprise landing tests and on second orbital test flight (STS-2). Later became first astronaut to serve as NASA Administrator under President George H. W. Bush.
• Paul J. Weitz – astronaut (Skylab 2)
• John Young – naval aviator, astronaut (Gemini 3 and 10, Apollo 10 and 16, Shuttle flight STS-1 and STS-9)

Others

• Eddie Albert – actor (Roman Holiday)
• James Avery – actor (The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air)
• Bob Barker – former host of The Price is Right
• Harry Belafonte – singer and actor
• Yogi Berra – baseball hall of famer, Catcher New York Yankees
• Humphrey Bogart – Academy Award-winning actor (Casablanca)
• Ernest Borgnine – Academy Award-winning actor (Marty)
• Christopher "Big Black" Boykin – Star of MTV's Rob & Big television series and personal bodyguard to pro-skateboarder Rob Dyrdek
• Carl Brashear – first African American Master Diver
• Lenny Bruce – comedian
• Johnny Carson – longtime host of The Tonight Show
• James H. Clark – American entrepreneur, founder of Netscape and other Silicon Valley startups.
• Jerry Clower – Country Comedian
• Bill Cosby – actor, comedian and educational philanthropist
• Tony Curtis – actor (Some Like It Hot)
• Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. – actor (Little Caesar)
• Bob Feller – baseball Hall of Famer
• Antwone Fisher – author and film producer who was the basis for the 2002 motion picture Antwone Fisher
• Larry Flynt – publisher of Hustler
• Henry Fonda – Academy Award-winning actor (The Grapes of Wrath (1940))
• Chris Gardner – self-made millionaire, entrepreneur, motivational speaker and philanthropist who, during the early 1980s, struggled with homelessness while raising his toddler son, Christopher. The 2006 film The Pursuit of Happyness is based on his life.
• Arthur Hill Gilbert – impressionist painter
• Robert A. Heinlein – science fiction author
• Barron Hilton – heir and co-chairman of the Hilton Hotels chain.
• L. Ron Hubbard— science fiction author and founder of the Church of Scientology
• Rene A. LaMarche Jr. - PNCM (DV) (PJ) (AC), US Navy ret, AV-13, EPDOPAC, CTF-117, Naval Station Sangley Point, SERE San Diego, USS Kitty Hawk CV-63, CNAP, and OP-01. Developed and operated construction forensics investigation company until 2013.
• Archie Lang – actor
• Robert LaSardo – actor (Nip/Tuck)
• Robert Montgomery – actor Lt Commander WWII USS Barton (DD-722)
• Charlie Murphy – entertainer and brother of comedian Eddie Murphy.
• Armistead Maupin – author and gay rights activist
• Paul Newman – Academy Award-winning actor (The Hustler)
• Tom Peters – bestselling author.
• Regis Philbin – talk show host of Regis and Kelly
• Thomas Pynchon – writer and novelist
• Soupy Sales – comedian
• MC Hammer – rap artist
• Bill Sharman – member of the Basketball Hall of Fame
• Dmitry Steesy – fashion designer
• John E Ussery – US Navy ret, VP-23, NAS Brunswick, VP-40, NAS Cubi Point, NAMTD 3020, ADCOP, USS Kitty Hawk and CNAP. Worked at GD Electronics and Convair
• Craig Venter – biologist instrumental in mapping the human genome. He was listed on Time Magazine's 2007 and 2008 Time 100 list of the most influential people in the world.
• Jesse Ventura – Former Navy UDT, professional wrestler and 38th Governor of Minnesota
• Montel Williams – talk show host
• Bill Withers – singer
• Jeremiah Wright – senior pastor, Trinity United Church of Christ; cardiopulmonary technician (once assisted in surgery on President Lyndon Johnson, himself an ex-Navy officer)
• Delmer J. Yoakum – artist

Groups

• Golden Thirteen – the thirteen African-American enlisted men who became the first African-American commissioned officers in the United States Navy.
• The Port Chicago 50 – group of 50 African-American Sailors who refused to return to work until changes were made at the U.S. Navy's Port Chicago near San Francisco.