DETROIT / A living lexicon / ¼

Famous Detroiters

People who were born here, moved here or built their careers in Detroit: musicians, carmakers, athletes, writers, inventors, civil-rights leaders and a few notorious names. With their dates, their Detroit story and the places where they lived, worked and played, closed ones included.

664 famous people
66 Detroit places
19 fields

59 people · 2/2 page

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Sports · 1901–1979Turkey Stearnesbaseball player, center fielderHall of Fame slugger of the Negro-league Detroit Stars who made Detroit his home for more than fifty years; Hamtramck Stadium's field bears his name.Moved hereDetroit career

MusicOne String Samblues singer, diddley bow playerDetroit street musician who played a homemade one-string diddley bow and cut two haunting sides for Joe Von Battle in 1956.Detroit career

Press & broadcasting · 1930–2000Martha Jean Steinbergradio broadcaster, station owner, minister"The Queen" of Detroit soul radio on WCHB and WJLB, who pleaded for calm on air during the 1967 uprising and later bought her own gospel station, WQBH.Moved hereDetroit career

Law · 1842–1908D. Augustus Strakerlawyer, jurist, civil rights advocateBarbados-born lawyer who became the first Black attorney to argue before the Michigan Supreme Court and won a landmark 1890 case against restaurant segregation.Moved hereDetroit career

Music · 1934–1977Nolan StrongsingerHigh-tenor lead of the Diablos, Detroit's leading pre-Motown doo-wop group on Fortune Records ("The Wind"), and a key early influence on Smokey Robinson.Grew up hereDetroit career

Visual art · 1898–1974Zoltan Sepeshypainter, art educatorHungarian-born painter who settled in Detroit in 1921 and later led the Cranbrook Academy of Art for about two decades.Moved hereDetroit career

Music · 1938–2004C. P. Spencersinger, songwriter, producerDetroit tenor who was an original member of the Spinners and the Voice Masters and later lead tenor of Motown's Originals.Born hereGrew up here

Business & brands · 1822–1882Bernhard Strohbrewer, founder of the Stroh BreweryGerman brewer from Kirn who founded the Lion's Head Brewery in Detroit in 1850, the start of the Stroh Brewery that brewed in the city for 135 years.Moved hereDetroit career

FoodFred Sandersconfectioner, founder of SandersGerman-born confectioner who opened his Detroit candy and soda shop in 1875 and founded Sanders, the brand of hot fudge, ice cream sodas and bumpy cake that became a Detroit institution.Moved hereDetroit career

Press & broadcastingOsama Siblaninewspaper publisherLebanese-born publisher who founded The Arab American News in Dearborn in 1984, the largest Arab American newspaper in the United States.Moved hereDetroit career

Visual artDmytro Szylakfolk artist, retired autoworkerUkrainian-born General Motors retiree who built Hamtramck Disneyland, a towering backyard folk-art installation that became one of Metro Detroit's best-loved oddities.Moved hereDetroit career

The lexicon keeps growing. Every entry lists its sources at the bottom. Dates were checked against Wikidata and Wikipedia. The texts are our own.

Famous Detroiters

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