List of people from Newport, Rhode Island

The following list includes notable people who were born or have lived in Newport, Rhode Island.

18th century

 * Vice-Admiral Sir Jahleel Brenton, Royal Navy
 * William Ellery Channing, one of the foremost Unitarian preachers
 * Caleb Gardner, captain and consul of French Empire
 * Edward Malbone, artist and miniaturist
 * David Olyphant, China merchant and member of American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions
 * Christopher Raymond Perry, naval officer in American Revolution
 * Solomon Southwick, publisher of Newport Mercury and advocate for Patriot cause in American Revolution
 * Abigail Stoneman, widow and businesswoman

19th century

 * D. Putnam Brinley, artist
 * Clarence G. Child, scholar
 * William Ennis, U.S. Army brigadier general
 * Thomas Harper Ince, actor
 * Clarence R. King, geologist, mountaineer, and first director of the U.S. Geological Survey (1879–1881); noted for exploration of Sierra Nevada
 * Ida Lewis, lighthouse keeper credited with saving 18 lives in Newport Harbor; received national attention and numerous honors; a Coast Guard buoy tender bears her name
 * David Melville, credited with first gas street lighting in the United States
 * Matthew C. Perry, Navy Commodore who opened Japan to the West with the Convention of Kanagawa in 1854, under the threat of military force
 * Cornelia Bryce Pinchot, native of Newport who became a conservationist, Progressive politician, women’s rights activist, and First Lady of Pennsylvania
 * Cynthia Taggart, poet
 * Charles C. Van Zandt, 34th Governor of Rhode Island

20th century

 * Harry Anderson, actor and comedian (Night Court)
 * Margaret Frances Andrews, socialite and show dog breeder
 * Allen Bestwick, NASCAR and IndyCar Series announcer
 * Nadia Bjorlin, soap opera actress (Days of Our Lives)
 * Frank Corridon, pitcher for Chicago Cubs, Philadelphia Phillies, and St. Louis Cardinals; invented now-illegal pitch, the spitball
 * Tanya Donelly, musician; vocalist for Rhode Island-based bands Belly and Throwing Muses; guitarist for the band The Breeders
 * Charlie Fern, White House speechwriter, journalist
 * Van Johnson, actor, known best for "all-American" roles in MGM films during World War II
 * Lawson Little, 1940 U.S. Open golf champion
 * Mena Suvari, actress, known for role in 1999 film American Beauty
 * Leon Wilkeson, bass guitarist

17th century

 * Benedict Arnold, Governor of Rhode Island
 * John Clarke, Baptist minister and drafter of Royal Charter
 * William Coddington, Governor of Rhode Island
 * Nicholas Easton, Governor of Rhode Island
 * George Gardiner, early settler of Rhode Island, early Newport resident

18th century

 * George Berkeley, philosopher
 * Louis Alexandre Berthier, French army officer, later Marshal of France and Napoleon's chief of staff
 * William Ellery, signer of Declaration of Independence
 * Robert Feke, portrait painter
 * Peter Harrison, architect
 * Samuel Hopkins, Congregational minister, Calvinist theologian, leader for abolition of slave trade
 * Aaron Lopez, merchant
 * Louis-Marie, vicomte de Noailles, French army officer
 * Charles Theodore Pachelbel, first organist of Newport's Trinity Church; son of Johann Pachelbel
 * Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, French general
 * William Selby, organist at Trinity Church, composer
 * John Smybert, artist
 * Ezra Stiles, minister, diarist, and President of Yale
 * Gilbert Stuart, portrait painter
 * Isaac Touro, hazzan at Synagogue
 * Judah Touro, merchant and philanthropist

19th century to 1885

 * George Bancroft, historian, Secretary of the Navy, diplomat, and summer resident
 * August Belmont, financier
 * Ambrose Burnside, Army officer stationed at Fort Adams, later Civil War general, governor, senator
 * Julia Ward Howe, author and summer resident
 * Henry James, author
 * William James, philosopher and Harvard professor
 * John Kensett, artist
 * Clement C. Moore, summer resident and author of "'Twas the Night before Christmas"
 * Levi P. Morton, summer resident and donor of Morton Park, later Vice President of the United States
 * Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry, hero of War of 1812
 * William Trost Richards, artist
 * Milton H. Sanford, textile magnate and thoroughbred racehorse owner
 * Judah Touro, philanthropist
 * Richard Upjohn, architect
 * Mahlon Van Horne, politician

The Gilded Age, 1885–1914

 * Caroline Webster Schermerhorn Astor, socialite
 * Charles D. Barney, socialite, banker, founder of Smith Barney Brokerage
 * Alva Belmont, socialite and leader of women's rights movement
 * August Belmont, financier
 * Oliver Hazard Perry Belmont, socialite, builder of Belcourt Castle
 * James Gordon Bennett, Jr., newspaper publisher and yachtsman
 * Ogden Codman, designer
 * Richard Morris Hunt, architect
 * William Morris Hunt, artist
 * John LaFarge, artist
 * Pierre Lorillard, tobacco manufacturer
 * Rear Admiral Stephen B. Luce, founder of Naval War College
 * Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan, naval historian and strategist
 * Ward McAllister, flamboyant raconteur of high society, coined the term 'the 400' for the New York social elite
 * Charles McKim, architect
 * Edith B. Price, writer and illustrator
 * H.H. Richardson, architect
 * Horace Trumbauer, architect
 * James J. Van Alen, summer resident and Ambassador to Italy
 * Alva Vanderbilt, wife of William K. Vanderbilt; early feminist, active in women's suffrage movement
 * Consuelo Vanderbilt, daughter of W.K. and Alva Vanderbilt; Duchess of Marlborough
 * Cornelius Vanderbilt II, heir to Vanderbilt fortune, Chairman of New York Central Railroad
 * Frederick Vanderbilt, heir to Vanderbilt fortune, philanthropist
 * William Kissam Vanderbilt, heir to Vanderbilt fortune, yachtsman
 * Edith Wharton, author
 * Stanford White, architect
 * Thornton Wilder, author, playwright; his 1973 novel Theophilus North is set in Newport; served briefly in Army's Coast Artillery Corps at Fort Adams in World War I

20th century, 1914–2000

 * John Jacob Astor VI, socialite, heir to Astor family fortune, summer resident
 * Admiral Jeremy Michael Boorda, 25th Chief of Naval Operations
 * John Nicholas Brown, socialite, yachtsman and philanthropist
 * Doris Duke, tobacco heiress and philanthropist
 * Joanna Going, actress, Another World, House of Cards
 * Paul Gordon, musician with Goo Goo Dolls, New Radicals, The B-52's
 * Kristin Hersh, musician, vocalist for Rhode Island-based band Throwing Muses, 50 Foot Wave; solo artist
 * Antony Kloman, painter
 * Jane Pickens Langley, singer, entertainer and philanthropist
 * Elaine Lorillard, summer resident, founder of Newport Jazz Festival
 * Perle Mesta, socialite, political hostess and U.S. Ambassador to Luxembourg
 * MacGillivray Milne, 27th Governor of American Samoa, 1936–1938
 * Diane Nelson, president of DC Entertainment
 * Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz, Commander, U.S. Pacific Fleet, 1942–1945; Chief of Naval Operations
 * Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, First Lady of the United States, summer resident
 * Claiborne Pell, socialite and U.S. Senator 1961–1997
 * Alfredo Sciarrotta, silversmith and undersea weapons expert
 * Admiral William Sims, commander of U.S. Naval Forces in Europe, 1917–1919
 * Carolyn Mary Skelly; owned Bois Dore Mansion; eccentric daughter of William Grove Skelly; oil heiress, dubbed the "most robbed woman in the US" by the Boston Globe; socialite; hosted fundraisers for President George H.W. Bush, & Texas Governor John Connally
 * Admiral Raymond Spruance, the victor of Midway; President, Naval War College
 * Jimmy Van Alen, summer resident and founder of International Tennis Hall of Fame
 * Margaret Van Alen Bruguiere, socialite, art collector; niece of Frederick Vanderbilt
 * Harold Vanderbilt, yachtsman, bridge player, inventor of contract bridge
 * Martha Sharp Crawford (Sunny) von Bülow, socialite, heiress (resided with husband Claus von Bülow at Clarendon Court on Bellevue Avenue)
 * Charlie Day, Actor

21st century, 2001–present

 * Richard Hatch, first winner of the reality television show Survivor
 * Sheldon Whitehouse, U.S. Senator, 2007–present
 * Dede Wilsey, San Franciscan socialite, summer resident and philanthropist
 * Richard Saul Wurman, architect, graphic designer, founder of the TED Conferences