Introduction | Famous Scots

The cover note for, "How the Scots Invented the Modern World: The True Story of How Western Europe's Poorest Nation Created Our World and Everything in It", 2001, by Arthur Herman, says:

The book "How the Scots Invented the Modern World" by Arthur Herman doesn't list out every Scot who contributed, but it highlights several influential figures. Here are some categories: Philosophers of the Enlightenment: David Hume, Adam Smith, Francis Hutcheson, Thomas Reid
Science and Industry: James Watt (steam engine), John McAdam (road construction), James Hutton (geology)
Writers: Sir Walter Scott, Robert Burns, Robert Louis Stevenson Others: John Knox (religious reformer), Andrew Carnegie (industrialist), Alexander Graham Bell (inventor)

"Mention of Scotland and the Scots usually conjures up images of kilts, bagpipes, Scotch whiskey, and golf. But as historian and author Arthur Herman demonstrates, in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries Scotland earned the respect of the rest of the world for its crucial contributions to science, philosophy, literature, education, medicine, commerce, and politics -- contributions that have formed and nurtured the modern West ever since.
  Here is the untold story of how John Knox and the Church of Scotland laid the foundation for our modern idea of democracy; how the Scottish Enlightenment helped to inspire both the American Revolution and the U.S. Constitution; and how thousands of Scottish immigrants left their homes to create the American frontier, the Australian outback, and the British Empire in India, South Africa and Hong Kong.
  It reveals how Scottish genius for creating the basic ideas and institutions of modern life stamped the lives of a series of remarkable historical figures, from James Watt and Adam Smith to Andrew Carnegie and Arthur Conan Doyle, and how Scottish heroes continure to inspire our contemporary culture, from William "Braveheart" Wallace to James Bond.

King George called the America Revolution "the Presbyterian Revolution" because so many Presbyterian ministers were influential in starting and supplying American independence.

In Herman's Preface he says, "Obviously, the Scots did not do everything by themselves; other nations - Germans, French, English, Italians, Russians, many others - supplied bricks and mortar for building the modern world. But it is the Scots who drew up the blueprints and taught us how to judge the final product."

In John Kenneth Galbraith's article "The Scotch Among Us", Readers Digest, Feb. 1986, he lists some Scottish traits: hard working (necessary for early American agriculture), thrift (no alternative in the absence of money), concern for education (Presbyterian colleges and universities - Knox in IL, Macalester in MN, Princeton in NJ, and Carnegie-Mellon in Pittsburgh). He calls Andrew Carnegie's endowments to 2,509 libraries the greatest inducement to literacy since the printing press.
But at the end he says "Scotch tolerance, we would love to believe, is our best contribution to the American Scene."

Some of those below are Ulster Scots (or Scotch-Irish). The majority of the protestants in Northern Ireland (most of the original province of Ulster) immigrated from Scotland in the 17th century. See N. Ireland.
For example William McKinley, 25th president of the United States, is consider an Ulster Scot, because his G-G-G-Grandfather who immigrated to the colonies in the early 1700's came from Ireland, but he was the only ancestor born in Ireland, all those before him were born in Scotland.

Books-Articles:
"How the Scots Invented the Modern World: The True Story of How Western Europe's Poorest Nation Created Our World and Everything in It", 2001, by Arthur Herman
The Scots, John Kenneth Galbraith
The Scottish 100: Portraits of History's Most Influential Scots, (2000), by Duncan A. Bruce
"The Scotch Among Us", John Kenneth Galbraith, Readers Digest, Feb. 1986

Mural in Glasgow Airport

Links:
Scottish Culture
Scotland: Famous People at geo.ed.ac.uk
Famous Scots at RampantScotland.com
The Scottish 100: the most influential Scots in history. From Duncan Bruce's book (above).
Scottish and Scotch-Irish Americans - History, The scotch-irish, Immigration, Settlement patterns.
Famous Ulster Scots
Ulster - Northern Ireland
Scottish American - Wikipedia
List of Scotch-Irish Americans - Wikipedia
Scotch-Irish Americans - Wikipedia Scottish Culture
Scotland History