Famous Montessori Alumni

Some famous people who attended Montessori school as children:

Jeff Bezos, financial analyst, founder of Amazon.com

Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, former editor, former first lady (John F. Kennedy)

Berry Brazelton, noted pediatrician and author

Sergey Brin & Larry Page, co-founders of Google.com

Julia Child, famous chef, star of many TV cooking shows and author of numerous cookbooks

Sean “P. Diddy” Combs, rap star, music mogul

Kami Cotler, actress (youngest child on long-running series The Waltons)

Katharine Graham, former owner-editor of the Washington Post

Prince William and Prince Harry, English royal family

Anne Frank, famous diarist from World War II

Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Nobel Prize winner for Literature

Melissa and Sarah Gilbert, actors

Friedensreich Hundertwasser, Austrian painter and architect

Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia

Will Wright, designer of The Sims

Helen Hunt, Academy Award-winning actress

George Clooney, Academy Award-winning actor

Joshua Bell, American violinist, owner of Stradivarius violin

Lea Salonga, a Filipino-American singer and Broadway actress

Famous people who chose Montessori schools for their own children:

Stephen J. Cannell, TV writer-producer-director (The Rockfor Files and many other)

Patty Duke Austin, actress

Cher Bono, singer, actress

John Bradshaw, psychologist and author

Yul Brynner, former actor

Marcy Carcy, TV producer

William Jefferson and Hillary Clinton, former president/senator, NY

Michael Douglas, actor

Shari Lewis, former puppeteer

Yo Yo Ma, cellist

Willie Nelson, musician, has a Montessori school on his ranch

Elizabeth Berridge, actress

David Blaine, street magician

Others with a Montessori connection:

Alexander Graham Bell, noted inventor, provided financial support directly to Dr. Montessori, helped establish the first Montessori class in Canada and one of the first in the United States

Bruno Bettelheim, noted psychologist/author, was married to a Montessori teacher

Erik Erikson, anthropologist/author, had a Montessori teaching certificate

Jean Piaget, noted Swiss psychologist, made his first observations of children in a Montessori school

Mister Rogers, children’s TV personality, strong supporter of Montessori education

Thomas Edison, noted scientist and inventor, helped found a Montessori school

President Wilson’s daughter trained as a Montessori teacher. There was a Montessori classroom in the basement of the White House during Wilson’s presidency.