| By Carol Brennan |
Welcome to 2025! While we usually adhere to a specific theme each month, it’s a delight to pick a broader topic and see what gems are discoverable inside Gale In Context: Biography. For January, we wondered what was happening in the world 100 years ago this month, and once again, we humbly profess to be astonished by the breadth and scope of biographical essays contained within Gale In Context: Biography.
Prominent figures born this month in 1925 begin with automotive executive John DeLorean (1925–2005), born in Detroit on January 6, who went on to become one of the most legendary engineering prodigies in the industry. As vice president of car and truck production at General Motors, DeLorean oversaw the development of fabled top-selling models like the Pontiac Firebird, but he famously quit in the early 1970s to launch his own car company. The DeLorean Motor Company produced the stainless-steel DeLorean, which would become part of pop-culture history as the time-traveling vehicle for Marty McFly, played by Michael J. Fox (born 1961), in the 1985 box-office hit Back to the Future (by which time the company had foundered due to DeLorean’s legal troubles). In the early 2000s, DeLorean sold his New Jersey estate to golf-resort developer and future U.S. president Donald Trump (born 1946), who still golfs at the Trump National Golf Club Bedminster.
American ballet dancer Maria Tallchief (1925–2013) was born on January 24, 1925, into a prominent Osage family in Oklahoma. A prima ballerina of exceptional talent, Tallchief
trained under Russian-Polish-émigré Bronislava Nijinska (1891–1972)—sister of the Ballet Russes founder Vaslav Nijinsky (1890–1950)—and had a long and illustrious career as the artistic partner of George Balanchine (1904–1983), founder of the New York City Ballet. Tallchief belongs to a celebrated quintet of Native American ballet dancers known as the Five Moons, including her sister Marjorie Tallchief (1926–2021), Moscelyne Larkin (1925–2012), Yvonne Chouteau (1929–2016), and Rosella Hightower (1920–2008).
Other notable figures also born in January of 1925 include American electrical engineer and computer-science pioneer Douglas Engelbart (1925–2013), inventor of the computer mouse; civil rights leader Benjamin Hooks (1925–2010), who served as executive director of the NAACP from 1977 to 1992; Italian fashion designer Mariuccia Mandelli (1925–2015), whose Krizia line popularized color-block and animal-print knitwear; and novelist Sol Yurick (1925–2013), the author of a 1965 novel adapted into the cult-classic 1979 film The Warriors that depicted a dystopian New York City overrun by youth gangs.
On January 5, 1925, a little more than four years after U.S. women gained the right to vote in national elections, former kindergarten teacher Nellie Tayloe Ross (1876–1977) succeeded her late husband as governor of Wyoming, becoming the first American woman to hold executive office at the state level. Fifteen days later, Miriam A. “Ma” Ferguson (1875–1961) took the oath of office to become the first female governor of Texas. In 2025, nearly one-quarter of governors’ offices in the United States are occupied by women. On the Republican side are Sarah Huckabee Sanders (born 1982) of Arkansas, Kristi Noem (born 1971) of South Dakota, Kay Ivey (born 1944) of Alabama, and Kim Reynolds (born 1959) of Iowa. Across the proverbial aisle, the Democratic Party’s list of female governors includes Kathy Hochul (born 1958), the first woman to serve as chief executive of the state of New York, Gretchen Whitmer (born 1971) of Michigan, Maura Healey (born 1971) of Massachusetts, and Katie Hobbs (born 1969) of Arizona.
Find out more about these people and others in Gale In Context: Biography.
About the Author
Carol Brennan has been writing biographical entries for Cengage/Gale since 1993. If she’s not writing, she is either at yoga or walking her dachshund. Carol consumes an alarming volume of podcasts and audiobooks weekly.