Notable alumni of Amherst College include:

College founders and Presidents

• William S. Clark 1848, second president of the Massachusetts Agricultural College
• Reverend Daniel Bliss 1852, founder of American University of Beirut
• Francis A. Walker 1860, third president of MIT
• Joseph Hardy Neesima 1870, founder of Doshisha University in Japan
• David Truman 1935, president of Mt. Holyoke College
• Colin Diver 1965, current president of Reed College
• Richard L. McCormick 1969, current president of Rutgers

Academics

• Biblical scholar Horatio Balch Hackett 1830
• Historian Herbert Baxter Adams 1872
• Librarian Melvil Dewey 1874, of the Dewey Decimal System
• Astronomer Raymond Smith Dugan 1899
• Mathematician Stephen Cole Kleene 1930
• Political Scientist David Truman 1935
• Scientist David Suzuki 1958
• Computer Scientist David S. Johnson 1967

Men of the Cloth

• Preacher Henry Ward Beecher 1834

Politicians

• President Calvin Coolidge 1895
• Speaker of the House Galusha A. Grow 1844 (24th Speaker)
• Speaker of the House Frederick H. Gillett 1874 (37th Speaker)
• Speaker of the House Henry T. Rainey 1883 (40th Speaker)
• Representative Julius H. Seelye 1874 (also president of Amherst College from 1877 - 1890)
• Representative Charles H. Allen 1869
• William Estabrook Chancellor 1889, nemesis of Warren G. Harding
• Thomas F. Eagleton 1950, one-time running mate of George McGovern
• Representative Thomas M. Davis III 1971
• David D. Freudenthal, governor of Wyoming
• Giorgios A. Papandreou 1975, former Foreign Minister of Greece
• Albert A. L. Grimaldi 1981, Crown Prince of Monaco
• Francisco G. Flores 1981, former president of El Salvador
• Tom Davis, 1971 (R-VA) Chairman of the Government Reform Committee

Lawyers and judges

• William Henry Lewis 1892 and Charles Hamilton Houston 1915, two of the first black men to argue and win cases before the U.S. Supreme Court
• Harlan Fiske Stone 1894, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court
• Joseph H. Hartzler 1972, lead U.S. attorney for the Oklahoma City bombing trial
• Patrick Fitzgerald 1982, investigator of the Valerie Plame scandal, prosecutor of former Illinois governor George Ryan

Businesspeople

• Henry Clay Folger 1879, former Standard Oil president, Folger Shakespeare Library founder
• Charles E. Merrill ex 1908, the founder of Merrill Lynch & Co.
• Clarence Birdseye ex 1910, food preservationist and founder of Birds Eye Foods
• Hugh B. Price 1963, former president of the National Urban League
• Daniel F. Duquette 1980, former General Manager of the Red Sox
• Sung Joo Kim 1981, director, Sung Joo International

Array

• Stansfield Turner ex 1945 (1977-81)
• William H. Webster 1947 (1987-91)
• John M. Deutch 1960 (1995-96)

Array

• Henry W. Kendall 1950 (1990, Physics)
• Harold E. Varmus 1961 (1989, Medicine)
• Joseph E. Stiglitz 1964 (2001, Economics), former Senior Vice President and Chief Economist of the World Bank

Doctors

• Dr. Walter Wyman 1870, Surgeon General of the United States from 1891-1911
• Dr. Charles R. Drew 1926, blood bank pioneer
• Talk show host D. Drew Pinsky 1980

Astronauts

• Robert A. R. Parker 1958
• Jeffrey A. Hoffman 1966

Entertainers

• Actor Emery B. Pottle 1899
• Actor Fred Everett Glass 1914
• Actor Burgess Meredith 1931
• Actor Stephen Collins 1969
• Magician Raymond J. Teller 1969, of Penn and Teller;
• Composer James R. Steinman 1969
• Comedian and actor Lawrence J. Miller 1975
• Director David O. Russell 1981E
• Susannah R. Grant 1984, screenwriter of Pocahontas, Ever After, Erin Brockovich, etc.
• Musicians Jonatha Brooke Mallet 1985 and Jennifer Kimball 1986
• Actor Jeffrey C. Wright 1987
• Actor John Cariani 1991, on Law and Order

Authors and artists

• Architect William Mead 1867, of McKim, Mead, and White
• Sculptor Edward C. Potter ex 1882, of the New York Public Library lions
• Children's author Philip D. Eastman 1933
• Poet Richard P. Wilbur 1942
• Poet James I. Merrill 1947
• Novelist Scott F. Turow 1970
• Cullen Murphy 1974, managing editor of the Atlantic Monthly and writer, "Prince Valiant" comic strip
• FoxTrot cartoonist William J. C. Amend III 1984
• Novelist Harlan F. Coben 1984
• Novelist David Foster Wallace 1985
• Novelist Daniel G. Brown 1986
• Poet Rafael Campo 1987
• Get Fuzzy cartoonist Darby N. Conley 1994

Other notables

• Phrenologist Orson Squire Fowler 1834
• Amiel Weeks Whipple ex 1840, surveyor of the First Transcontinental Railroad
• Joseph B. Eastman, Interstate Commerce Commissioner
• Dwight D. Eisenhower II 1970

Some better-known professors who taught at Amherst are Robert Frost, Archibald MacLeish, Henry Steele Commager, Anthony Lake, and Stark Young.