List of people known as the father or mother of something

The following alphabetical lists includes men and women commonly known as the father or mother of something. Whether each of these persons is genuinely the father or mother of this thing is a matter of opinion.

A

• Philip Abelson - The father of the nuclear submarine
• Nikolaj Abraham Abildgaard - The father of Danish painting
• Abu is an Arabic word meaning "father" that is used to form person names from either the name of a son or a concept to form a nickname, such as Abu Amar (Yasser Arafat)
• Jane Addams - The mother of Social Work (called "The mother of the world")
• George Agricola - The father of Mineralogy
• Mikael Agricola - The father of Finnish written language
• Eloy Alfaro - The father of Ecuadorian liberalism
• Steve Allen - The father of the television talk show
• Eric Allman - The father of modern Internet e-mail
• Susan B. Anthony - "The Mother of Us All" (title of Virgil Thomson/Gertrude Stein opera)
• Sabino Arana - The father of modern Basque nationalism
• Peter Artedi - The father of ichthyology
• Philip Astley - The father of the modern circus
• Mustafa Kemal Atatürk - The father of modern Turkey
• Stephen F. Austin - The father of Texas
• Cyrus Avery - The father of Route 66
• Ismail Al Azhary - The father of Modern Sudan