December 22

Birthdays:

 

1970 ~ Ted Cruz (né Rafael Edward Cruz), Canadian-born American politician who launched a campaign for the 2016 United States Presidential election.  He is a United States Senator from Texas.  He took office as Senator in January 2013.  He was born in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

 

1968 ~ Lauralee Bell (née Lauralee Kristen Bell), American soap opera actress known for her role as Christine Blair on The Young and the Restless.  She was born in Chicago, Illinois.

 

1962 ~ Ralph Fiennes (né Ralph Nathaniel Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes), English actor.  He was born in Ispwich, England.

 

1960 ~ Jean-Michel Basquiat (d. Aug. 12, 1988) African-American artist.  He was born and died in New York, New York.  He died at age 27 of a heroin overdose.

 

1956 ~ Colo (d. Jan. 17, 2017), the first gorilla bred in captivity, was born at the Columbus Zoo in Columbus, Ohio.  On December 22, 2016, Colo celebrated her 60^th birthday.  She died on January 17, 2017, just 25 days after her 60^th birthday.

 

1955 ~ Thomas C. Südhof (né Thomas Christian Südhof), German-born American biochemist and recipient of the 2013 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his study of synaptic transmission.  He was born in Göttingen, Germany

 

1949 ~ Maurice Gibb (né Maurice Ernest Gibb; d. Jan. 12, 2003), British musician and member of the Bee Gees.  He was the twin brother of Robin Gibb (1949 ~ 2012).  He was born in Douglas, Isle of Man.  Maurice died 3 weeks after his 53^rdbirthday in Miami Beach, Florida.

 

1949 ~ Robin Gibb (né Robin Hugh Gibb; d. May 20, 2012), British musician and the brother who launched the Bee Geesduring the disco era.  His twin brother was Maurice Gibb (1949 ~ 2003).  Robin died of cancer at age 62.  He was born in Douglas, Isle of Man and died in London, England.

 

1945 ~ Diane Sawyer (né Lila Diane Sawyer), American television journalist.  She was married to Mike Nichols.  She was born in Glasgow, Kentucky.

 

1943 ~ Gianni Bernardinello (d. Nov. 9, 2020), Italian baker who helped those in need during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.  He handed out free bred, pizzas and sweets from his bakery in Milan, Italy.  He died of Covid-19 at age 76.

 

1935 ~ Donald Harrington (né Donald Douglas Harrington; d. Nov. 7, 2009), American novelist who created a surreal Ozark world.  He was born in Little Rock, Arkansas.  He died at age 73 in Springdale, Arkansas.

 

1931 ~ Adolfo Calero (d. June 2, 2012), Nicaraguan who lead the Nicaraguan Democratic Force, the largest contras rebel group opposing the Sandinista government.  He died of complications of pneumonia and kidney disease at age 80.  He was born and died in Managua, Nicaragua.

 

1927 ~ John Najarian (né John Sarkis Najarian; d. Sept. 1, 2020), American surgeon who tackled the toughest transplants.  Prior to entering medical school, he was a college football star.  He was born in Oakland, California.  He died at age 92 in Stillwater, Minnesota.

 

1924 ~ Jack Greenberg (d. Oct. 12, 2016), American lawyer who won a landmark civil rights case.  He became the only white lawyer for the NCAAP Legal Defense and Educational Fund in 1949.  He was involved in the Brown v. Board of Education case, which ended segregation in public schools.  He was born in Brooklyn, New York.  He died at age 91 in Manhattan, New York.

 

1922 ~ Jim Wright (né James Claude Wright, Jr.; d. May 6, 2015), United States Speaker of the House of Representatives who resigned in 1989 in scandal amid allegations he was receiving kickbacks from business associates and lobbyists.  He had served from January 1987 until his ouster.  He was the congressional representative from Texas.  He was born and died in Fort Worth, Texas.  He was 92 years old at the time of his death.

 

1917 ~ Gene Rayburn (né Eugen Peter Jeljenic; d. Nov. 29, 1999), American game show host.  He hosted the Match Game for over 20 years.  He was born in Christopher, Illinois.  He died of congestive heart failure in Gloucester, Massachusetts 23 days before his 82^nd birthday.

 

1915 ~ Barbara Billingsley (née Barbara Lillian Combes; d. Oct. 16, 2010), American actress.  She is best known for her role as June Cleaver on Leave It to Beaver.  She was born in Los Angeles, California.  She died at age 94 in Santa Monica, California.

 

1912 ~ Lady Bird Johnson (née Claudia Alta Taylor; d. July 11, 2007), First Lady of the United States and wife of President Lyndon B. Johnson.  She was born in Karnack, Texas.  She died at age 94 in West Lake Hills, Texas.

 

1908 ~ Leo Aikman (né James Leo Aikman; d. Dec. 1, 1978), American journalist and historian.  He died following heart surgery just 21 days before his 70^th birthday.

 

1905 ~ Kenneth Rexroth (né Kenneth Charles Marion Rexroth; d. June 6, 1982), American poet.  He was born in South Bend, Indiana.  He died at age 76 in Santa Barbara, California.

 

1903 ~ Haldan Keffer Hartline (d. Mar. 17, 1983), American physiologist and recipient of the 1967 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work in analyzing the neurophysiological mechanisms of vision.  He was born in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania.  He died at age 79 in Fallston, Maryland.

 

1901 ~ André Kostelanetz (d. Jan. 13, 1980), Russian-born American orchestra conductor and composer.  He was born in St. Petersburg, Russia.  He died of pneumonia 22 days after his 78^th birthday in Haiti.

 

1898 ~ Vladimir Fock (d. Dec. 27, 1974), Russian mathematician.  He was born and died in St. Petersburg, Russia.  He died 5 days after his 76^th birthday.

 

1887 ~ Srinivasa Ramanujan (d. Apr. 26, 1920), Indian mathematician.  He was the subject of the 2015 movie The Man Who Knew Infinity.  He died at age 32 from tuberculosis.

 

1884 ~ St. Elmo Brady (d. Dec. 25, 1966), African-American chemist.  He was the first African-American to earn a Ph.D. in chemistry.  He was born in Louisville, Kentucky.  He died 3 days after his 82^nd birthday in Washington, D.C.

 

1869 ~ Dmitri Egorov (d. Sept. 10, 1931), Russian mathematician.  He was born in Moscow, Russia.  He died at age 61 in Kazan, Soviet Union.

 

1869 ~ Edward Arlington Robinson (d. Apr. 6, 1935), American poet from Maine.  He was born in Head Tide, Maine.  He died of cancer at age 65 in New York, New York.

 

1862 ~ Connie Mack, (né Cornelius Alexander McGillicuddy; d. Feb. 8, 1956), American baseball manager and executive who helped organize Baseball’s American League.  He was born in East Brookfield, Massachusetts.  He died at age 93 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

 

1858 ~ Giacomo Puccini (d. Nov. 29, 1924), Italian composer best known for his opera Madame Butterfly.  He was born in Lucca, Italy.  He died 23 days before his 66^th birthday of complications from throat cancer in Brussels, Belgium.

 

1856 ~ Frank B. Kellogg (né Frank Billings Kellogg; d. Dec. 21, 1937), 45^th United States Secretary of State.  He served under Presidents Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover from March 1925 until March 1929.  He was also the recipient of the 1929 Nobel Peace Prize.  He was born in Potsdam, New York.  He died of pneumonia following a stroke just 1 day before his 81^st birthday in St. Paul, Minnesota.

 

1853 ~ Yevgraf Fyodorov (d. May 21, 1919), Russian mathematician.  He died at age 65.

 

1823 ~ Thomas Wentworth Higginson (d. May 9, 1911), American abolitionist and Unitarian pastor.  He was born and died in Cambridge, Massachusetts.  He died at age 87.

 

1819 ~ Pierre Ossian Bonnet (d. June 22, 1892), French mathematician.  He is best known for his work in differential algebra.  He was born in Montpellier, France.  He died at age 72 in Paris, France.

 

1789 ~ Levi Woodbury (d. Sept. 4, 1851), Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.  He was nominated to the High Court by President James K. Polk.  He served on the Court from September 1845 until his death 6 years later in September 4, 1851.  He replaced Joseph Story on the Court.  He was succeeded by Benjamin Curtis.  He had previously served as the 13^th United States Secretary of the Treasury during the administrations of Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren.  He also served as the 9^th United States Secretary of the Navy from May 1831 until June 1834 during the Andrew Jackson administration.  Prior to that, he had served as the 9^th Governor of New Hampshire from June 1823 until June 1824.  He was also a United States Senator from New Hampshire, a position he held from March 1841 until November 1845.  He was born in Francestown, New Hampshire and died at age 61 in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

 

1765 ~ Johann Friedrich Pfaff (d. Apr. 21, 1825), German mathematician.  He died at age 59.

 

1696 ~ James Oglethorpe (d. June 30, 1784), English general and founder of the colony of Georgia in what would later become the United States.  He died at age 88.

 

1639 ~ Jean Racine (né Jean-Baptiste Racine, d. Apr. 21, 1699), French dramatist.  He died at age 59 in Paris, France.

 

1095 ~ Roger II, King of Sicily (d. Feb. 26, 1154).  He reigned from September 1130 until his death 24 years later.  He married 3 times; first to Elvira of Castile.  After her death, he married Sibylla of Burgundy.  She died of complications of childbirth.  He then married Beatrice of Rethel.  He was of the House of Hauteville.  He was the son of Roger I, King of Sicily and Adelaide del Vasto.  He died in Palermo, Sicily at age 58.

 

Events that Changed the World:

 

2019 ~ Chanukah began at sunset.

 

2018 ~ The eruption of Anak Krakatau in Indonesia caused a tsunami that killed over 400 people and injured thousands more.

 

2010 ~ President Barack Obama (b. 1961) signed into law the repeal of the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy that banned homosexuals from serving openly in the United States military.

 

2001 ~ Richard Reid (b. 1973), a British member of al-Qaeda, attempted to blow up American Airlines Flight 63, by igniting explosives hidden in his shoes.  He was arrested and pled guilty.  He was sentenced to 3 consecutive life sentences plus 110 years without parole.  His plan to blow-up the plan failed, but his actions changed airline regulations by requiring passengers to remove their shows when entering the boarding areas in airports.

 

1990 ~ Lech Wałęsa (b. 1943) was elected President of Poland.  He served as President from December 1990 until December 1995.

 

1989 ~ Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate reopened after nearly 30 years, thereby ending the division between East and West Germany.

 

1989 ~ The authoritarian regime of Romania’s Communist ruler, Nicolae Ceauşescu (1918 ~ 1989), ended following a bloody uprising.  Ion Iliescu (b. 1930) took over as President of Romania.  Ceauşescu and his wife Elena (1916 ~ 1989) tried to flee Bucharest in a helicopter.  They were ultimately captured and executed 3 days later, on Christmas Day.

 

1984 ~ Bernard Goetz (b. 1947) shot and wounded four African-American alleged muggers on a subway train in Manhattan, New York.  Goetz was later charged with attempted murder, but was acquitted of these charges in a jury trial.

 

1968 ~ During the Chinese Cultural Revolution, Mao Zedong (1893 ~ 1976) issued the edict that all intellectual youth were required to go into the country to be reeducated by living in rural poverty.

 

1937 ~ The Lincoln Tunnel, connecting New Jersey with New York City, opened to traffic.

 

1906 ~ A 7.6 magnitude earthquake struck in central China.  Between 250 and 300 people were killed and numerous others injured.

 

1894 ~ The Dreyfus affair began in France, in a case that triggered worldwide protests of anti-Semitism, after French naval officer Alfred Dreyfus (1859 ~ 1935) was wrongly convicted of treason.

 

1885 ~ Itō Hirobumi (1841 ~ 1909), a samurai, became the first Prime Minister of Japan.

 

1885 ~ The roller coaster was patented by LaMarcus Adna Thompson (1848 ~ 1919).

 

1864 ~ Savannah, Georgia fell to Union General William Tecumseh Sherman (1820 ~ 1891), thereby concluding his self-proclaimed “March to the Sea” during the American Civil War.

 

1808 ~ Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 ~ 1827) conducted and performed at a concert in Vienna, Austria.  It was the premiere of his Fifth Symphony.

 

1135 ~ Stephen of Blois (1092 ~ 1154) became King of England.  He reigned from 1135 until October 1154.

 

401 ~ Pope Innocent I (d. Mar. 12, 417) was elected Pope of the Catholic Church.  He is the only pope to succeed his father, Pope Anastasius I (d. Dec. 19, 401) in that Office.

 

Good-Byes:

 

2018 ~ Simcha Rotem (né Szymon Rathajzer; b. Feb. 24, 1924), Polish-Israeli veteran.  He was the last survivor of the 1943 Warsaw ghetto uprising during World War II.  He died in Jerusalem at age 94.

 

2014 ~ Joe Cocker (né John Robert Joseph Cocker, b. May 20, 1944), British singer-songwriter.  He died of lung cancer at age 70.

 

1995 ~ Butterfly McQueen (née Thelma McQueen; b. Jan. 7, 1911), American actress, best known for her role as Prissy, Scarlett O’Hara’s maid in Gone with the Wind.  She was born in Tampa, Florida.  She died 16 days before her 85^thbirthday in Augusta, Georgia.

 

1995 ~ James Meade (né James Edward Meade, b. June 23, 1907), British economist and recipient of the 1977 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences.  He died at age 88.

 

1989 ~ Samuel Beckett (né Samuel Barclay Beckett; b. Apr. 13, 1906), Irish playwright best known for his play, Waiting for Godot.  He was also the recipient of the 1969 Nobel Prize in Literature.  He died at age 83.

 

1986 ~ Ida Cook (b. Aug. 24, 1904), British romantic novelist.  She wrote under the pen name of Mary Burchell.  She is also known as being an advocate for Jewish refugees during World War II.  She and her sister, Mary Louise Cook (1901 ~ 1991) were honored as the Righteous Among the Nations in Israel.  She died at age 82.

 

1979 ~ Darryl F. Zanuck (né Darryl Francis Zanuck, b. Sept. 5, 1902), American actor and movie director.  He died of jaw cancer at age 77.

 

1966 ~ Lucy Burns (b. July 28, 1879), American social activist and leader in the women’s rights.  She was a co-founder, along with Alice Paul, of the National Woman’s Party.  She was born and died in Brooklyn, New York.  She died at age 87.

 

1943 ~ Beatrix Potter (née Helen Beatrix Potter, b. July 28, 1866), English author and creator of the Peter Rabbit stories. She died of pneumonia and heart disease at age 77.

 

1940 ~ Nathanael West (né Nathan Weinstein, b. Oct. 17, 1903), American author.  He was killed in a car accident at age 37.

 

1923 ~ Georg Luger (né Georg Johann Luger; b. Mar. 6, 1849), Austrian designer of the Luger pistol.  He died at age 74 in Berlin, Germany.

 

1915 ~ Rose Bullard (née Rose Talbot; b. Apr. 16, 1864), American medical doctor and medical school professor.  She taught gynecology at the University of Southern California.  She died suddenly of complications following surgery from a dental infection.  She was 51 years old.

 

1880 ~ George Eliot (née Mary Anne Evans; b. Nov. 22, 1819), English writer, best known for her novels, Mill on the Floss and Silas Marner.  She died a month after her 61^st birthday.

 

1867 ~ Jean-Victor Poncelet (b. July 1, 1788), French mathematician.  He died at age 79.

 

1828 ~ Rachel Jackson (née Rachel Donelson; b. June 15, 1767), wife of President Andrew Jackson.  She died at age 61 in Nashville, Tennessee.  She died after Jackson had been elected President, but before his inauguration, hence, she never served as First Lady.

 

1809 ~ William Cooper (b. Dec. 2, 1754), American politician and founder of Cooperstown, New York.  He was also a member of the United States House of Representatives from New York State.  He was the father of author James Fenimore Cooper.  He was born in Smithfield, Pennsylvania.  He died 20 days after his 55^th birthday in Albany, New York.

 

1767 ~ John Newbery (b. July 9, 1713), English publisher known as the Father of Children’s Literature.  The Newbery Award for children’s literature is named after him.  He died at age 54.

 

1708 ~ Hedvig Sophia of Sweden (b. June 26, 1681), Swedish princess and Duchess consort of Holstein-Gottorp.  She was the wife of Frederick IV, Duke of Holstein-Gottorp.  She was of the House of Palatinate-Zweibrücken.  She was the daughter of Charles XI, King of Sweden and Ulrike Eleanora of Denmark.  She died of smallpox at age 27.

 

1660 ~ André Tacquet (b. June 23, 1612), Flemish mathematician.  He died at age 48.

 

1115 ~ Olaf Magnusson (b. 1099), King of Norway.  The exact date of his birth is not known, but he is believed to have been 17 when he died of an illness.

November 20

Birthdays:

 

1971 ~ Joel McHale (né Joel Edward McHale), American comedian and actor.  He was born in Rome, Italy.

 

1963 ~ Timothy Gowers, English mathematician.  He is best known for his work in functional analysis.  He was born in Wiltshire, England.

 

1956 ~ Bo Derek (née Mary Cathleen Collins), American actress best known for her role in the movie 10.  She was born in Long Beach, California

 

1948 ~ John Bolton (né John Robert Bolton), 27^th United States National Security Advisor.  He began his service in the Trump Administration in April 2018 and was fired in September 2019.  Prior that he had served as the 25^th United States Ambassador to the United Nations from August 2005 until December 2006 during the George H.W. Bush administration.  He was born in Baltimore, Maryland.

 

1946 ~ Duane Allman (né Howard Duane Allman; d. Oct. 29, 1971), American musician and member of The Allman Brothers Band.  He was born in Nashville, Tennessee.  He was killed less than a month before his 25^th birthday in a motorcycle accident in Macon, Georgia.

 

1946 ~ Judy Woodruff (née Judy Carline Woodruff), American journalist and news anchor on public television.  She was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

 

1943 ~ Veronica Hamel, American actress.  She is best known for her role as Joyce Davenport on the television drama Hill Street Blues.  She was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

 

1942 ~ Bob Einstein (née Stewart Robert Einstein; d. Jan. 2, 2019), American actor and comedy writer.  He is best known for creating the satirical stuntman character known as Super Dave Osborne.  He also played Marty Funkhouser on Curb Your Enthusiasm.  He was the brother of Albert Brooks.  He was born in Los Angeles, California.  He died of cancer at age 76 in Indian Wells, California.

 

1942 ~ Joe Biden (né Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr.), 46^th President of the United States.  He assumed office in January 2021.  He also served as the 47^th Vice President of the United States under President Barack Obama from January 2009 until January 2017.  He was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania.

 

1941 ~ Dr. John (né Malcolm John Rebennack, Jr.; d. June 6, 2019), American musician who embodied New Orleans.  He was born and died in New Orleans, Louisiana.  He died of a heart attack at age 77.

 

1939 ~ Dick Smothers (né Richard Remick Smothers), American comedian and half of the Smothers Brothers comedy team.  He was born in New York, New York.

 

1936 ~ Don DeLillo (né Donald Richard DeLillo), American novelist.  He was born in The Bronx, New York.

 

1932 ~ Richard Dawson (né Colin Lionel Emm, d. June 2, 2012), English-American actor, comedian and game-show host.  He is best known for his role in Hogan’s Heroes.  In his later career, he became a game show host of Family Feud.  He died of esophageal cancer at age 79 in Los Angeles, California.

 

1930 ~ Curly Putman (né Claude Putman, Jr.; d. Oct. 30, 2016), American composer who wrote Green, Green, Grass of Home.  He was born in Princeton, Alabama.  He died three weeks before his 86^th birthday in Lebanon, Tennessee.

 

1926 ~ Ann Turner Cook (née Ann Leslie Turner; d. June 3, 2022), American educator and mystery novelist who gave Gerber its baby face.  In 1928, when Gerber was looking for a face for its line of baby food, a drawing of Ann Turner was selected.  She was born in Westport, Connecticut.  She died at age 95 in St. Petersburg, Florida.

 

1925 ~ Bobby Kennedy (né Robert Francis Kennedy; d. June 6, 1968), American politician.  He was the 64^th Attorney General of the United States.  He served during the presidency of his brother, John F. Kennedy, and Lyndon B. Johnson.  He was born in Brookline, Massachusetts.  He died from gunshot wounds sustained a day earlier in Los Angeles, California.  He was 42 years old.

 

1925 ~ Maya Plisetskaya (née Maya Mikhailovna Plisetskaya; d. May 2, 2015), Russian ballerina who stayed loyal to the USSR.  Her father was executed as an “enemy of the people” when she was 11, and her mother spent time in a labor camp, and although she was banned from touring in the West for fear that she would defect, Maya stayed in the Soviet Union because of her love of the Bolshoi Theater.  She was born in Moscow, Russia.  She died at age 89 in Munich, Germany.

 

1925 ~ George Barris (né George Salapatas; d. Nov. 5, 2015), American car designer who custom-made cars and is best known for creating the Batmobile.  He was born in Chicago, Illinois.  He died 15 days before his 90^th birthday in Encino, California.

 

1925 ~ Kaye Ballard (née Catherine Gloria Balotta; d. Jan. 21, 2019), American comedian and actress.  She was born in Cleveland, Ohio.  She died at age 93 in Rancho Mirage, California.

 

1924 ~ Benoît Mandelbrot (d. Oct. 14, 2010), Polish-born French mathematician.  He was born in Warsaw, Poland.  He died of pancreatic cancer in Cambridge, Massachusetts at age 85.

 

1923 ~ Nadine Gordimer (d. July 13, 2014), South American writer and political activist.  She was the author who challenged apartheid.  She was the recipient of the 1991 Nobel Prize in Literature.  She was born in Springs, South Africa.  She died at age 90 years old in Johannesburg, South Africa.

 

1921 ~ Jim Garrison (né Earling Carothers Garrison; d. Oct. 21, 1992), District Attorney of Orleans Parish, Louisiana from 1962 ~ 1973.  He is best known for his investigations into the assassination of President John Kennedy.  He was born in Denison, Iowa.  He died in New Orleans a month before his 71^st birthday.

 

1919 ~ Jane C. Wright (née Jane Cooke; d. Feb. 19, 2013), African-American oncologist and cancer research.  She is credited with developing a technique of using human tissue culture rather than lab rats to test the effects of potential drugs on cancer.  She was born in Manhattan, New York.  She died at age 93 in Guttenberg, New Jersey.

 

1917 ~ Leonard J. Savage (né Leonard Ogashevitz; d. Nov. 1, 1971), American mathematician and statistician.  He was born in Detroit, Michigan.  He died 19 days before his 54^th birthday in New Haven, Connecticut.

 

1916 ~ Evelyn Keys (née Evelyn Louise Keys; d. July 4, 2008), the American veteran actress who is best known for her role as Suellen O’Hara, sister of Scarlett O’Hara’s sister in Gone with the Wind.  She was born in Port Arthur, Texas.  She died at age 91 in Montecito, California.

 

1913 ~ Charles Berlitz (d. Dec. 18, 2003), American linguist.  He is best known for his series of language-learning courses and books.  He was born in New York, New York.  He died about a month after his 90^th birthday in Tamarac, Florida.

 

1912 ~ Otto von Habsburg (d. July 4, 2011), the last crown prince of Austria-Hungary.  He was the crown prince from 1916 until the dissolution of the Austria-Hungary empire.  In 1951, he married Princess Regina of Saxe-Meiningen.  He was of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine.  He was the son of Charles I, Emperor of Austria and Zita of Bourbon-Parma.  He died at age 98.

 

1910 ~ Willem Jacob van Stockum (d. June 10, 1944), Dutch mathematician.  He was born in Hatten, Netherlands.  He was killed at age 33 during a bombing raid during World War II, when his plane was hit by flak.

 

1910 ~ Pauli Murray (née Anna Pauline Murray; d. July 1, 1985), African-American civil rights activist, lawyer and Episcopal priest.  She was the first African-American woman to be ordained as an Episcopal priest.  She was born in Baltimore, Maryland.  She died of pancreatic cancer at age 74 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

 

1908 ~ Alistair Cooke (né Alfred Cooke; d. Mar. 30, 2004), English-born journalist and longtime host of Masterpiece Theater.  He was born in Salford, Lancashire, England.  He died at age 95 in New York, New York.

 

1900 ~ Helen Bradley (née Helen Layfield; d. July 19, 1979), British artist.  She died at age 78.

 

1900 ~ Chester Gould (d. May 11, 1985), American cartoonist and creator of Dick Tracy.  He was born in Pawnee, Territory of Oklahoma.  He died at age 84 in Woodstock, Illinois.

 

1893 ~ André Bloch (d. Oct. 11, 1948), French mathematician.  His mathematical legacy is his contribution to complex analysis.  He is probably best remembered, however, for the murder of his brother, George, and his aunt and uncle.  He was committed to an insane asylum, where he spent the rest of his life.  While in the asylum, he made his mark in the field of mathematics.  He died of leukemia at age 54.

 

1892 ~ James Collip (né James Bertram Collip; d. June 19, 1965), Canadian biochemist and co-discoverer of Insulin.  He was born in Belleville, Ontario, Canada.  He died at age 72 in London, Ontario, Canada.

 

1889 ~ Edwin Hubble (né Edwin Powell Hubble; d. Sept. 28, 1953), American astronomer.  The Hubble telescope is named in his honor.  He was born in Marshfield, Missouri.  He died of cerebral thrombosis at age 63 in San Marino, California.

 

1886 ~ Karl von Frisch (d. June 12, 1982), Austrian ethologist and zoologist.  He was the recipient of the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.  He studied the sensory perceptions of the honeybee.  He was born in Vienna, Austria-Hungary.  He died at age 95 in Munich, West Germany.

 

1885 ~ Olive Wetzel Dennis (d. Nov. 5, 1957), American engineer.  Many of her designs were innovations in the railroad industry.  She was born in Thurlow, Pennsylvania.  She died in Baltimore, Maryland 15 days before her 72^nd birthday.

 

1874 ~ James Michael Curley (d. Nov. 12, 1958), 4-term Mayor of Boston.  His terms as Mayor were non-consecutive, making him the 41^st, 43^rd, 45^th and 48^th Mayor of the City.  He also served as the 53^rd Governor of Massachusetts from January 1935 until January 1937.  He was born and died in Boston, Massachusetts.  He died 8 days before his 84^thbirthday.

 

1866 ~ Kenesaw M. Landis (né Kenesaw Mountain Landis; d. Nov. 25, 1944), American Federal judge and first commissioner of professional baseball.  He had also served as a federal district court judge for the United States District Court of Northern Illinois.  He is best remembered for his handling of the Black Sox scandal, which involved eight Chicago White Sox players who conspired to lose the 1919 World Series.  He was born in Millville, Ohio.  He died 5 days after his 78^th birthday in Chicago, Illinois.

 

1858 ~ Selma Lagerlöf (née Selma Ottilia Lovisa Lagerlöf; d. Mar. 16, 1940), Swedish author and recipient of the 1909 Nobel Prize in Literature.  She was the first female to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.  She was born and died in Mårbacka, Sweden.  She died at age 81.

 

1851 ~ Margherita of Savoy (d. Jan. 4, 1926), Queen consort of Italy and wife of Umberto I, King of Italy.  She was of the House of Savoy-Genoa.  She was the daughter of Prince Ferdinand, Duke of Genoa and Princess Elisabeth of Saxony. She died at age 74.

 

1841 ~ Victor D’Hondt (d. May 30, 1901), Belgian mathematician.  He was born and died in Ghent, Belgium.  He died at age 59.

 

1761 ~ Pope Pius VIII (né Francesco Saverio Maria Felice Castiglioni; d. Nov. 30, 1830).  He was Pope for a year and a half, from March 31, 1829 until his death on November 30, 1830.  He died 10 days after his 69^th birthday.

 

1726 ~ Oliver Wolcott, Sr. (d. Dec. 1, 1797), American politician and 19^th Governor of Connecticut.  He was born in Windsor, Connecticut.  He died 11 days after his 71^st birthday in Litchfield, Connecticut.

 

939 ~ Tai Zong (d. May 8, 997), 2^nd Chinese emperor of the Song Dynasty.  He was emperor from November 976 until his death in 997.

 

Events that Changed the World:

 

1992 ~ A fire in Windsor Castle, causing severe damage to the castle and property.

 

1985 ~ Microsoft Windows 1.0 was released to the public.

 

1980 ~ A misplaced Texaco oil probe drilled into the Diamond Crystal Salt Mine, causing Lake Peigneur in Iberville Parish, Louisiana to drain into the salt deposit.

 

1977 ~ Egyptian President Anwar Sadat (1918 ~ 1981) became the first Arab leader to officially visit Israel.  He met with Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin (1913 ~ 1992) and spoke before the Israeli Knesset to seek a permanent peace agreement.

 

1974 ~ The United States Department of Justice filed an anti-trust suit against AT&T.  The suit later was the reason for the breakup of AT&T and its Bell Systems.

 

1969 ~ The public became aware of the My Lai massacre in Vietnam after the Cleveland, Ohio newspaper, The Plain Dealer, published explicit photographs of dead villagers.

 

1968 ~ Seventy-eight miners were killed in an explosion at the Consolidated Coal Company’s Number 9 mine in Farmington, West Virginia.

 

1962 ~ The Cuban missile crisis ended after the Soviet Union agreed to remove its missiles from Cuba.

 

1947 ~ Princess Elizabeth (1926 ~ 2022) of the United Kingdom married Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten (1921 ~ 2021) at Westminster Abbey in London, England.  Upon his marriage to Elizabeth, he became known as the Duke of Edinburgh.

 

1945 ~ The Nuremberg trials against 24 Nazi war criminals began at the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg, Germany.

 

1820 ~ A sperm whale attacked a whaling ship from Nantucket, Massachusetts off the western coast of South America.  This event gave novelist Herman Melville (1819 ~ 1891) the inspiration for Moby Dick, which was published 30 years later.

 

1789 ~ New Jersey became the first State of the Union to ratify the Bill of Rights.

 

1194 ~ Holy Roman Emperor Henry VI (1165 ~ 1197) conquered Palermo, Sicily.

 

Good-Bye:

 

2020 ~ Jan Morris (née James Humphry Morris; b. Oct. 2, 1926), Welsh historian and travel writer who broke barriers.  She was born male, but had sex reassignment surgery and became known as Jan.  She died at age 94.

 

2019 ~ Jake Burton Carpenter (b. Apr. 29, 1954), American “punk” who made snowboarding a sport.  He was the founder of Burton Snowboards and invented the modern-day snowboard.  He was born in Manhattan, New York.  He died of cancer at age 65 in Burlington, Vermont.

 

2019 ~ Fred Cox (né Frederick William Cox; b. Dec. 11, 1938), American NFL football kicker who helped invent the Nerf football.  He was a kicker for 15 years with the Minnesota Vikings.  He was born in Monongahela, Pennsylvania.  He died 21 days before his 81^st birthday.  He died in Monticello, Minnesota.

 

2018 ~ Sir Aaron Klug (b. Aug. 11, 1926), Lithuanian-English chemist and biophysicist.  He was the recipient of the 1982 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work in the development of crystallography electron microscopy.  He was born in Lithuania.  He died at age 92 in Cambridge, England.

 

2014 ~ Doña María del Rosario Cayetana Fitz-James Stuart y de Silva; 18^th Duchess of Alba (b. Mar. 28, 1926).  She died at age 88.

 

2013 ~ Sylvia Browne (née Sylvia Celeste Shoemaker, b. Oct. 19, 1936), American television psychic who often got the future wrong.  She was born in Kansas City, Missouri.  She died a month after her 77^th birthday in San Jose, California.

 

2011 ~ Theodore Forstmann (né Theodore Joseph Forstmann; b. Feb. 13, 1940), American pioneer of private equity.  He was born in Greenwich, Connecticut.  He died at age 71 of complications from brain cancer in New York, New York.

 

2010 ~ Chalmers Johnson (né Chalmers Ashby Johnson; b. Aug. 6, 1931), American scholar who decried an empire.  He was a political scientist who specialized in comparative politics.  He was born in Phoenix, Arizona.  He died at age 79 in Cardiff-by-the-Sea, California.

 

2009 ~ Lester D. Shubin (b. Sept. 27, 1925), American chemist who saved lives with Kevlar.  He was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  He died of a heart attack at age 84 in Fairfax County, Virginia.

 

2009 ~ Charis Wilson (née Helen Charis Wilson; b. May 5, 1914), American model who inspired photographer Edward Wilson.  She was born in San Francisco, California.  She died at age 95 in Santa Cruz, California.

 

2007 ~ Ian Smith (né Ian Douglas Smith; b. Apr. 8, 1919), Zimbabwean politician and Prime Minister of Rhodesia.  He was born in Selukwe, Rhodesia.  He died at age 88 in Cape Town, South Africa.

 

2006 ~ Zoia Ceauşescu (b. Feb. 28, 1949), Romanian mathematician.  She was the daughter of Communist leader Nicolae Ceauşescu and his wife, Elena.  She was born and died in Bucharest, Romania.  She died of lung cancer at age 57.

 

2006 ~ Robert Altman (né Robert Bernard Altman; b. Feb. 20, 1925), American film director.  He was born in Kansas City, Missouri.  He died at age 81 in Los Angeles, California.

 

1986 ~ Arne Beurling (né Arne Carl-August Beurling; b. Feb. 3, 1905), Swedish mathematician.  He was born in Gothenburg, Sweden.  He died at age 81 in Princeton, New Jersey.

 

1975 ~ Francisco Franco (b. Dec. 4, 1892), Spanish dictator.  He died 14 days before his 83^rd birthday in Madrid, Spain.

 

1962 ~ Rosalie Edge (née Rosalie Barrow; b. Nov. 3, 1877), American environmental advocate and suffragist.  In 1929, she established the Emergency Conservation Committee to expose the conservation establishment’s ineffectiveness and to advocate for species preservation.  In 1934, she founded the world’s first preserve for birds of prey in Eastern Pennsylvania.  She was born and died in New York, New York.  She died 3 weeks after her 85^th birthday.

 

1954 ~ Clyde Cessna (né Clyde Vernon Cessna; b. Dec. 5, 1879), American aviation designer and founder of the Cessna Aircraft Corporation.  He was born in Hawthorne, Iowa.  He died 15 days before his 75^th birthday in Wichita, Kansas.

 

1945 ~ Francis William Aston (b. Sept. 1, 1877), British chemistry and 1922 recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his discovery of isotopes of non-radioactive elements.  He died at age 68 in Cambridge, England.

 

1943 ~ Bertha Lamme Feicht (née Bertha Lamme; b. Dec. 16, 1869), American electrical engineer.  She was the first woman to receive a degree from the Ohio State University.  She was born in Bethel Township, Ohio.  She died 26 days before her 74^th birthday in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

 

1940 ~ Harriot Stanton Blatch (née Harriot Eaton Stanton; b. Jan. 20, 1856), American suffragist and daughter of women’s rights activist Elizabeth Cady Stanton.  She was born in Seneca Falls, New York.  She died at age 84 in Greenwich, Connecticut.

 

1938 ~ Edwin Hall (b. Nov. 7, 1855), American physicist.  He discovered the eponymous Hall effect.  He conducted thermoelectric research.  He was born in Gorham, Maine.  He died 13 days after his 83^rd birthday in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

 

1938 ~ Maud of Wales (b. Nov. 26, 1869), Queen consort of Norway.  She was married to Haakon VII, King of Norway.  They married in 1896.  She was of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.  She was the youngest daughter of Edward VII, King of Great Britain and Alexandra of Denmark.  She died 6 days before her 69^th birthday, and on the 13^th anniversary of her mother’s death.

 

1934 ~ Willem de Sitter (b. May 6, 1872), Dutch mathematician and astronomer.  He died after a brief illness at age 62.

 

1925 ~ Alexandra of Denmark (b. Dec. 1, 1844), Queen consort of the United Kingdom and wife of Edward VII, King of the United Kingdom.  They married in 1863.  She was of the House of Glücksburg.  She was the daughter of Christian IX, King of Denmark and Louise of Hesse-Kassel.   She died 11 days before her 81^st birthday.

 

1914 ~ Vinnie Ream (née Lavinia Ellen Ream Hoxie; b. Sept. 25, 1847), American sculptor.  She is best known for the statue of Abraham Lincoln in the United States Capitol rotunda.  She was 18 years old when she received the commission for this statue.  She was born in Madison, Wisconsin.  She died at age 67 in Washington, D.C.

 

1910 ~ Count Leo Tolstoy (b. Sept. 9, 1828), Russian author.  He is best known for his epic novels such as War and Peaceand Anna Karenina.  He died at age 82.

 

1908 ~ Georgy Voronoy (b. Apr. 28, 1868), Russian mathematician.  He died at age 40 following a severe illness in Warsaw, Poland.

 

1894 ~ Anton Rubinstein (b. Nov. 28, 1829), Russian pianist and composer.  He died 8 days before his 65^th birthday in St. Petersburg, Russian Empire.

 

1888 ~ Nathaniel Currier (b. Mar. 27, 1813), American illustrator, who worked with James Ives to create lithographs of current events and life in the mid-1800s America.  Together James Ives and Nathaniel Currier co-founded Currier and Ives.  Currier was born in Roxbury, Massachusetts.  He died at age 75 in Amesbury, Massachusetts.

 

1856 ~ Farkas Bolyai (b. Feb. 9, 1775), Hungarian mathematician.  He died at age 81.

 

1778 ~ Francesco Cetti (b. Aug. 9, 1726), Italian priest, zoologist, and mathematician.  He died at age 52.

 

1764 ~ Christian Goldbach (b. Mar. 18, 1690), Prussian mathematician.  He is best known for Goldbach’s conjecture.  He died at age 74 in Moscow, Russian Empire.

 

1737 ~ Caroline of Ansbach (b. Mar. 1, 1683), Queen consort of Great Britain.  She was the wife of George II, King of Great Britain.  They married in 1705.  She was of the House of Hohenzollern.  She was the daughter of John Frederick, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach and Princess Eleanor Erdmuthe of Sax-Eisenach.  She died at age 54.

 

1597 ~ Princess Elizabeth Vasa (b. Apr. 5, 1549), Duchess consort of Mecklenburg and second wife of Christopher, Duke of Mecklenburg.  They married in 1581.  She was of the House of Vasa.  She was the daughter of Gustav I, King of Sweden and Margaret Leijonhufvud.  She died at age 48.

 

1593 ~ Hans Bol (b. Dec. 16, 1534), Flemish artist.  He died 26 days before his 48^th birthday.

 

1480 ~ Princess Eleanor of Scotland (b. 1433), Queen consort of Austria and first wife of Sigismund, Archduke of Austria.  She was of the House of Stewart.  She was the daughter of James I, King of Scotland and Joan Beaufort.  The exact date of her birth is not known, but she is believed to have been about age 46 or 47 at the time of her death.

 

1316 ~ John I, King of France and Navarre (b. Nov. 15, 1316).  He ruled France and Navarre for only 5 days.  He was of the House of Capet.  He was the son of Louis X, King of France and Clementia of Hungary.  His father had died before he was born, thus he became king upon his birth, thus was referred to as John the Posthumous.  He died, however, 5 days after his birth.

 

869 ~ Edmund the Martyr (b. 841), English king.  He was killed in battle.  The date of his birth is not known.

November 19

Birthdays:

 

1983 ~ Adam Driver (né Adam Douglas Driver), American actor.  He was born in San Diego, California.

 

1966 ~ Schmuel Boteach, American Orthodox rabbi and author.  He was born in Los Angeles, California.

 

1964 ~ Fred Diamond (né Fred Irvin Diamond), American mathematician.  He is best known for his work in number theory and his role in proving the modularity theorem for elliptic curves.

 

1962 ~ Jody Foster (née Alicia Christian Foster), American actress.  She was born in Los Angeles, California.

 

1961 ~ Meg Ryan (née Margaret Mary Emily Anne Hyra), American actress.  She was born in Fairfield, Connecticut.

 

1959 ~ Allison Janney (née Allison Brooks Janney), American actress.  She was born in Boston, Massachusetts.

 

1956 ~ Eileen Collins (née Eileen Marie Collins), American astronaut.  She was the first female pilot commander of a Space Shuttle.  She was born in Elmira, New York.

 

1956 ~ Ann Curry, American journalist.  She was born in Guam.

 

1942 ~ Daniel Haggerty (né Daniel Francis Haggerty; d. Jan. 15, 2016), American animal loving actor best known for playing the title role in The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams.  He was born in Pound, Wisconsin.  He died of spinal cancer at age 73 in Burbank, California.

 

1942 ~ Calvin Klein (né Calvin Richard Klein), American clothing designer.  He was born in The Bronx, New York.

 

1941 ~ Tommy Thompson (né Tommy George Thompson), 19^th United States Secretary of Health and Human Services.  He served under President George W. Bush from January 2001 until January 2005.  He had previously served as the Governor of Wisconsin from January 1987 through January 2001.  He was born in Elroy, Wisconsin.

 

1939 ~ Garrick Utley (né Clifton Garrick Utley; d. Feb. 20, 2014), American news journalist and television news anchor.  He was born in Chicago, Illinois.  He died of prostate cancer age 74 in New York, New York.

 

1939 ~ Emil Constantinescu, 3^rd President of Romania.  He served as President from November 1996 until December 2000.  He was born in Bender, Moldova.

 

1938 ~ Ted Turner (né Robert Edward Turner, III), American businessman and founder of the Turner Broadcasting System.  His third wife was Jane Fonda.  He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio.

 

1936 ~ Dick Cavett (né Richard Alva Cavett), American talk show host.  He was born in Gibbon, Nebraska.

 

1936 ~ Yuan T. Lee (né Yuan Tseh Lee), Taiwanese-born chemist and recipient of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.

 

1935 ~ Jack Welch (né John Francis Welch, Jr.; d. Mar. 1, 2020), American boss of General Electric who popularized ruthless management.  He went to the University of Massachusetts and earned an engineering degree.  He was the head of General Electric between 1981 to 2001.  He was born in Peabody, Massachusetts.  He died of kidney failure at age 84 in Manhattan, New York.

 

1933 ~ Larry King (né Lawrence Harvey Zeiger; d. Jan. 23, 2021), American television personality and suspendered CNN talk show host who interviewed the famous and infamous, including seven United States presidents, athletes, entertainers, sex therapists, and psychics.  He was born in Brooklyn, New York.  He died at age 87 of complications of Covid-19 in Los Angeles, California.

 

1932 ~ Eleanor Helin (d. Jan. 25, 2009), American astronomer.  She is best known for discovering numerous minor planets.  She died at age 76.

 

1927 ~ Lisl Steiner, Austrian-born photojournalist.  After Hitler annexed Austria, her family moved to Argentina.  She later moved to the United States and became a naturalized citizen.  She is best known for her political and cultural portraits.  She was born in Vienna, Austria.

 

1926 ~ Jeane Kirkpatrick (née Jeane Duane Jordan; d. Dec. 7, 2006), 16^th United States Ambassador to the United Nations.  She was the American diplomat who shaped President Ronald Reagan’s muscular foreign policy.  She was born in Duncan, Oklahoma.  She died 18 days after her 80^th birthday in Bethesda, Maryland.

 

1922 ~ Jerzy Glowczewski (d. Apr. 13, 2020), Polish-born American aircraft pilot.  He was the last known Polish fighter pilot to have flown for Britain’s Royal Air Force during World War II.  He flew 100 combat missions against the Nazis and later worked as an architect in Poland, Egypt, and the United States.  He was born in Warsaw, Poland.  He died of complications from Covid-19 at age 97 in New York, New York.

 

1921 ~ Roy Campanella (d. June 26, 1993), American professional baseball player and coach.  He was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  He died of heart failure at age 71 in Woodland Hills, California.

 

1920 ~ Gene Tierney (née Gene Eliza Tierney; d. Nov. 6, 1991), American actress.  She was born in Brooklyn, New York.  She died 13 days before her 71^st birthday in Houston, Texas.

 

1919 ~ Alan Young (né Angus Young; d. May 19, 2016), English-born Canadian-American actor and television personality.  He was best known for his role as Wilber Post, the actor who conversed with Mister Ed on the television sit-com that ran from 1961 to 1966.  He died at age 96 in Woodland Hills, California.

 

1917 ~ Indira Gandhi (né Indira Priyadarshini Nehru; d. Oct. 31, 1984), Prime Minister of India and first woman to hold that Office.  She served as Prime Minister from 1966 to 1977 and again from 1980 until her assassination on October 21, 1984.  She was assassinated by two of her Sikh bodyguards.  Her assassination caused riots throughout India in which nearly 10,000 Sikhs were killed.  She was killed in New Delhi, India just 19 days before her 67^th birthday.

 

1915 ~ Earl Wilber Sutherland, Jr. (d. Mar. 9, 1974), American physiologist and pharmacologist.  He was the recipient of the 1971 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.  He was born in Burlingame, Kansas.  He died of complications from an esophageal hemorrhage at age 58 in Miami, Florida.

 

1912 ~ George Palade (né George Emil Palade; d. Oct. 7, 2008), Romanian cell biologist and recipient of the 1974 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.  He died at age 95 in Del Mar, California.

 

1909 ~ Peter Drucker (né Peter Ferdinand Drucker; d. Nov. 11, 2005), American management theorist.  He was born in Vienna, Austria.  He died 8 days before his 96^th birthday in Claremont, California.

 

1905 ~ Tommy Dorsey (né Thomas Francis Dorsey, Jr.; d. Nov. 26, 1956), American bandleader.  He was born in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania.  He died 7 days after his 51^st birthday in Greenwich, Connecticut.

 

1904 ~ Nathan F. Leopold, Jr. (né Nathan Freudenthal Leopold; d. Aug. 29, 1971), American murderer.  In 1924, he, along with his college friend, Richard Albert Loeb (1905 ~ 1936), kidnapped and murdered 14-year Robert Franks simply because they thought they could get away with the “perfect crime.”  They were quickly arrested and tried for the crime.  Both were sentenced to life in prison.  Loeb was killed in prison by a fellow inmate.  Leopold was paroled in 1958.  He died of a heart attack at age 66.

 

1901 ~ Nina Bari (née Nina Karlova Bari; d. July 15, 1961), Russian mathematician.  She was born and died in Moscow, Russia.  She was killed at age 59 when she fell in front of a metro train in Moscow.

 

1900 ~ Mikhail Lavrentyev (d. Oct. 15, 1980), Russian physicist and mathematician.  He died about a month before his 80^th birthday in Moscow, Soviet Union.

 

1895 ~ Louise Dahl-Wolfe (née Louise Emma Augusta Dahl; d. Dec. 11, 1989), American photographer.  She was born in San Francisco, California.  She died 22 days after her 94^th birthday in Allendale, New Jersey.

 

1894 ~ Heinz Hopf (d. June 3, 1971), German mathematician whose major field was topology and geometry.  He died at age 76 in Zollikon, Switzerland.

 

1887 ~ James B. Sumner (né John Batcheller Sumner; d. Aug. 12, 1955), American chemist and recipient of the 1946 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for showing that enzymes are proteins.  He was born in Canton, Massachusetts.  He died of cancer at age 67 in Buffalo, New York.

 

1876 ~ Tatyana Afanasyeva (d. Apr. 14, 1964), Russian-born Dutch mathematician.  She was born in Kiev, Ukraine.  She died at age 87.

 

1862 ~ Billy Sunday (né William Ashley Sunday; d. Nov. 6, 1935), American baseball player-turned-evangelist.  He was born in Story County, Iowa.  He died 13 days before his 73^rd birthday in Chicago, Illinois.

 

1845 ~ Agnes Giberne (d. Aug. 20, 1939), British astronomer and novelist.  She was born in India.  She died at age 93 in Eastbourne, East Sussex, England.

 

1831 ~ James Garfield (né James Abram Garfield; d. Sept. 19, 1881), 20^th President of the United States.  He was the last United States President to have been born in a log cabin.  He was assassinated shortly after taking office, becoming the second President to be assassinated, and the fourth President to die in office.  He began his term as President in March 1881.  He was born in Moreland Hills, Ohio.  He died from wounds suffered after being shot by an assassin on July 2, 1881.  He is believed to have contracted an infection due to poor medical practices.  He died in Elberon, New Jersey at age 49.

 

1805 ~ Ferdinand Marie, Vicomte de Lesseps (d. Dec. 7, 1894), French diplomat and engineer who developed the Suez Canal.  The company he organized began work on the Canal in 1859 and completed the task 10 years later.  He was born in Versailles, French Empire.  He died 18 days after his 89^th birthday.

 

1752 ~ George Clark (né George Rogers Clark; d. Feb. 13, 1818), American general, surveyor and frontiersman.  He was the older brother of William Clark of Lewis and Clark fame.  He was born in Albemarle County, Colony of Virginia, British America.  George Clark died of a stroke at age 65 in Louisville, Kentucky.

 

1600 ~ Charles I, King of England and Ireland and King of Scotland (d. Jan. 30, 1649).  He was king from March 1625 until his execution in January 1649.  He was married to Henrietta Marie of France.  They married in 1625.  He was of the House of Stuart.  He was the son of James VI, King of England /James I, King of Scotland and Anne of Denmark.  He was Anglican.  He was tried and convicted of high treason and was beheaded at age 48 during the English Civil War.

 

Events that Changed the World:

 

2021 ~ Kyle Rittenhouse (b. 2003), a teenager who shot three people, killing two and injuring the third, in during a protest against police brutality in Kenosha, Wisconsin in 2020, was cleared of all charges.  He argued that he had fired in self-defense.

 

1998 ~ The impeachment proceedings against President Bill Clinton (b. 1946) began in the Lewinsky scandal.

 

1979 ~ The Ayatolla Ruhollah Khomeina (1902 ~ 1989) granted the release of several American hostages who had been captured earlier in the month and held at the United States Embassy in Tehran.

 

1969 ~ Apollo 12 astronauts Pete Conrad (1930 ~ 1999) and Alan Bean (1932 ~ 2018) landed at the moon’s Ocean of Storms to become the third and fourth humans to walk on the Moon.

 

1955 ~ The National Review, a conservative political magazine, began publication.  William F. Buckley, Jr. (1925 ~ 2008) founded the magazine.

 

1950 ~ Dwight David Eisenhower (1890 ~ 1969) became the Supreme Commander of NATO-Europe.

 

1945 ~ The International Military Tribunal opened, allowing for the first post-World War II Nuremberg Trials against 24 Nazi war criminals to begin at the Palace of Justice in Nuremberg.  The trials were held between November 20, 1945 through October 1, 1946.

 

1943 ~ Nazis murdered over 6,000 Jews at the Janowska concentration in the western Lviv, Ukraine.  This was in retaliation after a failed uprising by and a mass escape attempt.

 

1916 ~ Goldwyn Pictures was established by Samuel Goldwyn (1879 ~ 1974) and Edgar Selwyn (1875 ~ 1944).

 

1881 ~ A meteorite landed near the village of Grossliebenthal, near Odessa, Ukraine.

 

1863 ~ President Abraham Lincoln (1809 ~ 1865) delivered the Gettysburg Address.

 

1816 ~ Warsaw University was established.

 

Good-Byes:

 

2017 ~ Charles Manson (né Charles Milles Maddox; b. Nov. 12, 1934), American cult leader and convicted murderer.  He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio.  He died in prison in Bakersfield, California7 days after his 83^rd birthday.

 

2017 ~ Della Reese (née Delloreese Patricia Early; b. July 6, 1931), American gospel singer who became a TV star.  She was born in Detroit, Michigan.  She died at age 86 in Los Angeles, California.

 

2015 ~ Mal Whitfield (né Malvin Greston Whitfield; b. Oct. 11, 1924), African-American runner who became a sporting ambassador.  He was a track star at the 1948 and 1952 Summer Olympics.  He was born in Bay City, Texas.  He died about a month after his 91^st birthday in Washington, D.C.

 

2014 ~ Mike Nichols (né Igor Mikhail Peschkowsky; b. Nov. 6, 1931), German-born American film and theater director.  He is one of a small group of people who can claim the EGOT, having won an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Award.  He was the director who was able to conquer Broadway.  His fourth wife was Diane Sawyer.  He was born in Berlin, Germany.  He died of a heart attack two weeks after his 83^rd birthday in Los Angeles, California.

 

2013 ~ Dr. Dora Jean Dougherty Strother McKeown (b. Nov. 27, 1921), American military pilot.  She was well known as a Woman Airforce Service Pilots (WASP) and B-29 Superfortress demonstration pilot.  She was born in St. Paul, Minnesota.  She died 8 days before her 92^nd birthday.

 

2013 ~ Frederick Sanger (b. Aug. 13, 1918), British biochemist and recipient of the two Nobel Prizes in Chemistry who pioneered in genomics.  He won the 1958 and the 1970 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.  The former was for his work in the structure of proteins, specifically insulin.  The later was for his work in determining the base sequencing of nucleic acids.  He was a pioneer in genomics.  He died at age 95 in Cambridge, England.

 

2012 ~ Warren Rudman (né Warren Bruce Rudman; b. May 18, 1930), American United States Senator from New Hampshire who fought to curb deficits.  He is best known for his key role in bipartisan efforts to rein in federal deficits and the enactment of the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Balanced Budget Act of 1985.  He was born in Boston, Massachusetts.  He died at age 82 in Washington, D.C.

 

2011 ~ John Smale (né John Gray Smale; b. Aug. 1, 1927), Canadian executive who led Proctor and Gamble to growth.  He was born in Listowel, Ontario, Canada.  He died at age 84 in Cincinnati, Ohio.

 

2008 ~ Clive Barnes (né Clive Alexander Barnes; b. May 13, 1927), English critic who wielded Broadway’s most pointed pen.  He was born in London, England.  He died of liver cancer at age 81 in New York, New York.

 

2004 ~ Sir John Vane (né John Robert Vine; b. Mar. 29, 1927), English pharmacologist and recipient of the 1982 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work in deciphering how aspirin works.  He died at age 77 in Kent, England from complications from having fractured his hip and leg 6 months earlier.

 

1998 ~ Alan Jay Pakula (b. Apr. 7, 1928), American film director best known for Sophie’s Choice and All the President’s Men.  He was born in The Bronx, New York.  He was killed in a car accident at age 70 in Melville, New York.

 

1996 ~ Grace Bates (née Grace Elizabeth Bates; b. Aug. 13, 1914).  American mathematician.  She was one of a few women to earn a Ph.D. in mathematics in the 1940s.  She died at age 82.

 

1988 ~ Christina Onassis (b. Dec. 11, 1950), American-born Greek heiress and socialite.  She was the daughter of Ari Onassis and the step-daughter of Jackie Kennedy Onassis.  She was born in New York, New York.  She died of a heart attack 3 weeks before her 38^th birthday in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

 

1975 ~ Elizabeth Taylor (née Coles; b. July 3, 1912), British novelist.  She was born in Redding, England.  She died of cancer at age 63 in Penn, England.

 

1965 ~ Una Ledingham (née Una Christina Garvin; b. Jan. 2, 1900), British physician known for her studies of diabetes during pregnancy.  She died at age 65.

 

1918 ~ Joseph F. Smith, Sr. (né Joseph Fielding Smith; b. Nov. 13, 1838), 6^th President of the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints.  He was born in Far West, Missouri.  He died 6 days after his 80^th birthday in Salt Lake City, Utah.

 

1915 ~ Joe Hill (né Joel Emmanuel Hägglund; d. Oct. 7, 1879), Swedish-born American labor activist.  He was born in Gävle, Sweden.  He was executed by firing squad on murder charges at age 36 in Salt Lake City, Utah.

 

1887 ~ Emma Lazarus (b. July 22, 1849), American poet.  She is best known for her poem, The New Colossus, a portion of which is found on a plaque at the foot of the Statue of Liberty.  She was born and died in New York, New York.  She died of an illness at age 38.

 

1850 ~ Richard Mentor Johnson (b. Oct. 17, 1780), 9^th Vice President of the United States.  He served under President Martin Van Buren from March 1837 until March 1841.  He is the only Vice President elected by the Senate under the provisions of the 12^th Amendment.  He was born in Beargrass, Virginia (current day Louisville, Kentucky).  He died a month after his 70^th birthday in Frankfort, Kentucky.

 

1828 ~ Franz Schubert (né Franz Peter Schubert; b. Jan. 31, 1797), Austrian composer.  He died at age 31, possibly of typhoid fever.

 

1822 ~ Johann Georg Tralles (b. Oct. 15, 1763), German mathematician.  The crater Tralles on the moon is named in his honor.  He was born in Hamburg, Germany.  He died a month after his 59^th birthday in London, England.

 

1789 ~ Archduchess Maria Anna of Austria (b. Oct. 6, 1738), heir presumptive of the Austrian throne until her younger brother, Joseph was born.  She never married.  She was of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine.  She was the daughter of Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor and Maria Theresa of Austria.  She was in ill health.  She died at age 51.

 

1665 ~ Nicolas Poussin (b. June 15, 1594), French painter.  He was a leader in the classical French Baroque style.  He died in Rome at age 71.

 

1557 ~ Maria de’Medici (b. Apr. 3, 1540), Italian noblewoman and member of the Medici family.  She was the eldest daughter of Cosimo I de’Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany.  She is believed to have died of malaria at age 17.

 

1581 ~ Tsarevich Ivan Ivanovich of Russia (b. Mar. 28, 1554), member of the Russian royal family.  He married three times.  His first wife was Eudoxia Saburova.  His second wife was Praskovia Solova.  His third wife was Yelena Sheremeteva.  He was of the Rurik Dynasty.  He was the son of Ivan IV, Tsar of Russia, known as Ivan the Terrible, and Anastasia Romanovna.  He was Eastern Orthodox.  He was murdered by his father in a fit of rage at age 27.

 

1557 ~ Bona Sforza (b. Feb. 2, 1494), Queen consort of Poland and Grand Duchess consort of Lithuania.  She was the second wife of Sigismund I, King of Poland.  They married in 1517.  She was of the House of Sforza.  She was the daughter of Gian Galaezzo Sforza and Isabella of Aragon.  She was Roman Catholic.  She died at age 63.

 

498 ~ Pope Anastasius II (b. 445).  He was Pope from November 24, 496 until his death 2 years later.  The date of his birth is unknown, but he is believed to have been about 53 at the time of his death.

 

496 ~ Pope Gelasius I.  He was Pope from March 492 until his death on this date 4 years later.  The date of his birth is not known.