Died on Thursday, 10th April – Famous Deaths

10/04/2025

Leo Beenhakker, Dutch football manager (born 1942)

Leo Beenhakker was a Dutch football player and coach. Nicknamed "Don Leo" for his role in Spanish football, he had an extensive and successful career both at club and international level.

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Ted Kotcheff, Canadian film and television director (born 1931)

William Theodore Kotcheff was a Canadian director and producer of film, television, and theatre. He worked at various times in Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States. He was known for having directed such films as the seminal Australian New Wave picture Wake in Fright (1971), the Mordecai Richler adaptations The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1974) and Joshua Then and Now (1985), the original Rambo film First Blood (1982), and the comedies Fun with Dick and Jane (1977), North Dallas Forty (1979), and Weekend at Bernie's (1989).

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Peter Lovesey, British writer (born 1936)

Peter Harmer Lovesey, also known by his pen name Peter Lear, was a British writer of historical and contemporary detective novels and short stories. His best-known series characters are Sergeant Cribb, a Victorian-era police detective based in London, and Peter Diamond, a modern-day police detective in Bath. He was also one of the world's leading track and field statisticians.

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10/04/2024

O. J. Simpson, American football player, actor, and broadcaster (born 1947)

Orenthal James Simpson, also known by his nickname "the Juice", was an American professional football player, actor, and media personality who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 11 seasons, primarily with the Buffalo Bills. Simpson is regarded as one of the greatest running backs of all time, but his success was overshadowed by his criminal trial and contentious acquittal for the murders of his former wife Nicole Brown and her friend Ron Goldman in 1994.

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10/04/2023

Al Jaffee, American cartoonist (born 1921)

Allan Jaffee was an American cartoonist. He was known for his work in the satirical magazine Mad, including his trademark feature, the Mad Fold-in. Jaffee was a regular contributor to the magazine for 65 years and is its longest-running contributor. In a 2010 interview, Jaffee said, "Serious people my age are dead."

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10/04/2016

Howard Marks, Welsh cannabis smuggler, writer, and legalisation campaigner (born 1945)

Dennis Howard Marks was a Welsh drug smuggler and author who achieved notoriety as an international cannabis smuggler through high-profile court cases.

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10/04/2015

Richie Benaud, Australian cricketer and sportscaster (born 1930)

Richard Benaud was an Australian cricketer who played for New South Wales and Australia. Following his retirement from international cricket in 1964, Benaud became a highly regarded commentator on the game.

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Rose Francine Rogombé, Gabonese lawyer and politician, President of Gabon (born 1942)

Rose Francine Rogombé was a Gabonese politician who was acting president of Gabon from June to October 2009, following the death of long-time President Omar Bongo. She constitutionally succeeded Bongo due to her role as president of the Senate, a post to which she was elected in February 2009. She was a lawyer by profession and a member of the Gabonese Democratic Party (PDG). Rogombé was the first female head of state of Gabon. After her interim presidency, she returned to her post as President of the Senate.

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Peter Walsh, Australian farmer and politician, 6th Australian Minister for Finance (born 1935)

Peter Alexander Walsh was an Australian politician. He was a Senator for Western Australia from 1974 to 1993, representing the Australian Labor Party (ALP). He held senior ministerial office in the Hawke government, serving as Minister for Resources and Energy (1983–1984) and Minister for Finance (1984–1990).

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10/04/2013

Robert Edwards, English physiologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1925)

Sir Robert Geoffrey Edwards was a British physiologist and pioneer in reproductive medicine, and in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) in particular. Along with obstetrician and gynaecologist Patrick Steptoe and nurse and embryologist Jean Purdy, Edwards successfully pioneered conception through IVF, which led to the birth of Louise Brown on 25 July 1978. They founded the first IVF programme for infertile patients and trained other scientists in their techniques. Edwards was the founding editor-in-chief of Human Reproduction in 1986. In 2010, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine "for the development of in vitro fertilization".

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Gordon Thomas, English cyclist (born 1921)

Gordon W. "Tiny" Thomas was a British cyclist who competed at the 1948 Summer Olympics in London. There he won a silver medal in the team road race alongside Bob Maitland and Ian Scott. He also competed in the individual event, finishing 8th in a field of 101 participants. Born in Shipley, West Riding of Yorkshire, he served during World War II with the Royal Artillery in Africa and Italy. After his Olympic experience, he went on to win the 1953 Tour of Britain before retiring from cycling to enter the wool business.

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10/04/2012

Raymond Aubrac, French engineer and activist (born 1914)

Raymond Aubrac was a member of the French Resistance in World War II. A civil engineer by trade, he assisted General Charles Delestraint within the Armée secrète. Aubrac and his wife Lucie, both communist Resistance members, were friends with Ho Chi Minh; US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger solicited his help amid the Vietnam War to establish contact with North Vietnam.

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Barbara Buchholz, German theremin player and composer (born 1959)

Barbara Buchholz was a Berlin-based German musician and composer. She was one of the leading theremin players of the world.

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Lili Chookasian, Armenian-American operatic singer (born 1921)

Lili Chookasian was an American contralto of Armenian ethnicity, who appeared with many of the world's major symphony orchestras and opera houses. She began her career in the 1940s as a concert singer but did not draw wider acclaim until she began singing opera in her late thirties. She arose as one of the world's leading contraltos during the 1960s and 1970s, and notably had a long and celebrated career at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City from 1962 through 1986. She was admired for her sonorous, focused tone as well as her excellent musicianship. She often chose, against tradition, to sing oratorios from memory.

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Luis Aponte Martínez, Puerto Rican cardinal (born 1922)

Luis Aponte Martínez was a Puerto Rican Catholic prelate who served as Archbishop of San Juan from 1965 to 1999. He is the only Puerto Rican to have been named a cardinal of the Catholic Church. He participated as an elector in the two conclaves of 1978, which elected Popes John Paul I and John Paul II.

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Akin Omoboriowo, Nigerian lawyer and politician (born 1932)

Akinwole Michael Omoboriowo was a Nigerian lawyer and politician who was Deputy Governor of Ondo State, later switching parties and contested for the governorship election of 1983 in Ondo State during the Nigerian Second Republic. He was initially declared the winner but was disputed and later reversed by a court of appeal before he could take office.

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10/04/2010

Casualties in the 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash included:

Ryszard Kaczorowski, GCMG was a Polish statesman. From 1989 to 1990, he served as the last president of Poland-in-exile. He succeeded Kazimierz Sabbat, and resigned his post following Poland's regaining independence from the Soviet sphere of influence and the election of Lech Wałęsa as the first democratically elected president of Poland since before the Second World War. He died on 10 April 2010 in the plane crash near Smolensk, Russia, along with the president of Poland Lech Kaczyński and other senior government officials.

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Casualties in the 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash included:

Maria Helena Kaczyńska was the First Lady of Poland from 2005 to 2010 as the wife of President Lech Kaczyński. She and her husband died in a plane crash in the Russian city of Smolensk.

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Casualties in the 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash included:

Lech Aleksander Kaczyński was a Polish politician who served as the 4th president of Poland from 2005 to 2010, when he died in the Smolensk air disaster. Earlier he served as the city mayor of Warsaw from 2002 to 2005. Prior to these tenures, Kaczyński served as President of the Supreme Audit Office from 1992 to 1995 and later Minister of Justice and Public Prosecutor General in Jerzy Buzek's cabinet from 2000 until his dismissal in July 2001.

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Casualties in the 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash included:

Anna Walentynowicz was a Polish trade unionist and co-founder of Solidarity, the first recognised independent trade union in the Eastern Bloc. Her firing from her job at the Lenin Shipyard in Gdańsk in August 1980 was the event that ignited the strike at the shipyard, set off a wave of strikes across Poland, and quickly paralyzed the Baltic coast. The Interfactory Strike Committee (MKS) based in the Gdańsk shipyard eventually transformed itself into Solidarity; by September, more than one million workers were on strike in support of the 21 demands of MKS, making it the largest strike ever.

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Dixie Carter, American actress and singer (born 1939)

Dixie Virginia Carter was an American actress. She starred as Julia Sugarbaker on the sitcom Designing Women (1986–1993) and as Randi King on the drama series Family Law (1999–2002). She was nominated for the 2007 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Comedy Series for her role as Gloria Hodge on Desperate Housewives (2006–2007).

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10/04/2009

Deborah Digges, American poet and educator (born 1950)

Deborah Digges was an American poet and teacher.

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Ioannis Patakis, Greek politician (born 1940)

Ioannis Patakis was a Greek politician who was a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) from 2001 to 2004 for the Communist Party of Greece (KKE).

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10/04/2007

Charles Philippe Leblond, French-Canadian biologist and academic (born 1910)

Charles Philippe Leblond was a pioneer of cell biology and stem cell research and a Canadian former professor of anatomy. Leblond is notable for developing autoradiography and his work showing how cells continuously renew themselves, regardless of age.

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Dakota Staton, American singer (born 1930)

Dakota Staton was an American jazz vocalist who found international acclaim with the 1957 No. 4 hit "The Late, Late Show". She was also known by the Muslim name Aliyah Rabia for a period due to her conversion to Islam as interpreted by the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community.

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10/04/2006

Kleitos Kyrou, Greek poet and translator (born 1921)

Kleitos-Dimitrios Kyrou was a Greek poet and translator. He was born in Thessaloniki and he studied at Anatolia College. In 1939, he entered the Law School of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. He worked in banking between 1951 and 1983, and he was General Secretary of the National Theatre of Northern Greece between 1974 and 1976.

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10/04/2005

Norbert Brainin, Austrian violinist (born 1923)

Norbert Brainin was the first violinist of the Amadeus Quartet, one of the world's most highly regarded string quartets.

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Scott Gottlieb, American drummer (born 1970)

Bleed the Dream is an American post-hardcore/alternative rock band from Southern California.

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Archbishop Iakovos of America (born 1911)

Archbishop Iakovos of North and South America was the primate of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America from 1959 until his resignation in 1996.

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Al Lucas, American football player (born 1978)

Albert Lucas was an American professional football player who played in the National Football League (NFL) and Arena Football League (AFL). He died from a game-related spinal cord injury while playing for the Los Angeles Avengers.

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Wally Tax, Dutch singer-songwriter (born 1948)

Wladimir "Wally" Tax was a Dutch singer and songwriter. He was founder and frontman of the Nederbeat group The Outsiders (1959–1969) and the rock group Tax Free (1969–1971).

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10/04/2004

Jacek Kaczmarski, Polish singer-songwriter, guitarist, and poet (born 1957)

Jacek Marcin Kaczmarski was a Polish singer, songwriter, poet and author.

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Sakıp Sabancı, Turkish businessman and philanthropist, founded Sabancı Holding (born 1933)

Sakıp Sabancı was a Turkish business tycoon and philanthropist.

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10/04/2003

Little Eva, American singer (born 1943)

Eva Narcissus Boyd, known by her stage name Little Eva, was an American singer best known for her 1962 hit "The Loco-Motion".

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10/04/2000

Peter Jones, English actor and screenwriter (born 1920)

Peter Geoffrey Francis Jones was an English actor, screenwriter and broadcaster.

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Larry Linville, American actor (born 1939)

Lawrence Lavon Linville was an American actor known for his portrayal of the surgeon Major Frank Burns on the television series M*A*S*H.

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10/04/1999

Heinz Fraenkel-Conrat, German-American biochemist and physician (born 1910)

Heinz Ludwig Fraenkel-Conrat was a biochemist, famous for his research on viruses.

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Jean Vander Pyl, American actress and voice artist (born 1919)

Jean Thurston Vander Pyl was an American voice actress. Although her career spanned many decades, she is best known as the voice of Wilma Flintstone for the Hanna-Barbera cartoon The Flintstones. In addition to Wilma Flintstone, she also provided the voices of Pebbles Flintstone; Rosie the robot maid from The Jetsons; Goldie, Lola Glamour, Nurse LaRue, and other characters in Top Cat; Winsome Witch on The Secret Squirrel Show; and Ogee on The Magilla Gorilla Show.

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10/04/1998

Seraphim of Athens, Greek archbishop (born 1913)

Seraphim born Vissarion Tikas was Archbishop of Athens and All Greece from 1974 to 1998.

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10/04/1997

Michael Dorris, American author and academic (born 1945)

Michael Anthony Dorris was an American novelist and scholar who was the first Chair of the Native American Studies program at Dartmouth College. His works include the novel A Yellow Raft in Blue Water (1987) and the memoir The Broken Cord (1989).

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10/04/1995

Morarji Desai, Indian politician, 4th Prime Minister of India (born 1896)

Morarji Ranchhodji Desai was an Indian politician and independence activist who served as the prime minister of India between 1977 and 1979 leading the government formed by the Janata Party. During his long career in politics, he held many important posts in government such as the chief minister of Bombay State, the home minister, the finance minister, and the deputy prime minister.

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10/04/1994

Sam B. Hall, Jr., American lawyer, judge, and politician (born 1924)

Samuel Blakeley Hall Jr. was an American lawyer, politician, and judge. He was a member of the United States House of Representatives from Texas's 1st congressional district from 1976 to 1985 and a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas from 1985 until his death in 1994.

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10/04/1993

Chris Hani, South African activist and politician (born 1942)

Chris Hani was a South African military commander, politician and revolutionary who served as the leader of the South African Communist Party (SACP) and chief of staff of uMkhonto we Sizwe (MK), the former armed wing of the African National Congress (ANC). He was a fierce opponent of the apartheid government, and was assassinated by Janusz Waluś, a Polish immigrant and sympathiser of the Conservative opposition on 10 April 1993, during the unrest preceding the transition to democracy.

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10/04/1992

Sam Kinison, American comedian and actor (born 1953)

Samuel Burl Kinison was an American stand-up comedian and actor. A former Pentecostal preacher, he performed stand-up routines that were characterized by intense sudden tirades, punctuated with his distinctive scream. Initially performing for free, Kinison became a regular fixture at The Comedy Store, where he met and eventually befriended such comics as Robin Williams and Jim Carrey.

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10/04/1991

Kevin Peter Hall, American actor (born 1955)

Kevin Peter Hall was an American actor. Hall stood 7 ft 2 in (2.18 m) tall, and frequently played monster characters. He was the original title monster in the science fiction Predator franchise, appearing in the first 1987 film and its 1990 sequel. Hall also portrayed the eponymous Harry in the fantasy comedy film Harry and the Hendersons (1987), a role he reprised for the first season of the syndicated television adaptation (1990–1991). His human roles included Dr. Elvin "El" Lincoln on the NBC science fiction series Misfits of Science (1985–1986) and Warren Merriwether on the sitcom 227 (1989–1990).

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Martin Hannett, English guitarist and producer (born 1948)

James Martin Hannett, was an English record producer, musician, and an original partner and director at Tony Wilson's Factory Records. He was also a co-founder of the musicians' collective Music Force, and the record label Rabid in the late 1970s.

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Natalie Schafer, American actress (born 1900)

Natalie Schafer was an American actress, best known today for her role as Lovey Howell on the sitcom Gilligan's Island (1964–1967).

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10/04/1988

Ezekias Papaioannou, Greek Cypriot politician (born 1908)

Ezekias Papaioannou was a Greek Cypriot communist politician and Secretary General of AKEL.

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10/04/1986

Linda Creed, American singer-songwriter (born 1948)

Linda Diane Creed, also known by her married name Linda Epstein, was an American songwriter, lyricist, background singer and record producer who teamed up with Thom Bell to produce some of the most successful Philadelphia soul groups of the 1970s.

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10/04/1985

Zisis Verros, Greek chieftain of the Macedonian Struggle (born 1880)

Zisis Verros was a notable Greek chieftain of the Macedonian Struggle.

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10/04/1983

Issam Sartawi, Palestinian activist (born 1935)

Issam Sartawi was a Palestinian cardiologist, guerrilla leader, politician and diplomat. He led a small fedayeen organisation in Jordan between 1968 and 1971 and became during that time a senior member of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO). He merged his organisation into Fatah, and became the personal envoy of Yasser Arafat to both European governments and moderate Israeli civil society. He is remembered for both his moderate stance within the PLO and his participation in dialogues with his Israeli counterparts during the 1970s.

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10/04/1981

Howard Thurman, American author, philosopher and civil rights activist (born 1899)

Howard Washington Thurman was an American author, philosopher, minister, theologian, Christian mystic, educator, and civil rights leader.

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10/04/1980

Kay Medford, American actress and singer (born 1919)

Margaret Kathleen Regan, better known as Kay Medford, was an American actress and singer. For her performance as Rose Brice in the musical Funny Girl and the film adaptation of the same name, she was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical and an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress respectively.

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10/04/1979

Nino Rota, Italian pianist, composer, and conductor (born 1911)

Giovanni "Nino" Rota Rinaldi was an Italian composer, pianist, conductor and academic who is best known for his film scores, notably for the films of Federico Fellini and Luchino Visconti. He also composed the music for two of Franco Zeffirelli's Shakespeare screen adaptations, and for the first two installments of Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather trilogy, earning the Academy Award for Best Original Score for The Godfather Part II (1974).

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10/04/1978

Hjalmar Mäe, Estonian politician (born 1901)

Hjalmar-Johannes Mäe was an Estonian politician and Nazi collaborator. In 1941–1944 he headed the Estonian Self-Administration, a puppet government set up during the country's occupation by Nazi Germany during World War II.

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10/04/1975

Walker Evans, American photographer (born 1903)

Walker Evans was an American photographer and photojournalist best known for his work for the Resettlement Administration and the Farm Security Administration (FSA) documenting the effects of the Great Depression. Evans published his first photos at the age of 27. Much of Evans' New Deal work uses the large format, 8 × 10-inch (200×250 mm) view camera. He said that his goal as a photographer was to make pictures that are "literate, authoritative, transcendent".

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Marjorie Main, American actress (born 1890)

Mary Tomlinson, professionally known as Marjorie Main, was an American character actress and singer of the Classical Hollywood period, best known as a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer contract player in the 1940s and 1950s, and for her role as Ma Kettle in 10 Ma and Pa Kettle movies. Main started her career in vaudeville and theatre, and appeared in film classics, such as Dead End (1937), The Women (1939), Dark Command (1940), The Shepherd of the Hills (1941), Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), and Friendly Persuasion (1956). Main, best known for playing "raucous, rough, and cantankerous women" on-screen, was characterized as "soft-spoken, shy," and "dignified" off-screen.

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10/04/1969

Harley Earl, American businessman (born 1893)

Harley Jarvis Earl was an American automotive designer and business executive. He was the initial designated head of design at General Motors, later becoming vice president, the first top executive ever appointed in design of a major corporation in American history. He was an industrial designer and a pioneer of transportation design. A coachbuilder by trade, Earl pioneered the use of freeform sketching and hand sculpted clay models as automotive design techniques. He subsequently introduced the "concept car" as both a tool for the design process and a clever marketing device.

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10/04/1968

Gustavs Celmiņš, Latvian lieutenant and politician (born 1899)

Gustavs Celmiņš was a Latvian politician, who was the founder of the ultranationalist, Anti-Baltic, anti-Slavic, and antisemitic political party Pērkonkrusts.

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10/04/1966

Evelyn Waugh, English soldier, novelist, journalist and critic (born 1903)

Arthur Evelyn St. John Waugh was an English writer of novels, biographies, and travel books; he was also a prolific journalist and book reviewer. His most famous works include the early satires Decline and Fall (1928) and A Handful of Dust (1934), the novel Brideshead Revisited (1945), and the Second World War trilogy Sword of Honour (1952–1961). He is recognised as one of the great prose stylists of the English language in the 20th century.

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10/04/1965

Lloyd Casner, American race car driver, founded Casner Motor Racing Division (born 1928)

Lloyd Perry Casner was an American race car driver and the creator of the Casner Motor Racing Division team.

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Linda Darnell, American actress (born 1923)

Linda Darnell was an American actress. Darnell progressed from modelling as a child to acting in theatre and film. At the encouragement of her mother, she made her first film in 1939, and appeared in both lead and supporting roles in big-budget films for 20th Century Fox throughout the 1940s. She co-starred with Tyrone Power in four films, including the classic The Mark of Zorro (1940). Her biggest commercial success was the controversial Forever Amber (1947), an adaptation of the best-selling novel of the 1940s and Fox's biggest hit of 1947. She won critical acclaim for her work in Summer Storm (1944), Hangover Square (1945), Fallen Angel (1945), Unfaithfully Yours (1948), A Letter to Three Wives (1949), and No Way Out (1950).

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10/04/1962

Michael Curtiz, Hungarian-American director, producer, and screenwriter (born 1886)

Michael Curtiz was a Hungarian and American film director, recognized as one of the most prolific directors in history. He directed classic films from the silent era and numerous others during Hollywood's Golden Age, when the studio system was prevalent.

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Stuart Sutcliffe, Scottish artist and musician (born 1940)

Stuart Fergusson Victor Sutcliffe was a British painter and musician from Edinburgh, Scotland, best known as the original bass guitarist of the Beatles. Sutcliffe left the band to pursue his career as a painter, having previously attended the Liverpool College of Art. Sutcliffe and John Lennon are credited with inventing the name "Beetles" [sic], as they both liked Buddy Holly's band, the Crickets. They also had a fascination with group names with double meanings, so Lennon then came up with "The Beatles", from the word beat. As a member of the group when it was a five-piece band, Sutcliffe is one of several who are sometimes referred to as the "Fifth Beatle".

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10/04/1960

André Berthomieu, French director and screenwriter (born 1903)

André Berthomieu was a French screenwriter and film director. He was married to the actress Line Noro.

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10/04/1958

Chuck Willis, American singer-songwriter (born 1928)

Harold "Chuck" Willis was an American blues, rhythm and blues, and rock and roll singer and songwriter. His biggest hits, "C. C. Rider" (1957) and "What Am I Living For" (1958), both reached No. 1 on the Billboard R&B chart. He was known as 'The King of the Stroll' for his performance of the 1950s dance, the stroll.

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10/04/1955

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, French priest, theologian, and philosopher (born 1881)

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J. was a French Jesuit, Catholic priest, scientist, paleontologist, philosopher, mystic, and teacher. Teilhard de Chardin investigated the theory of evolution from a perspective influenced by Henri Bergson and Christian mysticism, writing multiple scientific and religious works on the subject. His mainstream scientific achievements include his paleontological research in China, taking part in the discovery of the significant Peking Man fossils from the Zhoukoudian cave complex near Beijing. His more speculative ideas, sometimes criticized as pseudoscientific, have included a vitalist conception of the Omega Point. Along with Vladimir Vernadsky, he contributed to the development of the concept of the noosphere.

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10/04/1954

Auguste Lumière, French director and producer (born 1862)

The Lumière brothers, Auguste Marie Louis Nicolas Lumière and Louis Jean Lumière, were French manufacturers of photography equipment, best known for their Cinématographe motion picture system and the short films they produced between 1895 and 1905, which places them among the earliest filmmakers.

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Oscar Mathisen, Norwegian speed skater (born 1888)

Oscar Wilhelm Mathisen was a Norwegian speed skater and celebrity, almost rivalling Roald Amundsen and Fridtjof Nansen as symbols for a young nation. He represented Kristiania Skøiteklub.

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10/04/1950

Fevzi Çakmak, Turkish field marshal and politician, 2nd Prime Minister of Turkey (born 1876)

Mustafa Fevzi Çakmak was a Turkish field marshal (Mareşal) and politician. He served as the Chief of General Staff from 1918 and 1919 and later the Minister of War of the Ottoman Empire in 1920. He later joined the provisional Government of the Grand National Assembly and became the Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of National Defense and later as the prime minister of Turkey from 1921 to 1922. He was the second chief of the General Staff of the provisional Ankara Government and the first chief of the General Staff of the Republic of Turkey.

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10/04/1947

Charles Nordhoff, English-American lieutenant and author (born 1887)

Charles Bernard Nordhoff was an American novelist and traveler, born in England. Nordhoff is perhaps best known for The Bounty Trilogy, three historical novels he wrote with James Norman Hall: Mutiny on the Bounty (1932), Men Against the Sea (1934) and Pitcairn's Island (1934). During World War I, he served as a driver in the Ambulance Corps as well as an aviator in both the French Air Force's Lafayette Flying Corps and the United States Army Air Service, reaching the rank of lieutenant. After the war, Nordhoff spent much of his life on the island of Tahiti, where he and Hall wrote a number of successful adventure books, many adapted for film.

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10/04/1945

Hendrik Nicolaas Werkman, Dutch printer and typographer (born 1882)

Hendrik Nicolaas Werkman was an experimental Dutch artist, typographer, and printer. He set up a clandestine printing house during the Nazi occupation (1940–1945) and was shot by the Gestapo in the closing days of the war.

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10/04/1943

Andreas Faehlmann, Estonian-German sailor and engineer (born 1898)

Andreas R. Faehlmann was an Estonian aviation engineer and yachtsman who competed in the 1928 Summer Olympics.

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10/04/1942

Carl Schenstrøm, Danish actor and director (born 1881)

Karl Georg Harald Schenstrøm was a Danish stage and film actor of the silent era in Denmark. He worked under directors such as August Blom and Lau Lauritzen Sr.

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10/04/1938

King Oliver, American cornet player and bandleader (born 1885)

Joseph Nathan "King" Oliver was an American jazz cornet player and bandleader. He was particularly recognized for his playing style and his pioneering use of mutes in jazz. Also a notable composer, he wrote many tunes still played today, including "Dippermouth Blues", "Sweet Like This", "Canal Street Blues", and "Doctor Jazz". He was the mentor and teacher of Louis Armstrong. His influence was such that Armstrong claimed, "if it had not been for Joe Oliver, jazz would not be what it is today."

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10/04/1935

Rosa Campbell Praed, Australian novelist (born 1851)

Rosa Campbell Praed was an Australian author. Born in Bromelton, Queensland, in 1851, she grew up on properties across rural Queensland. She married in 1872 and spent two unhappy years on a cattle station on Curtis Island before moving to England with her husband. She became a successful novelist and published more than 45 books over the course of her career. After separating from her husband in the late 1890s, she lived for more than thirty years with a medium named Nancy Harward and developed an interest in reincarnation, spiritualism, and the occult. Praed has been described by the scholar Elizabeth Webby as "the first Australian-born novelist to achieve a significant international reputation".

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10/04/1931

Kahlil Gibran, Lebanese-American poet, painter, and philosopher (born 1883)

Gibran Khalil Gibran, usually referred to in English as Kahlil Gibran, was a Lebanese-American writer, poet and visual artist; he was also considered a philosopher, although he himself rejected the title. He is best known as the author of The Prophet, which was first published in the United States in 1923 and has since become one of the best-selling books of all time, having been translated into more than 100 languages.

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10/04/1922

Luisa Capetillo, Puerto Rican labor organizer

Luisa Capetillo Perón was a Puerto Rican labor organizer, writer, journalist, and cigar factory reader. She organized workers in Puerto Rico, the Republic of Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and the United States. She also published four books in her lifetime, covering a wide variety of forms, genres, and topics. As an anarcha-feminist and social anarchist, she advocated for free love, universal education, women's rights, and collective ownership of scientific advances while opposing state control.

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10/04/1920

Moritz Cantor, German mathematician and historian (born 1829)

Moritz Benedikt Cantor was a German historian of mathematics.

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10/04/1919

Emiliano Zapata, Mexican general (born 1879)

Emiliano Zapata Salazar was a Mexican revolutionary and guerrilla leader. He was a leading figure in the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920, the main leader of the people's revolution in the Mexican state of Morelos, and the inspiration of the agrarian movement called Zapatismo.

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10/04/1909

Algernon Charles Swinburne, English poet, playwright, novelist, and critic (born 1837)

Algernon Charles Swinburne was an English poet, playwright, novelist, and critic. He was a major contributor to the Pre-Raphaelite movement in poetry, along with Dante Gabriel Rossetti and William Morris. His greatest works are the verse drama Atalanta in Calydon (1865), written in the form of an Ancient Greek tragedy, and his Pre-Raphaelite Poems and Ballads (1866).

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10/04/1889

William Crichton, Scottish engineer and shipbuilder (born 1827)

William Crichton was a Scottish engineer and shipbuilder who spent most of his career in Turku, located in the Grand Duchy of Finland.

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10/04/1871

Lucio Norberto Mansilla, Argentinian general and politician (born 1789)

Lucio Norberto Mansilla was an Argentine military officer, surveyor and politician who played a prominent role in the Argentine War of Independence, the Cisplatine War and the Anglo-French blockade of the Río de la Plata. He was the first governor of the Entre Ríos Province. Although he commanded several units in many battles, he is most renowned for commanding the Argentine forces in the battle of Vuelta de Obligado on the Paraná River during the Anglo-French blockade of the Río de la Plata.

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10/04/1823

Karl Leonhard Reinhold, Austrian philosopher and academic (born 1757)

Karl Leonhard Reinhold was an Austrian philosopher who helped to popularise the work of Immanuel Kant in the late 18th century. His "elementary philosophy" (Elementarphilosophie) also influenced German idealism, notably Johann Gottlieb Fichte, as a critical system grounded in a fundamental first principle.

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10/04/1821

Gregory V of Constantinople, Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople (born 1746)

Gregory V of Constantinople, born Georgios Angelopoulos, was Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople from 1797 to 1798, from 1806 to 1808, and from 1818 to 1821. He was responsible for much restoration work to the Patriarchal Cathedral of St George, which had been badly damaged by fire in 1738.

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10/04/1813

Joseph-Louis Lagrange, Italian mathematician and astronomer (born 1736)

Joseph-Louis Lagrange, also reported as Giuseppe Luigi Lagrange or Lagrangia, was an Italian and naturalized French mathematician, physicist and astronomer. He made significant contributions to the fields of analysis, number theory, and both classical and celestial mechanics.

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10/04/1806

Horatio Gates, English-American general (born 1727)

Major General Horatio Lloyd Gates was a British-born American army officer and politician who served in the British Army and Continental Army. He played a major role during the American Revolutionary War in the American victory at the 1777 Battles of Saratoga. His career was subsequently tarnished when he was defeated by the British at the 1780 Battle of Camden. He has been described as "one of the Revolution's most controversial military figures" due to his role in the Conway Cabal, which attempted to discredit and replace George Washington as the Continental Army's commander-in-chief, along with his controversial actions at Saratoga and Camden.

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10/04/1786

John Byron, English admiral and politician, 24th Commodore Governor of Newfoundland (born 1723)

Vice-Admiral of the White John Byron was a Royal Navy officer, explorer and colonial administrator. He earned the nickname "Foul-Weather Jack" in the British press due to his frequent encounters with bad weather at sea. As a midshipman, Byron sailed in a squadron under George Anson on his voyage around the world, though Byron's ship, HMS Wager, made it only to southern Chile, where it was wrecked. He returned to England with the captain of the ship.

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10/04/1760

Jean Lebeuf, French historian and author (born 1687)

Jean Lebeuf was a French historian.

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10/04/1756

Giacomo Antonio Perti, Italian composer (born 1661)

Giacomo Antonio Perti was an Italian composer of the Baroque era. He was mainly active at Bologna, where he was Maestro di Cappella for sixty years. He was the teacher of Giuseppe Torelli and Giovanni Battista Martini.

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10/04/1704

Wilhelm Egon von Fürstenberg, German cardinal (born 1629)

Wilhelm Egon von Fürstenberg-Heiligenberg was a German count and later prince of Fürstenberg-Heiligenberg in the Holy Roman Empire. He was a clergyman who became bishop of Strasbourg, and was heavily involved in European politics after the Thirty Years' War. He worked for the Archbishop-Elector of Cologne and Louis XIV of France at the same time, and was arrested and tried for treason for convincing the Elector to fight on the opposite side of a war from the Empire.

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10/04/1667

Jan Marek Marci, Czech physician and author (born 1595)

Jan Marek Marci, also known as Johannes Marcus Marci was a Czech physician and scientist. He was the rector of the University of Prague and official physician to the Holy Roman Emperors. The crater Marci on the far side of the Moon is named after him.

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10/04/1646

Santino Solari, Swiss architect and sculptor (born 1576)

Santino Solari, was a Swiss architect and sculptor, who worked mainly in Austria. He was born in the Canton of Tessin, in Switzerland, near Lugano.

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10/04/1644

William Brewster, English official and pilgrim leader (born 1566)

William Brewster was an English official and Mayflower passenger in 1620. He became senior elder and the leader of Plymouth Colony, by virtue of his education and existing stature with those immigrating from the Netherlands, being a Brownist.

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10/04/1640

Agostino Agazzari, Italian composer and theorist (born 1578)

Agostino Agazzari was an Italian composer and music theorist.

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10/04/1619

Thomas Jones, English-Irish archbishop and politician, Lord Chancellor of Ireland (born 1550)

Thomas Jones was Archbishop of Dublin and Lord Chancellor of Ireland. He was also Dean of St. Patrick's Cathedral and Bishop of Meath. He was the patrilineal ancestor of the Viscounts Ranelagh.

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10/04/1601

Mark Alexander Boyd, Scottish soldier and poet (born 1562)

Mark Alexander Boyd was a Scottish poet and soldier of fortune. He was born in Ayrshire, Scotland. His father was from Penkill, Carrick, in Ayrshire. He was educated under the care of his uncle, the Archbishop of Glasgow, James Boyd of Trochrig. As a young man, he left Scotland for France, where he studied civil law. He took part in the French Wars of Religion, serving in the army of Henri III.

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10/04/1599

Gabrielle d'Estrées, French mistress of Henry IV of France (born 1571)

Gabrielle d'Estrées, Duchess of Beaufort and Verneuil, Marchioness of Monceaux was a mistress of Henry IV of France. She is noted for her role in ending the religious civil wars that had plagued France for more than 30 years.

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10/04/1598

Jacopo Mazzoni, Italian philosopher (born 1548)

Jacopo Mazzoni was an Italian philosopher, a professor in Pisa, and friend of Galileo Galilei. His first name is sometimes reported as Giacomo.

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10/04/1585

Gregory XIII, pope of the Catholic Church (born 1502)

Pope Gregory XIII was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 13 May 1572 to his death in April 1585. He is best known for commissioning and being the namesake for the Gregorian calendar, which remains the internationally accepted civil calendar to this day.

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10/04/1545

Costanzo Festa, Italian composer

Costanzo Festa was an Italian composer of the Renaissance. While he is best known for his madrigals, he also wrote sacred vocal music. He was the first native Italian polyphonist of international renown, and with Philippe Verdelot, one of the first to write madrigals, in the infancy of that most popular of all sixteenth-century Italian musical forms.

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10/04/1533

Frederick I, king of Denmark and Norway (born 1471)

Frederick I was King of Denmark and Norway from 1523 and 1524, respectively, until his death in 1533, and earlier co-duke Duke of Schleswig and Holstein.

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10/04/1500

Michael Tarchaniota Marullus, Greek scholar and poet

Michael Tarchaniota Marullus was a Greek Renaissance scholar, Neo-Latin poet, humanist and soldier.

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10/04/1362

Maud, English noblewoman (born 1339)

Maud of Lancaster, also known as Matilda, Countess of Hainault, was a 14th-century English noblewoman who married into the Bavarian ducal family.

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10/04/1309

Elisabeth von Rapperswil, Swiss countess (born 1261)

Elisabeth von Rapperswil was the last countess of the House of Rapperswil, and secured by her second marriage the female line of the Counts of Rapperswil and the extensive possessions of Rapperswil in the former Zürichgau to the Laufenburg line. Her son by first marriage was Reichsvogt Wernher von Homberg, and her oldest son by second marriage was Count Johann von Habsburg-Laufenburg who passed over the title of the count of Rapperswil to his oldest son Johann II and his brothers Rudolf and Gotfried.

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10/04/1282

Ahmad Fanakati, chief minister under Kublai Khan

Ahmad Fanākatī, alternatively rendered as Ahmad Banākatī was a Persian Muslim from the Qara Khitai who served as chancellor and finance minister of the Yuan dynasty during Kublai's reign. He became known as a chief minister under Kublai and is credited with successfully establishing the financial system of the Yuan dynasty. He was considered to be a "villainous minister" in dynastic histories because of his perceived corruption.

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10/04/1216

Eric X, king of Sweden (born 1180)

Erik Knutsson, sometimes known as Eric X, was King of Sweden between 1208 and 1216. Also known as Erik the Survivor, he was, at his accession to the throne, the only remaining son of King Knut Eriksson and his queen, whose name may have been Cecilia.

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10/04/1008

Notker of Liège, French bishop (born 940)

Notker of Liège was a Benedictine monk, bishop (972–1008) and first prince-bishop (980–1008) of the Bishopric of Liège.

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10/04/0948

Hugh of Arles, king of Italy

Hugh of Italy, known as Hugh of Arles or Hugh of Provence, was the king of Italy from 926 until 947, and regent in Lower Burgundy and Provence from 911 to 933. He belonged to the Bosonid family. During his reign in Italy, he empowered his relatives at the expense of the aristocracy and tried to establish a relationship with the Byzantine Empire. He had success in defending the realm from external enemies, but his domestic habits and policies created many internal foes and he was removed from power before his death.

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10/04/0879

Louis the Stammerer, king of West Francia (born 846)

Louis the Stammerer was the king of Aquitaine and later the king of West Francia. He was the eldest son of Emperor Charles the Bald and Ermentrude of Orléans. Louis the Stammerer was physically weak and outlived his father by a year and a half.

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