Died on Monday, 18th August – Famous Deaths

18/08/2024

Ruth Johnson Colvin, American author and educator, founded ProLiteracy Worldwide (born 1916)

Ruth Johnson Colvin was an American philanthropist who was the founder of the non-profit organization Literacy Volunteers of America, now called ProLiteracy Worldwide in Syracuse, New York, in 1962. She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President George W. Bush in December 2006.

---

Alain Delon, French-Swiss actor (born 1935)

Alain Fabien Maurice Marcel Delon was a French actor, film producer, screenwriter, singer, and businessman. Acknowledged as a cultural and cinematic leading man of the 20th century, Delon emerged as one of the foremost European actors of the late 1950s to the late 1980s, and became an international sex symbol. He is regarded as one of the most well-known figures in French cinema. His style, looks, and roles, which made him an international icon, earned him enduring popularity.

---

Phil Donahue, American talk show host and producer (born 1935)

Phillip John Donahue was an American media personality, writer, film producer, and the creator and host of The Phil Donahue Show. The television program, later known simply as Donahue, was the first popular talk show to feature a format that included audience participation. The show had a 29-year run on national television that began in Dayton, Ohio, in 1967 and ended in New York City in 1996.

---

18/08/2023

Lolita, the second-oldest orca in captivity (born ca. 1966)

Lolita, also called Tokitae or Toki for short,, was a captive female orca of the southern resident population captured from the wild in September 1970 and displayed at the Miami Seaquarium in Florida. She was retired from performing and taken off public display in 2022, and subsequently died in August 2023. At the time of her death, Lolita was the second-oldest orca in captivity after Corky at SeaWorld San Diego.

---

Al Quie, American politician, 35th Governor of Minnesota (born 1923)

Albert Harold "Al" Quie was an American politician and farmer from Minnesota. Quie served as a member of the United States House of Representatives representing Minnesota's 1st congressional district from 1958 to 1979 and as the 35th governor of Minnesota from 1979 to 1983.

---

18/08/2020

Ben Cross, English stage and film actor (born 1947)

Harry Bernard Cross known as Ben Cross, was an English actor. He was best known for his portrayal of the British Olympic athlete Harold Abrahams in the 1981 film Chariots of Fire and for playing Billy Flynn in the original West End production of the musical Chicago.

---

18/08/2018

Denis Edozie, Nigerian Supreme Court judge (born 1935)

Dennis Edozie was a Nigerian jurist who was Judge of the Supreme Court of Nigeria from 2003 until his retirement in 2005.

---

Kofi Annan, Ghanaian diplomat and seventh Secretary-General of the United Nations (born 1938)

Kofi Atta Annan was a Ghanaian diplomat and statesman who served as the seventh secretary-general of the United Nations from 1997 to 2006. Annan and the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize. He was the founder and chairman of the Kofi Annan Foundation, as well as chairman of The Elders, an international organisation founded by Nelson Mandela.

---

18/08/2017

Bruce Forsyth, English television presenter and entertainer (born 1928)

Sir Bruce Joseph Forsyth-Johnson, also known as Brucie, was a British entertainer and television personality whose career spanned over 75 years. His appeal stemmed from his showmanship, quick wit, and ability to connect with audiences, a talent honed during years on the post-war variety circuit. His legacy is marked by a transition from traditional music hall performance to the evolving world of television.

---

Zoe Laskari, Greek actress and beauty pageant winner (born 1944)

Zoe Laskari was a Greek actress and beauty pageant titleholder. After being crowned Star Hellas 1959 and representing Greece at Miss Universe 1959, where she was placed in the top-15, she switched to acting, where she had a brilliant career. She is considered one of the biggest stars of Greek cinema.

---

18/08/2016

Ernst Nolte, German historian (born 1923)

Ernst Nolte was a German historian and philosopher. Nolte's major interest was the comparative studies of fascism and communism. Originally trained in philosophy, he was professor emeritus of modern history at the Free University of Berlin, where he taught from 1973 until his 1991 retirement. He was previously a professor at the University of Marburg from 1965 to 1973. He was best known for his seminal work Fascism in Its Epoch, which received widespread acclaim when it was published in 1963. Nolte was a prominent conservative academic from the early 1960s and was involved in many controversies related to the interpretation of the history of fascism and communism, including the Historikerstreit in the late 1980s. In later years, Nolte focused on Islamism and "Islamic fascism".

---

18/08/2015

Khaled al-Asaad, Syrian archaeologist and author (born 1932)

Khaled Mohamad al-Asaad was a Syrian archaeologist who was head of antiquities in the ancient city of Palmyra, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. He held this position for over forty years. Al-Asaad was publicly beheaded by the Islamic State on 18 August 2015, at the age of 83.

---

Roger Smalley, English-Australian pianist, composer, and conductor (born 1943)

John Roger Smalley was an Anglo-Australian composer, pianist and conductor. Professor Smalley was a senior honorary research fellow at the School of Music, University of Western Australia in Perth and honorary research associate at the University of Sydney.

---

Suvra Mukherjee, wife of Indian president Pranab Mukherjee (born 1940)

Suvra Mukherjee was the First Lady of India serving from the year 2012 until her death in 2015.

---

Louis Stokes, American lawyer and politician (born 1925)

Louis Stokes was an American attorney, civil rights pioneer and politician. He served 15 terms in the United States House of Representatives – representing the east side of Cleveland – and was the first African American congressman elected in the state of Ohio. He was one of the Cold War era chairmen of the United States House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, headed the Congressional Black Caucus, and was the first African American on the United States House Committee on Appropriations.

---

Bud Yorkin, American director, producer, and screenwriter (born 1926)

Alan David "Bud" Yorkin was an American film and television producer, director, screenwriter, and actor.

---

18/08/2014

Gordon Faber, American soldier and politician, 39th Mayor of Hillsboro, Oregon (born 1930)

Gordon C. Faber was an American politician and businessman in the U.S. state of Oregon. A native of Pennsylvania, he grew up in Hillsboro, Oregon. He joined the U.S. Air Force during the Korean War and was a small business owner before becoming a real estate agent and entering politics. He served on Hillsboro's budget committee and city council before serving two terms as mayor from 1993 to 2001. The Gordon Faber Recreation Complex in the city's northeast corner is named in his honor.

---

Jim Jeffords, American captain, lawyer, and politician (born 1934)

James Merrill Jeffords was an American lawyer and politician from Vermont. Originally a Republican, he served as a member of the Vermont Senate from 1967 to 1969 and Vermont Attorney General 1969 to 1973. He lost the 1972 Republican primary for governor of Vermont, but in 1974 he won Vermont's at-large seat in the United States House of Representatives. He served in the US House from 1975 to 1989, and in 1988 won election to the United States Senate. In 2001, Jeffords left the Republican Party to become an independent and began caucusing with the senate's Democrats. Jeffords served in the Senate from 1989 until 2007.

---

Levente Lengyel, Hungarian chess player (born 1933)

Levente Lengyel was a Hungarian chess player, who gained the Grandmaster title in 1964.

---

Don Pardo, American radio and television announcer (born 1918)

Dominick George "Don" Pardo Jr. was an American radio and television announcer whose career spanned more than seven decades.

---

18/08/2013

Josephine D'Angelo, American baseball player (born 1924)

Josephine "Jo Jo" D'Angelo was an American baseball left fielder who played from 1943 through 1944 in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL). Listed at 5 ft 0 in (152 cm), 135 lb, she batted and threw right-handed.

---

Jean Kahn, French lawyer and activist (born 1929)

Jean Salomon Kahn was a French Jewish community leader, human rights activist, and lawyer. Kahn served as the President of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions in France (CRIF) from 1989 to 1995, as well as the CRIF's vice president from 1983 to 1985. He later served as the President of the European Jewish Congress and the Vice President of the World Jewish Congress. Kahn also headed the Central Consistory of France from 1995 to 2008.

---

Albert Murray, American author and critic (born 1916)

Albert L. Murray was an American literary and music critic, novelist, essayist, and biographer. His books include The Omni-Americans, South to a Very Old Place, and Stomping the Blues.

---

18/08/2012

Harrison Begay, American painter (born 1917)

Harrison Begay, also known as Haashké yah Níyá was a renowned Diné (Navajo) painter, printmaker, and illustrator. Begay specialized in watercolors, gouache, and silkscreen prints. At the time of his death in 2012, he was the last living, former student of Dorothy Dunn and Geronima C. Montoya at the Santa Fe Indian School. His work has won multiple awards and is exhibited in museums and private collections worldwide and he was among the most famous Diné artists of his generation.

---

John Kovatch, American football player (born 1920)

John George Kovatch Jr. was an American professional football end in the National Football League (NFL) for the Washington Redskins and the Green Bay Packers. He was born in South Bend, Indiana. He played college football at the University of Notre Dame and was selected in the 13th round of the 1942 NFL draft.

---

Scott McKenzie, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (born 1939)

Scott McKenzie was an American singer and songwriter who recorded the 1967 hit single "San Francisco ".

---

Ra. Ki. Rangarajan, Indian journalist and author (born 1927)

Ra. Ki. Rangarajan, popularly known as Ra Ki, was a Tamil journalist and prolific author of novels, short stories, essays, translations and other works. Rangarajan wrote under 10 pen names including: Mohini for historical novels, T. Duraisami for family dramas, Surya for youthful romance, Krishnakumar for mysteries, K. Malathi for postal-related stories, Mulri, Vinodh, Hamsa and Avittam for another genres.

---

Jesse Robredo, Filipino public servant and politician, 23rd Secretary of the Interior and Local Government (born 1958)

Jesus "Jesse" Manalastas Robredo was a Filipino politician who served as 23rd Secretary of the Interior and Local Government in the administration of President Benigno Aquino III from 2010 until his death in 2012. Robredo was a member of the Liberal Party.

---

18/08/2010

Hal Connolly, American hammer thrower and coach (born 1931)

Harold Vincent "Hal" Connolly was an American athlete and hammer thrower from Somerville, Massachusetts. He won a gold medal in the hammer throw at the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne. Connolly became the first American to throw a hammer more than 200 feet. He set his first of six world records just prior to the 1956 Olympics, and held the world record for nearly 10 years.

---

Benjamin Kaplan, American scholar and jurist (born 1911)

Benjamin Kaplan was an American copyright and procedure scholar and jurist. He was also notable as "one of the principal architects" of the Nuremberg trials. And as Reporter to the U.S. Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on Civil Rules, he played a pivotal role in the 1966 revisions to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 23, which transformed class action practice in the U.S.

---

18/08/2009

Kim Dae-jung, South Korean lieutenant and politician, 15th President of South Korea, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1925)

Kim Dae-jung was a South Korean politician, activist and statesman who served as the eighth president of South Korea from 1998 to 2003.

---

Rose Friedman, Ukrainian-American economist and author (born 1910)

Rose Director Friedman ; born Rose Director was a free-market economist and co-founder of the Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation.

---

Robert Novak, American journalist and author (born 1931)

Robert David Sanders Novak was an American syndicated columnist, journalist, television personality, author, and conservative political commentator. After working for two newspapers before serving in the U.S. Army during the Korean War, he became a reporter for the Associated Press and then for The Wall Street Journal. He teamed up with Rowland Evans in 1963 to start Inside Report, which became the longest running syndicated political column in U.S. history and ran in hundreds of papers. They also started the Evans-Novak Political Report, a biweekly newsletter, in 1967.

---

18/08/2007

Michael Deaver, American soldier and politician, White House Deputy Chief of Staff (born 1938)

Michael Keith Deaver was a member of President Ronald Reagan's White House staff who served as White House Deputy Chief of Staff under James Baker III and Donald Regan from January 1981 to May 1985.

---

Magdalen Nabb, English author (born 1947)

Magdalen Nabb was a British author, best known for the Marshal Guarnaccia detective novels.

---

18/08/2006

Fernand Gignac, French Canadian singer and actor (born 1934).

Fernand Gignac was a French Canadian singer and actor.

---

Ken Kearney, Australian rugby player (born 1924)

Kenneth Howard "Killer" Kearney was an Australian rugby footballer – a dual-code international player – and a rugby league coach. He represented the Wallabies in seven Tests, and the Kangaroos in thirty-one Test matches and World Cup games. He captained Australia in nine rugby league Test matches in 1956 and 1957. He was a hooker and captain-coach with the St. George Dragons in the first half of their eleven-year consecutive premiership winning run from 1956 to 1966. He is considered one of Australia's finest footballers of the 20th century.

---

18/08/2005

Chri$ Ca$h, American wrestler (born 1982)

Christopher Jonathan Bauman Jr. was an American professional wrestler, better known by his ring name Chri$ Ca$h. Bauman wrestled in many independent promotions, but is known for his time in Combat Zone Wrestling, where he was a CZW World Tag Team Champion. On August 18, 2005, Bauman was killed in a motorcycle accident.

---

18/08/2004

Elmer Bernstein, American composer and conductor (born 1922)

Elmer Bernstein was an American composer and conductor. In a career that spanned over five decades, he composed "some of the most recognizable and memorable themes in Hollywood history", including over 150 original film scores, as well as scores for nearly 80 television productions. For his work, he received an Academy Award for Thoroughly Modern Millie (1967) and a Primetime Emmy Award. He also received seven Golden Globe Awards, five Grammy Awards, and two Tony Award nominations.

---

Hiram Fong, American soldier and politician (born 1906)

Hiram Leong Fong was an American businessman, lawyer, and politician from Hawaii. Born to a Cantonese immigrant sugar plantation worker, Fong was one of the first two senators for Hawaii after it became the 50th US state in 1959. He was the first Chinese American and first Asian American United States Senator, serving from 1959 to 1977, and to date he remains the only Republican U.S. senator from Hawaii.

---

18/08/2003

Tony Jackson, English singer and bassist (born 1938)

Anthony Paul Jackson was a British musician. He was known for being a member of the Merseybeat band The Searchers.

---

18/08/2002

Dean Riesner, American actor and screenwriter (born 1918)

Dean Riesner was an American film and television writer.

---

18/08/2001

David Peakall, English chemist and toxicologist (born 1931)

David Beaumont Peakall was an internationally recognised toxicologist. His research into the effects of DDE and DDT on eggshells contributed to the ban on DDT in the United States. He proved that the chemicals caused thinning of eggshells, leading to a reduction in the population of various bird species. He also pioneered research on the effects of PCBs on birds.

---

18/08/1998

Persis Khambatta, Indian model and actress, Femina Miss India 1965 (born 1948)

Persis Khambatta was an Indian actress, model and beauty pageant titleholder best remembered for playing Lieutenant Ilia in the feature film Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979).

---

18/08/1994

Francis Raymond Shea, American bishop (born 1913)

Francis Raymond Shea was an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as the third bishop of the Diocese of Evansville in Indiana from 1969 to 1989.

---

18/08/1990

B. F. Skinner, American psychologist and philosopher, invented the Skinner box (born 1904)

Burrhus Frederic Skinner was an American psychologist, behaviorist, inventor, and social philosopher. He was the Edgar Pierce Professor of Psychology at Harvard University from 1948 until his retirement in 1974.

---

18/08/1986

Harun Babunagari, Bangladeshi Islamic scholar and educationist (born 1902)

Harun Babunagari was a Bangladeshi Deobandi Islamic scholar, Sufi, and an exegete of the Quran. He was the founder and first Principal of Al-Jamiatul Islamiah Azizul Uloom Babunagar, one of the oldest Qawmi madrasas in Bangladesh.

---

18/08/1983

Nikolaus Pevsner, German-English historian and scholar (born 1902)

Sir Nikolaus Bernhard Leon Pevsner was a German-British historian who specialised in the art and architecture genres. He is best known for his monumental 46-volume series of county-by-county guides, The Buildings of England (1951–1974).

---

18/08/1981

Anita Loos, American author and screenwriter (born 1889)

Corinne Anita Loos was an American actress, novelist, playwright and screenwriter. In 1912, she became the first female staff screenwriter in Hollywood, when D. W. Griffith put her on the payroll at Triangle Film Corporation. She is best known for her 1925 comic novel, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, her screenplay of the 1939 adaptation of The Women, and her 1951 Broadway adaptation of Colette's novella Gigi.

---

18/08/1979

Vasantrao Naik, Indian politician (born 1913)

Vasantrao Phulsingh Naik was an Indian politician, social reformer and Pioneer of Green, White Revolution and Guarantee Employment Scheme. He served as the Chief Minister of Maharashtra from 1963 until 1975.

---

18/08/1975

Odd Lindbäck-Larsen, Norwegian Army general and war historian (born 1897)

Odd Lindbäck-Larsen was a Norwegian military officer and war historian. He participated in the Norwegian Campaign in Northern Norway during the Second World War as the chief-of-staff, under general Fleischer. He spent most of the war in Norwegian and German concentration camps. He continued his military career after the war, eventually with the rank of major general and military attaché in Stockholm. He wrote several books on Norwegian military history.

---

18/08/1968

Arthur Marshall, American pianist and composer (born 1881)

Arthur Owen Marshall was an American composer and performer of ragtime music from Missouri. He was a protege of famed ragtime composer Scott Joplin.

---

18/08/1964

Hildegard Trabant, Berlin Wall victim (born 1927)

Hildegard Johanna Maria Trabant was an East German woman who became the fiftieth known person to die at the Berlin Wall. Trabant was shot and killed by East German border guards during a crossing attempt, one of only eight women victims of the Berlin Wall, and was the only escapee victim known to have a record of loyalty toward the East German regime.

---

18/08/1961

Learned Hand, American lawyer, jurist, and philosopher (born 1872)

Billings Learned Hand was an American jurist, lawyer, and judicial philosopher. He served as a federal trial judge on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York from 1909 to 1924 and as a federal appellate judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit from 1924 to 1961.

---

18/08/1952

Alberto Hurtado, Chilean priest, lawyer, and saint (born 1901)

Alberto Hurtado, SJ, popularly known as Padre Hurtado, was a Chilean Jesuit priest, lawyer, social worker, and writer of Basque ancestry. He founded the Hogar de Cristo foundation in 1944.

---

18/08/1950

Julien Lahaut, Belgian soldier and politician (born 1884)

Julien-Victor Lahaut was a Belgian politician and communist activist who served as president of the Communist Party of Belgium from 1945 to 1950. An important figure during the German occupation of 1940–44, he became a vocal advocate for the abolition of the Belgian monarchy during the post-war Royal Question. His assassination in August 1950, at the height of the crisis, was linked to anti-communist and royalist elements inside the Belgian intelligence services by a team of historians in 2015; however, the murder remains officially unsolved.

---

18/08/1949

Paul Mares, American trumpet player and bandleader (born 1900)

Paul Mares, was an American early dixieland jazz cornet and trumpet player, and leader of the New Orleans Rhythm Kings.

---

18/08/1946

Che Yaoxian, Chinese communist (born 1894)

Che Yaoxian was a member of the Chinese Communist Party and an officer in the Sichuan army. In 1921, after meeting a local preacher in Jianyang, he converted to Christianity. In 1927, he represented Sichuan at the East Asian Christian Association conference in Shanghai. Sometime in the 1930s, he founded the anti-imperialist Chengdu Christian Improvement Association, which advocated for "self-nourishing" and "self-propagation". However, he also experienced crises of faith, such as in 1928, when he lamented in a poem titled "Oath to Myself": "Religion merely deceives foolish people."

---

Luo Shiwen, Chinese communist (born 1904)

Luo Shiwen was a Chinese communist. Born in Weiyuan County, Sichuan, he became interested in communism during the May Fourth Movement before joining the Chinese Socialist Youth League in 1923 and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in 1925. After three years in the Soviet Union, he returned to China in 1928 and was dispatched to advise General Kuang Jixun when his forces declared themselves part of the Red Army. After several victories against the Kuomintang (KMT), the communist forces were defeated at Kaijiang, and Luo was subsequently sent to provide training in the Sichuan–Shanxi Soviet.

---

18/08/1945

Subhas Chandra Bose, Indian activist and politician (born 1897)

Subhas Chandra Bose was an Indian anti-colonial nationalist. Bose's defiance of British authority in India made him a hero among many Indians, but his wartime alliances with Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan left a legacy vexed by authoritarianism, antisemitism, and military failure. The honorific Netaji was first applied to Bose in Germany in early 1942—by the Indian soldiers of the Indische Legion and by the German and Indian officials in the Special Bureau for India in Berlin. It is now used throughout India.

---

18/08/1944

Ernst Thälmann, German soldier and politician (born 1886)

Ernst Johannes Fritz Thälmann was a German communist politician, revolutionary, and leader of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD) from 1925 to 1933.

---

18/08/1943

Ali-Agha Shikhlinski, Azerbaijani general (born 1865)

Ali Agha Ismail Agha oghlu Shikhlinski ; 3 March [O.S. 15 March] 1863 – 18 August 1943) was an Azerbaijani lieutenant-general of the Imperial Russian Army, Deputy Minister of Defense and General of the Artillery of Azerbaijan Democratic Republic and a Soviet military officer.

---

18/08/1942

Erwin Schulhoff, Austro-Czech composer and pianist (born 1894)

Erwin Schulhoff was an Austro-Czech composer and pianist. He was one of the figures in the generation of European musicians whose successful careers were prematurely terminated by the rise of the Nazi regime in Germany and whose works have been rarely noted or performed beyond Czechoslovakia until the 1980s.

---

18/08/1940

Walter Chrysler, American businessman, founded Chrysler (born 1875)

Walter Percy Chrysler was an American industrial pioneer in the automotive industry, automotive industry executive, and the founder and namesake of American Chrysler Corporation.

---

18/08/1919

Joseph E. Seagram, Canadian businessman and politician, founded the Seagram Company (born 1841)

Joseph Emm Seagram was a Canadian distillery founder, politician, philanthropist, and major owner of thoroughbred racehorses.

---

18/08/1890

Mother Solomon, Wyandot activist (born 1816)

Margaret Grey Eyes Solomon, better known as Mother Solomon, was a Wyandot nanny and cultural activist. Solomon was born along Owl Creek in Marion County, Ohio, to a Wyandot chief father. In 1822, her family moved to the Big Spring Reservation in Wyandot County, where elders relayed oral tradition to her. She learned housekeeping and English at a mission school and began attending the Wyandot Mission Church. Solomon married David Young, a Wyandot man, in 1833 and had several children with him, some of whom died before 1843. That year, the Indian Removal Act forced the Wyandots to move to Kansas. Illness and poor living conditions were initially widespread in the new community. Solomon had more children in Kansas, though by 1860, her husband and remaining children had died.

---

18/08/1886

Eli Whitney Blake, American inventor, invented the Mortise lock (born 1795)

Eli Whitney Blake, Sr. was an American inventor, best known for his mortise lock and stone-crushing machine, the latter of which earned him a place into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.

---

18/08/1852

James Finlayson, Scottish Quaker (born 1772)

James Finlayson was a Scottish Quaker who, in effect, brought the Industrial Revolution to Tampere, Finland, founding in 1820 the Finlayson company.

---

18/08/1850

Honoré de Balzac, French novelist and playwright (born 1799)

Honoré de Balzac was a French novelist and playwright. The novel sequence La Comédie humaine, described as a panorama of post-Napoleonic French life, is generally viewed as his magnum opus.

---

18/08/1842

Louis de Freycinet, French explorer and navigator (born 1779)

Louis Claude de Saulces de Freycinet was a French Navy officer. He circumnavigated the Earth, and in 1811 published the first map to show a full outline of the coastline of Australia.

---

18/08/1823

André-Jacques Garnerin, French balloonist and the inventor of the frameless parachute (born 1769)

André-Jacques Garnerin was a French balloonist and the inventor of the frameless parachute. He was appointed Official Aeronaut of France.

---

18/08/1815

Chauncey Goodrich, American lawyer and politician, 8th Lieutenant Governor of Connecticut (born 1759)

Chauncey Goodrich was an American lawyer and politician from Connecticut who represented that state in the United States Congress as both a senator and a representative.

---

18/08/1765

Francis I, Holy Roman Emperor (born 1708)

Francis I was Holy Roman Emperor from 1745 to 1765, Archduke of Austria from 1740 to 1765, Duke of Lorraine and Bar from 1729 to 1737, and Grand Duke of Tuscany from 1737 to 1765. He became the ruler of the Holy Roman Empire and Tuscany through his marriage to his second cousin Maria Theresa of Austria, daughter of Emperor Charles VI. Francis was the last non-Habsburg monarch of the Empire. The couple were the founders of the Habsburg-Lorraine dynasty, and their marriage produced sixteen children.

---

18/08/1712

Richard Savage, 4th Earl Rivers, English general and politician, Lord Lieutenant of Essex (born 1660)

General Richard Savage, 4th Earl Rivers PC was an English nobleman and soldier who was a senior Army officer in the English and then British Army. The second son of Thomas Savage, 3rd Earl Rivers and his first wife Elizabeth Scrope, Savage was styled Viscount Colchester after the death of his elder brother Thomas in 1680, he was designated by that title until he succeeded to the peerage upon the death of his father, the 3rd Earl, in 1694. Savage served as Master-General of the Ordnance and Constable of the Tower, and was briefly commander-in-chief of the forces in lieu of James Butler, 2nd Duke of Ormonde until his death in 1712.

---

18/08/1707

William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Devonshire, English soldier and politician, Lord Lieutenant of Derbyshire (born 1640)

William Cavendish, 1st Duke of Devonshire was an English Whig politician who sat in the House of Commons of England from 1661 until 1684 when he inherited his father's peerage as Earl of Devonshire and took his seat in the House of Lords. Cavendish was part of the "Immortal Seven" which invited William of Orange to depose James II of England as part of the Glorious Revolution, and was rewarded for his efforts by being elevated to the Duke of Devonshire in 1694.

---

18/08/1683

Charles Hart, English actor (born 1625)

Charles Hart was a prominent English Restoration actor.

---

18/08/1648

Ibrahim of the Ottoman Empire (born 1615)

Ibrahim was the sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1640 until 1648.

---

18/08/1642

Guido Reni, Italian painter and educator (born 1575)

Guido Reni was an Italian Baroque painter, although his works showed a classical manner, similar to Simon Vouet, Nicolas Poussin, and Philippe de Champaigne. He painted primarily religious works, but also mythological and allegorical subjects. Active in Rome, Naples, and his native Bologna, he became the dominant figure in the Bolognese School that emerged under the influence of the Carracci.

---

18/08/1634

Urbain Grandier, French priest (born 1590)

Urbain Grandier was a French Catholic priest who was burned at the stake after being convicted of witchcraft, following the events of the so-called "Loudun possessions". Most modern commentators have concluded that Grandier was the victim of a politically motivated persecution led by the powerful Cardinal Richelieu.

---

18/08/1625

Edward la Zouche, 11th Baron Zouche, English diplomat (born 1556)

Edward la Zouche, 11th Baron Zouche was an English diplomat. He is remembered chiefly for his lone vote against the condemnation of Mary, Queen of Scots, and for organising the stag hunt where his guest, the Archbishop of Canterbury, accidentally killed a man.

---

18/08/1620

Wanli Emperor of China (born 1563)

The Wanli Emperor, personal name Zhu Yijun, was the 14th emperor of the Ming dynasty, reigning from 1572 to 1620. He succeeded his father, the Longqing Emperor. His reign of 48 years was the longest of the Ming dynasty.

---

18/08/1613

Giovanni Artusi, Italian composer and theorist (born 1540)

Giovanni Maria Artusi was an Italian music theorist, composer, and writer.

---

18/08/1600

Sebastiano Montelupi, Italian businessman (born 1516)

Sebastiano Montelupi, was an Italian-born merchant and banker in Kraków, Poland, and Postmaster General of the Polish royal postal service under Sigismund II Augustus, Henry III of Poland, Anna Jagiellon, Stephen Báthory and Sigismund III Vasa.

---

18/08/1563

Étienne de La Boétie, French judge and philosopher (born 1530)

Étienne or Estienne de La Boétie was a French magistrate, classicist, writer, poet and political theorist, best remembered for his friendship with essayist Michel de Montaigne. His early political treatise Discourse on Voluntary Servitude was posthumously adopted by the Huguenot movement and is sometimes seen as an early influence on modern anti-statist, utopian and civil disobedience thought.

---

18/08/1559

Pope Paul IV (born 1476)

Pope Paul IV, born Gian Pietro Carafa, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 23 May 1555 to his death, in August 1559. While serving as papal nuncio in Spain, he developed an anti-Spanish outlook that later coloured his papacy. In response to an invasion of part of the Papal States by Spain during his papacy, he called for a French military intervention. After a defeat of the French and with Spanish troops at the edge of Rome, the Papacy and Spain reached a compromise: French and Spanish forces left the Papal States and the Pope thereafter adopted a neutral stance between France and Spain.

---

18/08/1550

Antonio Ferramolino, Italian architect and military engineer

Antonio Ferramolino was a 16th-century Italian architect and military engineer. He is also known as Sferrandino da Bergamo, and is called Hernan Molin in Spanish sources. He is mostly known for his work in Sicily, but he also designed fortifications in Ragusa and Malta.

---

18/08/1503

Pope Alexander VI (born 1431)

Pope Alexander VI was head of the Catholic Church and leader of the Papal States from 11 August 1492 until his death in 1503.

---

18/08/1502

Knut Alvsson, Norwegian nobleman and politician (born 1455)

Knut Alvsson was a Norwegian nobleman and landowner. He was the country's foremost Norwegian-born noble in his time and served as fief-holder in southern-central Norway.

---

18/08/1500

Alfonso of Aragon, Spanish prince (born 1481)

Alfonso of Aragon, Duke of Bisceglie and Prince of Salerno of the House of Trastámara, was the illegitimate son of Alfonso II King of Naples and his mistress Trogia Gazzella. His father, cousin of King Ferdinand II of Aragon, abdicated in favour of his legitimate son Ferdinand II of Naples.

---

18/08/1430

Thomas de Ros, 8th Baron de Ros, English soldier and politician (born 1406)

Thomas Ros or Roos, 8th Baron Ros of Helmsley was an English peer.

---

18/08/1318

Clare of Montefalco, Italian nun and saint (born 1268)

Clare of Montefalco, OSA, in religion Saint Clare of the Cross, was an Augustinian nun and abbess. She was formerly a member of the Third Order of St. Francis. She was canonized by Pope Leo XIII on December 8, 1881.

---

18/08/1276

Pope Adrian V (born 1220)

Pope Adrian V, born Ottobuono de' Fieschi, was the head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 11 July 1276 to his death on 18 August 1276. He was an envoy of Pope Clement IV sent to England in May 1265 who successfully completed his task of resolving disputes between King Henry III of England and his barons. Adrian V was elected pope following the death of Innocent V, but died of natural illness before being ordained to the priesthood.

---

18/08/1258

Theodore II Laskaris, emperor of Nicea (Byzantine emperor in exile)

Theodore II Doukas Laskaris or Ducas Lascaris was Emperor of Nicaea from 1254 to 1258. He was the only child of Emperor John III Doukas Vatatzes and Empress Irene Laskarina. His mother was the eldest daughter of Theodore I Laskaris, who had established the Empire of Nicaea as a successor state to the Byzantine Empire in Asia Minor after the crusaders captured the Byzantine capital, Constantinople, during the Fourth Crusade in 1204. Theodore received an excellent education from two renowned scholars, Nikephoros Blemmydes and George Akropolites. He made friends with young intellectuals, especially with a page of low birth, George Mouzalon. Theodore began to write treatises on theological, historical and philosophical themes in his youth.

---

18/08/1211

Narapatisithu, king of Burma (born 1150)

Narapati Sithu was king of Pagan dynasty of Burma (Myanmar) from 1174 to 1211. He is considered the last important king of the Pagans. His peaceful and prosperous reign gave rise to Burmese culture which finally emerged from the shadow of Mon and Pyu cultures. The Burman leadership of the kingdom was now unquestioned. The Pagan Empire reached its peak during his reign, and would decline gradually after his death.

---

18/08/1095

King Olaf I of Denmark

Olaf I, nicknamed Olaf Hunger, was king of Denmark from 1086 to 1095, following the death of his brother Canute IV the Holy. He was a son of king Sweyn II Estridsson, and the third of Sweyn's sons to rule. He married Ingegard, the daughter of Harald Hardråde, but did not have any sons. He was succeeded by his brother Eric the Good.

---

18/08/0911

Al-Hadi ila'l-Haqq Yahya, first Zaydi Imam of Yemen (born 859)

911 (CMXI) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar.

---

18/08/0849

Walafrid Strabo, German monk and theologian (born 808)

Walafrid, alternatively spelt Walahfrid, nicknamed Strabo, was an Alemannic Benedictine monk and theological writer who lived on Reichenau Island in southern Germany.

---

18/08/0673

Kim Yu-shin, general of Silla (born 595)

Kim Yu-sin was a Korean military general and politician in 7th-century Silla. He led the unification of the Korean Peninsula by Silla under the reign of King Muyeol and King Munmu. He is said to have been the great-grandchild of King Guhae of Geumgwan Gaya, the last ruler of the Geumgwan Gaya state. This would have given him a very high position in the Silla bone rank system, which governed the political and military status that a person could attain.

---

18/08/0670

Fiacre, Irish hermit

Fiacre is the name of three different Irish saints, the most famous of which is Fiacre of Breuil, the priest, abbot, hermit, and gardener of the seventh century who was famous for his sanctity and skill in curing infirmities. He emigrated from his native Ireland to France, where he constructed for himself a hermitage together with a vegetable and herb garden, oratory, and hospice for travellers. He is the patron saint of gardeners and hemorrhoids.

---

18/08/0472

Ricimer, Roman general and politician (born 405)

Ricimer was a Romanized Germanic general, who ruled the remaining territory of the Western Roman Empire from 456 after defeating Avitus, until his death in 472, with a brief interlude in which he contested power with Procopius Anthemius. Deriving his power from his position as magister militum of the Western Empire, Ricimer exercised political control through a series of puppet emperors. Ricimer's death led to unrest across Italy and the establishment of a Germanic kingdom on the Italian Peninsula.

---

18/08/0440

Pope Sixtus III

Pope Sixtus III, also called Pope Xystus III, was the bishop of Rome from 31 July 432 to his death on 18 August 440. His ascension to the papacy is associated with a period of increased construction in the city of Rome. His feast day is celebrated by the Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodox Church on 28 March.

---

18/08/0353

Decentius, Roman usurper

Magnus Decentius was caesar of the Western Roman Empire from 350 to 353, under his brother Magnentius.

---