Died on Monday, 8th December – Famous Deaths

08/12/2024

Jill Jacobson, American actress (born 1954)

Jill Jacobson was an American actress of film, television, primetime soap opera, stage, and standup, best known for her television performances.

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Clarke Reed, American businessman and politician (born 1928)

Clarke Thomas Reed Sr. was an American businessman and politician. He served as Chairman of the Mississippi Republican Party from 1966 to 1976. Prior to his political career, Reed was an agricultural businessman and a graduate in economics.

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08/12/2023

Ryan O'Neal, American actor (born 1941)

Charles Patrick Ryan O'Neal was an American actor. Born in Los Angeles, he trained as an amateur boxer before beginning a career in acting in 1960.

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08/12/2021

Robbie Shakespeare, Jamaican bass guitarist and record producer (born 1953)

Robert Warren Dale Shakespeare was a Jamaican bass guitarist and record producer, best known as half of the reggae rhythm section and production duo Sly and Robbie, with drummer Sly Dunbar. Regarded as one of the most influential reggae bassists, Shakespeare was also known for his creative use of electronics and production effects units. He was sometimes nicknamed "Basspeare".

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08/12/2019

René Auberjonois, American actor (born 1940)

René Marie Murat Auberjonois was an American actor. He was a Tony Award and Drama Desk Award winner, and a three-time Emmy Award nominee, among other accolades.

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Juice Wrld, American rapper, singer and songwriter (born 1998)

Jarad Anthony Higgins, known professionally as Juice Wrld, was an American rapper, singer, and songwriter. He emerged as a leading figure in the emo and SoundCloud rap genres, which garnered mainstream attention during the mid-to-late 2010s. His stage name, which he said represents "taking over the world", was derived from the crime thriller film Juice (1992).

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Caroll Spinney, American puppeteer and actor (born 1933)

Caroll Edwin Spinney was an American puppeteer, cartoonist, author, artist and speaker, most famous for playing Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch on Sesame Street from its inception in 1969 until 2018.

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08/12/2018

David Weatherall, English physician, geneticist, and academic (born 1933)

Sir David John Weatherall was a British physician and researcher in molecular genetics, haematology, pathology and clinical medicine.

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08/12/2016

John Glenn, American astronaut and senator, first American to go into orbit (born 1921)

John Herschel Glenn Jr. was an American Marine Corps aviator, astronaut, businessman, and politician. He was the third American in space and the first to orbit the Earth, circling it three times in 1962. Following his retirement from NASA, he served from 1974 to 1999 as a U.S. senator from Ohio. In 1998, he flew into space again at the age of 77.

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08/12/2015

Mattiwilda Dobbs, American soprano and actress (born 1925)

Mattiwilda Dobbs was an American coloratura soprano and was one of the first black singers to enjoy a major international career in opera. She was the first black singer to perform at La Scala in Italy, the first black woman to receive a long-term performance contract and to sing a lead role at the Metropolitan Opera, New York and the first black singer to play a lead role at the San Francisco Opera.

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Alan Hodgkinson, English footballer and coach (born 1936)

Alan Hodgkinson MBE was an English professional football goalkeeper and goalkeeping coach.

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Douglas Tompkins, American businessman, co-founded The North Face and Esprit Holdings (born 1943)

Douglas Rainsford Tompkins was an American businessman, conservationist, outdoorsman, philanthropist, filmmaker, and agriculturalist. He founded the North Face Inc, co-founded Esprit and various environmental groups, including the Foundation for Deep Ecology and Tompkins Conservation.

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John Trudell, American author, poet, and actor (born 1946)

John Trudell was a Native American author, poet, actor, musician, and political activist. He was the spokesperson for the Indians of All Tribes' takeover of Alcatraz beginning in 1969, broadcasting as Radio Free Alcatraz. During most of the 1970s, he served as the chairman of the American Indian Movement, based in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

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Elsie Tu, English-Hong Kong educator and politician (born 1913)

Elsie Tu, known as Elsie Elliott in her earlier life, was a British-born Hong Kong social activist, elected member of the Urban Council of Hong Kong from 1963 to 1995, and member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong from 1988 to 1995.

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08/12/2014

Tom Gosnell, Canadian lawyer and politician (born 1951)

Thomas Charles Gosnell was mayor of London, Ontario, Canada from December 1, 1985, to December 1, 1994. He was the son of James Fredrick Gosnell, known as "Fred", who was the mayor of London, Ontario, Canada briefly in 1972. Gosnell was London City Council's deputy mayor and budget chief from 2003 to 2010. Gosnell died at his home in London of cancer in 2014.

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Russ Kemmerer, American baseball player and coach (born 1930)

Russell Paul Kemmerer was an American professional baseball player. He was a right-handed pitcher who played for the Boston Red Sox (1954–1957), the Washington Senators (1957–1960), the Chicago White Sox (1960–1962), and the Houston Colt .45s (1962–1963) to finish his career.

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Knut Nystedt, Norwegian organist and composer (born 1915)

Knut Nystedt was a Norwegian orchestral and choral composer.

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08/12/2013

John Cornforth, Australian-English chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1917)

Sir John Warcup Cornforth Jr., was an Australian–British chemist who won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1975 for his work on the stereochemistry of enzyme-catalysed reactions, becoming the only Nobel laureate born in New South Wales.

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Sándor Szokolay, Hungarian composer and academic (born 1931)

Sándor Szokolay was a Hungarian composer and professor of the Liszt Ferenc Academy, Budapest.

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Richard S. Williamson, American lawyer and diplomat (born 1949)

Richard Salisbury Williamson was an American lawyer, diplomat and political advisor. He previously served as Special Envoy to Sudan under George W. Bush. Williamson was a partner at Winston & Strawn and was also Thomas J. Sharkey Distinguished Visiting Scholar at Seton Hall's Whitehead School of Diplomacy.

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08/12/2012

Jerry Brown, American football player (born 1987)

Jerry Jerome Brown Jr. was an American professional football linebacker who played in the National Football League (NFL). In college, he played on the defensive line for the University of Illinois. In his professional career, he was a member of the Indianapolis Colts and Dallas Cowboys of the NFL, the Hamilton Tiger-Cats of the Canadian Football League, and the Jacksonville Sharks and San Antonio Talons of the Arena Football League (AFL). He was signed as a free agent by the Sharks in 2011; in the team's ArenaBowl XXIV victory, he had one tackle assist, a forced fumble and a fumble recovery.

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John Gowans, Scottish-English 16th General of The Salvation Army (born 1934)

John Gowans was a Scottish clergyman, who was the 16th General of The Salvation Army from 1999 to 2002, succeeding General Paul Rader. He is also notable for pairing with General John Larsson in the composition of many songs and musicals.

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Johnny Lira, American boxer (born 1951)

Johnny Lira was a professional lightweight and welterweight boxing contender who was born and died in Chicago, Illinois.

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08/12/2009

Luis Días, Dominican singer-songwriter and guitarist (born 1952)

Luis Díaz Portorreal, best known as Luis Días, was a Dominican Republic musician, composer and performer of popular music.

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08/12/2008

Oliver Postgate, English voice actor, director, producer, and screenwriter (born 1925)

Richard Oliver Postgate was an English animator, puppeteer, and writer. He was the creator and writer of several popular British children's television programmes. Bagpuss, Pingwings, Noggin the Nog, Ivor the Engine, Clangers and Pogles' Wood, were all made by Smallfilms, the company he set up with collaborator, artist and puppet maker Peter Firmin. The programmes were originally broadcast by the BBC from the 1950s to the 1980s. In a 1999 BBC poll Bagpuss was voted the most popular children's television programme of all time.

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Robert Prosky, American actor (born 1930)

Robert Prosky was an American actor. He became a well-known supporting actor in the 1980s with his roles in Thief (1981), Christine (1983), The Natural (1984), and Broadcast News (1987).

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08/12/2007

Gerardo García Pimentel, Mexican journalist (born 1983)

Gerardo Israel García Pimentel was a Mexican journalist and crime reporter.

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08/12/2006

Martha Tilton, American singer (born 1915)

Martha Tilton was an American popular singer during America's swing era and traditional pop period. She is best known for her 1939 recording of "And the Angels Sing" with Benny Goodman.

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José Uribe, Dominican baseball player (born 1959)

José Altagracia González Uribe was a Dominican Major League Baseball shortstop from 1984 until 1993. Most of his ten-year career was spent with the San Francisco Giants. He played for the Giants in the 1989 World Series against the Oakland Athletics.

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08/12/2005

Rose Heilbron, British barrister and judge (born 1914)

Dame Rose Heilbron, DBE was a British barrister who served later as a High Court judge. Her career included many "firsts" for a woman – she was the first woman to achieve a first class honours degree in law at the University of Liverpool, the first woman to win a scholarship to Gray's Inn, one of the first two women to be appointed King's Counsel in England, the first woman to lead in a murder case, the first woman recorder, the first woman judge to sit at the Old Bailey, and the first woman treasurer of Gray's Inn. She was also the second woman to be appointed a High Court judge, after Elizabeth Lane.

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08/12/2004

Dimebag Darrell, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (born 1966)

Darrell Lance Abbott, known professionally as Dimebag Darrell, was an American musician. He was the guitarist of the heavy metal bands Pantera and Damageplan, both of which he co-founded alongside his brother Vinnie Paul. He is considered by many to be one of the greatest metal guitarists of all time.

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08/12/2003

Rubén González, Cuban pianist (born 1919)

Rubén González Fontanills was a Cuban pianist. Together with Lilí Martínez and Peruchín he is said to have "forged the style of modern Cuban piano playing in the 1940s".

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Pekka Siitoin, Finnish neo-Nazi and Satanist (b. 1944)

Timo Pekka Olavi Siitoin was a Finnish neo-Nazi, Satanist, and occultist.

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08/12/2001

Mirza Delibašić, Bosnian basketball player and coach (born 1954)

Mirza Delibašić was a Bosnian professional basketball player and coach. He is widely considered one of the greatest players in the history of European basketball.

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Betty Holberton, American computer scientist and programmer (born 1917)

Frances Elizabeth Holberton was an American computer scientist who was one of the six original programmers of the first general-purpose electronic digital computer, ENIAC. The other five ENIAC programmers were Jean Bartik, Ruth Teitelbaum, Kathleen Antonelli, Marlyn Meltzer, and Frances Spence.

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08/12/1999

Péter Kuczka, Hungarian poet and author (born 1923)

Péter Kuczka was a Hungarian writer, poet and science fiction editor. He was also active as a comic writer.

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08/12/1997

Bob Bell, American clown and actor (born 1922)

Robert Lewis Bell was an American actor and announcer famous for his alter-ego, Bozo the Clown. He was the original portrayer of the character for Chicago superstation WGN-TV.

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08/12/1996

Howard Rollins, American actor (born 1950)

Howard Ellsworth Rollins Jr. was an American stage, film and television actor. He was best known for his role as Andrew Young in 1978's King, George Haley in the 1979 miniseries Roots: The Next Generations, Coalhouse Walker Jr. in the 1981 film Ragtime, as civil rights activist Medgar Evers in PBS' American Playhouse production of For Us the Living: The Medgar Evers Story in 1983, Captain Davenport in the 1984 film A Soldier's Story, and as Virgil Tibbs on the NBC/CBS television crime drama In the Heat of the Night (1988–1995).

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Kashiwado Tsuyoshi, Japanese sumo wrestler, the 47th Yokozuna (born 1938)

Kashiwado Tsuyoshi was a Japanese professional sumo wrestler from Yamagata Prefecture. He was the sport's 47th yokozuna, fighting at the sport's highest rank from 1961 to 1969. After his retirement he became an elder of the Japan Sumo Association and ran his own training stable from 1970 until his death.

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08/12/1994

Antônio Carlos Jobim, Brazilian singer-songwriter and pianist (born 1927)

Antônio Carlos Brasileiro de Almeida Jobim, also known as Tom Jobim, was a Brazilian composer, pianist, guitarist, songwriter, arranger and singer. Jobim is considered a great exponent of Brazilian music and one of the fathers of bossa nova for having merged samba with cool jazz in the 1960s as a pioneer of the genre. He is also regarded as one of the most celebrated songwriters of the 20th century, and his compositions have been played and recorded by many singers and instrumentalists internationally since the early 1960s.

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08/12/1993

Yevgeny Minayev, Russian weightlifter (born 1933)

Yevgeny Gavrilovich Minayev was a Russian weightlifter who competed for the Soviet Union. He won a silver medal at the 1956 Summer Olympics and a gold medal at the 1960 Summer Olympics.

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08/12/1992

William Shawn, American journalist (born 1917)

William Shawn was an American magazine editor who edited The New Yorker from 1952 until 1987.

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08/12/1991

Buck Clayton, American trumpet player and composer (born 1911)

Wilbur Dorsey "Buck" Clayton was an American jazz trumpeter who was a member of Count Basie's orchestra. His principal influence was Louis Armstrong, first hearing the record "Confessin' that I Love You" as he passed by a shop window.

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08/12/1984

Luther Adler, American actor (born 1903)

Luther Adler was an American actor who worked in theatre, film, television, and directed plays on Broadway.

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Robert Jay Mathews, American militant leader, founded The Order (born 1953)

Robert Jay Mathews was an American neo-Nazi and the leader of The Order, an American white supremacist militant group that committed counterfeiting, several bank robberies, car heists, murders, and assassinations. Mathews is believed to have served as a lookout in the murder of Alan Berg. Before founding The Order, Mathews was a member of the neo-Nazi groups the National Alliance and Aryan Nations.

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Razzle, English drummer (born 1960)

Nicholas Charles Dingley, better known by his stage name Razzle, was an English musician, who was the drummer of the Finnish glam rock band Hanoi Rocks from 1982 until his death in 1984.

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Semih Sancar, Turkish general (born 1911)

Semih Sancar was the 16th Chief of the Turkish General Staff from 1973 to 1978, a period including the 1974 Operation Atilla. He was previously Commander of the Turkish Land Forces (1972–1973) and General Commander of the Turkish Gendarmerie (1969–1970).

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08/12/1983

Keith Holyoake, New Zealand farmer and politician, 26th Prime Minister of New Zealand (born 1904)

Sir Keith Jacka Holyoake was a New Zealand politician who served as the 26th prime minister of New Zealand, serving for a brief period in 1957 and then from 1960 to 1972, and also as the 13th governor-general of New Zealand, serving from 1977 to 1980. He is the only New Zealand politician to have held both positions.

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Slim Pickens, American actor (born 1919)

Louis Burton Lindley, better known by his stage name Slim Pickens, was an American actor and rodeo performer. Starting off in the rodeo, Pickens took up acting, and appeared in dozens of movies and TV shows. For much of his career, Pickens played cowboy roles. He played comic roles in Dr. Strangelove, Blazing Saddles, 1941, and had a villainous role in One-Eyed Jacks with Marlon Brando.

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08/12/1982

Bram Behr, Surinamese journalist and politician (born 1951)

Abraham Maurits Behr was a Surinamese journalist. He published the pamphlet De Rode Surinamer and edited the weekly newspaper Mokro. He also founded and led the Hoxhaist Communist Party of Suriname (KPS), and was in opposition to the military dictatorship of Dési Bouterse. Behr was assassinated along with 14 other prominent Bouterse opponents on 8 December 1982, in an incident known as the December murders.

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André Kamperveen, Surinamese footballer and manager (born 1924)

Rudi André Kamperveen was a Surinamese football player, sports administrator, politician and businessman.

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Marty Robbins, American singer-songwriter and race car driver (born 1925)

Martin David Robinson, known professionally as Marty Robbins, was an American country and western singer and songwriter. He was one of the most popular and successful singers of his genre for most of his nearly four-decade career, which spanned from the late 1940s to the early 1980s. He was also an early outlaw country pioneer.

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Haim Laskov, Israel Defense Forces fifth Chief of Staff (born 1919)

Haim Laskov was an Israeli public figure and the fifth Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces.

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08/12/1980

John Lennon, English singer-songwriter and guitarist (born 1940)

John Winston Ono Lennon was an English musician and activist. He gained global fame as the founder, co-lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of the Beatles. Lennon's songwriting partnership with Paul McCartney remains the most successful in history.

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08/12/1978

Golda Meir, Ukrainian-Israeli educator and politician, 4th Prime Minister of Israel (born 1898)

Golda Meir was the prime minister of Israel from 1969 to 1974. She was Israel's first and, to date, only female head of government.

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08/12/1975

Gary Thain, New Zealand bass player (born 1948)

Gary Mervin Thain was a New Zealand bassist, best known for his work with British rock band Uriah Heep.

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08/12/1971

Ernst Krenkel, Russian geographer and explorer (born 1903)

Ernst Teodorovich Krenkel was a Soviet Arctic explorer, radio operator, and doctor of geographical sciences (1938). He is best known as one of the four members of the North Pole-1 expedition, for which he was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union in 1938. Amateur radio callsigns: EU2EQ, U3AA, UA3AA, RAEM.

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Eleni Ourani, Greek poet and critic (born 1896)

Alkis Thrylos was a Greek writer. She was a member of the Negroponte (Νεγρεπόντη) family. She was a critic of literature of the theatre. Her husband was the poet Kostas Ouranis. She died on December 8, 1971.

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08/12/1966

Ward Morehouse, American playwright, author, and critic (born 1899)

Ward Morehouse was an American theater critic, newspaper columnist, playwright, and author.

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08/12/1963

Sarit Thanarat, Thai field marshal and politician, 11th Prime Minister of Thailand (born 1908)

Sarit Thanarat was a Thai politician and military commander. He served as commander-in-chief of the Royal Thai Army and as Minister of Defense during Plaek Phibunsongkhram's premiership. In 1957, he became chief of a military junta after leading a coup in which Phibun was overthrown. Sarit lasted the de facto prime minister only five days before was replaced by Pote Sarasin, but assumed power again as the head of the Revolutionary Council after 1958 coup and then as the eleventh Prime Minister of Thailand in February 1959 until his death in 1963.

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08/12/1958

Tris Speaker, American baseball player and manager (born 1888)

Tristram Edgar Speaker, nicknamed "the Gray Eagle", was an American professional baseball player and manager. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a center fielder from 1907 to 1928. Considered one of the greatest players in the history of Major League Baseball, he compiled a career batting average of .345. His 792 career doubles represent an MLB career record. His 3,514 hits are fifth in the all-time hits list. Defensively, Speaker holds career records for assists, double plays, and unassisted double plays by an outfielder. He held the major league career record for putouts by a center fielder (6,592) until he was surpassed by Willie Mays in 1971. His fielding glove was known as the place "where triples go to die."

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08/12/1954

Claude Cahun, French artist, photographer, and writer (born 1894)

Claude Cahun was a French surrealist photographer, sculptor, and writer.

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Gladys George, American actress (born 1904)

Gladys George was an American actress of stage and screen. Though nominated for an Academy Award for her leading role in Valiant Is the Word for Carrie (1936), she spent most of her career in supporting roles in films such as Marie Antoinette (1938), The Roaring Twenties (1939), The Maltese Falcon (1941), The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), Flamingo Road (1949), and Lullaby of Broadway (1951) in which marked her first color film.

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Joseph B. Keenan, American lawyer and politician (born 1888)

Joseph Berry Keenan was an American lawyer best known for serving as Chief Prosecutor for the International Military Tribunal for the Far East. He previously served as Assistant Attorney General in the administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

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08/12/1952

Charles Lightoller, English sailor (born 1874)

Commander Charles Herbert Lightoller, was a British mariner and naval officer who was the second officer on board the ocean liner RMS Titanic during its ill-fated maiden voyage, and was the most senior crewmember to survive the disaster.

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08/12/1946

Tex O'Reilly, American mercenary (born 1880)

Edward Sinnott "Tex" O'Reilly was an American soldier of fortune, writer, journalist, and film actor. He is said to have fought in ten wars under many flags. Initially serving in the U.S. Army in the Spanish–American War, the Philippine–American War, and the Boxer Rebellion, he would claim to fight in several conflicts in Central America and to have fought with Pancho Villa in Mexico and claimed to have fought in the Rif War with the Spanish Foreign Legion in North Africa. He worked as a reporter for the Associated Press. He wrote an autobiography, Roving and Fighting, and Lowell Thomas wrote Born to Raise Hell about him. The latter book has been reprinted and is distributed by The Long Riders' Guild Press. He was the author of Pecos Bill.

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08/12/1942

Albert Kahn, American architect, Fisher Building, Packard Automotive Plant, Ford River Rouge Complex (born 1869)

Albert Kahn was an American architect who collaborated with his brother Julius Kahn in designing industrial plant complexes such as the Ford River Rouge automobile complex. Based in Detroit, he also designed skyscrapers, office buildings, and mansions in the city and suburbs, as well as many buildings at University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Kahn has been called the "architect of Detroit" as the designer of nearly 900 buildings in the city.

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08/12/1941

Izidor Kürschner, Hungarian football player and coach (born 1885)

Izidor "Dori" Kürschner, in Brazil primarily known as Dori Kruschner,, was a Hungarian football player and coach. As player he was successful with Budapest club MTK, and also played for the Hungary national team. As coach he succeeded in Germany, winning the national championship with 1. FC Nürnberg. His greatest triumphs were to follow in Switzerland with the Grasshopper Club Zürich, where he won seven titles. Kürschner's arrival to Brazilian football brought tactical innovations which helped to establish the country as one of the world leaders in the sport.

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08/12/1940

George Lloyd, English-Canadian bishop and theologian (born 1861)

George Exton Lloyd was an Anglican bishop and theologian who helped found Lloydminster, a city on the border of the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan in Canada. He served as Bishop of Saskatchewan from 1922 to 1931.

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08/12/1938

Friedrich Glauser, Swiss author (born 1896)

Friedrich Glauser was a German-language Swiss writer.

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08/12/1937

Hans Molisch, Czech-Austrian botanist and academic (born 1856)

Hans Molisch was a Czech-Austrian botanist.

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08/12/1932

Gertrude Jekyll, British horticulturist and writer (born 1843)

Gertrude Jekyll was a British horticulturist, garden designer, craftswoman, photographer, writer and artist. She created over 400 gardens in the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States, and wrote over 1000 articles for magazines such as Country Life and William Robinson's The Garden. Jekyll has been described as "a premier influence in garden design" by British and American gardening enthusiasts.

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08/12/1929

José Vicente Concha, Colombian politician and 8th President of Colombia (born 1867)

José Vicente Concha Ferreira was a Colombian politician who served as President of Colombia from 1914 to 1918. He was also a noted member of the Colombian Conservative Party.

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08/12/1922

Dick Barrett, executed Irish Republican Army leader (born 1889)

Richard Barrett, commonly called Dick Barrett, was a prominent Irish Republican Army officer who fought in the War of Independence and on the Anti-Treaty side in the Irish Civil War. He was assistant quartermaster-general of the IRA with the rank of commandant. During the Civil War he was captured by Free State forces at the Four Courts on 30 June 1922 and later executed unlawfully on 8 December 1922.

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Joe McKelvey, executed Irish Republican Army leader (born 1898)

Joseph McKelvey was an Irish Republican Army officer who was executed during the Irish Civil War without trial or court martial. He participated in the Anti-Treaty IRA's repudiation of the authority of the Dáil Éireann, the civil government of the Irish Republic declared in 1919 in March 1922, and was elected to the IRA Army Council as Deputy Chief of Staff. In April 1922, he helped command the occupation of the Four Courts in defiance of the new Irish Free State. This action helped to spark the civil war, between pro- and anti-treaty factions. McKelvey was among the most hardline of the republican side and, briefly in June 1922, became IRA Chief of Staff.

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LIam Mellows, executed Irish Republican Army leader (born 1892)

William Joseph Mellows was an Irish republican and Sinn Féin politician. Born in England to an English father and Irish mother, he grew up in Ashton-under-Lyne before moving to Ireland, being raised in Cork, Dublin and his mother's native Wexford. He was active with the Irish Republican Brotherhood and Irish Volunteers, and participated in the Easter Rising in County Galway and the War of Independence. Elected as a TD to the First Dáil, he rejected the Anglo-Irish Treaty. During the Irish Civil War Mellows was captured by Pro-Treaty forces after the surrender of the Four Courts in June 1922. On 8 December 1922 he was one of four senior IRA men executed by the free state Government.

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Rory O'Connor, executed Irish Republican Army leader, (born 1883)

Roderick O'Connor was an Irish republican who was Director of Engineering for the IRA in the Irish War of Independence. O'Connor opposed the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921 and was chairman of the republican military council that became the Anti-Treaty IRA in March 1922. He was the main spokesman for the republican side in the lead-up to the outbreak of the Irish Civil War in June of that year. On 30 June, O'Connor was taken prisoner at the conclusion of the attack by Free State forces on the Four Courts in Dublin. On 8 December 1922, he was executed along with three other senior members of the IRA Four Courts garrison. All four men were executed without trial or court martial.

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08/12/1919

J. Alden Weir, American painter (born 1852)

Julian Alden Weir was an American impressionist painter and member of the Cos Cob Art Colony in Greenwich, Connecticut. Weir was also one of the founding members of "The Ten", a loosely allied group of American artists dissatisfied with professional art organizations, who banded together in 1898 to exhibit their works as a stylistically unified group.

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08/12/1918

Josip Stadler, Bosnian Catholic archbishop (born 1843)

Josip Stadler was a Bosnian prelate of the Catholic Church who served as the first archbishop of Vrhbosna, from 1881 to his death in 1918. He was the founder of the religious order of the Servants of the Infant Jesus.

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08/12/1917

Mendele Mocher Sforim, Russian author (born 1836)

Mendele Mocher Sforim was a Belarusian Jewish author and one of the founders of modern Yiddish and Hebrew literature.

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08/12/1914

Melchior Anderegg, Swiss mountain guide (born 1828)

Melchior Anderegg, from Zaun, Meiringen, was a Swiss mountain guide and the first ascensionist of many prominent mountains in the western Alps during the golden and silver ages of alpinism. His clients were mostly British, the most famous of whom was Leslie Stephen, the writer, critic and mountaineer; Anderegg also climbed extensively with members of the Walker family, including Horace Walker and Lucy Walker, and with Florence Crauford Grove. His cousin Jakob Anderegg was also a well-known guide.

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Maximilian von Spee, Danish-German admiral (born 1861)

Maximilian Johannes Maria Hubert Reichsgraf von Spee was a German naval officer in the Imperial German Navy, who commanded the East Asia Squadron during World War I. Spee entered the navy in 1878 and served in a variety of roles and locations, including on a colonial gunboat in German West Africa in the 1880s, the East Africa Squadron in the late 1890s, and as commander of several warships in the main German fleet in the early 1900s. During his time in Germany in the late 1880s and early 1890s, he married his wife, Margareta, and had three children, his sons Heinrich and Otto and his daughter Huberta. By 1912, he had returned to the East Asia Squadron as its commander, and was promoted to the rank of Vizeadmiral the following year.

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08/12/1913

Camille Jenatzy, Belgian race car driver (born 1868)

Camille Jenatzy was a Belgian race car driver. He is known for breaking the land speed record three times and being the first man to break the 100 km/h barrier. He was nicknamed Le Diable Rouge after the colour of his beard.

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08/12/1907

King Oscar II of Sweden (born 1829)

Oscar II was King of Sweden from 1872 until his death in 1907 and King of Norway from 1872 to 1905.

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08/12/1903

Herbert Spencer, English biologist, anthropologist, sociologist, and philosopher (born 1820)

Herbert Spencer was an English polymath active as a philosopher, psychologist, biologist, sociologist, and anthropologist. Spencer originated the expression "survival of the fittest", which he coined in Principles of Biology (1864) after reading Charles Darwin's 1859 book On the Origin of Species. The term strongly suggests natural selection, yet Spencer saw evolution as extending into realms of sociology and ethics, so he also supported Lamarckism.

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08/12/1894

Pafnuty Chebyshev, Russian mathematician and theorist (born 1821)

Pafnuty Lvovich Chebyshev was a Russian mathematician and considered to be the founding father of Russian mathematics.

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08/12/1886

Isaac Lea, American conchologist, geologist, and publisher (born 1792)

Isaac Lea was an American publisher, conchologist and geologist. He was a partner in the publishing businesses Matthew Carey & Sons; Carey, Lea & Carey; Carey, Lea & Blanchard; and Lea & Blanchard.

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08/12/1885

William Henry Vanderbilt, American businessman and philanthropist (born 1821)

William Henry Vanderbilt was an American businessman and railroad magnate. Known as "Billy", he was the eldest son of Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt, an heir to his fortune and a prominent member of the Vanderbilt family. Vanderbilt became the richest American after he took over his father's fortune in 1877 until his own death in 1885, passing on a substantial part of the fortune to his wife and children, particularly to his sons Cornelius II and William. He inherited nearly $100 million from his father. The fortune had doubled when he died fewer than nine years later.

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08/12/1869

Narcisa de Jesús, Ecuadorian saint (born 1832)

Narcisa de Jesús Martillo Morán was an Ecuadorian virgin and Dominican tertiary in the Roman Catholic Church. Martillo was known for her charitable giving and strict devotion to Jesus Christ while living a virginal and austere life of prayer and penance. Her devotion to prayer and the mortification of the flesh was strong and it led her to the decision to live as a member of the Third Order of Saint Dominic in Patrocínio (Peru), where she died on 8 December 1869. Narcisa de Jesús was beatified on 25 October 1992.

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08/12/1864

George Boole, English mathematician and philosopher (born 1815)

George Boole was an English autodidact, mathematician, philosopher and logician who served as the first professor of mathematics at Queen's College, Cork in Ireland. He worked in the fields of differential equations and algebraic logic, and is best known as the author of The Laws of Thought (1854), which contains Boolean algebra. Boolean logic, essential to computer programming, is credited with helping to lay the foundations for the Information Age.

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08/12/1859

Thomas De Quincey, English journalist and author (born 1785)

Thomas Penson De Quincey was an English writer, essayist, and literary critic, best known for his Confessions of an English Opium-Eater (1821). Many scholars suggest that in publishing this work De Quincey inaugurated the tradition of addiction literature in the West.

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08/12/1856

Theobald Mathew, Irish social reformer and temperance movement leader (born 1790)

Theobald Mathew was an Irish Catholic priest, member of the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin, and teetotalist reformer, popularly known as Father Mathew. He was born at Thomastown, near Golden, County Tipperary, on 10 October 1790, to James Mathew and his wife Anne, daughter of George Whyte, of Cappaghwhyte. Of the family of the Earls Landaff, he was a kinsman of the clergyman Arnold Mathew.

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08/12/1830

Benjamin Constant, Swiss-French philosopher and author (born 1767)

Henri-Benjamin Constant de Rebecque, or simply Benjamin Constant, was a Swiss and French political thinker, activist and writer on political theory and religion.

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08/12/1815

Mary Bosanquet Fletcher, Methodist preacher and philanthropist (born 1739)

Mary Bosanquet Fletcher was an English preacher credited with persuading John Wesley, a founder of Methodism, to allow women to preach in public. She was born into an affluent family, but after converting to Methodism, rejected its luxurious life. She was involved in charity work throughout her life, operating a school and orphanage until her marriage to John Fletcher. She and a friend, Sarah Crosby, began preaching and leading meetings at her orphanage and became the most popular female preachers of their time. Fletcher was known as a "Mother in Israel", a Methodist term of honour, for her work in spreading the denomination across England.

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08/12/1779

Nathan Alcock, English physician (born 1707)

Nathan Alcock was an English physician.

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08/12/1768

Jean Denis Attiret, French painter and missionary (born 1702)

Jean Denis Attiret was a French Jesuit painter and missionary to Qing China.

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08/12/1756

William Stanhope, 1st Earl of Harrington, English politician and diplomat, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (born 1690)

William Stanhope, 1st Earl of Harrington, was a British statesman and diplomat.

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08/12/1746

Charles Radclyffe, English courtier and soldier (born 1693)

Charles Radclyffe, titular 5th Earl of Derwentwater, was one of the few English participants in the Jacobite risings of both 1715 and 1745.

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08/12/1745

Étienne Fourmont, French orientalist and academic (born 1683)

Étienne Fourmont was a French Orientalist who served as professor of Arabic at the Collège de France and published grammars on the Arabic, Hebrew, and Chinese languages.

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08/12/1744

Marie Anne de Mailly, French mistress of Louis XV (born 1717)

Marie Anne de Mailly-Nesle, duchesse de Châteauroux was the youngest of five famous de Nesle sisters, four of whom would become mistresses of King Louis XV of France. Marie Anne was the King's mistress from 1742 until 1744.

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08/12/1734

James Figg, English prizefighter

James Figg was an English prizefighter and instructor in historical European martial arts. While Figg primarily fought with weapons including short swords, quarterstaffs, and cudgels, he also played a role in boxing's development. In 1719, he opened a London fighting venue that could seat more than 1,000 spectators and was one of the first of its kind. In 1725, he organised and promoted modern history's first international boxing match at his amphitheatre. He claimed to have won more than 200 matches during his career, and was posthumously considered the first boxing champion.

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08/12/1722

Elizabeth Charlotte, Princess Palatine (born 1652)

Madame Elizabeth Charlotte, Duchess of Orléans, also known as Liselotte von der Pfalz, was a German member of the House of Wittelsbach who married into the French royal family. She was the second wife of Monsieur Philippe I, Duke of Orléans. By Philippe, Liselotte was the mother of Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, and Élisabeth Charlotte, Duchess of Lorraine. Philippe II was France's ruler during the Regency. Liselotte gained literary and historical importance primarily through preservation of her correspondence, which is of great cultural and historical value due to her sometimes very blunt descriptions of French court life and is today one of the best-known German-language texts of the Baroque period.

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08/12/1709

Thomas Corneille, French playwright and philologist (born 1625)

Thomas Corneille was a French lexicographer and dramatist.

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08/12/1695

Barthélemy d'Herbelot, French orientalist and academic (born 1625)

Barthélemy d'Herbelot de Molainville was a French Orientalist.

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08/12/1691

Richard Baxter, English minister, poet, and hymn-writer (born 1615)

Richard Baxter was an English Nonconformist church leader and theologian from Rowton, Shropshire, who has been described as "the chief of English Protestant Schoolmen". He made his reputation in the late 1630s by his ministry at Kidderminster in Worcestershire, when he also began a long and prolific career as a theological writer.

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08/12/1680

Henry Pierrepont, 1st Marquess of Dorchester, English lawyer and politician (born 1606)

Henry Pierrepont, 1st Marquess of Dorchester, PC, FRS, FRCP was an English peer. He was the son of Robert Pierrepont, 1st Earl of Kingston-upon-Hull, and his wife, the former Gertrude Talbot, daughter of George Talbot and Elizabeth Reyner, and cousin of the Earl of Shrewsbury. He was born in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire.

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08/12/1649

Noël Chabanel, French missionary and saint (born 1613)

Noël Chabanel was a Jesuit missionary at Sainte-Marie among the Hurons, and one of the Canadian Martyrs.

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08/12/1643

John Pym, English politician (born 1583)

John Pym was a politician from Somerset, commonly credited with helping establish the modern English Parliamentary system. A key leader of the opposition to Charles I of England prior to the First English Civil War, his use of procedure to outmanoeuvre opponents was unusual for the period. Although he was respected by contemporaries rather than admired, in 1895 historian Goldwin Smith described him as "the greatest member of Parliament that ever lived".

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08/12/1638

Ivan Gundulić, Croatian poet (born 1589)

Dživo Franov Gundulić, better known today as Ivan Gundulić, was the most prominent Ragusan Baroque. He is regarded as the Croatian national poet. His work embodies central characteristics of Roman Catholic Counter-Reformation: religious fervor, insistence on "vanity of this world" and zeal in opposition to "infidels". Gundulić's major works—the epic poem Osman, the pastoral play Dubravka, and the religious poem Tears of the Prodigal Son —are examples of Baroque stylistic richness and, frequently, rhetorical excess.

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08/12/1632

Philippe van Lansberge, Dutch astronomer and mathematician (born 1561)

Johan Philip Lansberge was a Flemish Calvinist Minister, astronomer and Mathematician. His name is sometimes written Lansberg, and his first name is sometimes given as Philip or Johannes Philippus. He published under the Latin name Philippus Lansbergius.

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08/12/1626

John Davies, English poet, lawyer, and politician (born 1569)

Sir John Davies was an English poet, lawyer, and politician who sat in the House of Commons at various times between 1597 and 1621. He became Attorney General for Ireland and formulated many of the legal principles that underpinned the British Empire.

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08/12/1596

Luis de Carvajal the Younger, Marrano writer and martyr (born c. 1566/1567)

Luis de Carvajal the Younger was a Spanish-born Crypto-Jewish writer. He was the nephew of the conquistador Luis de Carvajal y de la Cueva, who was the governor of New Mexico, and was brought to Mexico at a young age. In Mexico, he began to practice Judaism in secret alongside his family, and additionally kept memoirs of his life. His writings are the earliest known to be written by a Jew in the Americas. He was executed as a martyr of the Jewish faith by the Spanish Inquisition in 1596.

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08/12/1550

Gian Giorgio Trissino, Italian humanist, poet, dramatist and diplomat (born 1478)

Gian Giorgio Trissino, also called Giovan Giorgio Trissino and self-styled as Giovan Giꞷrgio Trissino, was a Venetian Renaissance humanist, poet, dramatist, diplomat, grammarian, linguist, and philosopher. He first proposed adding letters to the Italian alphabet to distinguish J from I, and V from U.

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08/12/1431

Hedwig Jagiellon, Polish and Lithuanian princess (born 1408)

Hedwig Jagiellon was a Polish and Lithuanian princess, and a member of the Jagiellon dynasty. For most of her life she, as the only child of Władysław II Jagiełło, was considered to be heiress of the Polish and Lithuanian thrones. After the birth of Jagiello's sons in 1424 and 1427, Hedwig had some support for her claims to the throne. She died in 1431 amidst rumors that she was poisoned by her stepmother Sophia of Halshany.

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08/12/1365

Nicholas II, Duke of Opava (born 1288)

Nicholas II of Opava was Duke of Opava from 1318 to 1365 and Duke of Ratibór from 1337 to 1365 and Burgrave of Kladsko from 1350 to 1365 and also chamberlain of the Kingdom of Bohemia.

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08/12/1292

John Peckham, Archbishop of Canterbury

John Peckham was a Franciscan friar and Archbishop of Canterbury in the years 1279–1292.

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08/12/1186

Berthold IV, Duke of Zähringen (bornc 1125)

Berthold IV, Duke of Zähringen was a Duke of Zähringen and Rector of Burgundy. He was the son of Conrad I, Duke of Zähringen and Clementia of Luxembourg-Namur. He founded numerous cities, including Fribourg.

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08/12/0964

Zhou the Elder, Chinese queen consort

Zhou Ehuang (周娥皇), posthumously named Queen Zhaohui (昭惠國后), was a queen consort of imperial China's short-lived Southern Tang state during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period. Her husband was Li Yu, Southern Tang's third and last ruler.

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08/12/0899

Arnulf of Carinthia (born 850)

Arnulf of Carinthia was King of East Francia since 887, King of Italy since 894, and Emperor since 896. Initially, he was the Duke of Carinthia who overthrew his uncle Emperor Charles the Fat to become the Carolingian king of East Francia in late 887. He also ruled Lotharingia, and tried to impose suzerainty over West Francia, and rule over Burgundy and Italy. In 894, he invaded Italy and took Pavia, but soon returned to East Francia. Upon invading Italy again, he was crowned Emperor on 22 February 896 in Rome by Pope Formosus, but soon returned again to East Francia. He died on 8 December 899 at Ratisbon, in Bavaria. He was the last member of the Carolingian dynasty from the male line to rule in Italy as both King and Emperor, despite his rule being contested by his rivals Lambert of Italy and Berengar I of Italy.

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08/12/0855

Drogo of Metz, illegitimate son of Charlemagne (born 801)

Drogo, also known as Dreux or Drogon, was an illegitimate son of Frankish emperor Charlemagne by the concubine Regina.

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