Died on Wednesday, 14th January – Famous Deaths

14/01/2025

Arthur Blessitt, American Christian preacher (born 1940)

Arthur Owen Blessitt was an American traveling Christian preacher who was known for carrying a cross through every nation of the world.

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Tony Slattery, British actor, comedian and television personality (born 1959)

Tony Declan James Slattery was an English actor and comedian. He appeared on British television regularly from the mid-1980s, including as a regular on the Channel 4 improvisation show Whose Line Is It Anyway?. His serious and comedic film work included roles in The Crying Game, Peter's Friends and How to Get Ahead in Advertising.

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14/01/2023

Mukarram Jah, 8th Nizam of Hyderabad (born 1933)

Nizam Mir Barkat Ali Khan Siddiqi Mukarram Jah, Asaf Jah VIII, less formally known as Mukarram Jah, was the titular Nizam of Hyderabad between 1967 and 1971. He was the head of the House of Asaf Jah until he died in 2023.

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14/01/2021

Joel Robert, Belgian motorcycle racer (born 1943)

Joël Robert was a Belgian professional motocross racer. He competed in the Motocross World Championships from 1962 to 1976 when the sport experienced a surge in popularity worldwide. A six-time world champion, Robert dominated the 250cc class for almost a decade when, he placed either first or second every year between 1964 and 1972 including, five consecutive world championships. In 1964, he was named the recipient of the Belgian National Sports Merit Award. He won a total of 50 Grand Prix races over his career, a record which stood for nearly 30 years.

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14/01/2018

Spanky Manikan, Filipino veteran actor (born 1942)

Manuel S. Manikan, known professionally as Spanky Manikan, was a Filipino theater, film and television actor.

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Cyrille Regis, French Guianan-English footballer (born 1958)

Cyrille Regis was a professional footballer who played as a forward. His professional playing career spanned 19 years, where he made 614 league appearances and scored 158 league goals, most prolifically at West Bromwich Albion and Coventry City. Born in French Guiana, Regis also won five caps with the England national team.

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14/01/2017

Zhou Youguang, Chinese sociologist, (born 1906)

Zhou Youguang, also known as Chou Yu-kuang or Chou Yao-ping, was a Chinese economist, linguist, sinologist, and supercentenarian. He has been credited as the father of pinyin, the most popular romanization system for Chinese, which was adopted by the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1958, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) in 1982, and the United Nations in 1986.

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14/01/2016

René Angélil, Canadian music producer, talent manager, and singer (born 1942)

René Angélil was a Canadian musical producer, talent manager and singer. He was the husband and manager of singer Celine Dion.

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Alan Rickman, English actor (born 1946)

Alan Sidney Patrick Rickman was an English actor. A graduate of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, he was renowned for his stage and screen roles and for his deep and distinctive voice. He received various accolades, including a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award, in addition to nominations for two Tony Awards and a Laurence Olivier Award.

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14/01/2015

Bob Boyd, American basketball player and coach (born 1930)

William Robert Boyd was an American collegiate men's basketball coach who was head coach at Seattle University, the University of Southern California (USC) and Mississippi State University.

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Zhang Wannian, Chinese general (born 1928)

Zhang Wannian was a general of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) of the People's Republic of China.

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14/01/2014

Jon Bing, Norwegian author, scholar, and academic (born 1944)

Jon Bing was a Norwegian writer and law professor at the Norwegian Research Center for Computers and Law (NRCCL), and the Faculty of Law at the University of Oslo. Bing was considered a pioneer in international IT and information law. He held honorary doctorates from the Stockholm University and the University of Copenhagen, and was a visiting professor at King's College London. Bing was part of The Protection of Privacy Committee. From 1979 to 1981 he was head of Norsk Filmråd. Between 1981 and 1982, he was the head of The Council of Europe Committee on Legal Data Processing. Between 1993 and 2000, he headed Norsk kulturråd.

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Juan Gelman, Argentinian poet and author (born 1930)

Juan Gelman was an Argentine poet. He published more than twenty books of poetry between 1956 and his death in early 2014. He was a naturalized citizen of Mexico, where he arrived as a political exile of the Process, the military junta that ruled Argentina from 1976 to 1983.

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Flavio Testi, Italian composer and musicologist (born 1923)

Flavio Testi was an Italian composer of contemporary classical music and musicologist.

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14/01/2013

Conrad Bain, Canadian-American actor (born 1923)

Conrad Stafford Bain was a Canadian-American actor. His television credits include a leading role as Phillip Drummond in the sitcom Diff'rent Strokes (1978–1986), as Dr. Arthur Harmon on Maude (1972–1978), and as Charlie Ross in Mr. President (1987–1988).

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14/01/2012

Txillardegi, Spanish linguist and politician (born 1929)

José Luis Álvarez Enparantza, better known by his pseudonym Txillardegi, was a Basque linguist, politician, and writer. He was born and raised in the Basque Country, and although he did not learn the Basque language until the age of 17, he later came to be considered one of the most influential figures in Basque nationalism and culture in the second half of the 20th century. He was one of the founders of ETA, but in 1967 he left because he did not agree with its political line.

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Dan Evins, American businessman, founded Cracker Barrel Old Country Store (born 1935)

Danny Wood Evins was an American entrepreneur and founder of Cracker Barrel, a Southern-themed restaurant chain.

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Arfa Karim, Pakistani student and computer prodigy, youngest Microsoft Certified Professional in 2004 (born 1995)

Arfa Abdul Karim Randhawa (Urdu: ارفع عبد الکریم رندھاوا‎, Punjabi: ارفع عبد الکریم رندھاوا‎; 2 February 1995 – 14 January 2012) was a Pakistani student and computer prodigy who became the youngest Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) in 2004. She was submitted to the Guinness Book of World Records for her achievement. Arfa kept the title until 2008 and went on to represent Pakistan on various international forums, including the TechEd Developers Conference. She received Pakistan's highest literary award, the Presidential Pride of Performance from General Pervez Musharraf in 2005. A science park in Lahore, the Arfa Software Technology Park, is named in her honour. At the age of 10, Arfa was invited by Bill Gates to visit Microsoft's headquarters in the United States. She died in 2012, aged 16, from a cardiac arrest.

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Giampiero Moretti, Italian entrepreneur and race car driver (born 1940)

Gianpiero Moretti was an Italian racing driver and the founder of the MOMO company in the 1960s. He was born in Milan.

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Rosy Varte, Armenian-French actress (born 1923)

Rosy Varte was a French actress of Armenian descent. She made more than 100 film and television appearances during her career.

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14/01/2011

Georgia Carroll, American singer, model and actress (born 1919)

Georgia Carroll was an American singer, model and actress, best known for her work with Kay Kyser's big band orchestra in the mid-1940s. She and Kyser were married in 1944 until he died in 1985.

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14/01/2010

Antonio Fontán, Spanish journalist and academic (born 1923)

Antonio Fontán Pérez, 1st Marquess of Guadalcanal was a Spanish journalist recognized for his work in promoting press freedom in his country. He was also a well-known Catholic and a member of Opus Dei.

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14/01/2009

Jan Kaplický, Czech architect, designed the Selfridges Building (born 1937)

Jan Kaplický was a Neofuturistic Czech architect who spent a significant part of his life in the United Kingdom. He was the leading architect behind the innovative design office, Future Systems. He was best known for the neofuturistic Selfridges Building in Birmingham, England, and the Media Centre at Lord's Cricket Ground in London.

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Ricardo Montalbán, Mexican actor (born 1920)

Ricardo Gonzalo Pedro Montalbán y Merino, was a Mexican and American film and television actor. Montalbán's career spanned seven decades, during which he became widely known for performances in genres from crime and drama to musicals and comedy.

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14/01/2008

Judah Folkman, American physician, biologist, and academic (born 1933)

Moses Judah Folkman was an American biologist and pediatric surgeon best known for his research on tumor angiogenesis, the process by which a tumor attracts blood vessels to nourish itself and sustain its existence. He founded the field of angiogenesis research, which has led to the discovery of a number of therapies based on inhibiting or stimulating neovascularization.

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14/01/2007

Vassilis Photopoulos, Greek painter, director, and set designer (born 1934)

Vassilis Photopoulos was an influential Greek painter, film director, art director and set designer.

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14/01/2006

Henri Colpi, French director and screenwriter (born 1921)

Henri Colpi was a French film editor and film director.

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Jim Gary, American sculptor (born 1939)

Jim Gary was an American sculptor popularly known for his large, colorful creations of dinosaurs made from discarded automobile parts. These sculptures were typically finished with automobile paint although some were left to develop a natural patina during display outdoors.

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Shelley Winters, American actress (born 1920)

Shelley Winters was an American film actress whose career spanned seven decades. She won Academy Awards for The Diary of Anne Frank (1959) and A Patch of Blue (1965), and received nominations for A Place in the Sun (1951) and The Poseidon Adventure (1972), the latter of which also earned her a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role – Motion Picture, as well as a nomination for a British Academy Film Award for Best Supporting Actress. She also appeared in A Double Life (1947), The Night of the Hunter (1955), Lolita (1962), Alfie (1966), Next Stop, Greenwich Village (1976), and Pete's Dragon (1977). She also acted on television, including a tenure on the sitcom Roseanne, and several appearances on Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre, earning a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in 1964. Additionally, Winters wrote three autobiographies, beginning with the best-seller Shelley: Also known as Shirley.

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14/01/2005

Charlotte MacLeod, Canadian-American author (born 1922)

Charlotte MacLeod was a Canadian-American mystery fiction writer.

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Conroy Maddox, English painter and educator (born 1912)

Conroy Maddox was an English surrealist painter, collagist, writer and lecturer; and a key figure in the Birmingham Surrealist movement.

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Rudolph Moshammer, German fashion designer (born 1940)

Rudolph Moshammer was a German fashion designer. He built a reputation for the extravagant clothes he designed and wore, and was well known in Germany's celebrity circuit.

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Jesús Rafael Soto, Venezuelan sculptor and painter (born 1923)

Jesús Rafael Soto was a Venezuelan kinetic and op artist, a sculptor and a painter.

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14/01/2004

Uta Hagen, German-American actress (born 1919)

Uta Thyra Hagen was a German and American actress and theatre practitioner. She originated the role of Martha in the 1962 Broadway premiere of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? by Edward Albee, who called her "a profoundly truthful actress." Because Hagen was on the Hollywood blacklist, in part because of her association with Paul Robeson, her film opportunities dwindled and she focused her career on New York theatre.

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Ron O'Neal, American actor, director, and screenwriter (born 1937)

Ron O'Neal was an American actor, director and screenwriter, who rose to fame in his role as Youngblood Priest, a New York City cocaine dealer, in the blaxploitation film Super Fly (1972) and its sequel Super Fly T.N.T. (1973). O'Neal was also a director and writer for the sequel, and for the film Up Against the Wall.

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14/01/2000

Leonard Weisgard, American author and illustrator (born 1916)

Leonard Joseph Weisgard was an American writer and illustrator of more than 200 children's books. He is known best for his collaborations with writer Margaret Wise Brown.

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14/01/1997

Dollard Ménard, Canadian general (born 1913)

Brigadier Dollard Ménard was a senior officer in the Canadian Army. As a lieutenant colonel, he was wounded five times during the Dieppe Raid in 1942 while leading Les Fusiliers Mont-Royal. His story inspired a famous Canadian World War II poster Ce qu’il faut pour vaincre. He was later made a Companion of the Distinguished Service Order. Since all of the other commanding officers were either killed or captured, he was the only commanding officer who had landed at Dieppe to return to Britain after the raid.

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14/01/1996

Onno Tunç, Armenian-Turkish composer (born 1948)

Ohannes Tunçboyacıyan, better known as Onno Tunç, was a leading Turkish musician of Armenian descent, working mainly as a composer, arranger and a music producer. Tunç also played bass guitar and occasionally double bass, contributing to the albums of several musicians. He was one of the prominent names of Turkish pop music in the 1980s and 1990s with his arrangements. He was the elder brother of musician Arto Tunçboyacıyan.

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14/01/1995

Alexander Gibson, Scottish conductor (born 1926)

Sir Alexander Drummond Gibson was a Scottish conductor and opera intendant. He was also well known for his service to the BBC and his achievements during his reign as the longest serving principal conductor of the Scottish National Orchestra in which the orchestra was awarded its royal patronage.

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14/01/1991

Gordon Bryant, Australian educator and politician (born 1914)

Gordon Munro Bryant was an Australian politician. He was a member of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and represented the Division of Wills in Victoria from 1955 to 1980. During this time, he took an active interest in Indigenous land rights in Australia, in particular the case in Yirrkala, Arnhem Land, which led to the Yirrkala bark petitions. He served as Minister for Aboriginal Affairs (1972–1973) and Minister for the Capital Territory (1973–1975) in the Whitlam government.

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14/01/1988

Georgy Malenkov, Russian engineer and politician, 5th Premier of the Soviet Union (born 1902)

Georgy Maximilianovich Malenkov was a Soviet politician who succeeded Joseph Stalin as Premier and the overall leader of the Soviet Union in March 1953. Shortly thereafter, Malenkov entered into a power struggle with the party's First Secretary, Nikita Khrushchev, which culminated in his removal from the premiership in 1955 as well as the Central Committee Presidium in 1957.

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14/01/1987

Turgut Demirağ, Turkish director, producer, and screenwriter (born 1921)

Turgut Demirağ was a Turkish film producer, director, and screenwriter. He directed 16 films between 1947 and 1973. His 1964 film Love and Grudge was entered into the 4th Moscow International Film Festival.

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Douglas Sirk, German-Swiss director and screenwriter (born 1900)

Douglas Sirk was a German film director best known for his work in Hollywood melodramas of the 1950s. However, he also directed comedies, westerns, and war films. Sirk started his career in Germany as a stage and screen director, but he left for Hollywood in 1937 after his Jewish wife was persecuted by the Nazis.

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14/01/1986

Donna Reed, American actress (born 1921)

Donna Reed was an American actress. Her career spanned more than 40 years and included appearances in over 40 films. She is best known for playing Mary Hatch Bailey in Frank Capra's Christmas classic It's a Wonderful Life (1946), and for her Academy Award–winning performance as Lorene in Fred Zinnemann's war drama From Here to Eternity (1953).

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14/01/1984

Ray Kroc, American businessman and philanthropist (born 1902)

Raymond Albert Kroc was an American businessman who was instrumental in turning McDonald's into the most successful global fast food corporation by revenue. He purchased it from the McDonald Brothers in 1961, after several years as their franchising agent, and served as the leader of the company until his death.

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14/01/1981

G. Lloyd Spencer, American lieutenant and politician (born 1893)

George Lloyd Spencer was an American politician from Arkansas. A member of the Democratic Party, he represented the state in the United States Senate from 1941 to 1943.

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14/01/1980

Robert Ardrey, American-South African author, playwright, and screenwriter (born 1908)

Robert Ardrey was an American playwright, screenwriter and science writer perhaps best known for The Territorial Imperative (1966). After a Broadway and Hollywood career, he returned to his academic training in anthropology in the 1950s.

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14/01/1978

Harold Abrahams, English sprinter, lawyer, and journalist (born 1899)

Harold Maurice Abrahams was an English track and field athlete. He was Olympic champion in 1924 in the 100 metres sprint, a feat depicted in the 1981 film Chariots of Fire.

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Kurt Gödel, Austrian-American mathematician and philosopher (born 1906)

Kurt Friedrich Gödel was a logician, mathematician, and philosopher. Considered along with Aristotle and Gottlob Frege to be one of the most significant logicians in history, Gödel profoundly influenced scientific and philosophical thinking in the 20th century, building on earlier work by Frege, Richard Dedekind, and Georg Cantor.

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Robert Heger, German conductor and composer (born 1886)

Robert Heger was a German conductor and composer from Strasbourg, Alsace-Lorraine.

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Blossom Rock, American actress (born 1895)

Edith Marie Blossom MacDonald, also known as Blossom Rock, was an American actress of vaudeville, stage, film and television. During her career she was also billed as Marie Blake or Blossom MacDonald. Her younger sister was screen actress and singer Jeanette MacDonald. Rock is best known for her role as "Grandmama" on the 1960s macabre/black comedy sitcom The Addams Family.

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14/01/1977

Anthony Eden, English soldier and politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (born 1897)

Robert Anthony Eden, 1st Earl of Avon, was a British politician and military officer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 1955 until his resignation in 1957.

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Peter Finch, English-Australian actor (born 1916)

Frederick George Peter Ingle Finch was an English and Australian actor.

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Anaïs Nin, French-American essayist and memoirist (born 1903)

Angela Anaïs Juana Antolina Rosa Edelmira Nin y Culmell was a French-born American diarist, essayist, novelist, and writer of short stories and erotica. Born to Cuban parents in France, Nin was the daughter of the composer Joaquín Nin and the classically trained singer Rosa Culmell. Nin spent her early years in Spain and Cuba, about sixteen years in Paris (1924–1940), and the remaining half of her life in the United States, where she became an established author.

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14/01/1976

Abdul Razak Hussein, Malaysian lawyer and politician, 2nd Prime Minister of Malaysia (born 1922)

Abdul Razak bin Hussein was a Malaysian lawyer and politician who served as the second prime minister of Malaysia from 1970 until his death in 1976. He also served as the first deputy prime minister of Malaysia from 1957 to 1970. He is referred to as the "Father of Development" of Malaysia.

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14/01/1972

Horst Assmy, German footballer (born 1933)

Horst Assmy was a German footballer who played as a forward. Assmy played in East Germany for Einheit Pankow, Motor Oberschöneweide and Vorwärts Berlin, and won 12 caps for the national team, scoring 4 goals. He defected as a republikflucht to West Germany in 1959, appearing for Tennis Borussia Berlin, Schalke 04 and Hessen Kassel.

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Frederik IX of Denmark (born 1899)

Frederik IX was King of Denmark from 1947 to 1972.

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14/01/1970

William Feller, Croatian-American mathematician and academic (born 1906)

William "Vilim" Feller, born Vilibald Srećko Feller, was a Croatian–American mathematician specializing in probability theory.

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Asım Gündüz, Turkish general (born 1880)

Âsım Gündüz was an officer of the Ottoman Army and a general of the Turkish Army.

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14/01/1968

Dorothea Mackellar, Australian poet and author (born 1885)

Isobel Marion Dorothea Mackellar was an Australian poet and fiction writer. Her poem "My Country" is widely known in Australia, especially its second stanza, which begins: "I love a sunburnt country / A land of sweeping plains, / Of ragged mountain ranges, / Of droughts and flooding rains."

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14/01/1966

Sergei Korolev, Ukrainian-Russian engineer and academic (born 1906)

Sergei Pavlovich Korolev was the lead Soviet rocket engineer and spacecraft designer during the Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union in the 1950s and 1960s. He invented the R-7 Rocket, Sputnik 1, and was involved in the launching of Laika, Sputnik 3, the first human-made object to make contact with another celestial body, Belka and Strelka, the first human being, Yuri Gagarin, into space, Voskhod 1, and the first person, Alexei Leonov, to conduct a spacewalk.

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14/01/1965

Jeanette MacDonald, American actress and singer (born 1903)

Jeanette Anna MacDonald was an American soprano and actress best remembered for her musical films of the 1930s with Maurice Chevalier and Nelson Eddy. During the 1930s and 1940s she starred in 29 feature films, four nominated for Best Picture Oscars, and recorded extensively, earning three gold records. She later appeared in opera, concerts, radio, and television. MacDonald was one of the most influential sopranos of the 20th century, introducing opera to film-going audiences and inspiring a generation of singers.

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14/01/1961

Barry Fitzgerald, Irish actor (born 1888)

William Joseph Shields, known professionally as Barry Fitzgerald, was an Irish stage, film, and television actor. In a career spanning almost forty years, he appeared in such notable films as Bringing Up Baby (1938), The Long Voyage Home (1940), How Green Was My Valley (1941), The Sea Wolf (1941), Going My Way (1944), None but the Lonely Heart (1944), and The Quiet Man (1952). For Going My Way, he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor and was simultaneously nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor for the same performance. In 2020, he was listed at number 11 on The Irish Times list of Ireland's greatest film actors.

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14/01/1959

Eivind Berggrav, Norwegian bishop and translator (born 1884)

Eivind Josef Berggrav was a Norwegian Lutheran bishop. As primate of the Church of Norway, Berggrav became known for his central role in the Church of Norway's resistance against the Nazi occupation of Norway during World War II. Berggrav also became an important figure in 20th-century ecumenical movement and served as president of the United Bible Societies.

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14/01/1957

Humphrey Bogart, American actor (born 1899)

Humphrey DeForest Bogart, nicknamed Bogie, was an American actor. His performances in classic Hollywood cinema made him an American cultural icon. In 1999, the American Film Institute selected Bogart as the greatest male star of classic American cinema.

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14/01/1952

Artur Kapp, Estonian composer and conductor (born 1878)

Artur Kapp was an Estonian composer.

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14/01/1951

Gregorios Xenopoulos, Greek author, journalist, and playwright (born 1867)

Gregorios Xenopoulos was a novelist, journalist and playwright from Zakynthos.

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14/01/1949

Harry Stack Sullivan, American psychiatrist and psychoanalyst (born 1892)

Herbert "Harry" Stack Sullivan was an American neo-Freudian psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who held that "personality can never be isolated from the complex interpersonal relationships in which [a] person lives" and that "[t]he field of psychiatry is the field of interpersonal relations under any and all circumstances in which [such] relations exist". Having studied therapists Sigmund Freud, Adolf Meyer, and William Alanson White, he devoted years of clinical and research work to helping people with psychotic illness.

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14/01/1947

Gustave Mathieu, French illegalist anarchist, suspected of being one of Ravachol's main accomplices (born 1866)

Gustave Mathieu,, was a French worker and illegalist anarchist. A very militant anarchist and central to the birth of illegalism, he notably associated with Placide Schouppe, one of the first illegalists. Mathieu was also one of the most wanted people in France at the start of the Ère des attentats (1892-1894), being accused of being one of Ravachol's main accomplices for the Saint-Germain and the Clichy bombings.

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14/01/1944

Mehmet Emin Yurdakul, Turkish author and politician (born 1869)

Mehmet Emin Yurdakul was a Turkish nationalist writer, poet and politician. Being an ideologue of Pan-Turkism, his writings and poems had a major impact on defining the term vatan (Fatherland).

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14/01/1943

Laura E. Richards, American author and poet (born 1850)

Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards was an American writer. She wrote more than 90 books including biographies, poetry, and several for children. One well-known children's poem is her literary nonsense verse Eletelephony.

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14/01/1942

Porfirio Barba-Jacob, Colombian poet and author (born 1883)

Miguel Ángel Osorio Benítez, better known by his pseudonym, Porfirio Barba-Jacob, was a Colombian poet and writer.

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14/01/1938

Jaakko Mäki, Finnish politician (born 1878)

Jaakko Mäki was a Finnish coppersmith, politician and member of the Parliament of Finland, the national legislature of Finland. A member of the Social Democratic Party, he represented Vaasa Province South between August 1908 and September 1918. Mäki went to Soviet Russia during the Finnish Civil War and was executed there in January 1938 during Stalin's Great Purge.

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14/01/1937

Jaishankar Prasad, Indian poet, author, and playwright (born 1889)

Jaishankar Prasad was a prominent figure in modern Hindi literature as well as Hindi theatre. Prasad was his pen name. He was also known as Chhayavadi kavi.

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14/01/1934

Ioan Cantacuzino, Romanian physician and bacteriologist (born 1863)

Ioan I. Cantacuzino was a renowned Romanian physician and bacteriologist, a professor at the School of Medicine and Pharmacy of the University of Bucharest, and a titular member of the Romanian Academy. He established the fields of microbiology and experimental medicine in Romania, and founded the Cantacuzino Institute.

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14/01/1926

August Sedláček, Czech historian and author (born 1843)

August Sedláček was a Czech historian and archivist.

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14/01/1920

John Francis Dodge, American businessman, co-founded the Dodge Automobile Company (born 1864)

John Francis Dodge was an American automobile manufacturing pioneer and co-founder of Dodge Brothers Company.

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14/01/1919

Platon, Estonian bishop and saint (born 1869)

Platon, born Paul Kulbusch, was an Estonian bishop and the first Orthodox saint of Estonian ethnicity.

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14/01/1915

Richard Meux Benson, English priest and saint, founded the Society of St. John the Evangelist (born 1824)

Richard Meux Benson was a priest in the Church of England and founder of the Society of St. John the Evangelist, the first religious order of monks in the Anglican Communion since the Reformation. He is commemorated in the Calendar of Saints of the Anglican Church of Canada on 15 January and on the Episcopal Church calendar on 14 January with Charles Gore.

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14/01/1908

Holger Drachmann, Danish poet and playwright (born 1846)

Holger Henrik Herholdt Drachmann was a Danish poet, dramatist and painter. He was a member of the Skagen artistic colony and became a figure of the Scandinavian Modern Breakthrough Movement.

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14/01/1907

Sir James Fergusson, 6th Baronet, Scottish soldier and politician, 6th Governor of New Zealand (born 1832)

Sir James Fergusson, 6th Baronet was a British soldier, Conservative politician and colonial administrator who was the sixth governor of New Zealand from 1873 to 1874.

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14/01/1905

Ernst Abbe, German physicist and engineer (born 1840)

Ernst Karl Abbe, was a German businessman, optical engineer, physicist, and social reformer. Together with Otto Schott and Carl Zeiss, he developed numerous optical instruments. He was also a co-owner of Carl Zeiss AG, a German manufacturer of scientific microscopes, astronomical telescopes, planetariums, and other advanced optical systems.

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14/01/1901

Mandell Creighton, English bishop and historian (born 1843)

Mandell Creighton was a British historian, Anglican priest and bishop. The son of a successful cabinet-maker in north-west England, Creighton studied at the University of Oxford, focusing his scholarship on the Renaissance Papacy, and then became a don in 1866. He was appointed the first occupant of the Dixie Chair of Ecclesiastical History at the University of Cambridge in 1884. The following year, he also was engaged as the founding editor of The English Historical Review, the first English-language academic journal in its field. In these posts, he helped to establish history as an independent academic discipline in England.

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Charles Hermite, French mathematician and theorist (born 1822)

Charles Hermite FRS FRSE MIAS was a French mathematician who studied analysis, number theory, and algebra. One of his most remarkable achievements was the proof of the transcendence of the number e.

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14/01/1898

Lewis Carroll, English novelist, poet, and mathematician (born 1832)

Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was an English author, poet, mathematician, photographer and reluctant Anglican deacon. His most notable works are Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass (1871), some of the most important examples of Victorian literature. He was noted for his facility with word play, logic, and fantasy. His poems Jabberwocky (1871) and The Hunting of the Snark (1876) are classified in the genre of literary nonsense. Some of Alice's nonsensical wonderland logic reflects his published work on mathematical logic.

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14/01/1892

Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale (born 1864)

Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale, was the eldest child of the Prince and Princess of Wales. From birth, he was second in the line of succession to the British throne, but did not become king or Prince of Wales because he died before both his father and paternal grandmother Queen Victoria.

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Alexander J. Davis, American architect (born 1803)

Alexander Jackson Davis was an American architect known particularly for his association with the Gothic Revival style.

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14/01/1889

Ema Pukšec, Croatian soprano (born 1834)

Ema Pukšec, also known as Ilma de Murska, as well as Ilma di Murska, was a 19th-century operatic coloratura soprano with a voice with nearly three octaves compass from Croatia.

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14/01/1888

Stephen Heller, Hungarian pianist and composer (born 1813)

Stephen Heller was a Hungarian pianist, teacher, and composer whose career spanned the period from Schumann to Bizet. Heller was an influence for later Romantic composers. He outlived his reputation, and was a near-forgotten figure at his death in 1888.

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14/01/1883

Napoléon Coste, French guitarist and composer (born 1806)

Claude Antoine Jean Georges Napoléon Coste was a French classical guitarist and composer.

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14/01/1874

Johann Philipp Reis, German physicist and academic, invented the Reis telephone (born 1834)

Johann Philipp Reis was a self-taught German scientist and inventor. In 1861, he constructed the first make-and-break telephone, today called the Reis telephone. It was the first device to transmit a voice via electronic signals, and is regarded by some as the first telephone. Reis also coined the term telephone.

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14/01/1867

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, French painter and illustrator (born 1780)

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres was a French Neoclassical painter. Ingres was profoundly influenced by past artistic traditions and aspired to become the guardian of academic orthodoxy against the ascendant Romantic style. Although he considered himself a painter of history in the tradition of Nicolas Poussin and Jacques-Louis David, it is his portraits, both painted and drawn, that are recognized as his greatest legacy. His expressive distortions of form and space made him an important precursor of modern art, influencing Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, and other modernists.

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14/01/1833

Seraphim of Sarov, Russian monk and saint (born 1759)

Seraphim of Sarov, born Prókhor Isídorovich Moshnín (Mashnín) [Про́хор Иси́дорович Мошни́н (Машни́н)], is one of the most renowned Russian saints and is venerated in the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Anglican Communion. He is generally considered the greatest of the 18th-century startsy (elders). Seraphim extended the monastic teachings of contemplation, theoria and self-denial to the layperson. He taught that the purpose of the Christian life was to receive the Holy Spirit. Perhaps his most popular quotation amongst his devotees is "Acquire the Spirit of Peace, and thousands around you will be saved."

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14/01/1825

George Dance the Younger, English architect and surveyor (born 1741)

George Dance the Younger RA was an English architect and surveyor as well as a portraitist.

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14/01/1823

Athanasios Kanakaris, Greek politician (born 1760)

Athanasios Kanakaris was a Greek politician. He fought in the Greek War of Independence against the Ottoman Empire.

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14/01/1786

Michael Arne, English organist and composer (born 1741)

Michael Arne was an English composer, harpsichordist, organist, singer, and actor. He was the son of the composer Thomas Arne and the soprano Cecilia Young, a member of the famous Young family of musicians of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Like his father, Arne worked primarily as a composer of stage music and vocal art song, contributing little to other genres of music. He wrote several songs for London's pleasure gardens, the most famous of which is Lass with the Delicate Air (1762). A moderately prolific composer, Arne wrote nine operas and collaborated on at least 15 others. His most successful opera, Cymon (1767), enjoyed several revivals during his lifetime and into the early nineteenth century.

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Meshech Weare, American lawyer and politician, 1st Governor of New Hampshire (born 1713)

Meshech Weare was an American farmer, lawyer, and statesman from Seabrook and Hampton Falls, New Hampshire. He served as the first president of New Hampshire. Before 1784 the position of governor was referred to as “president of New Hampshire.” He is also called “The father of New Hampshire.” The first president of the earlier Province of New Hampshire was John Cutt.

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14/01/1776

Edward Cornwallis, English general and politician, Governor of Gibraltar (born 1713)

Lieutenant-General Edward Cornwallis was a British Army officer and member of the aristocratic Cornwallis family. After Cornwallis fought in Scotland, putting down the Jacobite rebellion of 1745, he was appointed Groom of the Chamber for King George II. He was then made Governor of Nova Scotia (1749–1752), one of the colonies in North America, and assigned to establish the new town of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Later Cornwallis returned to London, where he was elected as MP for Westminster and married the niece of Robert Walpole, Great Britain's first Prime Minister. Cornwallis was next appointed as Governor of Gibraltar.

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14/01/1766

Frederick V of Denmark (born 1723)

Frederick V was King of Denmark and Norway and Duke of Schleswig-Holstein from 6 August 1746 until his death in 1766. A member of the House of Oldenburg, he was the son of Christian VI of Denmark and Sophie Magdalene of Brandenburg-Kulmbach.

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14/01/1753

George Berkeley, Anglo-Irish philosopher and author (born 1685)

George Berkeley, known as Bishop Berkeley, was an Anglo-Irish philosopher, writer, and clergyman who is regarded as the founder of immaterialism, a philosophical theory he developed which later came to be known as subjective idealism. He has also been called "the father of idealism" by German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer. Berkeley played a leading role in the empiricism movement and was one of its pioneers. He was among the most cited philosophers of 18th-century Europe, and his works deeply influenced later thinkers such as Immanuel Kant and David Hume.

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14/01/1701

Tokugawa Mitsukuni, Japanese daimyō (born 1628)

Tokugawa Mitsukuni , also known as Mito Kōmon , was a Japanese daimyo who was known for his influence in the politics of the early Edo period. He was the third son of Tokugawa Yorifusa and succeeded him, becoming the second daimyo of the Mito Domain.

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14/01/1679

Jacques de Billy, French mathematician and academic (born 1602)

Jacques de Billy was a French Jesuit mathematician. Born in Compiègne, he subsequently entered the Society of Jesus. From 1629 to 1630, Billy taught mathematics at the Jesuit College at Pont-à-Mousson. He was still studying theology at this time. From 1631 to 1633, Billy taught mathematics at the Jesuit college at Rheims. From 1665 to 1668 he was professor of mathematics at the Jesuit college at Dijon. One of his pupils there was Jacques Ozanam. Billy also taught in Grenoble. He also served as rector of a number of Jesuit Colleges in Châlons-en-Champagne, Langres and in Sens.

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14/01/1676

Francesco Cavalli, Italian organist and composer (born 1602)

Francesco Cavalli was a Venetian composer, organist and singer of the early Baroque period. He succeeded his teacher Claudio Monteverdi as the dominant and leading opera composer of the mid 17th-century. A central figure of Venetian musical life, Cavalli wrote more than thirty operas, almost all of which premiered in the city's theaters. His best known works include Ormindo (1644), Giasone (1649) and La Calisto (1651).

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14/01/1648

Caspar Barlaeus, Dutch historian, poet, and theologian (born 1584)

Caspar Barlaeus was a Flemish polymath and Renaissance humanist, a theologian, poet, and historian.

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14/01/1640

Thomas Coventry, 1st Baron Coventry, English lawyer, judge, and politician, Attorney General for England and Wales (born 1578)

Thomas Coventry, 1st Baron Coventry was a prominent English lawyer, politician and judge during the early 17th century.

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14/01/1555

Jacques Dubois, French anatomist (born 1478)

Jacques Dubois was a French anatomist who was professor of surgery at Collège Royal. He was the first to describe venous valves, although their function was later discovered by William Harvey.

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14/01/1476

John de Mowbray, 4th Duke of Norfolk (born 1444)

John de Mowbray, 4th Duke of Norfolk, KG, known as 1st Earl of Surrey between 1451 and 1461, was the only son of John de Mowbray, 3rd Duke of Norfolk and Eleanor Bourchier. His maternal grandparents were William Bourchier, Count of Eu and Anne of Gloucester.

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14/01/1465

Thomas Beckington, English statesman and prelate

Thomas Beckington was the Bishop of Bath and Wells and King's Secretary in medieval England under Henry VI.

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14/01/1331

Odoric of Pordenone, Italian priest and explorer (born 1286)

Odoric of Pordenone was a Franciscan friar and missionary explorer from Friuli in northeast Italy. He journeyed through India, Sumatra, Java, and China, where he spent three years in the imperial capital of Khanbaliq. After more than ten years of travel, he returned home and dictated a narrative of his experiences and observations called the Relatio, highlighting various cultural, religious, and social peculiarities he encountered in Asia.

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14/01/1301

Andrew III of Hungary (born 1265)

Andrew III the Venetian was King of Hungary and Croatia between 1290 and 1301. His father, Stephen the Posthumous, was the posthumous son of Andrew II of Hungary although Stephen's older half brothers considered him a bastard. Andrew grew up in Venice, and first arrived in Hungary upon the invitation of a rebellious baron, Ivan Kőszegi, in 1278. Kőszegi tried to play Andrew off against Ladislaus IV of Hungary, but the conspiracy collapsed and Andrew returned to Venice.

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14/01/1236

Saint Sava, Serbian archbishop and saint (born 1175)

Saint Sava, known as the Enlightener or the Illuminator, was a Serbian prince and Orthodox monk who became the first Archbishop of the autocephalous Serbian Church. He was also a writer, diplomat, and the founder of Serbian law.

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14/01/1163

Ladislaus II of Hungary (born 1131)

Ladislaus II or Ladislas II was King of Hungary and Croatia between 1162 and 1163, having usurped the crown from his nephew, Stephen III.

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14/01/1092

Vratislaus II of Bohemia

Vratislaus II, the son of Bretislaus I and Judith of Schweinfurt, was the first King of Bohemia as of 15 June 1085, his royal title granted as a lifetime honorific from Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV that did not establish a hereditary monarchy. Before his elevation to the royal dignity, Vratislaus had ruled Bohemia as duke since 1061.

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14/01/0973

Ekkehard I, Frankish monk and poet

Ekkehard I, called Major or Senex, was a monk of the Abbey of Saint Gall. He was of noble birth, of the Jonschwyl family in Toggenburg, and was educated in the monastery of St. Gall. After joining the Benedictine Order, he was appointed director of the inner school there. Later, under Abbot Kralo, who trusted him implicitly, he was elected dean of the monastery and, for a time, directed all the affairs of the abbey.

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14/01/0937

Zhang Yanlang, Chinese official

Zhang Yanlang was an official of the Chinese Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period states Later Liang and Later Tang. He had his most powerful positions during the reign of Later Tang's last emperor Li Congke, as both chancellor and the director of the three financial agencies. After Li Congke was overthrown by his brother-in-law Shi Jingtang, who established his own Later Jin, Shi ordered Zhang be put to death.

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14/01/0927

Wang Yanhan, king of Min (Ten Kingdoms)

Wang Yanhan, courtesy name Ziyi (子逸), also known by his posthumous name as the King Si of Min (閩嗣王), was a ruler of Min during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period of China. He ruled briefly after the death of his father Wang Shenzhi without a regal title, but later declared himself king. Just two months after declaring himself king, he was overthrown and killed in a revolt by his adoptive brother Wang Yanbing and younger biological brother Wang Yanjun. Wang Yanjun took over the state thereafter.

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14/01/0769

Cui Huan, chancellor of the Tang Dynasty

Cui Huan (崔渙) was a Chinese politician during the Tang dynasty, serving as a chancellor briefly during the reign of Emperor Suzong—although he was commissioned by Emperor Suzong's father Emperor Xuanzong, not Emperor Suzong.

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14/01/0378

Chak Tok Ichʼaak I, ajaw of the Maya city of Tikal

Chak Tok Ichʼaak I also known as Great Paw, Great Jaguar Paw, and Toh Chak Ichʼak was an ajaw of the Maya city of Tikal. He took the throne on 7 August 360 and reigned until his death in 378, apparently at the hands of invaders from central Mexico.

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