27th January — International Holocaust Remembrance Day

On this day, 200 notable people were born on 27th January — spanning from 1365 to 2003. From world leaders to artists and scientists, discover who shares this birthday.

27/01/2003

Park Seong-hoon, South Korean footballer

Park Seong-hoon is a South Korean professional footballer who plays as a central defender for K League 1 club FC Seoul. He trained in the club's youth system, serving as captain for its U-18 youth team. He made his debut appearance in the 2022 K League 1 season. After limited appearances in his first two seasons, Park became a regular starter in 2024, scoring his first league goal.

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27/01/2000

Morgan Gibbs-White, English footballer

Morgan Anthony Gibbs-White is an English professional footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder for Premier League club Nottingham Forest and the England national team.

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Aurélien Tchouaméni, French footballer

Aurélien Djani Tchouaméni is a French professional footballer who plays as a defensive midfielder or a centre-back for La Liga club Real Madrid and the France national team.

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27/01/1998

Devin Druid, American actor

Devin McKenzie Druid is an American actor. He is known for his portrayal of Tyler Down in the Netflix series 13 Reasons Why, based on the 2007 novel by Jay Asher.

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27/01/1996

Braeden Lemasters, American actor, musician, and singer

Braeden Matthew Lemasters is an American musician and actor. He began his career as a child actor, receiving recognition for his role as Albert Tranelli in the TNT comedy-drama series Men of a Certain Age (2009–2011). He has made guest appearances in several television series such as, Criminal Minds, ER, House, Grey's Anatomy and Amazon Prime Video's The Romanoffs. He is also the lead guitarist and co-lead singer for the American alternative rock band Wallows.

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27/01/1995

Harrison Reed, English footballer

Harrison James Reed is an English professional footballer who plays as a defensive midfielder for Premier League club Fulham.

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27/01/1994

Desiree Becker, German politician

Desiree Becker is a German politician and member of the Bundestag. A member of The Left, she has represented Hesse since 2025.

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Jack Stephens, English footballer

Jack Stephens is an English professional footballer who plays as a defender for and captains EFL Championship club Southampton.

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27/01/1992

Stefano Pettinari, Italian footballer

Stefano Pettinari is an Italian professional footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder or striker for Serie C Group B club Ternana.

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27/01/1991

Christian Bickel, German footballer

Christian Bickel is a German professional footballer who plays for amateur club BW 91 Bad Frankenhausen as a midfielder.

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Julio Teherán, Colombian baseball player

Julio Alberto Teherán Pinto is a Colombian former professional baseball pitcher. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Atlanta Braves, Los Angeles Angels, Detroit Tigers, Milwaukee Brewers, and New York Mets. Teherán signed with the Braves as an international free agent in 2007 and made his MLB debut in 2011. He was an MLB All-Star in 2014 and 2016.

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27/01/1990

Tim Beckham, American baseball player

Timothy Lamar Beckham is an American former professional baseball infielder. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Tampa Bay Rays, Baltimore Orioles, Seattle Mariners, and Minnesota Twins. Beckham was the first overall selection of the 2008 MLB draft by the Rays and received a signing bonus of $6.15 million. He made his MLB debut in 2013, and played for the Rays through 2017 when they traded him to Baltimore. He played for the Orioles in 2017 and 2018, for Seattle in 2019, and for Minnesota in 2022.

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27/01/1989

Alberto Botía, Spanish footballer

Alberto Botía is a Spanish professional footballer who plays as a centre-back for Super League Greece club A.E. Kifisia.

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27/01/1988

Kerlon, Brazilian footballer

Kerlon Moura Souza is a Brazilian former professional footballer who played as an attacking midfielder. After retiring, he worked as a coach at Olé Soccer in the United States.

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27/01/1987

Katy Rose, American singer-songwriter and producer

Kathryn Rosemary Bullard, known professionally as Katy Rose, is an American singer-songwriter and producer. Rose released two studio albums, Because I Can and Candy Eyed. Since her last album, Rose has released eight independent singles.

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Anton Shunin, Russian footballer

Anton Vladimirovich Shunin is a Russian former footballer who played as a goalkeeper.

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27/01/1986

Johan Petro, French basketball player

Johan Petro is a French former professional basketball player of Guadeloupean descent. He was selected by the Seattle SuperSonics with the 25th overall pick in the 2005 NBA draft.

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27/01/1985

Ruben Amorim, Portuguese footballer and manager

Ruben Filipe Marques Amorim is a Portuguese professional football manager and former player who was most recently manager of Premier League club Manchester United.

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27/01/1983

Carlo Colaiacovo, Canadian ice hockey player

Carlo Colaiacovo is a Canadian former professional ice hockey defenceman who is currently co-hosting a show on Canada’s TSN 1050 radio station, First Up with Korolnek and Colaiacovo. He most recently played for Adler Mannheim in the Deutsche Eishockey Liga (DEL). Colaiacovo has an identical twin brother, Paulo Colaiacovo, who has also played professional ice hockey, as a goaltender.

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Paulo Colaiacovo, Canadian ice hockey player

Paulo Colaiacovo is a Canadian former professional ice hockey goaltender. He is the identical twin brother of National Hockey League defenceman Carlo Colaiacovo. He was born in Toronto, Ontario.

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Gavin Floyd, American baseball player

Gavin Christopher Floyd is an American former professional baseball pitcher, who played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Philadelphia Phillies, Chicago White Sox, Atlanta Braves, Cleveland Indians, and Toronto Blue Jays.

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Lee Grant, English footballer

Lee Anderson Grant is an English football coach and former professional footballer who is currently the head coach of EFL League Two club Walsall.

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27/01/1982

Eva Asderaki, Greek tennis umpire

Eva Asderaki, also known by her married name Eva Asderaki-Moore, is a Greek tennis umpire, who has umpired international tennis matches since 2001. She has umpired at all four Grand Slam tournaments, and in 2015, she became the first woman to umpire a men's US Open tennis final.

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27/01/1981

Alicia Molik, Australian tennis player and sportscaster

Alicia Molik is an Australian former professional tennis player. She reached a career-high singles ranking of world No. 8 and a career-high doubles ranking of world No. 6.

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Tony Woodcock, New Zealand rugby player

Tony Dale Woodcock is a New Zealand former rugby union player. His position was loosehead prop, and he played 118 tests for the New Zealand national team, the All Blacks. Woodcock played for the All Blacks from 2002 to 2015, scoring eight test tries. He was described by The Dominion Post as "widely regarded as the world's premier loosehead", and by The New Zealand Herald as having the "best range of skills of any prop on the planet". He is now the most capped All Black prop of all time, and is the second most capped player in Blues history, behind Keven Mealamu. He was a key member of the 2011 and 2015 Rugby World Cup winning squads, becoming one of only 20 players to have won multiple Rugby World Cups.

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27/01/1980

Chanda Gunn, American ice hockey player and coach

Chanda Leigh Gunn is a retired American ice hockey goaltender. She won a bronze medal at the 2006 Winter Olympics. At the games in Turin, she played close to 250 minutes and had 50 saves with a save percentage of 89.3%.

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Marat Safin, Russian tennis player and politician

Marat Mubinovich Safin is a Russian former professional tennis player and current coach. He was ranked as the world No. 1 in men's singles by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) for nine weeks. Safin won 15 ATP Tour-level singles titles, including two majors at the 2000 US Open and 2005 Australian Open, and helped lead Russia to Davis Cup titles in 2002 and 2006.

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Jiří Welsch, Czech basketball player

Jiří Welsch is a Czech former professional basketball player for BK Pardubice of the Czech Republic National Basketball League. He has also represented the senior Czech Republic national basketball team. Welsch has played in the National Basketball Association in the United States, having been drafted in 2002 by the Philadelphia 76ers.

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27/01/1979

Lonny Baxter, American basketball player

Lonny Leroy Baxter is an American former professional basketball player. He is 6 ft 8 in (2.03 m) in height, and played the power forward and center positions.

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Daniel Vettori, New Zealand cricketer and coach

Daniel Luca Vettori is a New Zealand cricket coach and former cricketer who played for the New Zealand national cricket team. He was the 200th player to win their Test cricket cap for New Zealand and an inductee in the New Zealand Cricket Hall of Fame. He is currently an assistant coach of the Australia men's national cricket team.

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27/01/1977

Tomi Kallio, Finnish ice hockey player

Tomi Kristian Kallio is a Finnish former professional ice hockey right winger who last played for HC TPS in the Finnish Liiga. After retiring from TPS in 2018, Kallio remained with the team and assumed the role of director of European scouting.

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27/01/1976

Clint Ford, American screenwriter and voice actor

Clint Ford is an American screenwriter, actor, voice-over artist, and novelist. He is best known for his portrayal as the Klingon M'ven, of the Great House of Martok, in the video game, Star Trek Online. Ford is also known for his work in the American dubs of Japanese anime series, such as Yû yû hakusho, Blue Gender, and Dragon Ball Z.

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Danielle George, American professor

Danielle Amanda George is a Professor of Radio frequency engineering in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering (EEE) and Associate Dean for Teaching and Learning at the University of Manchester in the UK. George became the 139th President of the Institution of Engineering and Technology in October 2020. George was appointed as the Chief Scientific Adviser for National Security in 2025.

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Ahn Jung-hwan, South Korean footballer

Ahn Jung-hwan is a South Korean television personality and former professional footballer. A versatile forward known for his technical skills and clutch goalscoring, Ahn represented South Korea at three FIFA World Cups, notably scoring a golden goal against Italy in 2002. Following his retirement, Ahn transitioned into a successful career in broadcasting, becoming a popular football commentator and television host. He is also recognised for his philanthropic endeavors.

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Fred Taylor, American football player

Frederick Antwon Taylor is an American former professional football player who was a running back in the National Football League (NFL) for 13 seasons from 1998 to 2010. He played college football for the Florida Gators and was selected by the Jacksonville Jaguars ninth overall in the 1998 NFL draft. Taylor played for the Jaguars and New England Patriots and is a member of the 10,000 yard rushing club. He is a co-host of The Pivot Podcast with friends, Channing Crowder and Ryan Clark.

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27/01/1974

Ole Einar Bjørndalen, Norwegian skier and biathlete

Ole Einar Bjørndalen is a retired Norwegian professional biathlete and coach, often referred to by the nickname, the "King of Biathlon". With 14 Winter Olympic Games medals, he is second on the list of multiple medalists behind Marit Bjørgen who has won 15 medals. He is also the most successful biathlete of all time at the Biathlon World Championships, having won 45 medals. With 95 World Cup wins, Bjørndalen is ranked first all-time for career victories on the Biathlon World Cup tour. He has won the Overall World Cup title six times, in 1997–98, in 2002–03, in 2004–05, in 2005–06, in 2007–08 and in 2008–09.

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Andrei Pavel, Romanian tennis player and coach

Andrei Pavel is a Romanian tennis coach and former professional tennis player. He achieved a career-high ATP singles ranking of world No. 13 and won three titles, including the 2001 Canada Masters. He also reached a career-high in doubles of No. 18 and won six doubles titles.

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Chaminda Vaas, Sri Lankan cricketer and coach

Deshabandu Warnakulasuriya Patabendige Ushantha Joseph Chaminda Vaas is a former Sri Lankan international cricketer who represented the Sri Lanka national cricket team. He is a fast medium pace bowler and regarded as one of the greatest bowlers from Sri Lanka and one of the most successful bowlers in international cricket. He was a part of the Sri Lankan squad which won the 1996 Cricket World Cup, and the 2002 ICC Champions Trophy.

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27/01/1973

Valyantsin Byalkevich, Belarusian footballer and manager (died 2014)

Valyantsin Byalkevich, also referred to as Valiantsin Bialkevich, was a Belarusian professional footballer who played as a midfielder for the Belarus national team. He spent the majority of his career with Ukrainian club Dynamo Kyiv, where he was predominantly used as a playmaker, and was part of the team that reached the semi-finals of 1998–99 UEFA Champions League.

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27/01/1972

Bibi Gaytán, Mexican singer and actress

Silvia "Bibi" Gaytán Barragán is a Mexican singer and actress. Since she was born, she has lived in Villahermosa, Tabasco and she considers herself "Tabasqueña".

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Josh Randall, American actor

Joshua Reeve Randall is an American actor. He is best known for his television roles as Dr. Mike Burton on the NBC comedy-drama series Ed (2000–2004) and Sean Beckett on the ABC drama series Station 19 (2021–2024).

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Bryant Young, American football player and coach

Bryant Colby Young is an American former professional football player who was a defensive tackle for the San Francisco 49ers of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish was selected by the 49ers in the first round of the 1994 NFL draft. Young was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2022.

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27/01/1971

Patrice Brisebois, Canadian ice hockey player and coach

Joseph Patrice Brisebois is a Canadian former professional ice hockey defenceman for the Montreal Canadiens and Colorado Avalanche, playing nearly 900 games with the former and 1,009 games overall. Brisebois was recently the Canadiens' Director of Player Development.

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27/01/1970

Bradley Clyde, Australian rugby league player

Bradley Clyde is an Australian former professional rugby league footballer who played in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s who, at the peak of his playing career was widely acknowledged as the best lock in the game. He represented both New South Wales, and played for the Australian national side, and played his club football in Australia for the Canberra Raiders and Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs, and in England for Leeds Rhinos.

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Dean Headley, English cricketer and coach

Dean Warren Headley is a former English professional cricketer who played as a right-arm fast bowler for the England cricket team. Domestically he played for Middlesex and Kent County Cricket Clubs. Headley is now an ECB match referee and the current director of cricket at Blundell's School.

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27/01/1969

Michael Kulas, Canadian singer-songwriter and producer

Michael Wade Kulas is a Canadian singer and songwriter who was a member of the English rock band James between 1997 and 2001.

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Patton Oswalt, American comedian and actor

Patton Peter Oswalt is an American stand-up comedian and actor. His acting roles include Spence Olchin in the sitcom The King of Queens (1998–2007) and narrating the sitcom The Goldbergs (2013–2023) as adult Adam F. Goldberg. After making his acting debut in the Seinfeld episode "The Couch", he has appeared in a variety of television series, such as Parks and Recreation, Community, Two and a Half Men, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Drunk History, Reno 911!, Mystery Science Theater 3000, Archer, Veep, Justified, Kim Possible, WordGirl, Modern Family, Brooklyn Nine-Nine and We Bare Bears. He portrayed Principal Ralph Durbin in A.P. Bio (2018–2021) and voiced Matthew the Raven in the TV series The Sandman (2022–2025).

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Shane Thomson, New Zealand cricketer

Shane Alexander Thomson is a former New Zealand international cricketer. He played as a genuine all-rounder, making 19 Test and 56 One Day International appearances for New Zealand.

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27/01/1968

Tracy Lawrence, American country singer

Tracy Lee Lawrence is an American country music singer, songwriter, and record producer. Born in Atlanta, Texas, and raised in Foreman, Arkansas, Lawrence began performing at age 15 and moved to Nashville, Tennessee, in 1990 to begin his country music career. He signed to Atlantic Records Nashville in 1991 and made his debut later that year with the album Sticks and Stones. Five more studio albums, as well as a live album and a compilation album, followed throughout the 1990s and into 2000 on Atlantic before the label's country division was closed in 2001. Afterward, he recorded for Warner Bros. Records, DreamWorks Records, Mercury Records Nashville, and his own labels, Rocky Comfort Records and Lawrence Music Group.

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Mike Patton, American singer, composer, and voice artist

Michael Allan Patton is an American singer, songwriter, producer, and voice actor, best known as the lead vocalist of the rock bands Faith No More and Mr. Bungle. He has also fronted and/or played with Tomahawk, The Dillinger Escape Plan, Fantômas, Moonchild Trio, Kaada/Patton, Dead Cross, Lovage, Mondo Cane, the X-ecutioners, The Avett Brothers, and Peeping Tom. Consistent collaborators through his varied career include avant-garde jazz saxophonist John Zorn, hip hop producer Dan the Automator and classical violinist Eyvind Kang. Patton saw his largest commercial success with Faith No More; although they scored only one US hit, they scored three UK top 20 singles.

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Matt Stover, American football player

John Matthew Stover is an American former professional football player who was a placekicker for 20 seasons in the National Football League (NFL), primarily with the Baltimore Ravens. After five seasons for the Cleveland Browns, he was among the Browns players transferred to the newly created Ravens franchise in 1996, with whom he played 13 seasons. Additionally, Stover was a member of the New York Giants during his first season and Indianapolis Colts during his last. His most successful season was in 2000 when he earned Pro Bowl and first-team All-Pro honors en route to the Ravens winning their first Super Bowl title in Super Bowl XXXV. He was also part of the Giants team that won Super Bowl XXV. For his accomplishments with the Ravens, Stover was named to the Baltimore Ravens Ring of Honor in 2011.

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Tricky, English rapper and producer

Adrian Nicholas Matthews Thaws, better known by his stage name Tricky, is an English musician, record producer, vocalist and rapper. Born and raised in Bristol, in southwest England. Through his work with Massive Attack and other artists, Tricky became a major figure in the Bristol underground scene, which gave rise to multiple internationally recognized artists and the music genre of trip hop.

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27/01/1967

Dave Manson, Canadian ice hockey player and coach

David Michael Manson is a Canadian former professional ice hockey defenceman who played in the National Hockey League (NHL) with several teams. He was an assistant coach with the Edmonton Oilers of the National Hockey League (NHL), and was relieved of duties on November 12, 2023.

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27/01/1966

Tamlyn Tomita, Japanese-American actress and singer

Tamlyn Naomi Tomita is an American actress. She made her screen debut as Kumiko in The Karate Kid Part II (1986) and reprised the character for the streaming series Cobra Kai (2021). She is also well known for her role as Waverly in The Joy Luck Club (1993). Additional films include Come See the Paradise (1990), Picture Bride (1994), Four Rooms (1995), Robot Stories (2003), The Day After Tomorrow (2004) and Gaijin 2: Love Me as I Am (2005).

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27/01/1965

Alan Cumming, Scottish-American actor

Alan Cumming is a Scottish actor, filmmaker and presenter. Known for his roles on stage and screen, he has received numerous accolades including a BAFTA Award, five Emmy Awards, and two Tony Awards. He also won the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Comedy Performance for the West End production of Accidental Death of an Anarchist (1991). His other Olivier-nominated roles are in The Conquest of the South Pole (1988), La Bête (1992), and Cabaret (1994). Cumming won the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical for reprising his role as the Emcee on Broadway in Cabaret (1998). His other performances on Broadway include Design for Living (2001), and Macbeth (2013).

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Mike Newell, English footballer and manager

Michael Colin Newell is an English football manager and former professional footballer.

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Ignacio Noé, Argentinian author and illustrator

Ignacio Noé, usually known simply as Noé, is an artist in a wide range of graphic genres, working in comics, children's books, magazine illustration and erotic comics, in a highly rendered style that utilizes both digital and traditional media. His works include "The Piano Tuner", "Ship of Fools" and most notably "The Convent of Hell".

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Attila Sekerlioglu, Austrian footballer and manager

Attila Sekerlioglu is an Austrian former professional footballer who played as a midfielder. After retiring, he moved into management. He has most recently been manager of Austrian club SV Stockerau. He is now a scout for Bayern Munich.

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27/01/1964

Bridget Fonda, American actress

Bridget Jane Fonda is an American actress known for her roles in films such as The Godfather Part III (1990), Single White Female (1992), Singles (1992), Point of No Return (1993), It Could Happen to You (1994), Balto (1995), City Hall (1996), Jackie Brown (1997), A Simple Plan (1998), Lake Placid (1999), and Kiss of the Dragon (2001). She was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress for her portrayal of Mandy Rice-Davies in Scandal (1989), and received Primetime Emmy and Golden Globe nominations for the television films In the Gloaming (1997) and No Ordinary Baby (2001), respectively. Fonda retired from acting in 2002.

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Jack Haley, American basketball player (died 2015)

Jack Kevin Haley was an American professional basketball player.

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Patrick van Deurzen, Dutch composer and academic

Patrick van Deurzen is a Dutch composer.

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27/01/1963

George Monbiot, English-Welsh author and activist

George Joshua Richard Monbiot is an English journalist, author, and environmental and political activist. He writes a regular column for The Guardian and has written several books.

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27/01/1962

Roberto Paci Dalò, Italian director and composer

Roberto Paci Dalò is an Italian author, composer and musician, film maker and theatre director, sound and visual artist, radio-maker. He is the co-founder and director of the performing arts ensemble Giardini Pensili and he has been the artistic director of Wikimania 2016 Esino Lario. He won the Premio Napoli per la lingua e la cultura italiana in 2015.

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27/01/1961

Gillian Gilbert, English musician, songwriter, and singer

Gillian Lesley Gilbert is an English musician. She is the keyboardist and guitarist of the band New Order. In 2026, Gilbert was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of New Order after two previous nominations.

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Narciso Rodriguez, American fashion designer

Narciso Jesus Rodriguez III is an American fashion designer known for minimalist, body-conscious silhouettes. He gained widespread attention in 1996 when he designed the wedding dress of Carolyn Bessette for her marriage to John F. Kennedy Jr. Rodriguez launched his own label in 1997 and won the Council of Fashion Designers of America (CFDA) Womenswear Designer of the Year award in both 2002 and 2003. He also designed the dress Michelle Obama wore on election night in November 2008, when Barack Obama first appeared as president-elect.

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Margo Timmins, Canadian singer-songwriter

Margo Timmins is a Canadian singer and songwriter. She is the lead vocalist of the alternative country and folk rock band Cowboy Junkies. Her brothers Michael Timmins and Peter Timmins are the band's lead guitarist and drummer.

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27/01/1960

Fiona O'Donnell, Canadian-Scottish politician

Fiona O'Donnell is a Scottish Labour Party politician who served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for East Lothian from 2010 to 2015.

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27/01/1959

Cris Collinsworth, American football player and sportscaster

Anthony Cris Collinsworth is an American former professional football player and sports broadcaster who was a wide receiver in the National Football League (NFL) for eight seasons (1981–1988) with the Cincinnati Bengals. He played college football for the Florida Gators, earning first-team All-American honors. He is a television sportscaster for NBC, Showtime, and the NFL Network, and winner of 17 Sports Emmy Awards. He is also the majority owner of Pro Football Focus.

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Göran Hägglund, Swedish lawyer and politician, 28th Swedish Minister for Social Affairs

Bo Göran Hägglund is a Swedish politician of the Christian Democrats. He was the leader of the Christian Democrats from 2004 to 2015, Member of the Riksdag from 1991 to 2015, and served as Minister for Social Affairs from 2006 to 2014.

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Keith Olbermann, American journalist and author

Keith Theodore Olbermann is an American sports and political commentator and writer. Olbermann spent the first 20 years of his career in sports journalism. He was a sports correspondent for CNN and for local TV and radio stations in the 1980s, winning the Best Sportscaster award from the California Associated Press three times. He co-hosted ESPN's SportsCenter from 1992 to 1997. From 1998 to 2001, he was a producer and anchor for Fox Sports Net and a host for Fox Sports' coverage of Major League Baseball.

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27/01/1958

James Grippando, American lawyer and author

James Grippando is an American novelist and lawyer best known as the 2017 winner of the Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction.

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Alan Milburn, English businessman and politician, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster

Alan Milburn is a British politician who was Member of Parliament (MP) for Darlington from 1992 to 2010. A member of the Labour Party, he served for five years in the Cabinet, first as Chief Secretary to the Treasury from 1998 to 1999, and subsequently as Secretary of State for Health until 2003, when he resigned. He briefly rejoined the Cabinet as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in order to manage Labour's 2005 re-election campaign. He did not seek re-election in the 2010 election. Milburn was chair of the Social Mobility Commission from 2012 to 2017. Since 2015, he has been Chancellor of Lancaster University.

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Susanna Thompson, American actress

Susanna Thompson is an American actress. She is known for her roles in films Little Giants (1994), Ghosts of Mississippi (1996), Random Hearts (1999) and Dragonfly (2002). On television, she played Dr. Lenara Kahn in the episode "Rejoined" in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1995), the Borg Queen in three episodes of Star Trek: Voyager (1999–2000), Karen Sammler on the drama series Once and Again (1999–2002), and Moira Queen on the series Arrow (2012–2020).

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27/01/1957

Janick Gers, English guitarist and songwriter

Janick Robert Gers is an English musician who is best known as one of the three guitarists in heavy metal band Iron Maiden since 1990. He initially joined to replace Adrian Smith, but remained in the band after Smith rejoined in 1999. Gers was previously a member of Gillan and co-founder of the band White Spirit in 1975.

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Frank Miller, American illustrator, director, producer, and screenwriter

Frank Miller is an American comic book creator, screenwriter, and director known for his comic book stories and graphic novels such as his run on Daredevil, for which he created the character Elektra, and subsequent Daredevil: Born Again, The Dark Knight Returns, Batman: Year One, Sin City, Ronin, and 300.

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27/01/1956

Mimi Rogers, American actress

Miriam Ann Rogers is an American actress.

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27/01/1955

Brian Engblom, Canadian ice hockey player and sportscaster

Brian Paul Engblom is a Canadian ice hockey broadcaster for the Tampa Bay Lightning, and a former professional hockey defenceman. He was a two-time Stanley Cup champion with the Montreal Canadiens.

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John Roberts, American lawyer and judge, 17th Chief Justice of the United States

John Glover Roberts Jr. is an American jurist who has served since 2005 as the 17th chief justice of the United States. Though primarily an institutionalist, he has been described as having a moderate conservative judicial philosophy. Regarded as a swing vote in some cases, Roberts has presided over an ideological shift toward conservative jurisprudence on the high court, in which he has authored key opinions.

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27/01/1954

Peter Laird, American author and illustrator

Peter Alan Laird is an American comic book writer and artist. He is best known for co-creating the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles with writer and artist Kevin Eastman.

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Ed Schultz, American talk show host and sportscaster (died 2018)

Edward Andrew Schultz was an American television and radio host, political commentator, news anchor and sports broadcaster.

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27/01/1952

Brian Gottfried, American tennis player

Brian Edward Gottfried is an American retired tennis player who won 25 singles titles and 54 doubles titles during his professional career. He was the runner-up in singles at the 1977 French Open, won the 1975 and 1977 French Open Doubles as well as the 1976 Wimbledon Doubles. He achieved a career-high singles ranking on the ATP tour on June 19, 1977, when he became world No. 3, and a career-high doubles ranking on December 12, 1976, when he became world No. 2.

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Billy Johnson, American football player and coach

William Arthur Johnson, better known as Billy "White Shoes" Johnson, is an American former professional football player who was a wide receiver and return specialist in the National Football League (NFL) from 1974 through 1988. A 75th and 100th Anniversary All-Time NFL Team selection, Johnson was one of the first players to display elaborate celebrations in the end zone.

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Tam O'Shaughnessy, American tennis player, psychologist, and academic

Tam Elizabeth O'Shaughnessy is an American children's science writer, associate professor emeritus of school psychology, and former professional tennis player. She co-founded the science education company Sally Ride Science together with her life partner, astronaut Sally Ride – the third woman and first American woman in space. The company was relaunched as a nonprofit entity, Sally Ride Science at UC San Diego, on October 1, 2015. O'Shaughnessy serves as executive director.

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G. E. Smith, American guitarist and songwriter

George Edward Smith is an American guitarist. Smith was the lead guitarist for the duo Hall & Oates during the band's heyday from 1979 to 1985, playing on several albums and five number one singles. When Hall & Oates took a hiatus in 1985, Smith joined the sketch-comedy show Saturday Night Live, serving as bandleader and co-musical director of the Saturday Night Live Band.

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27/01/1951

Seth Justman, American keyboard player and songwriter

Seth Justman is an American keyboardist, singer and songwriter. He played keyboards on all albums and tours of the J. Geils Band, in addition to writing or co-writing most of their songs and also singing lead after Peter Wolf's departure from the band.

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Cees van der Knaap, Dutch soldier and politician

Cornelis (Cees) van der Knaap is a Dutch politician. He was State Secretary for Defence for the Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA).

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27/01/1950

Jiří Bubla, Czech ice hockey player

Jiří Bubla is a Czech former professional ice hockey defenceman.

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27/01/1948

Mikhail Baryshnikov, Russian-American dancer, choreographer, and actor

Mikhail Nikolayevich Baryshnikov is a Latvian and American dancer, choreographer, and actor. He was the preeminent male classical ballet dancer of the 1970s and 1980s. He subsequently became a noted dance director.

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Jean-Philippe Collard, French pianist

Jean-Philippe Henri Collard is a French pianist known for his interpretations of the works of Gabriel Fauré and Camille Saint-Saëns.

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27/01/1947

Björn Afzelius, Swedish singer-songwriter and guitarist (died 1999)

Björn Svante Afzelius was a Swedish singer-songwriter and guitar player. He was an outspoken socialist, known for his support for Olof Palme. His songs are about love, politics and joys and sadness in life.

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Vyron Polydoras, Greek lawyer and politician, Greek Minister for Public Order

Vyron Polydoras is a Greek politician who was the Minister for Public Order and Justice of Greece from 2006 to 2007 in the first Cabinet of Kostas Karamanlis.

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Cal Schenkel, American painter and illustrator

Calvin "Cal" Schenkel is an American illustrator, graphic designer, animator and comics artist, specializing in album cover design.

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Philip Sugden, English historian and author (died 2014)

Philip Sugden was an English historian, best known for his comprehensive study of Jack the Ripper case, including the books The Complete History of Jack the Ripper, first published in 1994, and The Life and Times of Jack the Ripper (1996). He was the first academic historian to work on the case.

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Perfecto Yasay Jr., Filipino lawyer and Secretary of Foreign Affairs of the Philippines (died 2020)

Perfecto Rivas Yasay Jr. was a Philippine government official who served as Secretary of Foreign Affairs of the Philippines under the Duterte administration in an ad interim basis from June 30, 2016, until March 8, 2017, the rejection of his appointment by the Commission on Appointments over eligibility concerns resulting from questions on his citizenship.

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27/01/1946

Christopher Hum, English academic and diplomat, British Ambassador to China

Sir Christopher Owen Hum is the former UK Ambassador to the People's Republic of China and Master of a constituent college of the University of Cambridge.

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Nedra Talley, American singer

Nedra Yvonne Talley-Ross was an American singer. She was best known as a member of the girl group the Ronettes, in which she performed with her cousins Ronnie and Estelle Bennett.

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27/01/1945

Harold Cardinal, Canadian lawyer and politician (died 2005)

Harold Cardinal was a Cree writer, political leader, teacher, negotiator, and lawyer. Throughout his career he advocated, on behalf of all First Nation peoples, for the right to be "the red tile in the Canadian mosaic."

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27/01/1944

Peter Akinola, Nigerian archbishop

Peter Jasper Akinola is the former Anglican Primate of the Church of Nigeria. He is also the former bishop of Abuja and Archbishop of Province III, which covered the northern and central parts of the country. When the division into ecclesiastical provinces was adopted in 2002, he became the first Archbishop of Abuja Province, a position he held until 2010. He is married and a father of six.

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Mairead Maguire, Northern Irish activist, Nobel Prize laureate

Mairead Maguire, also known as Mairead Corrigan Maguire and formerly as Mairéad Corrigan, is a peace activist from Northern Ireland. She co-founded, with Betty Williams and Ciaran McKeown, the Women for Peace, which later became the Community for Peace People, an organization dedicated to encouraging a peaceful resolution of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Maguire and Williams were awarded the 1976 Nobel Peace Prize.

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Nick Mason, English drummer, songwriter, and producer

Nicholas Berkeley Mason is an English drummer and a founder member of the rock band Pink Floyd. He has been the only constant member since the band's formation in 1965, and the only member to appear on every Pink Floyd album. He co-wrote Pink Floyd compositions including "Echoes", "Time", "Careful with That Axe, Eugene" and "One of These Days".

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27/01/1943

Julia Cumberlege, Baroness Cumberlege, English businesswoman and politician

Julia Frances Cumberlege, Baroness Cumberlege, is a former British Conservative Party politician and businesswoman. She was created a life peer on 18 May 1990 as Baroness Cumberlege, of Newick in the County of East Sussex. She retired from the House of Lords on 20 December 2024.

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27/01/1942

Maki Asakawa, Japanese singer-songwriter and producer (died 2010)

Maki Asakawa was a Japanese jazz and blues singer, lyricist and composer. Known as the "Queen of the Underground" , she was an important voice of Japan's urban counterculture.

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Tasuku Honjo, Japanese immunologist, Nobel Prize laureate in Physiology or Medicine

Tasuku Honjo is a Japanese physician-scientist and immunologist. He won the 2018 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine and is best known for his identification of programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1). He is also known for his molecular identification of cytokines IL-4 and IL-5, as well as the discovery of activation-induced cytidine deaminase (AID) that is essential for class switch recombination and somatic hypermutation.

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John Witherspoon, American actor and comedian (died 2019)

John Witherspoon was an American actor and comedian who performed in various television shows and films. He played Willie Jones in the Friday series, and starred in films such as Hollywood Shuffle (1987), Boomerang (1992), The Five Heartbeats (1991), and Vampire in Brooklyn (1995). In addition, Witherspoon made appearances on television shows such as The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (1994), The Wayans Bros. (1995–1999), The Tracy Morgan Show (2003), Barnaby Jones (1973), The Boondocks (2005–2014), and Black Jesus (2014–2019).

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Kate Wolf, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (died 1986)

Kate Wolf was an American folk singer and songwriter. Though her career was relatively short, she had a significant impact on the folk music scene. Her best-known compositions include "Here in California", "Love Still Remains", "Across the Great Divide", "Unfinished Life", “Green Eyes” and "Give Yourself to Love". She recorded six albums as a solo artist. She was elected to the NAIRD Independent Music Hall of Fame in 1987. Her songs have since been recorded by Nanci Griffith and Emmylou Harris.

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27/01/1941

Beatrice Tinsley, New Zealand astronomer and cosmologist (died 1981)

Beatrice Muriel Hill Tinsley was a British-born New Zealand astronomer and cosmologist, and the first female professor of astronomy at Yale University, whose research made fundamental contributions to the astronomical understanding of how galaxies evolve, grow and die.

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27/01/1940

Ahmet Kurtcebe Alptemoçin, Turkish engineer and politician, 35th Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs

Ahmet Kurtcebe Alptemoçin is a Turkish mechanical engineer, industrialist and politician belonging to the Motherland Party. He served as minister of finance and customs between 1984 and 1985 and minister of foreign affairs between 1990 and 1991.

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James Cromwell, American actor

James Oliver Cromwell is an American actor. He has received a Primetime Emmy Award as well as a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for Babe (1995). Other film roles include Star Trek: First Contact (1996), L.A. Confidential (1997), Deep Impact (1998), The Green Mile (1999), Space Cowboys (2000), I, Robot (2004), The Longest Yard (2005), The Queen (2006), Spider-Man 3 (2007), W. (2008), Secretariat (2010), The Artist (2011), Still Mine (2012), The Promise (2016), Marshall (2017), Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018), and Emperor (2020). He has also voiced roles in Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron (2002), and Big Hero 6 (2014).

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Terry Harper, Canadian ice hockey player and coach

Terrance Victor Harper is a Canadian former professional ice hockey player. Harper played in the National Hockey League from 1962 to 1981. During this time, he played for the Montreal Canadiens, Los Angeles Kings, Detroit Red Wings, St. Louis Blues, and Colorado Rockies.

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Petru Lucinschi, Romanian activist and politician, 2nd President of Moldova

Petru Lucinschi is a former Moldovan politician who was Moldova's second President from 1997 to 2001. He currently serves as the founder and head of the Lucinschi Foundation of Strategic Studies and International Relations.

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Reynaldo Rey, American actor and screenwriter (died 2015)

Reynaldo Rey was an American actor, comedian and television personality.

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27/01/1937

Fred Åkerström, Swedish singer-songwriter and guitarist (died 1985)

Fred Bo Gunnar Åkerström was a Swedish singer, activist, and theatre actor. Regarded as one of the greatest interpreters of Carl Michael Bellman, he is noted for his resonant bass-baritone voice and emotional performances. Debuting during the folk music revival in the early 1960s, he covered several socially conscious and sentimental ballads by both notable and obscure Swedish poets.

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27/01/1936

Troy Donahue, American actor (died 2001)

Troy Donahue was an American film and television actor, best known for his role as Johnny Hunter in the film A Summer Place. He was a popular sex symbol in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

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Samuel C. C. Ting, American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate

Chao Chung Ting, also known by his English name Samuel, is a Taiwanese-American particle physicist who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1976 with Burton Richter for discovering the subatomic J/ψ particle. He is the Thomas Dudley Cabot Institute Chair at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

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27/01/1935

Steve Demeter, American baseball player, coach, and manager (died 2013)

Stephen Demeter was an American professional baseball player, manager, coach and scout. He played in Major League Baseball for parts of two seasons, appearing in 15 games as a third baseman and pinch hitter in 1959 and 1960. Demeter was born in Homer City, Pennsylvania; he threw and batted right-handed and was listed as 5 feet 9 inches (1.75 m) tall and 185 pounds (84 kg).

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27/01/1934

Édith Cresson, French politician and diplomat, Prime Minister of France

Édith Jeanne Thérèse Cresson is a French politician of the Socialist Party. She served as Prime Minister of France from 1991 to 1992, the first woman to do so and only woman until Élisabeth Borne's appointment in 2022. Her political career ended in scandal as a result of corruption charges dating from her tenure as European Commissioner for Research, Science and Technology.

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George Follmer, American race car driver

George Richard Follmer is an American former auto racing driver, and one of the most successful road racers of the 1970s. He was born in Phoenix, Arizona. His family moved to California when he was just an infant.

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27/01/1933

Jerry Buss, American chemist and businessman (died 2013)

Gerald Hatten Buss was an American businessman, investor, chemist, and philanthropist. He was the majority owner of the Los Angeles Lakers of the National Basketball Association (NBA), winning 10 league championships that were highlighted by the team's Showtime era during the 1980s. He was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame as a contributor. Buss owned other professional sports franchises in Southern California.

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27/01/1932

Boris Shakhlin, Russian-Ukrainian gymnast (died 2008)

Boris Anfiyanovich Shakhlin was a Soviet gymnast who was the 1960 Olympic all-around champion and the 1958 all-around World Champion. He won a total of 13 medals including seven gold medals at the Summer Olympics, and was the most successful athlete at the 1960 Summer Olympics. He held the record for most Olympic medals by a male athlete record until gymnast Nikolai Andrianov won his 14th and 15th medals at the 1980 Summer Olympics. He also won 14 medals at the World Championships.

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27/01/1931

Mordecai Richler, Canadian author and screenwriter (died 2001)

Mordecai Richler was a Canadian writer from Montreal, Quebec. He is best known for his novels set in Montreal's Jewish community; including The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1959) and Barney's Version (1997). His 1970 novel St. Urbain's Horseman and 1989 novel Solomon Gursky Was Here were nominated for the Booker Prize. He is also well known for the Jacob Two-Two fantasy series for children.

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Nigel Vinson, Baron Vinson, English lieutenant and businessman

Nigel Vinson, Baron Vinson, LVO, is a British entrepreneur, inventor, philanthropist, and former Conservative member of the House of Lords.

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27/01/1930

Bobby Bland, American blues singer-songwriter (died 2013)

Robert Calvin Bland, known professionally as Bobby "Blue" Bland, was an American blues singer. Bland developed a sound that mixed gospel with the blues and R&B. He was described as "among the great storytellers of blues and soul music... [who] created tempestuous arias of love, betrayal and resignation, set against roiling, dramatic orchestrations, and left the listener drained but awed." The inspiration behind his unique style was a Detroit Preacher, CL Franklin, because Bland studied his sermons. He was sometimes referred to as the "Lion of the Blues" and as the "Sinatra of the Blues". His music was influenced by Nat King Cole.

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27/01/1929

Mohamed Al-Fayed, Egyptian-Swiss businessman (died 2023)

Mohamed Abdel Moneim Al-Fayed was an Egyptian businessman. His residence and primary business interests were in the United Kingdom from the mid-1960s, and his business interests included ownership of the Hôtel Ritz Paris, Harrods department store, and Fulham Football Club. At the time of his death in 2023, Forbes estimated his wealth at US$2 billion. Since his death, Al-Fayed has been accused by multiple women of sexual harassment and assault.

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Michael Craig, Indian-English actor and screenwriter

Michael Francis Gregson, known professionally as Michael Craig, is an Indian-born British retired actor and screenwriter, known for his work in theatre, film and television both in the United Kingdom and in Australia.

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Gastón Suárez, Bolivian author and playwright (died 1984)

Gastón Suárez was a Bolivian novelist and dramatist. Suárez was born in the town of Tupiza, in the southern part of Potosí, Bolivia in 1929.

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27/01/1928

Hans Modrow, Polish-German lawyer and politician, 5th Prime Minister of East Germany (died 2023)

Hans Modrow was a German politician best known as the last communist premier of East Germany.

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27/01/1926

Fritz Spiegl, Austrian flute player and journalist (died 2003)

Fritz Spiegl was an Austrian-born English musician, journalist, broadcaster, humorist and collector who lived in Britain from 1939. His works include compiling the Radio 4 UK Theme in 1978.

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Ingrid Thulin, Swedish actress (died 2004)

Ingrid Lilian Thulin was a Swedish actress and director who collaborated with filmmaker Ingmar Bergman. She was often cast as harrowing and desperate characters, and earned acclaim from both Swedish and international critics. She won the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actress for her performance in Brink of Life (1958) and the inaugural Guldbagge Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role for The Silence (1963), and was nominated for a Best Supporting Actress BAFTA for Cries and Whispers (1972).

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27/01/1924

Rauf Denktaş, Cypriot lawyer and politician, 1st President of Northern Cyprus (died 2012)

Rauf Raif Denktaş was a Turkish Cypriot politician, barrister and jurist who served as the founding president of Northern Cyprus. He occupied this position as the president of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus between the declaration of the de facto state by Denktaş in 1983 and 2005, as the president of the Turkish Federated State of Cyprus between 1975 and 1983 and as the president of the Autonomous Turkish Cypriot Administration between 1974 and 1975. He was also elected in 1973 as the Vice President of the Republic of Cyprus.

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Brian Rix, English actor, producer, and politician (died 2016)

Brian Norman Roger Rix, Baron Rix was an English actor-manager, who produced a record-breaking sequence of long-running farces on the London stage, including Dry Rot, Simple Spymen and One for the Pot. His one-night TV shows made him the joint highest paid star on the BBC. He often worked with his wife Elspet Gray and sister Sheila Mercier, who became the matriarch in Emmerdale Farm.

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Harvey Shapiro, American poet (died 2013)

Harvey Shapiro was an American poet and editor of The New York Times. He wrote a dozen books of poetry from 1953 to 2006, writing in epigrammatic style about things in his everyday life. As an editor, he was always affiliated with The New York Times in some capacity, mainly in the magazine and book reviews, from 1957 to 2005.

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27/01/1921

Donna Reed, American actress (died 1986)

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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27/01/1920

Hiroyoshi Nishizawa, Japanese lieutenant and pilot (died 1944)

Lieutenant Junior Grade Hiroyoshi Nishizawa was a Japanese naval aviator and an ace of the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service during World War II. Nishizawa was known to his colleagues as 'the Devil' for his breathtaking, brilliant, and unpredictable aerobatics and superb control of his aircraft while in combat. He was a member of the Tainan Kōkūtai's famous "clean up trio" with fellow aces Saburō Sakai and Toshio Ōta and would see action in the New Guinea campaign as well as in the aerial battles over Guadalcanal and over the Solomon Islands. He was killed in 1944 during the Philippines Campaign while aboard an IJN transport aircraft. It is possible that he was the most successful Japanese fighter ace of the war, reportedly telling his last CO that he had achieved a tally of 86 or 87 aerial victories- post war he was linked with scores of 147 or 103, but both of these scores have been considered inaccurate.

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Helmut Zacharias, German violinist and composer (died 2002)

Helmut Zacharias was a German violinist and composer who created over 400 works and sold 14 million records. He also appeared in a number of films, usually playing musicians.

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27/01/1919

Ross Bagdasarian, Sr., American singer-songwriter, pianist, producer, and actor, created Alvin and the Chipmunks (died 1972)

Ross S. Bagdasarian, also known by his stage name David Seville, was an American singer, songwriter, record producer, and actor best known for creating the cartoon band Alvin and the Chipmunks. Initially a stage and film actor, he rose to prominence in 1958 with the songs "Witch Doctor" and "The Chipmunk Song ", which both became Billboard number-one singles. He produced and directed The Alvin Show, which aired on CBS in 1961–62.

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27/01/1918

Skitch Henderson, American pianist, composer, and conductor (died 2005)

Lyle Russel "Skitch" Henderson was an American pianist, conductor, and composer. His nickname "Skitch" came from his ability to "re-sketch" a song in a different key. Bing Crosby suggested that he should use the name professionally.

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Elmore James, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (died 1963)

Elmore James was an American blues guitarist, singer, songwriter, and bandleader. Noted for his use of loud amplification and his stirring voice, James was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992. His slide guitar technique earned him the nickname "King of the Slide Guitar".

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William Seawell, American general (died 2005)

William Thomas Seawell was a brigadier general in the United States Air Force and former head of Pan Am.

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27/01/1915

Jules Archer, American historian and author (died 2008)

Jules Archer was an American author who wrote many volumes of non-fiction history for a general audience and for young adults.

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Jacques Hnizdovsky, Ukrainian-American painter, sculptor, and illustrator (died 1985)

Jacques Hnizdovsky was a Ukrainian-born American painter, printmaker, graphic designer, illustrator and sculptor.

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27/01/1913

Michael Ripper, English actor (died 2000)

Michael George Ripper was an English character actor who appeared in many British horror, comedy and science fiction films.

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27/01/1912

Arne Næss, Norwegian philosopher and environmentalist (died 2009)

Arne Dekke Eide Næss was a Norwegian philosopher who coined the term "deep ecology", an important intellectual and inspirational figure within the environmental movement of the late twentieth century, and a prolific writer on many other philosophical issues. Næss cited Rachel Carson's 1962 book Silent Spring as being a key influence in his vision of deep ecology. Næss combined his ecological vision with Gandhian nonviolence and on several occasions participated in direct action.

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Francis Rogallo, American engineer, invented the Rogallo wing (died 2009)

Francis Melvin Rogallo was an American aeronautical engineer inventor born in Sanger, California, U.S. Together with his wife, he is credited with the invention of the Rogallo wing, or "flexible wing", a precursor to the modern hang glider and paraglider. His patents were ranged over mechanical utility patents and ornamental design patents for wing controls, airfoils, target kite, flexible wing, and advanced configurations for flexible wing vehicles.

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27/01/1910

Edvard Kardelj, Slovene general, economist, and politician, 2nd Foreign Minister of Yugoslavia (died 1979)

Edvard Kardelj, also known by the pseudonyms Bevc, Sperans, and Krištof, was a Yugoslav politician and economist. He was one of the leading members of the Communist Party of Slovenia before World War II. During the war, Kardelj was one of the leaders of the Liberation Front of the Slovenian People and a Slovene Partisan. After the war, he was a federal political leader in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. He led the Yugoslav delegation in peace talks with Italy over the border dispute in the Julian March.

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27/01/1908

William Randolph Hearst, Jr., American journalist and publisher (died 1993)

William Randolph Hearst Jr. was an American businessman, newspaper publisher and member of the wealthy Hearst family.

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27/01/1905

Howard McNear, American actor (died 1969)

Howard Terbell McNear was an American stage, screen, and radio character actor. He is best remembered as the original voice of Doc Adams in the radio version of Gunsmoke and as Floyd Lawson on The Andy Griffith Show (1961–1967).

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27/01/1904

James J. Gibson, American psychologist and academic (died 1979)

James Jerome Gibson was an American psychologist and is considered to be one of the most important contributors to the field of visual perception. Gibson challenged the idea that the nervous system actively constructs conscious visual perception, and instead promoted ecological psychology, in which the mind directly perceives environmental stimuli without additional cognitive construction or processing. A Review of General Psychology survey, published in 2002, ranked him as the 88th most cited psychologist of the 20th century, tied with John Garcia, David Rumelhart, Louis Leon Thurstone, Margaret Floy Washburn, and Robert S. Woodworth.

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27/01/1903

John Eccles, Australian-Swiss neurophysiologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died 1997)

Sir John Carew Eccles was an Australian neurophysiologist and philosopher who won the 1963 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work on the synapse. He shared the prize with Andrew Huxley and Alan Lloyd Hodgkin.

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27/01/1901

Willy Fritsch, German actor (died 1973)

Willy Fritsch was a German theatre and film actor, a popular leading man and character actor from the silent-film era to the early 1960s.

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Art Rooney, American football player, coach and owner (died 1988)

Arthur Joseph Rooney Sr., often referred to as "the Chief", was an American professional football executive. He was the founding owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers, an American football franchise in the National Football League (NFL), from 1933 until his death. Rooney is a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, was an Olympic qualifying boxer, and was part or whole owner in several track sport venues and Pittsburgh area pro teams. He was the first president of the Pittsburgh Steelers from 1933 to 1974, and the first chairman of the team from 1933 until his death in 1988.

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27/01/1900

Hyman G. Rickover, American admiral, leader in the development of nuclear propulsion in the US Navy (died 1986)

Hyman George Rickover was an admiral in the United States Navy. He directed the original development of naval nuclear propulsion and controlled its operations for three decades as director of the U.S. Naval Reactors office. In addition, he oversaw the development of the Shippingport Atomic Power Station, the world's first commercial pressurized water reactor used for generating electricity. Rickover is also one of seven people who have been awarded two Congressional Gold Medals.

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27/01/1895

Joseph Rosenstock, Polish-American conductor and manager (died 1985)

Joseph Rosenstock was an American conductor.

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Harry Ruby, American composer and screenwriter (died 1974)

Harry Rubenstein, known professionally as Harry Ruby, was an American pianist, composer, songwriter and screenwriter, who was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1970. He was married to silent film actress Eileen Percy.

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27/01/1893

Soong Ching-ling, Chinese politician, Honorary President of the People's Republic of China (died 1981)

Soong Ch'ing-ling was a Chinese politician. She was the wife of Sun Yat-sen, therefore known by Madame Sun Yat-sen and the "Mother of Modern China". A member of the Soong family, she and her family played a significant role in shaping the Republic of China. As a prominent leader of the left wing of the Kuomintang (KMT), she founded the Revolutionary Committee of the KMT. She entered the Communist government in 1949, and was the only female, non-Communist head of state of the People's Republic of China. She was named Honorary Chairman of the People's Republic of China and admitted to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) a few weeks before her death in 1981.

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27/01/1889

Balthasar van der Pol, Dutch physicist and academic (died 1959)

Balthasar van der Pol (1889–1959) was a Dutch physicist known for the van der Pol oscillator.

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27/01/1886

Radhabinod Pal, Indian academic and jurist (died 1967)

Radhabinod Pal was an Indian jurist who was a member of the United Nations' International Law Commission from 1952 to 1966. Pal was one of three Asian judges appointed to the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, the "Tokyo Trials" of Japanese war crimes committed during the Second World War. Among all the judges of the tribunal, he was the only one who submitted a judgement which insisted all defendants were not guilty. The Yasukuni Shrine and the Kyoto Ryozen Gokoku Shrine have monuments specially dedicated to Pal.

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27/01/1885

Jerome Kern, American composer and songwriter (died 1945)

Jerome David Kern was an American composer of musical theatre and popular music. One of the most important American theatre composers of the early 20th century, he wrote more than 700 songs, used in over 100 stage works, including such classics as "Ol' Man River", "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man", "A Fine Romance", "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes", "The Song Is You", "All the Things You Are", "The Way You Look Tonight" and "Long Ago ". He collaborated with many of the leading librettists and lyricists of his era, including George Grossmith Jr., Guy Bolton, P. G. Wodehouse, Otto Harbach, Oscar Hammerstein II, Dorothy Fields, Johnny Mercer, Ira Gershwin and Yip Harburg.

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Seison Maeda, Japanese painter (died 1977)

Seison Maeda was the art-name of a nihonga painter in the Taishō and Shōwa periods of Japan. His legal name was Maeda Renzō. He is considered one of the greatest contemporary Japanese painters, and one of the leaders of the Nihonga movement.

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27/01/1878

Dorothy Scarborough, American author (died 1935)

Emily Dorothy Scarborough was born to Judge John B. Scarborough and his wife, Mary Adelaide. She was a famous American writer who wrote about Texas, folk culture, cotton farming, ghost stories and women's life in the Southwest. In addition to writing, she taught lectures as an assistant professor at Columbia University in creative writing, and numerous students of hers went on to become well-published and respected authors. She is considered a Baylor University alumni celebrity by the Baylor Lariat. Her students and colleagues described her as being energetic, engaging and a keen-observer, in regards to her occupation as an assistant professor as well as her temperament as a person. Scarborough also displayed interest in art and agriculture as she frequently attended an art retreat called YADDO in Saratoga Springs, New York, and she owned a farm of 125 acres in Connecticut.

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27/01/1869

Will Marion Cook, American violinist and composer (died 1944)

William Mercer Cook, better known as Will Marion Cook, was an African-American composer, pianist, orchestrator, lyricist, violinist, and choral director. Cook was a student of Antonín Dvořák. In 1919 he took his New York Syncopated Orchestra to England for a command performance for King George V of the United Kingdom, and tour. Cook is probably best known for his popular songs and landmark Broadway musicals, featuring African-American creators, producers, and casts, such as Clorindy, or The Origin of the Cake Walk (1898) and In Dahomey (1903). The latter toured for four years, including in the United Kingdom and United States.

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27/01/1859

Wilhelm II, German Emperor during World War I (died 1941)

Wilhelm II was the last German Emperor from 1888 until his abdication in 1918. His fall from power marked the end of the German Empire as well as the Hohenzollern dynasty's 400-year rule over Prussia.

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27/01/1858

Neel Doff, Dutch-Belgian author (died 1942)

Cornelia Hubertina "Neel" Doff was a writer of Dutch descent living and working in Belgium and mainly writing in French. She is one of the most important contributors to proletarian literature.

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27/01/1850

John Collier, English painter and author (died 1934)

John Maler Collier was an English painter and writer. He was one of the most prominent portrait painters of his generation. Both of his marriages were to daughters of Thomas Henry Huxley. He was educated at Eton College, and he studied painting in Paris with Jean-Paul Laurens and at the Munich Academy starting in 1875.

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Samuel Gompers, English-American labor leader (died 1924)

Samuel Gompers was a British-born American cigar maker and labor union leader. A key figure in American labor history, Gompers founded the American Federation of Labor (AFL) and served as the organization's president from 1886 to 1894, and from 1895 until his death in 1924. He promoted harmony among the different craft unions that comprised the AFL, trying to minimize jurisdictional battles. He promoted thorough organization and collective bargaining in order to secure shorter hours and higher wages, which he considered the essential first steps to emancipating labor.

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Edward Smith, English captain (died 1912)

Commander Edward John Smith was a British merchant sea captain and naval officer, who became best known as the captain of the ill-fated ocean liner RMS Titanic.

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27/01/1848

Tōgō Heihachirō, Japanese admiral (died 1934)

Tōgō Heihachirō , served as a gensui or admiral of the fleet in the Imperial Japanese Navy and became one of Japan's greatest naval heroes. As Commander-in-Chief of the Combined Fleet during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–1905, he successfully confined the Russian Pacific naval forces to Port Arthur before winning a decisive victory over a relieving fleet at Tsushima in May 1905. Western journalists called Tōgō "the Nelson of the East". He remains deeply revered as a national hero in Japan, with shrines and streets named in his honour.

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27/01/1842

Arkhip Kuindzhi, Ukrainian-Russian painter (died 1910)

Arkhip Ivanovich Kuindzhi was a Russian landscape painter of Urum origin.

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27/01/1836

Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, Austrian journalist and author (died 1895)

Leopold Ritter von Sacher-Masoch was an Austrian nobleman, writer and journalist, who gained renown for his romantic stories of Galician life. The term masochism is derived from his name, invented by his contemporary, the Austrian psychiatrist Richard von Krafft-Ebing. Masoch did not approve of this use of his name.

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27/01/1832

Lewis Carroll, English novelist, poet, and mathematician (died 1898)

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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Carl Friedrich Schmidt, Estonian-Russian geologist and botanist (died 1908)

Carl Friedrich Schmidt was a Baltic German geologist and botanist in the Russian Empire. He is acknowledged as the founder of Estonian geology. In the mid-19th century, he researched Estonian oil shale, kukersite, and named it after Kuckers.

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27/01/1826

Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin, Russian journalist and author (died 1889)

Mikhail Yevgrafovich Saltykov-Shchedrin, born Mikhail Yevgrafovich Saltykov and known during his lifetime by the pen name Nikolai Shchedrin, was a major Russian writer and satirist of the 19th century. He spent most of his life working as a civil servant in various capacities. After the death of poet Nikolay Nekrasov, he acted as editor of a Russian literary magazine Otechestvenniye Zapiski until the Tsarist government banned it in 1884. In his works Saltykov mastered both stark realism and satirical grotesque merged with fantasy. His most famous works, the family chronicle novel The Golovlyov Family (1880) and the novel The History of a Town (1870), also translated as Foolsburg, became important works of 19th-century fiction, and Saltykov is regarded as a major figure of Russian literary Realism.

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Richard Taylor, American general, historian, and politician (died 1879)

Richard "Dick" Taylor was an American planter, politician, military historian, and Confederate general. Following the outbreak of the American Civil War, Taylor joined the Confederate States Army, serving first as a brigade commander in Virginia and later as an army commander in the trans-Mississippi Theater. Taylor commanded the District of West Louisiana and opposed United States troops advancing through upper northwest Louisiana during the Red River Campaign of 1864. He was the only son of Zachary Taylor, the 12th president of the United States. After the war and Reconstruction, Taylor published a memoir about his experiences.

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27/01/1824

Urbain Johnson, Canadian farmer and political figure (died 1917)

Urbain Johnson was a farmer and political figure in the Canadian province of New Brunswick. He represented Kent County in the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick from 1869 to 1870, from 1874 to 1882 and from 1895 to 1908 as a Liberal member.

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27/01/1823

Édouard Lalo, French violinist and composer (died 1892)

Édouard-Victoire-Antoine Lalo was a French composer, violist, violinist, and academic teacher. His most celebrated piece is the Symphonie Espagnole, a five-movement concerto for violin and orchestra that remains a popular work in the standard repertoire.

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27/01/1821

John Chivington, American colonel and pastor (died 1892)

John Milton Chivington was a Methodist pastor and Mason who served as a colonel in the United States Volunteers during the New Mexico Campaign of the American Civil War. He led a rear action against a Confederate supply train in the Battle of Glorieta Pass that ended the Confederacy's campaigns in the Western states, and was then appointed a colonel of cavalry during the Colorado War.

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27/01/1814

Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, French architect, designed the Lausanne Cathedral (died 1879)

Eugène Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc was a French architect and author, famous for his restoration of the most prominent medieval landmarks in France. His major restoration projects included Notre-Dame de Paris, the Basilica of Saint Denis, Mont Saint-Michel, Sainte-Chapelle, the medieval walls of the city of Carcassonne, and Château de Roquetaillade in the Bordeaux region.

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27/01/1808

David Strauss, German theologian and author (died 1874)

David Friedrich Strauss was a German liberal Protestant theologian and writer who influenced Christian Europe with his portrayal of the "historical Jesus", whose divine nature he explored via myth.

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27/01/1806

Juan Crisóstomo Arriaga, Spanish composer and educator (died 1826)

Juan Crisóstomo Jacobo Antonio de Arriaga y Balzola was a Spanish Basque composer. He was nicknamed "the Spanish Mozart" after he died, because, like Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, he was both a child prodigy and an accomplished composer who died young. They also shared the same first and second baptismal names; and they shared the same birthday, 27 January.

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27/01/1805

Maria Anna of Bavaria (died 1877)

Princess Maria Anna of Bavaria, known as 'Marie' was Queen of Saxony from 1836 to 1854 as the second wife of King Frederick Augustus II of Saxony.

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Samuel Palmer, English painter and etcher (died 1881)

Samuel Palmer Hon.RE was a British landscape painter, etcher and printmaker. He was also a prolific writer. Palmer was a key figure in Romanticism in Britain and produced visionary pastoral paintings.

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27/01/1803

Eunice Hale Waite Cobb, American writer, public speaker, and activist (died 1880)

Eunice Hale Cobb was an American writer, public speaker, and activist. She wrote hymns, and occasional poems, and obituary lines; her poetry had a religious focus. As a public speaker, she was persuasive and convincing. She was the first female president of the Ladies Physiological Institute, of Boston, and served it in that capacity for some 15 years. After marrying married Rev. Sylvanus Cobb, she assisted him in his religious work as a Universalist preacher. Their eldest son, Sylvanus, Jr., developed a faculty for storytelling from his mother's practice of telling stories when he was a child.

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27/01/1795

Eli Whitney Blake, American engineer, invented the Mortise lock (died 1886)

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

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27/01/1790

Juan Álvarez, Mexican general and president (1855) (died 1867)

Juan Nepomuceno Álvarez Hurtado de Luna, generally known as Juan Álvarez, was a general, long-time caudillo in southern Mexico, and president of Mexico for two months in 1855, following the liberals' ouster of Antonio López de Santa Anna. His presidency inaugurated the pivotal era of La Reforma.

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27/01/1782

Titumir, Bengali revolutionary (died 1831)

Syed Mir Nisar Ali, better known as Titumir, was a Bengali Muslim Revolutionary in British India who developed a strand of Islamic revivalism, sometimes also for Bengali nationalism coupled with agrarian and political consciousness. He is famed for having built a large bamboo fort to resist the British, which passed into Bengali Muslim folk legend.

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27/01/1775

Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, German-Swiss philosopher and academic (died 1854)

Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling was a German philosopher. Standard histories of philosophy make him the midpoint in the development of German idealism, situating him between Johann Gottlieb Fichte, his mentor in his early years, and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, his one-time university roommate, early friend, and later rival. Interpreting Schelling's philosophy is regarded as difficult because of its evolving nature.

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27/01/1756

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Austrian pianist and composer (died 1791)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was a Classical composer and musician. He completed more than 800 works in his life—including outstanding examples of most of the genres of his time: symphonies, concertos, chamber music, opera, and choral music.

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27/01/1741

Hester Thrale, Welsh author (died 1821)

Hester Lynch Thrale Piozzi was a Welsh writer and socialite who was an important source on Samuel Johnson and 18th-century British life. She belonged to the prominent Salusbury family of Anglo-Welsh landowners, and married firstly a wealthy brewer, Henry Thrale, with whom she had 12 children, then a music teacher, Gabriel Mario Piozzi. Her Anecdotes of the Late Samuel Johnson (1786) and her diary Thraliana, published posthumously in 1942, are the main works for which she is remembered. She also wrote a popular history book, a travel book, and a dictionary. She has been seen as a protofeminist.

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27/01/1708

Grand Duchess Anna Petrovna of Russia (died 1728)

Grand Duchess Anna Petrovna of Russia was the eldest daughter of Emperor Peter I of Russia and Empress Catherine I. Her younger sister, Empress Elizabeth, ruled between 1741 and 1762. While a potential heir in the reign of her nephew Peter II, she never acceded to the throne due to political reasons. However, her son Peter III became Emperor in 1762, succeeding Elizabeth. She was Duchess Consort of Holstein-Gottorp by marriage. She was born in Moscow and died in Kiel in her youth at the age of 20.

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27/01/1701

Johann Nikolaus von Hontheim, German historian and theologian (died 1790)

Johann Nikolaus von Hontheim was a German Catholic priest and coadjutor bishop of Trier, and a historian/theologian. He is remembered as Febronius, the pseudonym under which he wrote his 1763 treatise On the State of the Church and the Legitimate Power of the Roman Pontiff and which gave rise to Febronianism.

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27/01/1687

Johann Balthasar Neumann, German engineer and architect, designed Würzburg Residence and Basilica of the Fourteen Holy Helpers (died 1753)

Johann Balthasar Neumann, usually known as Balthasar Neumann, was a German architect and military engineer and one of the most important designers of late Baroque architecture in Central Europe. He developed a distinctive architectural style integrating Austrian, Bohemian, Italian, and French influences.

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27/01/1663

George Byng, 1st Viscount Torrington, Royal Navy admiral (died 1733)

Admiral of the Fleet George Byng, 1st Viscount Torrington, was a Royal Navy officer and politician who represented Plymouth in the English and British House of Commons from 1705 to 1721. While still a lieutenant, he delivered a letter from various captains to William of Orange, who had just landed at Torbay, assuring the Prince of the captains' support; the Prince gave Byng a response which ultimately led to the Royal Navy switching allegiance to the Prince and the Glorious Revolution of November 1688.

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27/01/1662

Richard Bentley, English scholar and theologian (died 1742)

Richard Bentley was an English classical scholar, critic, and theologian. Considered the "founder of historical philology", Bentley is widely credited with establishing the English school of Hellenism. In 1892, A. E. Housman called Bentley "the greatest scholar that England or perhaps that Europe ever bred".

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27/01/1621

Thomas Willis, English physician and anatomist (died 1675)

Thomas Willis FRS was an English physician who played an important part in the history of anatomy, neurology, and psychiatry, and was a founding member of the Royal Society.

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27/01/1603

Sir Harbottle Grimston, 2nd Baronet, English lawyer and politician, Speaker of the House of Commons (died 1685)

Sir Harbottle Grimston, 2nd Baronet was an English lawyer and politician who sat in the House of Commons at various times between 1640 and 1685 and was Speaker in 1660. During the English Civil War he remained a Parliamentarian but was sympathetic to the Royalists.

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Humphrey Mackworth, English politician, lawyer and judge (died 1654)

Humphrey Mackworth was an English lawyer, judge, and politician of Shropshire landed gentry origins who rose to prominence in the Midlands, the Welsh Marches and Wales during the English Civil War. He was the Parliamentarian military governor of Shrewsbury in the later phases of the war and under The Protectorate. He occupied several important legal and judicial posts in Chester and North Wales, presiding over the major trials that followed the Charles Stuart's invasion in 1651. In the last year of his life, he attained national prominence as a member of Oliver Cromwell's Council and as a Member of the House of Commons for Shropshire in the First Protectorate Parliament.

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27/01/1585

Hendrick Avercamp, Dutch painter (died 1634)

Hendrick Avercamp was a Dutch painter during the Dutch Golden Age of painting. He was one of the earliest landscape painters of the 17th-century Dutch school, he specialized in painting the Netherlands in winter. His paintings are colorful and lively, with carefully crafted images of the people in the landscape. His works give a vivid depiction of sport and leisure in the Netherlands in the beginning of the 17th century. Many of Avercamp's paintings feature people ice skating on frozen lakes.

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27/01/1571

Abbas I of Persia (died 1629)

Abbas I, commonly known as Abbas the Great, was the fifth Safavid shah of Iran from 1588 to 1629. The third son of Shah Mohammad Khodabanda, he is generally considered one of the most important rulers in Iranian history and the greatest ruler of the Safavid dynasty.

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27/01/1546

Joachim III Frederick, Elector of Brandenburg (died 1608)

Joachim Frederick, of the House of Hohenzollern, was Prince-elector of the Margraviate of Brandenburg from 1598 until his death.

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27/01/1443

Albert III, Duke of Saxony (died 1500)

Albert III was Duke of Saxony from 1464 to 1500. Known as Albert the Bold or Albert the Courageous, he founded the Albertine line of the House of Wettin. Initially, he ruled jointly with his older brother Ernest, Elector of Saxony, but upon division of Wettinian lands by the Treaty of Leipzig (1485), he became a sole ruler in his own domain, known is historiography as the Albertine Duchy of Saxony.

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27/01/1365

Edward of Angoulême, English noble (died 1370)

Edward of Angoulême was second in line to the throne of the Kingdom of England before his death. Born in Angoulême, he was the eldest child of Edward, Prince of Wales, commonly called "the Black Prince", and Joan, Countess of Kent, and thus was a member of the House of Plantagenet. Edward's birth, during the Hundred Years' War, was celebrated luxuriously by his father and by other monarchs, such as Charles V of France.

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