Died on Friday, 30th January – Famous Deaths

30/01/2026

Catherine O'Hara, Canadian-American actress, comedian and screenwriter (born 1954)

Catherine Anne O'Hara was a Canadian and American actress and comedian, whose career spanned over 50 years. O'Hara started in sketch and improvisational comedy in film and television before taking dramatic roles to expand her career. She received various accolades including two Primetime Emmy Awards, a Golden Globe Award, and four Screen Actors Guild Awards. Her films have grossed more than US$4.3 billion worldwide. She was appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2017.

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30/01/2025

Dick Button, American figure skater and actor (born 1929)

Richard Totten Button was an American figure skater and skating analyst. He was a two-time Olympic champion and five-time consecutive world champion (1948–1952). He was also the only non-European man to have become European champion. Button is credited as having been the first skater to successfully land the double Axel jump in competition in 1948, as well as the first triple jump of any kind – a triple loop – in 1952. He also invented the flying camel spin, which was originally known as the "Button camel". He "brought increased athleticism" to figure skating in the years following World War II. According to figure skating historian James R. Hines, Button represented the "American School" of figure skating, which was a more athletic style than skaters from Europe.

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Julius Chan, Papua New Guinean politician, 2nd Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea (born 1939)

Sir Julius Chan was a Papua New Guinean politician who served as Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea from 1980 to 1982 and from 1994 to 1997. He was Member of Parliament for New Ireland Province, having won the seat in the 2007 national election. He was also the Governor of New Ireland Province from 2007 until his death in 2025. On 26 May 2019, Prime Minister Peter O'Neill announced he would soon resign and that he wished for Sir Julius to succeed him. An outgoing Prime Minister does not, however, have the power to appoint his successor, and the following day O'Neill delayed his own formal resignation. He was also a leading figure in his country during the years-long Bougainville conflict.

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Marianne Faithfull, English singer-songwriter and actress (born 1946)

Marianne Evelyn Gabriel Faithfull was an English singer-songwriter and actress who achieved popularity in the 1960s with the release of her UK top 10 single "As Tears Go By". She became one of the leading female artists of the British Invasion in the United States.

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Edcel Lagman, Filipino politician (born 1942)

Edcel Castelar Lagman Sr. was a Filipino human rights lawyer and politician from the province of Albay. He was elected as a member of the House from 1987 to 1998 and 2004 to 2013 and from 2016 up until his death. He served as Minority Floor Leader of the House of Representatives of the Philippines until 2012, when he resigned the office. Lagman was one of the key Liberal Party figures in the House of Representatives, having supported the Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health Act, the SOGIE Equality Bill, the Free Tertiary Education Act, the Anti-Dynasty Bill, and the Freedom of Information Bill. He was also the principal author of the Divorce Bill, the Human Rights Defenders Bill, the Prevention of Teenage Pregnancy Bill, and the Anti-Child Marriage Bill.

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30/01/2024

Chita Rivera, American actress, singer, and dancer (born 1933)

Dolores Conchita Figueroa del Rivero, known professionally as Chita Rivera, was an American actress, singer, and dancer. Rivera received numerous accolades including two Tony Awards, two Drama Desk Awards, and a Drama League Award. She was the first Latina and the first Latino American to receive a Kennedy Center Honor in 2002, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009. She won the Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2018.

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30/01/2023

Bobby Beathard, American Pro Football Hall of Fame executive (born 1937)

Robert King Beathard Jr. was an American professional football executive who was the general manager for the Washington Redskins (1978–1988) and the San Diego Chargers (1990–2000) of the National Football League (NFL). His teams won four Super Bowls and competed in three others during his 38 years in the NFL, doing so with the Kansas City Chiefs (1966), Miami Dolphins, Redskins, and the Chargers (1994). Beathard was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2018.

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Bobby Hull, Canadian ice hockey player (born 1939)

Robert Marvin Hull was a Canadian professional ice hockey player who is widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time. His blond hair, skating speed, end-to-end rushes, and ability to shoot the puck at very high velocity all earned him the nickname "the Golden Jet". His talents were such that an opposing player was often assigned just to shadow him.

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30/01/2022

Cheslie Kryst, American television presenter and model (born 1991)

Cheslie Corrinne Kryst was an American television correspondent, model, and beauty pageant titleholder. She was also an attorney and a correspondent for the TV show Extra from October 2019 until her death. For her work on Extra, she was nominated for two Daytime Emmy Awards. As Miss USA 2019, Kryst represented the United States at Miss Universe 2019, where she placed in the Top 10. She was the third woman from North Carolina to win Miss USA.

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30/01/2021

Sophie, Scottish musician (born 1986)

Sophie Xeon, known mononymously as Sophie, was a British music producer, songwriter, and DJ. Her distinctive musical style incorporates experimental sound design, "sugary" synthesised textures, and underground dance elements. She would help pioneer the 2010s hyperpop microgenre.

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30/01/2019

Dick Miller, American actor (born 1928)

Richard Miller was an American character actor who appeared in more than 180 films, including many produced by Roger Corman. He later appeared in the films of directors who began their careers with Corman, including Joe Dante, James Cameron, and Martin Scorsese, with the distinction of appearing in every film directed by Dante. He was known for playing the beleaguered everyman, often in one-scene appearances.

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30/01/2018

Mark Salling, American actor and musician (born 1982)

Mark Wayne Salling was an American actor and musician known for his role as Noah "Puck" Puckerman on the television series Glee.

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30/01/2016

Frank Finlay, English actor (born 1926)

Francis Finlay was an English actor. He earned an Academy Award nomination for his performance as Iago in Othello (1965). His first leading television role came in 1971 in Casanova. This led to appearances on The Morecambe and Wise Show. Finlay starred alongside famous Italian actress Stefania Sandrelli in Tinto Brass' The Key, the most successful Italian film of the 1983–1984 season. He also appeared in the drama Bouquet of Barbed Wire. A four-time BAFTA nominee, Finlay won one for his television performances in 1974.

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Francisco Flores Pérez, Salvadorian politician, President of El Salvador (born 1959)

Francisco Guillermo Flores Pérez was a Salvadoran politician who served as President of El Salvador from 1 June 1999 to 1 June 2004 as a member of the conservative Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA). He previously served as a deputy of the Legislative Assembly from 1994 to 1999, having been president of the Assembly from 1997 to 1999.

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Georgia Davis Powers, American activist and politician (born 1923)

Georgia Davis Powers was an American politician who served for 21 years as a state senator in the Kentucky Senate. In 1967, she was the first African American elected to the senate. During her term, she was "regarded as the leading advocate for blacks, women, children, the poor, and the handicapped," and was the chair of the Health and Welfare committee from 1970 to 1976 and the Labor and Industry committee from 1978 to 1988.

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Gaston Mialaret, French pedagogist and professor (born 1918)

Gaston Mialaret was a French educator, pedagogist and professor at the University of Caen. He contributed to the establishment of educational sciences at the university from 1967.

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30/01/2015

Carl Djerassi, Austrian-American chemist, author, and playwright (born 1923)

Carl Djerassi was an Austrian-born Bulgarian-American pharmaceutical chemist, novelist, playwright and co-founder of Djerassi Resident Artists Program with Diane Wood Middlebrook. He is best known for his contribution to the development of oral contraceptive pills, nicknamed the "father of the pill".

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Ülo Kaevats, Estonian academic, philosopher, and politician (born 1947)

Ülo Kaevats was an Estonian statesman, academic and philosopher.

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Geraldine McEwan, English actress (born 1932)

Geraldine McEwan was an English actress, who had a long career in film, theatre and television. Michael Coveney described her, in a tribute article, as "a great comic stylist, with a syrupy, seductive voice and a forthright, sparkling manner".

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Gerrit Voorting, Dutch cyclist (born 1923)

Gerardus "Gerrit" Petrus Voorting was a Dutch road cyclist who was active between 1947 and 1960. As an amateur he won the silver medal in the individual road race at the 1948 Summer Olympics in London. In his professional career Voorting won two Tour de France stages and wore the yellow jersey for 4 days. Voorting died on 30 January 2015 in his home in Heemskerk at the age of 92, within a week of two other members of the Dutch men's team pursuit squad, Henk Faanhof and Joop Harmans. He was the elder brother of Olympic cyclist Adrie Voorting.

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Zhelyu Zhelev, Bulgarian philosopher and politician, 2nd President of Bulgaria (born 1935)

Zhelyu Mitev Zhelev was a Bulgarian politician and former dissident who served as the first democratically elected and non-Communist president of Bulgaria, from 1990 to 1997. Zhelev was one of the most prominent figures of the 1989 Bulgarian Revolution, which ended the 35 year rule of President Todor Zhivkov. A member of the Union of Democratic Forces, he was elected as president by the 7th Grand National Assembly. Two years later, he won Bulgaria's first direct presidential elections. He lost his party's nomination for his 1996 reelection campaign after losing a tough primary race to Petar Stoyanov.

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30/01/2014

Stefan Bałuk, Polish general and photographer (born 1914)

Stefan Bałuk was a Polish general and photographer.

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The Mighty Hannibal, American singer-songwriter and producer (born 1939)

James Timothy Shaw, known as The Mighty Hannibal, was an American R&B, soul, and funk singer, songwriter, and record producer. Known for his showmanship, and outlandish costumes often incorporating a pink turban, several of his songs carried social or political themes. His biggest hit was "Hymn No. 5", a commentary on the effects of the Vietnam War on servicemen, which was banned from being played on the radio.

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Russell D. Hemenway, American political activist (born 1925)

Russell D. Hemenway was an American political activist. He is most well-known for his activities with the National Committee for an Effective Congress, a political action committee that he served as the national director of from 1966 until his death. As the head of that organization for almost 50 years, he supported liberal and progressive candidates for United States Congress and advocated for campaign finance reform. He was also involved in other nonprofit organizations, serving as the chairman of the board for both The Fund for Constitutional Government and the National Security Archive and a trustee for the Fund for Peace. Concerning his political impact, journalist Michael Tomasky said that he was "one of the great unheralded liberal operatives of the last 50 years in American politics".

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William Motzing, American composer and conductor (born 1937)

William Edward Motzing Jr. was an American composer, conductor, arranger and trombonist best known for the award-winning film and television scores and gold and platinum pop album arrangements he wrote in Australia. He was a jazz lecturer and the Director of Jazz Studies at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music over a period of 40 years.

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Arthur Rankin Jr., American director, producer, and screenwriter (born 1924)

Arthur Gardner Rankin Jr. was an American director, producer and screenwriter, who mostly worked in animation. Co-creator of Rankin/Bass Productions with his friend Jules Bass, he created stop-motion and traditional animation features such as Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Frosty the Snowman, Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town, and the 1977 cartoon special of The Hobbit. He is credited on over 1,000 television programs.

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Greater, oldest known greater flamingo and Feast Festival 2021 mascot (h. c.1919–1933)

Greater, also known as Flamingo One and Flamingo 1, was the world's oldest greater flamingo, residing at the Adelaide Zoo in Adelaide, Australia. It was at least 83 years old, having arrived at the zoo from either Cairo or Hamburg in either 1933, 1930, 1925, or 1919, at which point it was already a full-grown adult. Greater's sex was never determined.

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30/01/2013

Gamal al-Banna, Egyptian author and scholar (born 1920)

Gamal al-Banna was an Egyptian author, and trade unionist. He was the youngest brother of Hassan al-Banna (1906–49), founder of the Muslim Brotherhood. Al-Banna was considered a liberal scholar, known for his criticism of Islamic traditional narratives. He rejected 635 Hadiths of Sahih Bukhari and Sahih Muslim which he found contradictory to the Qur'an. He was a great-uncle of the Swiss Muslim academic and writer Tariq Ramadan.

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Patty Andrews, American singer (born 1918)

The Andrews Sisters were an American close harmony singing group of the swing and boogie-woogie eras. The group consisted of three sisters: contralto LaVerne Sophia Andrews (1911–1967), soprano Maxene Anglyn Andrews (1916–1995), and mezzo-soprano Patricia Marie Andrews (1918–2013). The sisters have sold an estimated 80 million records. Their 1941 hit "Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy" can be considered an early example of jump blues. Other songs closely associated with the Andrews Sisters include their first major hit, "Bei Mir Bist Du Schön " (1937), "Beer Barrel Polka " (1939), "Beat Me Daddy, Eight to the Bar" (1940), "Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree " (1942), and "Rum and Coca-Cola" (1945), which helped introduce American audiences to calypso.

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George Witt, American baseball player and coach (born 1931)

George Adrian "Red" Witt, was an American professional baseball player, a right-handed pitcher who played all or part of six seasons in Major League Baseball (1957–62) with the Pittsburgh Pirates, Los Angeles Angels and Houston Colt .45s. The native of Long Beach, California, stood 6 feet 3 inches (1.91 m) tall and weighed 185 pounds (84 kg) during his playing career. He graduated from California State University, Long Beach.

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30/01/2012

Frank Aschenbrenner, American football player and soldier (born 1925)

Francis Xavier Aschenbrenner was a professional American football player for the Chicago Hornets and the Montreal Alouettes.

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Doeschka Meijsing, Dutch author (born 1947)

Maria Johanna Meijsing was a Dutch novelist. She won the AKO Literatuurprijs in 2000 for her novel De tweede man, and in 2008 the Ferdinand Bordewijk Prijs for her novel Over de liefde. Doeschka Meijsing is the older sister of writer Geerten Meijsing and philosopher Monica Meijsing.

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30/01/2011

John Barry, English composer and conductor (born 1933)

John Barry Prendergast was an English composer and conductor of film music. Born in York, Barry spent his early years working in cinemas owned by his father. During his national service with the British Army in Cyprus, Barry began performing as a musician after learning to play the trumpet. Upon completing his national service, he formed a band in 1957, the John Barry Seven. He later developed an interest in composing and arranging music, making his début for television in 1958. He came to the notice of the filmmakers of the first James Bond film Dr. No, who were dissatisfied with a theme for James Bond given to them by Monty Norman. Noel Rogers, the head of music at United Artists, approached Barry. This started a successful association between Barry and the Bond series that lasted for 25 years.

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30/01/2010

Fadil Ferati, Kosovar accountant and politician (born 1960)

Fadil Ferati was a Kosovar political leader, he was the Mayor of Istok and vice-president of Democratic League of Kosovo and he was widely known as a politician who never lost any election.

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30/01/2009

H. Guy Hunt, American soldier, pastor, and politician, 49th Governor of Alabama (born 1933)

Harold Guy Hunt was an American politician who served as the 49th governor of Alabama from 1987 to 1993. He was the first Republican to serve as governor of the state since Reconstruction.

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30/01/2008

Marcial Maciel, Mexican-American priest, founded the Legion of Christ and Regnum Christi (born 1920)

Marcial Maciel Degollado was a Mexican Catholic priest and sex offender. Maciel founded the Legion of Christ and the Regnum Christi movement. He was general director of the Legion from 1941 to 2005. Throughout most of his career, he was respected within the church as "the greatest fundraiser of the modern Roman Catholic church" and as a prolific recruiter of new seminarians.

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30/01/2007

Sidney Sheldon, American author and screenwriter (born 1917)

Sidney Sheldon was an American writer. He was prominent in the 1940s and 50s, first working on Broadway plays, and then in motion pictures, notably writing the successful comedy The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer (1947), which earned him an Oscar in 1948. He went on to work in television, where over 20 years he created The Patty Duke Show (1963–66), I Dream of Jeannie (1965–70), and Hart to Hart (1979–84). After turning 50, he began writing best-selling romantic suspense novels, such as The Other Side of Midnight (1973), Master of the Game (1982), and Rage of Angels (1980).

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30/01/2006

Coretta Scott King, American author and activist (born 1927)

Coretta Scott King was an American author, activist, and civil rights leader who was the wife of Martin Luther King Jr. from 1953 until his assassination in 1968. As an advocate for African-American equality, she was a leader for the civil rights movement in the 1960s. King was also a singer who often incorporated music into her civil rights work. King met her husband while attending graduate school in Boston. They both became increasingly active in the American civil rights movement.

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Wendy Wasserstein, American playwright and academic (born 1950)

Wendy Wasserstein was an American playwright. She was an Andrew Dickson White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University. She received the Tony Award for Best Play and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1989 for her play The Heidi Chronicles.

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30/01/2005

Martyn Bennett, Canadian-Scottish violinist (born 1971)

Martyn Bennett was a Canadian-Scottish musician who was influential in the evolution of modern Celtic fusion, a blending of traditional Celtic and modern music. He was a piper, violinist, composer and producer. Diagnosis of serious illness at the age of thirty curtailed his live performances, although he completed a further two albums in the studio. He died from cancer in 2005, fifteen months after the release of his fifth album Grit.

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30/01/2004

Egon Mayer, Swiss-American sociologist (born 1944)

Egon Mayer was a Swiss-born American sociologist and professor at Brooklyn College. He wrote a number of books on Jewish culture and history, including From Suburb to Shtetl (1979), The Court Jew: A Contribution to the History of Absolutism in Europe (1984), and Love and Tradition: Marriage Between Jews and Christians (1985).

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30/01/2001

Jean-Pierre Aumont, French soldier and actor (born 1911)

Jean-Pierre Aumont was a French film and theatre actor. He was a matinée idol and a leading man during the 1930s, but his burgeoning career was interrupted by the Second World War. He served in the Free French Forces, and receiving both the Légion d'Honneur and the Croix de Guerre for his actions.

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Johnnie Johnson, English air marshal and pilot (born 1915)

Air Vice Marshal James Edgar Johnson,, DL, nicknamed "Johnnie", was an English Royal Air Force (RAF) pilot and flying ace who flew and fought during the Second World War.

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Joseph Ransohoff, American surgeon and educator (born 1915)

Dr. Joseph Ransohoff, II was a member of the Ransohoff family and a pioneer in the field of neurosurgery. In addition to training numerous neurosurgeons, his "ingenuity in adapting advanced technologies" saved many lives and even influenced the television program Ben Casey. Among other innovations, he created the first intensive care unit dedicated to neurosurgery, pioneered the use of medical imaging and catheterization in the diagnosis and treatment of brain tumors, and helped define the fields of pediatric neurosurgery and neuroradiology.

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30/01/1999

Huntz Hall, American actor (born 1919)

Henry Richard "Huntz" Hall was an American radio, stage, and movie performer who appeared in the popular "Dead End Kids" movies, including Angels with Dirty Faces (1938), and in the later "Bowery Boys" movies, during the late 1930s to the late 1950s.

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Ed Herlihy, American journalist (born 1909)

Edward Joseph Herlihy was an American newsreel narrator for Universal-International. He was also a long-time radio and television announcer for NBC, hosting The Horn and Hardart Children's Hour in the 1940s and 1950, and was briefly interim announcer on The Tonight Show in 1962. He was also the voice of Kraft Foods radio and television commercials from the 1940s through the early 1980s. When he died in 1999, his obituary in The New York Times said he was "A Voice of Cheer and Cheese".

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30/01/1994

Pierre Boulle, French soldier and author (born 1912)

Pierre François Marie Louis Boulle was a French author. He is best known for two works, The Bridge over the River Kwai (1952) and Planet of the Apes (1963), that were both made into award-winning films.

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30/01/1993

Alexandra of Yugoslavia, the last Queen of Yugoslavia (born 1921)

Alexandra was the last Queen of Yugoslavia as the wife of King Peter II.

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30/01/1991

John Bardeen, American physicist and engineer, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1908)

John Bardeen was an American physicist. He is the only person to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics twice: first in 1956 with William Shockley and Walter Brattain for their invention of the transistor; and again in 1972 with Leon Cooper and John Robert Schrieffer for their microscopic theory of superconductivity, known as the BCS theory.

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Clifton C. Edom, American photographer and educator (born 1907)

Clifton Cedric Edom, often credited with the title "Father of Photojournalism", was prolific in the development of photojournalism education.

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30/01/1982

Lightnin' Hopkins, American singer-songwriter and guitarist (born 1912)

Samuel John "Lightnin'" Hopkins was an American country blues singer, songwriter, guitarist and occasional pianist from Centerville, Texas. In 2010, Rolling Stone magazine ranked him No. 71 on its list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time.

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30/01/1980

Professor Longhair, American singer-songwriter and pianist (born 1918)

Henry Roeland Byrd, better known as Professor Longhair or "Fess" for short, was an American singer and pianist who performed New Orleans blues. He was active in two distinct periods, first in the heyday of early rhythm and blues and later in the resurgence of interest in traditional jazz after the founding of the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival in 1970. His piano style has been described as "instantly recognizable, combining rumba, mambo, and calypso".

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30/01/1977

Paul Marais de Beauchamp, French zoologist (born 1883)

Charles Alfred Paul Marais de Beauchamp, 5th Baron Soye, was a French zoologist.

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30/01/1974

Olav Roots, Estonian pianist and composer (born 1910)

Olav Roots was an Estonian conductor, pianist and composer.

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30/01/1973

Elizabeth Baker, American economist and academic (born 1885)

Elizabeth Faulkner Baker was an American economist and academic who specialized in scientific management and the relationship between employment and technological change, especially the role of women.

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Titina Silá, Bissau-Guinean revolutionary (born 1943)

Ernestina "Titina" Silá was a Bissau-Guinean revolutionary. Recruited into the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC), while she was a young woman, she joined in the Guinea-Bissau War of Independence against the Portuguese Empire.

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30/01/1969

Dominique Pire, Belgian friar, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1910)

Dominique Pire, O.P. was a Belgian Dominican friar whose work helping refugees in post-World War II Europe saw him receive the Nobel Peace Prize in 1958. Pire delivered his Nobel lecture, entitled Brotherly Love: Foundation of Peace, in December 1958.

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30/01/1968

Makhanlal Chaturvedi, Indian poet, playwright, and journalist (born 1889)

Pandit Makhanlal Chaturvedi, also called Pandit ji, was an Indian poet, writer, essayist, playwright and who is particularly remembered for his participation in India's national struggle for independence and his contribution to Chhayavaad, the Neo-romanticism movement of Hindi literature. He was awarded the first Sahitya Akademi Award in Hindi for his work Him Tarangini in 1955. The Government of India awarded him the civilian honour of the Padma Bhushan in 1963. For his works reinforcing Indian nationalism during the British Raj, he is referred to as the Yug Charan.

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30/01/1966

Jaan Hargel, Estonian flute player, conductor, and educator (born 1912)

Jaan (Joann) Hargel was an Estonian conductor, music teacher, oboe and flute player.

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30/01/1963

Francis Poulenc, French pianist and composer (born 1899)

Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc was a French composer and pianist. His compositions include songs, solo piano works, chamber music, choral pieces, operas, ballets, and orchestral concert music. Among the best-known are the piano suite Trois mouvements perpétuels (1919), the ballet Les biches (1923), the Concert champêtre (1928) for harpsichord and orchestra, the Organ Concerto (1938), the opera Dialogues des Carmélites (1957), and the Gloria (1959) for soprano, choir, and orchestra.

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30/01/1962

Manuel de Abreu, Brazilian physician and engineer (born 1894)

Manuel Dias de Abreu was a Brazilian physician and scientist, the inventor of abreugraphy, a rapid radiography of the lungs for screening tuberculosis. He is considered one of the most important Brazilian physicians, side by side with Carlos Chagas, Vital Brazil and Oswaldo Cruz.

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30/01/1958

Jean Crotti, Swiss painter (born 1878)

Jean Crotti was a French painter.

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Ernst Heinkel, German engineer and businessman; founded the Heinkel Aircraft Company (born 1888)

Dr. Ernst Heinkel was a German aircraft designer, manufacturer, Wehrwirtschaftsführer in Nazi Germany, and member of the Nazi Party. His company Heinkel Flugzeugwerke produced the Heinkel He 178, the world's first turbojet-powered aircraft, and the Heinkel He 176, the first rocket aircraft.

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30/01/1951

Ferdinand Porsche, Austrian-German engineer and businessman, founded Porsche (born 1875)

Ferdinand Porsche was an Austrian-German automotive engineer and founder of the Porsche AG. He is best known for creating the first gasoline-electric hybrid vehicle (Lohner-Porsche), the Volkswagen Beetle, the Auto Union racing cars, the Mercedes-Benz SS/SSK, and several other important developments and Porsche automobiles.

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30/01/1948

Arthur Coningham, Australian air marshal (born 1895)

Air Marshal Sir Arthur Coningham,, nicknamed "Mary", was a senior officer in the Royal Air Force. During the First World War, he was at Gallipoli with the New Zealand Expeditionary Force, was discharged in New Zealand as medically unfit for active service, and journeyed to Britain at his own expense to join the Royal Flying Corps, where he became a flying ace. Coningham was later a senior Royal Air Force commander during the Second World War, as Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief 2nd Tactical Air Force and subsequently the Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief Flying Training Command.

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Mahatma Gandhi, leader of the Indian independence movement against British rule (born 1869)

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, and political thinker who employed nonviolent resistance to lead the successful campaign for India's independence from British rule. He inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world. The honorific Mahātmā, first applied to him in South Africa in 1914, is used worldwide.

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Orville Wright, American pilot and engineer, co-founded the Wright Company (born 1871)

The Wright brothers, Orville Wright and Wilbur Wright, were American aviation pioneers generally credited with inventing, building, and flying the world's first successful airplane. They made the first controlled, sustained flight of an engine-powered, heavier-than-air aircraft with the Wright Flyer on December 17, 1903, four miles (6 km) south of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, at what is now known as Kill Devil Hills. In 1904 the Wright brothers developed the Wright Flyer II, which made longer-duration flights including the first circle, followed in 1905 by the first truly practical fixed-wing aircraft, the Wright Flyer III.

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30/01/1947

Frederick Blackman, English botanist and physiologist (born 1866)

Frederick Frost Blackman FRS was a British plant physiologist.

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30/01/1934

Frank Nelson Doubleday, American publisher, founded the Doubleday Publishing Company (born 1862)

Frank Nelson Doubleday, known to friends and family as "Effendi", founded the Doubleday & McClure Company in 1897, which later operated under other names. Starting work at the age of 14 after his father's business failed, Doubleday began with Charles Scribner's Sons in New York.

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30/01/1928

Johannes Fibiger, Danish physician and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1867)

Johannes Andreas Grib Fibiger was a Danish physician and professor of anatomical pathology at the University of Copenhagen. He was the recipient of the 1926 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine "for his discovery of the Spiroptera carcinoma". He claimed to have shown that the roundworm which he called Spiroptera carcinoma could cause stomach cancer in rats and mice. His experimental results were later proven to be a case of mistaken conclusion.

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30/01/1926

Barbara La Marr, American actress (born 1896)

Barbara La Marr was an American film actress and screenwriter who appeared in twenty-seven films during her career between 1920 and 1926. La Marr was also noted by the media for her beauty, dubbed as the "Girl Who Is Too Beautiful", as well as her tumultuous personal life.

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30/01/1923

Columba Marmion, Benedictine abbot (born 1858)

Columba Marmion O.S.B, born Joseph Aloysius Marmion was an Irish Benedictine monk and the third Abbot of Maredsous Abbey in Belgium. Beatified by Pope John Paul II on September 3, 2000, Columba was one of the most popular and influential Catholic authors of the 20th century. His books are considered spiritual classics.

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30/01/1889

Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria, heir apparent to the throne of Austria-Hungary (born 1858)

Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria was the only son and third child of Emperor Franz Joseph I and Empress Elisabeth of Austria. He was heir apparent to the imperial throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire from birth. In 1889, he died in a suicide pact with his mistress Baroness Mary Vetsera at the Mayerling hunting lodge. The ensuing scandal made international headlines.

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30/01/1881

Arthur O'Shaughnessy, English poet and herpetologist (born 1844)

Arthur William Edgar O'Shaughnessy was a British poet and herpetologist. Of Irish descent, he was born in London. He is most remembered for his poem "Ode", from his 1874 collection Music and Moonlight, which begins with the words "We are the music makers, / And we are the dreamers of dreams", and which has been set to music by several composers including Edward Elgar, Zoltán Kodály, Alfred Reed and, more recently, 808 State and Aphex Twin.

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30/01/1869

William Carleton, Irish author (born 1794)

William Carleton was an Irish writer and novelist. He is best known for his Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry, a collection of ethnic sketches of the stereotypical Irishman.

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30/01/1867

Emperor Kōmei of Japan (born 1831)

Emperor Kōmei was the 121st emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession. Kōmei's reign spanned the years from 1846 through 1867, corresponding to the final years of the Edo period.

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30/01/1858

Coenraad Jacob Temminck, Dutch zoologist and ornithologist (born 1778)

Coenraad Jacob Temminck was a Dutch patrician, zoologist and museum director.

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30/01/1838

Osceola, American tribal leader (born 1804)

Osceola, named Billy Powell at birth, was an influential leader of the Seminole people in Florida. His mother was Muscogee, and his great-grandfather was a Scotsman, James McQueen. He was reared by his mother in the Creek (Muscogee) tradition. When he was a child, they migrated to Florida with other Red Stick refugees, led by a relative, Peter McQueen, after their group's defeat in 1814 in the Creek Wars. There they became part of what was known as the Seminole people.

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30/01/1836

Betsy Ross, American seamstress, said to have designed the American Flag (born 1752)

Elizabeth Griscom Ross, also known by her second and third married names, Ashburn and Claypoole, was an American upholsterer who was credited by her relatives in 1870 with designing and making the first U.S. flag, commonly known as the Betsy Ross flag. Though historians dismissed the story both then and now, Ross family tradition holds that General George Washington, commander-in-chief of the Continental Army and two members of a congressional committee—Robert Morris and George Ross—visited Ross in 1776. Ross convinced Washington to change the shape of the stars in a sketch of a flag he showed her from six-pointed to five-pointed by demonstrating that it was easier and speedier to cut the latter. However, there is no archival evidence or other recorded verbal tradition to substantiate this story of the first U.S. flag. It appears that the story first surfaced in the writings of her grandson in the 1870s, with no mention or documentation in earlier decades. The myth was later incorporated into a large oil painting that appeared at the 1893 Chicago World's fair. The painter, Charles Weisgerber, subsequently promoted the myth, even buying a house he deemed The Betsy Ross House. He solicited money nationwide for the upkeep of the house as a tourist attraction. With the solicitations, he provided a synopsis of the myth with reproductions of his painting.

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30/01/1770

Giovanni Pietro Francesco Agius de Soldanis, Maltese linguist, historian and cleric (born 1712)

Canon Giovanni Pietro Francesco Agius de Soldanis, often called de Soldanis, was a Maltese linguist, historian and cleric from the island of Gozo. He wrote the first lexicon and systematic grammar of the Maltese language, and he was the first librarian of the Bibliotheca Publica, the precursor of the National Library of Malta.

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30/01/1730

Peter II of Russia (born 1715)

Peter II Alexeyevich was Emperor of Russia from 1727 until 1730, when he died at the age of 14. He was the only son of Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich and Charlotte Christine of Brunswick-Lüneburg. After Catherine I's death, Alexander Menshikov controlled Peter II, but was thwarted by his opponents and exiled by Peter. Peter was also influenced by favorites like Prince Aleksey Dolgorukov, leading to a neglect of state affairs and the tightening of serfdom. Peter's reign was marked by disengagement, disorder, and indulgence. He was engaged to Ekaterina Dolgorukova, but died suddenly of smallpox before the marriage, thus making him the last male agnatic member of the House of Romanov.

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30/01/1664

Cornelis de Graeff, Dutch mayor (born 1599)

Cornelis de Graeff, often named Polsbroek or de heer van (lord) Polsbroek during his lifetime, was an influential regent and Burgemeester of Amsterdam, statesman and diplomat of Holland and the Republic of the United Netherlands at the height of the Dutch Golden Age.

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30/01/1649

Charles I of England, Scotland, and Ireland (born 1600)

Charles I was King of England, Scotland, and Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649.

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30/01/1606

Everard Digby, English criminal (born 1578)

Sir Everard Digby was a member of the group of provincial English Catholics who planned the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605. Although he was raised in a Protestant household and married a Protestant, Digby and his wife were converted to Catholicism by the Jesuit priest John Gerard. In the autumn of 1605, he was part of a Catholic pilgrimage to the shrine of St Winefride's Well in Holywell, Wales. About this time, he met Robert Catesby, who planned to blow up the House of Lords with gunpowder, killing James I. Catesby then planned to incite a popular revolt, through which a Catholic monarch would be placed upon the English throne.

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John Grant, English conspirator (born 1570)

John Grant was a member of the failed Gunpowder Plot, a conspiracy to replace the Protestant King James I of England with a Catholic monarch. Grant was born around 1570, and lived at Norbrook in Warwickshire. He married the sister of another plotter, Thomas Wintour. Grant was enlisted by Robert Catesby, a religious zealot who had grown so impatient with James's lack of toleration for Catholics that he planned to kill him, by blowing up the House of Lords with gunpowder. Grant's role in the conspiracy was to provide supplies for a planned Midlands uprising, during which James's daughter, Princess Elizabeth, would be captured. However, on the eve of the planned explosion, Guy Fawkes was discovered guarding the explosives the plotters had positioned in the undercroft beneath the House of Lords, and arrested.

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Robert Wintour, English conspirator (born 1565)

Robert Wintour and Thomas Wintour, also spelt Winter, were members of the Gunpowder Plot, a failed conspiracy to assassinate King James I. They were brothers, and related to other conspirators, such as their cousin, Robert Catesby; a half-brother, John Wintour, also joined them following the plot's failure. Thomas was an intelligent and educated man, fluent in several languages and trained as a lawyer, but chose instead to become a soldier, fighting for England in the Low Countries, France, and possibly in Central Europe. By 1600, however, he changed his mind and became a fervent Catholic. On several occasions he travelled to the continent and entreated Spain on behalf of England's oppressed Catholics, and suggested that with Spanish support a Catholic rebellion was likely.

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30/01/1574

Damião de Góis, Portuguese historian and philosopher (born 1502)

Damião de Góis was a Portuguese diplomat, historian, musician, and humanist philosopher. A friend and student of Erasmus, Góis is considered one of the most influential intellectuals of the Portuguese Renaissance. He was appointed secretary to the Portuguese factory in Antwerp in 1523 by King John III of Portugal. He compiled one of the first accounts on Ethiopian Christianity.

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30/01/1384

Louis II, Count of Flanders (born 1330)

Louis II, also known as Louis of Male, a member of the House of Dampierre, was the count of Flanders, Nevers, and Rethel from 1346 to 1384, and also of Artois and Burgundy from 1382 until his death. He was the son and successor of Count Louis I of Flanders and Countess Margaret I of Burgundy, a daughter of King Philip V of France.

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30/01/1344

William Montacute, 1st Earl of Salisbury (born 1301)

William Montagu, alias de Montacute, 1st Earl of Salisbury, 3rd Baron Montagu, King of Man was an English nobleman and loyal servant of King Edward III.

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30/01/1314

Nicholas III of Saint Omer

Nicholas III of Saint-Omer was one of the most powerful and influential lords of Frankish Greece. He was hereditary Marshal of the Principality of Achaea, lord of one third of Akova and of one half of Thebes. He also served on three occasions as bailli of the Principality of Achaea.

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30/01/1240

Pelagio Galvani, Leonese lawyer and cardinal (born 1165)

Pelagio Galvani was a Leonese cardinal, and canon lawyer. He became a papal legate and leader of the Fifth Crusade.

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30/01/1181

Emperor Takakura of Japan (born 1161)

Emperor Takakura was the 80th emperor of Japan, according to the traditional order of succession. His reign spanned the years from 1168 through 1180.

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30/01/1030

William V, Duke of Aquitaine (born 969)

William the Great was duke of Aquitaine and count of Poitou from 990 until his death. Upon the death of the emperor Henry II, he was offered the kingdom of Italy but declined to contest the title against Conrad II.

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30/01/0970

Peter I of Bulgaria

Peter I was the emperor (tsar) of Bulgaria from 27 May 927 to 969. Facing Bogomilism and rebellions by his brothers and also by Časlav Klonimirović early on in his reign, Peter secured more success later in life; he ensured the retreat of the invading Rus by inciting Bulgaria's allies, the Pechenegs, to attack Kiev itself. Traditionally seen as a weak ruler who lost land and prestige, recent scholarship challenges this view, emphasizing the empire's affluence and internal peace. Considered a good ruler during the Middle Ages, his name was adopted by later leaders trying to restore Bulgarian independence under Byzantine rule to emphasize legitimacy and continuity.

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30/01/0680

Balthild, Frankish queen (born 626)

Balthild, also spelled Bathilda, Bauthieult or Baudour, was queen consort of Neustria and Burgundy by marriage to Clovis II, the King of Neustria and Burgundy (639–658), and regent during the minority of her son, Chlothar III. Her hagiography was intended to further her successful candidature for sainthood.

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