Died on Tuesday, 15th July – Famous Deaths

15/07/2021

Peter R. de Vries, Dutch investigative journalist and crime reporter (born 1956)

Peter Rudolf de Vries was a Dutch investigative journalist and crime reporter. His television program Peter R. de Vries, misdaadverslaggever covered high-profile cases and set a Dutch television viewing record. For decades he was famous in the Netherlands for his works in unsolved crimes. He also became internationally renowned for his programme covering the disappearance of Natalee Holloway. In 2005, he founded his own political party which was disbanded soon after.

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15/07/2017

Martin Landau, American film and television actor (born 1928)

Martin James Landau was an American actor. His career began in the late 1950s, with early film appearances including a supporting role in Alfred Hitchcock's North by Northwest (1959). His career breakthrough came with leading roles in the television series Mission: Impossible (1966–1969) and Space: 1999 (1975–1977).

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15/07/2015

Masahiko Aoki, Japanese-American economist and academic (born 1938)

Masahiko Aoki was a Japanese economist, Tomoye and Henri Takahashi Professor Emeritus of Japanese Studies in the Economics Department, and Senior Fellow of the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research and Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. Aoki was known for his work in comparative institutional analysis, corporate governance, the theory of the firm, and comparative East Asian development.

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Wan Li, Chinese politician, 4th Vice Premier of the People's Republic of China (born 1916)

Wan Li was a Chinese Communist revolutionary and politician who served as First Vice Premier of the People's Republic of China from 1983 to 1988 and the 5th Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress from 1988 to 1993.

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Aubrey Morris, British actor (born 1926)

Aubrey Morris was a British actor known for his appearances in the films A Clockwork Orange and The Wicker Man.

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Dave Somerville, Canadian singer (born 1933)

David Troy Somerville was a Canadian singer best known as the co-founder, and original lead singer, of The Diamonds, one of the most popular vocal groups of the 1950s.

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15/07/2014

Óscar Acosta, Honduran author, poet, and diplomat (born 1933)

Óscar Acosta Zeledón was a Honduran writer, poet, critic, politician and diplomat.

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James MacGregor Burns, American historian, political scientist, and author (born 1918)

James MacGregor Burns was an American historian and political scientist, presidential biographer, and authority on leadership studies. He was the Woodrow Wilson Professor of Government Emeritus at Williams College and Distinguished Leadership Scholar at the James MacGregor Burns Academy of Leadership of the School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland, College Park. In 1971 Burns received the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award in History and Biography for his work on America's 32nd president, Roosevelt: The Soldier of Freedom.

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Edward Perl, American neuroscientist and academic (born 1926)

Edward Roy Perl was an American neuroscientist whose research focused on neural mechanisms of and circuitry involved in somatic sensation, principally nociception. Work in his laboratory in the late 1960s established the existence of unique nociceptors. Perl was one of the founding members of the Society for Neuroscience and served as its first president. He was a Sarah Graham Kenan Professor of Cell Biology & Physiology and a member of the UNC Neuroscience Center at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine.

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Robert A. Roe, American soldier and politician (born 1924)

Robert Aloysius Roe was an American Democratic Party politician who represented New Jersey in the United States House of Representatives from November 4, 1969 to January 3, 1993.

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15/07/2013

Ninos Aho, Syrian-American poet and activist (born 1945)

Ninos Aho, was an Assyrian poet and activist. He is recognized one of the pioneers of the modern Assyrian nationalistic movement.

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Henry Braden, American lawyer and politician (born 1944)

Henry English "Hank" Braden IV was a lawyer and politician.

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Tom Greenwell, American lawyer and judge (born 1956)

Thomas Frederick Greenwell was a judge of the Texas 319th District Court based in Corpus Christi in Nueces County, Texas. The first Republican to serve on the 319th court, Greenwell was first elected in 2002 and reelected in 2006 and 2010.

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Earl Gros, American football player (born 1940)

Earl Roy Gros was an American football running back who played in the National Football League (NFL) for nine seasons. Born and raised in Louisiana, he played college football at Louisiana State University (LSU) in Baton Rouge.

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Noël Lee, Chinese-American pianist and composer (born 1924)

Noël Lee was an American classical pianist and composer.

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Meskerem Legesse, Ethiopian runner (born 1986)

Meskerem Legesse was an Ethiopian distance runner. She participated in the 1,500 meters at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens. Legesse turned professional and participated in a number of U.S. events at various distances.

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John T. Riedl, American computer scientist and academic (born 1962)

John Thomas Riedl was an American computer scientist and the McKnight Distinguished Professor at the University of Minnesota. His published works include highly influential research on the social web, recommendation systems, and collaborative systems.

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15/07/2012

Boris Cebotari, Moldovan footballer (born 1975)

Boris Cebotari was a Moldovan footballer.

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Tsilla Chelton, Israeli-French actress (born 1919)

Tsilla Chelton was a French actress of theatre and film, famous for playing the main role in 1990 film Tatie Danielle, in which she was nominated for a César Awards and as an elderly Dominican in Sister Smile.

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Grant Feasel, American football player (born 1960)

Grant Earl Feasel was an American professional football center in the National Football League (NFL) for the Baltimore/Indianapolis Colts, Minnesota Vikings, and Seattle Seahawks.

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David Fraser, English general (born 1920)

General Sir David William Fraser, was a senior British Army officer who served as Commandant of the Royal College of Defence Studies from 1978 until his retirement from military service in 1980. He was also a prolific author, publishing over 20 books mostly focused on the history of the Second World War.

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Celeste Holm, American actress and singer (born 1917)

Celeste Holm was an American actress. Holm won an Academy Award for her performance in Elia Kazan's Gentleman's Agreement (1947), and was nominated for her roles in Come to the Stable (1949) and All About Eve (1950). She also is known for her performances in The Snake Pit (1948), A Letter to Three Wives (1949), and High Society (1956) as well as for originating the role of Ado Annie in the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical Oklahoma! (1943).

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Yoichi Takabayashi, Japanese director and screenwriter (born 1931)

Yoichi Takabayashi was a Japanese film director.

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15/07/2011

Friedrich Wilhelm Schnitzler, German landowner and politician (born 1928)

Friedrich "Fritz" Wilhelm Schnitzler was a German landowner and business manager, and also a local politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the founder of the agricultural association of the District of Reutlingen and co-founder of the landholders' association of Baden-Württemberg, and lobbyist in the state parliament.

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Googie Withers, British-Australian actress (born 1917)

Georgette Lizette "Googie" Withers was an English entertainer. She was a dancer and actress, with a lengthy career spanning some 73 years in theatre, film, and television. She was a well-known actress and star of British films during and after the Second World War.

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15/07/2010

James E. Akins, American politician and diplomat, United States Ambassador to Saudi Arabia (born 1926)

James Elmer Akins was the U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia from September, 1973 to February, 1976, just in time to serve during the 1973 Oil Crisis of October, 1973 to March, 1974. Akins was a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and on the advisory council of the Iran Policy Committee (IPC). Akins has been involved with the pro-Palestine organization If Americans Knew.

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15/07/2008

György Kolonics, Hungarian canoe racer (born 1972)

György "Kolo" Kolonics was a Hungarian sprint canoeist who won two gold and two bronze medals at four Summer Olympics. He also won a record fifteen gold medals at the ICF Canoe Sprint World Championships. He died from cardiac arrest while preparing for his fifth Olympics.

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15/07/2006

Robert H. Brooks, American businessman, founder of Hooters and Naturally Fresh, Inc. (born 1937)

Robert Howell Brooks was founder of Naturally Fresh, Inc. in 1966 in Atlanta, Georgia. He helped create the Hooters of America, Inc. restaurant chain that would eventually drive that company's rapid expansion in the mid–late 1990s.

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Alireza Shapour Shahbazi, Iranian archaeologist and academic (born 1942)

Alireza Shapour Shahbazi was a prominent Persian archaeologist, Iranologist and a world expert on Achaemenid archaeology. Shahbazi got a BA degree in and an MA degree in East Asian archaeology from SOAS. Shahbazi had a doctorate degree in Achaemenid archaeology from University of London. Alireza Shapour Shahbazi was a lecturer in Achaemenid archaeology and Iranology at Harvard University. He was also a full professor of archaeology at Shiraz University and founded at Persepolis the Institute of Achaemenid Research in 1974. After the Islamic revolution, he moved to the US, firstly teaching at Columbia University and then later becoming a full professor of history in Eastern Oregon University.

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15/07/2003

Roberto Bolaño, Chilean novelist, short-story writer, poet, and essayist (born 1953)

Roberto Bolaño Ávalos was a Chilean novelist, short-story writer, poet and essayist. In 1999, Bolaño won the Rómulo Gallegos Prize for his novel The Savage Detectives, and in 2008 he was posthumously awarded the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction for his novel 2666, which was described by board member Marcela Valdes as a "work so rich and dazzling that it will surely draw readers and scholars for ages".

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Elisabeth Welch, American actress and singer (born 1904)

Elisabeth Margaret Welch was an American singer, actress, and entertainer, whose career spanned seven decades. Her best-known songs were "Stormy Weather", "Love for Sale" and "Far Away in Shanty Town". She was American-born, but was based in Britain for most of her career.

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15/07/2001

C. Balasingham, Sri Lankan lawyer and civil servant (born 1917)

Coomarasamy Balasingham was a leading Ceylon Tamil civil servant.

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15/07/2000

Louis Quilico, Canadian opera singer and educator (born 1925)

Louis Quilico, was a Canadian opera singer. One of the leading dramatic baritones of his day, he was an ideal interpreter of the great Italian and French composers, especially Giuseppe Verdi. He was often referred to as "Mr Rigoletto" in reference to the Verdi opera. During his 45-year-long career he shared performing credits with opera's greatest stars. He spent 25 consecutive years at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. After his retirement from the stage in 1998 he continued to perform and record, most often with his second wife, pianist Christina Petrowska Quilico,, with whom he made four CDs. The couple also toured together extensively in concerts until Quilico's death in 2000. Quilico received the Governor General's Performing Arts Award, Canada's highest honour in the performing arts, in November 1999 for his lifetime contribution to classical music.

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15/07/1998

S. Shanmuganathan, Sri Lankan politician (born 1960)

Sarawanabavanandan Shanmuganathan was a Sri Lankan Tamil militant, politician and Member of Parliament.

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15/07/1997

Justinas Lagunavičius, Lithuanian basketball player (born 1924)

Justinas Lagunavičius was a Lithuanian basketball player who competed for the Soviet Union in the 1952 Summer Olympics. He trained at VSS Žalgiris in Kaunas.

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Gianni Versace, Italian fashion designer, founded Versace (born 1946)

Giovanni Maria "Gianni" Versace was an Italian fashion designer and businessman. He was the founder of Versace, an international luxury-fashion house that produces accessories, fragrances, make-up, home furnishings and clothes. He also designed costumes for theatre and films. As a friend of Eric Clapton, Princess Diana, Whitney Houston, Naomi Campbell, Kate Moss, Madonna, Elton John, Tupac Shakur, Joan Collins and many other celebrities, he was one of the first designers to link fashion to the music world. He and his partner Antonio D'Amico were regulars on the international party scene. The place where he was born and raised, Reggio di Calabria, greatly influenced his career.

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15/07/1992

Hammer DeRoburt, Nauruan educator and politician, 1st President of Nauru (born 1922)

Hammer DeRoburt was a Nauruan politician and independence leader. He led negotiations for independence from Australia and the end of the country's status as a United Nations trust territory. He was subsequently elected as the inaugural president of Nauru, serving four terms in office. Prior to independence he was head chief of Nauru and chair of the Nauru Local Government Council.

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Chingiz Mustafayev, Azerbaijani journalist and author (born 1960)

Chingiz Fuad oghlu Mustafayev was an independent Azerbaijani journalist, posthumously bestowed the title of National Hero of Azerbaijan. Mustafayev, with the medical degree and no formal background in journalism save for a year of on the job training, created a video record of the early stages of the First Nagorno-Karabakh War, most of the documentary had to be shot from the frontline which ultimately was the cause of his abrupt death due to mortar wounds.

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15/07/1991

Bert Convy, American actor, singer, and game show host (born 1933)

Bernard Whalen "Bert" Convy was an American actor, singer, game-show panelist, and host known for Tattletales, Super Password, and Win, Lose or Draw.

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15/07/1990

Zaim Topčić, Yugoslav and Bosnian writer (born 1920)

Zaim Topčić was a Bosnian writer of novels. He twice won the Annual Award of the Association of Writers of Bosnia and Herzegovina, for the novels Lump of Sun and Black Snows.

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Margaret Lockwood, English actress (born 1916)

Margaret Mary Day Lockwood was a British actress. One of Britain's most popular film stars of the 1930s and 1940s, her film appearances included The Lady Vanishes (1938), Night Train to Munich (1940), The Man in Grey (1943), and The Wicked Lady (1945). She was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best British Actress for the 1955 film Cast a Dark Shadow. She also starred in the television series Justice (1971–74). Ronald Bergan of The Guardian called her "one of the most beautiful, energetic, and spirited actresses in the history of British cinema."

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Omar Abu Risha, Syrian poet and diplomat, 4th Syrian Ambassador to the United States (born 1910)

Omar Abu Risha was a Syrian poet and diplomat. He served as the Syrian ambassador to the United States from 1961 to 1964 and was a renowned poet who lyricized Fī Sabīli al-Majd , Syria's de facto national anthem.

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15/07/1989

Laurie Cunningham, English footballer (born 1956)

Laurence Paul Cunningham was an English professional footballer who played as a winger. He notably played in England, France, and Spain, where he became the first-ever English player to sign for Real Madrid.

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15/07/1988

Eleanor Estes, American librarian, author, and illustrator (born 1906)

Eleanor Estes was an American children's writer and a children's librarian. Her book Ginger Pye, for which she also created illustrations, won the Newbery Medal. Three of her books were Newbery Honor Winners, and one was awarded the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award. Estes' books were based on her life in small-town Connecticut in the early 1900s.

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15/07/1986

Billy Haughton, American harness racer and trainer (born 1923)

William Robert (Billy) Haughton was an American harness driver and trainer. He was one of only three drivers to win the Hambletonian four times, the only one to win the Little Brown Jug five times, and the only one to win the Messenger Stakes seven times. With a career record of 4,910 wins and about $40 million in earnings, he was first in annual winnings 12 times – 1952–59, 1963, 1965, 1967, and 1968 – and in heats won from 1953 to 1958.

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15/07/1982

Bill Justis, American saxophonist, songwriter, and producer (born 1926)

William Everett Justis Jr. was an American pioneer rock and roll musician, composer, and musical arranger, best known for his 1957 Grammy Hall of Fame song, "Raunchy". As a songwriter, he was also often credited as Bill Everette.

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15/07/1981

Frédéric Dorion, Canadian lawyer, judge, and politician (born 1898)

Frédéric Dorion was a Quebec politician and chief justice. He led a group of Independent MPs in the House of Commons of Canada who were opposed to the implementation of conscription during World War II.

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15/07/1979

Gustavo Díaz Ordaz, Mexican academic and politician, 29th President of Mexico (born 1911)

Gustavo Díaz Ordaz Bolaños was a Mexican politician and member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). He served as the President of Mexico from 1964 to 1970. Previously, he served as a member of the Chamber of Deputies for Puebla's 1st district, a senator of the Congress of the Union for Puebla, and Secretary of the Interior.

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15/07/1977

Donald Mackay, Australian businessman and activist (born 1933)

Donald Bruce Mackay was an Australian businessman and anti-drug campaigner. He disappeared in 1977, but his body has never been found. In 1986, James Bazley was convicted for his murder.

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15/07/1976

Paul Gallico, American journalist and author (born 1897)

Paul William Gallico was an American novelist and short story and sports writer. Many of his works were adapted for motion pictures. He is perhaps best remembered for The Snow Goose, his most critically successful book, for the novel The Poseidon Adventure, primarily through the 1972 film adaptation, and for four novels about the beloved character of Mrs. Harris.

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15/07/1974

Christine Chubbuck, American journalist (born 1944)

Christine Chubbuck was an American television news reporter who worked for stations WTOG and WXLT-TV in Sarasota, Florida. She is best known for being the first person to die by suicide on a live television broadcast.

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15/07/1969

Grace Hutchins, American labor reformer and researcher (born 1885)

Grace Hutchins was an American labor reformer and researcher, journalist, political activist and communist. She spent many years of her life writing about labor and economics, in addition to being a lifelong dedicated member of the Communist Party, along with Anna Rochester, a Marxist economist and historian and her companion of 45 years. Together they were known for promoting radical Christian pacifism in the United States, although Hutchins was also regularly involved in strikes, demonstrations and labor disputes.

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15/07/1966

Seyfi Arkan, Turkish architect (born 1903)

Abdurrahman Seyfettin Arkan, Seyfi Nasih was a Turkish architect, the personal architect of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. He was born in 1903 in Istanbul. He attended Kadikoy French School and Galatasaray High School. He was first in his class under Vedat Tek in 1928, and later worked with Hans Poelzig in Germany. In 1933, he designed the Glass Villa of Çankaya Köşkü, the President of Turkey's official residence, as well as Florya Atatürk Marine Mansion, a Bauhaus-style former residence of Atatürk and now a museum, in 1935.

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15/07/1965

Francis Cherry, American lawyer and politician, 35th Governor of Arkansas (born 1908)

Francis Adams Cherry was an American politician and judge. A Democrat, he served as the 35th governor of Arkansas from 1953 to 1955. The Arkansas government was known for its honesty during his administration, though Cherry went on to mishandle the state economy.

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15/07/1961

John Edward Brownlee, Canadian lawyer and politician, 5th Premier of Alberta (born 1884)

John Edward Brownlee was the fifth premier of Alberta, serving from 1925 until 1934. Born in Port Ryerse, Ontario, he studied history and political science at the University of Toronto's Victoria College before moving west to Calgary to become a lawyer. His clients included the United Farmers of Alberta (UFA); through his connection with that lobby group, he was involved in founding the United Grain Growers (UGG).

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Nina Bari, Russian mathematician (born 1901)

Nina Karlovna Bari was a Soviet mathematician known for her work on trigonometric series. She is also well-known for two textbooks, Higher Algebra and The Theory of Series.

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15/07/1960

Set Persson, Swedish politician (born 1897)

Set Persson was a Swedish communist leader.

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Lawrence Tibbett, American singer and actor (born 1896)

Lawrence Mervil Tibbett was an American opera singer and recording artist who also performed as a film actor and radio personality. A baritone with large, deep, and dark-timbred voice. His dynamic range ranged from forceful fortes to delicate pianissimos, he sang leading roles with the Metropolitan Opera in New York City more than 600 times from 1923 to 1950. He performed diverse musical theatre roles, including Captain Hook in Peter Pan in a touring show.

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15/07/1959

Ernest Bloch, Swiss-American composer and academic (born 1880)

Ernest Bloch was a Swiss-born American composer. Bloch was a preeminent artist in his day, and left a lasting legacy. He is recognized as one of the most significant Swiss composers in history. Several of his most notable compositions reflect his Jewish heritage. As well as producing musical scores, Bloch had an academic career that culminated in his recognition as Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley in 1952.

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Vance Palmer, Australian author and critic (born 1885)

Edward Vivian "Vance" Palmer was an Australian novelist, dramatist, essayist and critic.

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15/07/1957

James M. Cox, American publisher and politician, 46th Governor of Ohio (born 1870)

James Middleton Cox was an American businessman and politician who served as the 46th and 48th governor of Ohio, and a two-term U.S. Representative from Ohio. As the Democratic nominee for President of the United States at the 1920 presidential election, he lost in a landslide to fellow Ohioan Warren G. Harding. Cox's running mate was future president Franklin D. Roosevelt. He founded the chain of newspapers that continues today as Cox Enterprises, a media conglomerate.

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Vasily Maklakov, a Russian lawyer and politician (born 1869)

Vasily Alekseyevich Maklakov was a Russian student activist, a trial lawyer and liberal parliamentary deputy, an orator, and one of the leaders of the Constitutional Democratic Party, notable for his advocacy of a constitutional Russian state. He served as deputy in the (radical) Second, and conservative Third and Fourth State Duma. According to Stephen F. Williams Maklakov is "an inviting lens to which to view at the last years of Tsarism".

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15/07/1953

Geevarghese Mar Ivanios, Indian archbishop, founded the Order of the Imitation of Christ (born 1882)

Panikkervettil Thomas Panicker Geevarghese, known formally as Geevarghese Mar Ivanios, was a prominent Indian bishop and the first metropolitan archbishop and the founder of the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church. He was a key figure in the Malankara Reunion Movement, which sought to reunite the Malankara Church with the Catholic Church, culminating in his joining the Roman Catholic Church in 1930 along with a small group of followers.

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15/07/1948

John J. Pershing, American general (born 1860)

John Joseph Pershing, nicknamed "Black Jack", was an American army general, educator, and founder of the Pershing Rifles. He served as the commander of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF) during World War I from 1917 to 1920. In addition to leading the AEF to victory in World War I, Pershing served as a mentor to many in the generation of generals who led the United States Army during World War II, including George C. Marshall, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Omar Bradley, Lesley J. McNair, George S. Patton, and Douglas MacArthur.

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15/07/1947

Walter Donaldson, American soldier and songwriter (born 1893)

Walter Donaldson was a prolific American popular songwriter and publishing company founder, composing many hit songs of the 1910s to 1940s, that have become standards and form part of the Great American Songbook.

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15/07/1946

Razor Smith, English cricketer and coach (born 1877)

William Charles "Razor" Smith was a Surrey slow bowler. Nicknamed "Razor" because of his extreme thinness, Smith was a frail man and prone to serious injury; he could rarely get through a full season's cricket, but when fit and healthy, could command the sharpest off-break among bowlers of his day. He was also able to bowl a somewhat faster ball with a very high flight that turned a little from leg and, with any help from the pitch, would get up almost straight.

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15/07/1944

Marie-Victorin Kirouac, Canadian botanist and academic (born 1885)

Brother Marie-Victorin, F.S.C., was a Canadian member of Brothers of the Christian Schools and a noted botanist in Quebec, Canada.

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15/07/1942

Wenceslao Vinzons, Filipino lawyer and politician (born 1910)

Wenceslao "Bintao" Quinito Vinzons Sr. was a Filipino patriot and leader of the Philippine armed resistance against the Japanese invasion in World War II. He was the youngest delegate to the 1935 Philippine Constitutional Convention. For leading demonstrations as a student leader, he was dubbed the "Father of Student Activism in the Philippines" when he, along with Narciso J. Alegre and future Senator and Vice President Arturo Tolentino, founded the Young Philippines Party.

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15/07/1940

Eugen Bleuler, Swiss psychiatrist and physician (born 1857)

Paul Eugen Bleuler was a Swiss psychiatrist and eugenicist most notable for his influence on modern concepts of mental illness. He coined several psychiatric terms including schizophrenia, schizoid, autism, depth psychology and what Sigmund Freud called "Bleuler's happily chosen term 'ambivalence'". Bleuler remains a controversial figure in psychiatric history for his racist and ableist beliefs, as well as his implementation of eugenic practises in psychiatry based on these beliefs, most notably at the Burghölzli clinic in Zurich.

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Robert Wadlow, American giant, 8"11' 271 cm (born 1918)

Robert Pershing Wadlow, also known as the Alton Giant and the Giant of Illinois, was an American man known for being the tallest person in recorded history for whom there is irrefutable evidence. Wadlow was born and raised in Alton, Illinois, a small city near St. Louis, Missouri.

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15/07/1933

Irving Babbitt, American scholar, critic, and academic (born 1865)

Irving Babbitt was an American academic and literary critic, noted for his founding role in a movement that became known as the New Humanism, a significant influence on literary discussion and conservative thought in the period between 1910 and 1930. He was a cultural critic in the tradition of Matthew Arnold and a consistent opponent of romanticism, as represented by the writings of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Politically he can, without serious distortion, be called a follower of Aristotle and Edmund Burke. He was an advocate of classical humanism but also offered an ecumenical defense of religion. His humanism implied a broad knowledge of various moral and religious traditions. His book Democracy and Leadership (1924) is regarded as a classic text of political conservatism. Babbitt is regarded as a major influence over American cultural and political conservatism.

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Freddie Keppard, American cornet player (born 1890)

Freddie Keppard was an American jazz cornetist who once held the title of "King" in the New Orleans jazz scene. This title was previously held by Buddy Bolden and succeeded by Joe Oliver.

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15/07/1932

Bahíyyih Khánum, Iranian writer and leader in the Baha'i faith (born 1846)

Bahíyyih Khánum was the only daughter of Baháʼu'lláh, the founder of the Baháʼí Faith, and Ásíyih Khánum. She was born in 1846 with the given name Fatimih Sultan, and was entitled "Varaqiy-i-'Ulyá" or "Greatest Holy Leaf". Brought up through the trying times her family lived through, in adulthood she served the interests of the religion and was even quite often entrusted with running the affairs of the religion. Greatly favoured by Bahá'u'lláh, she is seen within the Baháʼí Faith as one of the greatest women to have lived. According to Baháʼís, every dispensation has one particular holy woman or "immortal heroine". In the time of Jesus it was the Virgin Mary, the time of Muhammad it was his daughter Fatima Zahra and during the Báb's dispensation it was Táhirih. Baháʼís believe that Bahíyyih Khánum is the outstanding heroine of the Baháʼí dispensation.

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Cornelis Jacobus Langenhoven, South African poet and politician (born 1873)

Cornelis Jacobus Langenhoven, who published under his initials C.J. Langenhoven, was a South African poet who played a major role in the development of Afrikaans literature and cultural history. His poetry was one of the then young language's foremost promoters. He is best known for writing the words for "Die Stem van Suid-Afrika", which was used previously as the national anthem during apartheid. He was affectionately known as Sagmoedige Neelsie or Kerneels. His childhood friend who helped him get into poetry was called Hans Conrodius van Zyl.

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15/07/1931

Ladislaus Bortkiewicz, Russian-German economist and mathematician (born 1868)

Ladislaus Josephovich Bortkiewicz was a Russian economist and statistician of Polish ancestry. He wrote a book showing how the Poisson distribution, a discrete probability distribution, can be useful in applied statistics, and he made contributions to mathematical economics. He lived most of his professional life in Germany, where he taught at Strassburg University and Berlin University (1901–1931).

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15/07/1930

Leopold Auer, Hungarian violinist, composer, and conductor (born 1845)

Leopold von Auer was a Hungarian violinist, academic, conductor, composer, and instructor. Many of his students went on to become prominent concert performers and teachers.

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Leonora Barry, Irish-born American social activist (born 1849)

Leonora M. Kearney Barry was an Irish-American labor activist. As the only woman to hold national office within the Knights of Labor, she brought attention to the conditions of working women through her involvement in the labor reform movement. She also furthered the progress of women's rights during the period following the American Civil War and Reconstruction.

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15/07/1929

Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Austrian author, poet, and playwright (born 1874)

Hugo Laurenz August Hofmann von Hofmannsthal was an Austrian novelist, librettist, poet, dramatist, narrator, and essayist.

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15/07/1919

Emil Fischer, German chemist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1852)

Hermann Emil Louis Fischer was a German chemist and 1902 recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. He discovered the Fischer esterification. He also developed the Fischer projection, a symbolic way of drawing asymmetric carbon atoms. He also hypothesized lock and key mechanism of enzyme action. He never used his first given name, and was known throughout his life simply as Emil Fischer.

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15/07/1904

Anton Chekhov, Russian playwright and short story writer (born 1860)

Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was a Russian playwright and short story writer. Widely considered one of the greatest writers of all time, his career as a playwright produced four classics, and his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics. Along with Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg, Chekhov is often referred to as one of the three seminal figures in the birth of early modernism in the theatre. Chekhov was a physician by profession. "Medicine is my lawful wife," he once said, "and literature is my mistress."

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15/07/1898

Jean-Baptiste Salpointe, French-American archbishop (born 1825)

Jean-Baptiste Salpointe was a French-born prelate who serve as archbishop of the Archdiocese of Santa Fe in New Mexico in the United States from 1885 to 1894.

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15/07/1890

Gottfried Keller, Swiss author, poet and playwright (born 1819)

Gottfried Keller was a Swiss poet and writer of German literature. Best known for his novel Green Henry and his cycle of novellas called Seldwyla Folks, he became one of the most popular narrators of literary realism in the late 19th century.

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15/07/1885

Rosalía de Castro, Spanish author and poet (born 1837)

María Rosalía Rita de Castro, was a Galician poet and novelist, considered one of the most important figures of the 19th-century Spanish literature and modern lyricism. Widely regarded as the greatest Galician cultural icon, she was a leading figure in the emergence of the literary Galician language. Through her work, she projected multiple emotions, including the yearning for the celebration of Galician identity and culture, and female empowerment. She is credited with challenging the traditional female writer archetype.

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15/07/1883

General Tom Thumb, American circus performer (born 1838)

Charles Sherwood Stratton, better known by his stage name "General Tom Thumb", was an American with dwarfism who achieved great fame as a performer under circus pioneer P. T. Barnum.

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15/07/1858

Alexander Andreyevich Ivanov, Russian painter (born 1806)

Alexander Andreyevich Ivanov was a Russian painter who adhered to the waning tradition of Neoclassicism but found little sympathy with his contemporaries. He was born and died in St. Petersburg. He has been called the master of one work, for it took 20 years to complete his magnum opus The Appearance of Christ Before the People.

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15/07/1857

Carl Czerny, Austrian pianist and composer (born 1791)

Carl Czerny was an Austrian composer, teacher, and pianist of Czech origin whose music spanned the late Classical and early Romantic eras. His vast musical production amounted to over a thousand works and his books of studies for the piano are still widely used in piano teaching. He was one of Ludwig van Beethoven's best-known pupils and would later on be one of the main teachers of Franz Liszt.

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15/07/1851

Anne-Marie Javouhey, French nun, founder of the Sisters of St Joseph of Cluny (born 1779)

Anne-Marie Javouhey, SJC was a French nun who founded the Sisters of Saint Joseph of Cluny. She is venerated in the Roman Catholic Church. She is known as the Liberator of the Slaves in the New World, and as the mother of the town of Mana, French Guiana.

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Juan Felipe Ibarra, Argentinian general and politician (born 1787)

Juan Felipe Ibarra was an Argentine soldier and politician. He was one of the caudillos who dominated the Argentine interior during the formation of the national state, and ruled the province of his birth for decades.

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15/07/1844

Claude Charles Fauriel, French philologist and historian (born 1772)

Claude Charles Fauriel was a French historian, philologist and critic.

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15/07/1839

Winthrop Mackworth Praed, English poet and politician (born 1802)

Winthrop Mackworth Praed —typically written as W. Mackworth Praed—was an English politician and poet.

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15/07/1828

Jean-Antoine Houdon, French sculptor (born 1741)

Jean-Antoine, chevalier Houdon was a French neoclassical sculptor.

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15/07/1789

Jacques Duphly, French harpsichord player and composer (born 1715)

Jacques Duphly was a French harpsichordist and composer.

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15/07/1765

Charles-André van Loo, French painter (born 1705)

Carle or Charles-André van Loo was a French painter, son of the painter Louis-Abraham van Loo, a younger brother of Jean-Baptiste van Loo and grandson of Jacob van Loo. He was the most famous member of a successful dynasty of painters of Dutch origin. His oeuvre includes every category: religion, history painting, mythology, portraiture, allegory, and genre scenes.

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15/07/1750

Vasily Tatishchev, Russian ethnographer and politician (born 1686)

Vasily Nikitich Tatishchev was a Russian statesman, historian, philosopher, and ethnographer. He is known as the author of a book on Russian history titled The History of Russia, posthumously published in 1767. He also founded three cities in the Russian Empire: Stavropol-on-Volga, Yekaterinburg, and Perm.

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15/07/1685

James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth, Dutch-born English general and claimant to the throne, executed (born 1649)

General James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth, 1st Duke of Buccleuch, was an English Army officer and courtier. Originally called James Crofts or James Fitzroy, he was born in Rotterdam in the Netherlands, the eldest illegitimate son of Charles II of England with his mistress Lucy Walter.

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15/07/1655

Girolamo Rainaldi, Italian architect (born 1570)

Girolamo Rainaldi was an Italian architect who worked mainly in a conservative Mannerist style, often with collaborating architects. He was a successful competitor of Bernini. His son, Carlo Rainaldi, became an even more notable, more fully Baroque architect.

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15/07/1614

Pierre de Bourdeille, seigneur de Brantôme, French soldier, historian and author (born 1540)

Pierre de Bourdeille, called the seigneur et abbé de Brantôme, was a French memoirist, soldier and biographer.

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15/07/1609

Annibale Carracci, Italian painter and illustrator (born 1560)

Annibale Carracci was an Italian painter and instructor, active in Bologna and later in Rome. Along with his brother Agostino and cousin Ludovico, Annibale was one of the progenitors, if not founders of a leading strand of the Baroque style, borrowing from styles from both north and south of their native city, and aspiring for a return to classical monumentality, but adding a more vital dynamism. Painters working under Annibale at the gallery of the Palazzo Farnese would be highly influential in Roman painting for decades.

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15/07/1571

Shimazu Takahisa, Japanese daimyō (born 1514)

Shimazu Takahisa , a son of Shimazu Tadayoshi, was a daimyō during Japan's Sengoku period. He was the fifteenth head of the Shimazu clan.

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15/07/1544

René of Châlon (born 1519)

René of Chalon, also known as Renatus of Chalon, was a Prince of Orange and stadtholder of Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht and Gelre.

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15/07/1542

Lisa del Giocondo, subject of Leonardo da Vinci's painting Mona Lisa (born 1479)

Lisa del Giocondo was an Italian noblewoman and member of the Gherardini family of Florence and Tuscany. Her name was given to the Mona Lisa, her portrait commissioned by her husband and painted by Leonardo da Vinci in the Italian Renaissance.

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15/07/1445

Joan Beaufort, Queen of Scotland

Joan Beaufort was Queen of Scots from 1424 to 1437 as the spouse of King James I. During part of the minority of her son James II, she served as the regent of Scotland, the first dowager Queen of Scotland to do so since the 13th century.

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15/07/1410

Ulrich von Jungingen, German Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights (born 1360)

Ulrich von Jungingen was the 26th Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights, serving from 1407 to 1410. His policy of confrontation with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Kingdom of Poland would spark the Polish–Lithuanian–Teutonic War and lead to disaster for his Order, and his own death, at the Battle of Grunwald.

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15/07/1406

William, Duke of Austria

William, known as William the Courteous, a member of the House of Habsburg and Wilhelm, was Duke of Austria from 1386. As head of the Leopoldian line, he ruled over the Inner Austrian duchies of Carinthia, Styria and Carniola as well as the County of Tyrol and Further Austria from 1396 until his death.

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15/07/1397

Catherine of Henneberg, German ruler (born c. 1334)

Catherine of Henneberg was a Countess of Henneberg by birth and, from 1347, Margravine of Meissen and Landgravine of Thuringia by marriage. She was the wife of Frederick the Severe of the House of Wettin. Through her, the Wettins inherited her family's Franconian possessions.

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15/07/1388

Agnes of Durazzo, titular Latin empress consort of Constantinople (born 1313)

Agnes of Durazzo was the wife of James of Baux, titular Latin Emperor of Constantinople. She was the last woman to claim the title of empress of the Latin Empire.

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15/07/1381

John Ball, English Lollard priest

John Ball was an English priest who took a prominent part in the Peasants' Revolt of 1381. Although he is often associated with John Wycliffe and the Lollard movement, Ball was actively preaching "articles contrary to the faith of the church" at least a decade before Wycliffe started attracting attention.

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15/07/1299

King Eric II of Norway (born c. 1268)

Eric Magnusson was king of Norway from 1280 until 1299.

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15/07/1291

Rudolf I of Germany (born 1218)

Rudolf of Habsburg (1 May 1218 – 15 July 1291) was a German nobleman and the first member of the House of Habsburg to become King of the Romans, reigning from 1273 until his death. Born into a relatively minor noble family, Rudolf succeeded his father as Count of Habsburg in 1240, gradually expanding his power through military campaigns, political alliances, and the construction of key fortresses such as Neuhabsburg Castle. His marriage to Gertrude of Hohenberg further strengthened his position among the Swabian nobility. During the turbulent period of the Great Interregnum, Rudolf distinguished himself both as a formidable military leader—participating in regional conflicts and even joining the Prussian Crusade in 1254—and as a restorer of order, often intervening against robber barons and feuding nobles. Despite facing excommunication due to disputes with the Church, Rudolf ultimately reconciled with ecclesiastical authorities and built a reputation for fairness and pragmatism. In 1273, he was elected King of the Romans, ending decades of imperial vacancy and division. As king, Rudolf reasserted imperial authority in Germany, notably defeating King Ottokar II of Bohemia and securing Habsburg control over Austria, Styria, and Carinthia. His reign laid the foundations for the rise of the Habsburg dynasty, which would become one of the most influential royal houses in European history. Rudolf died in 1291, leaving a legacy of restored stability and dynastic ambition within the Holy Roman Empire.

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15/07/1274

Bonaventure, Italian bishop and saint (born 1221)

Bonaventure was an Italian Catholic Franciscan bishop, cardinal, scholastic theologian and philosopher.

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15/07/1015

Vladimir the Great, Grand prince of Kievan Rus' (born c. 958)

Vladimir I Sviatoslavich or Volodymyr I Sviatoslavych, given the epithet "the Great", was Prince of Novgorod from 970 and Grand Prince of Kiev from 978 until his death in 1015. The Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church both canonised him as Saint Vladimir.

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15/07/0998

Abū al-Wafā' Būzjānī, Persian mathematician and astronomer (born 940)

Abū al-Wafāʾ Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad ibn Yaḥyā ibn Ismāʿīl ibn al-ʿAbbās al-Būzjānī or Abū al-Wafā Būzhjānī was a Persian mathematician and astronomer who worked in Baghdad. He made important innovations in spherical trigonometry, and his work on arithmetic for businessmen contains the first instance of using negative numbers in a medieval Islamic text.

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15/07/0756

Yang Guifei, consort of Xuan Zong (born 719)

Yang Yuhuan, often known as Yang Guifei or Consort Yang, and known briefly by the Taoist nun name Taizhen (太真), was the beloved consort of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang during his later years. She is known as one of the Four Beauties of ancient China.

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