Died on Friday, 2nd May – Famous Deaths

02/05/2025

Ricky Davao, Filipino actor and director (born 1961)

Frederick Charles Abiera Davao was a Filipino actor and television director.

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George Ryan, American politician, 39th Governor of Illinois (born 1934)

George Homer Ryan was an American politician who served as the 39th Governor of Illinois from 1999 to 2003. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as Secretary of State of Illinois from 1991 to 1999 and as lieutenant governor from 1983 to 1991. He was later convicted of federal racketeering, bribery, extortion, money laundering, and tax fraud stemming from his time in office.

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02/05/2024

Sjoukje Dijkstra, Dutch figure skater (born 1942)

Sjoukje Rosalinde Dijkstra was a Dutch competitive figure skater. She was the 1964 Olympic champion in ladies' singles, the 1960 Olympic silver medalist, a three-time World champion (1962–1964), five-time European champion (1960–1964), and the six-time Dutch national champion (1959–1964). She was the first Dutch athlete to win a Winter Olympics gold medal.

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Darius Morris, American basketball player (born 1991)

Darius Aaron Morris was an American professional basketball player. Morris was selected as the 41st pick in the 2011 NBA draft by the Los Angeles Lakers and played the point guard position. He also played for the Brooklyn Nets, Philadelphia 76ers, Los Angeles Clippers and Memphis Grizzlies of the NBA as well as the Los Angeles D-Fenders and Rio Grande Valley Vipers of the NBA D-League. He also played overseas in China, Russia and France.

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Peter Oosterhuis, English golfer and broadcaster (born 1948)

Peter Arthur Oosterhuis was an English professional golfer and broadcaster. He played on the European circuit from 1969 to 1974, winning 10 tournaments and taking the Harry Vardon Trophy for heading the Order of Merit for four consecutive seasons from 1971 to 1974. From 1975 he played on the PGA Tour, winning the Canadian Open in 1981. Oosterhuis was twice runner-up in the Open Championship, in 1974 and 1982. Later he became a golf analyst on TV, initially in Europe and then in the United States. In 2015, he announced that he had Alzheimer's disease.

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02/05/2021

Marcel Stellman, Belgian record producer and lyricist (born 1925)

Marcel Leopold Stellman was a Belgian born British record producer and lyricist. Among the many artists who recorded Stellman’s songs are Cilla Black, Petula Clark, Charles Aznavour, the Shadows, Kathy Kirby, and Tony Bennett. In the UK he is best known as the man who brought the French show Des chiffres et des lettres to the UK as Countdown. His pseudonyms as a lyricist include Gene Martyn and Leo Johns.

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02/05/2020

Arif Wazir, Pakistani politician, leader of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (born 1982)

Arif Wazir was a Pakistani politician, activist, and a leader of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM). He was a member of the Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PMAP) and its president for the South Waziristan chapter. He also headed the FATA Political Alliance South Waziristan, which campaigned for the rights of the people of former Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

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02/05/2016

Afeni Shakur, American music businesswoman, activist, and Black Panther (born 1947)

Afeni Shakur Davis was an American political activist and member of the Black Panther Party. Shakur was the mother of rapper Tupac Shakur and the executor of his estate. She founded the Tupac Amaru Shakur Foundation and was the CEO of Amaru Entertainment, Inc., a record and film production company she founded.

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02/05/2015

Stuart Archer, English colonel and architect (born 1915)

Colonel Bertram Stuart Trevelyan Archer,, known as Stuart Archer, was a recipient of the George Cross, the highest British and Commonwealth award for gallantry not in the face of the enemy. On 3 February 2015 Archer became the first recipient of the Victoria Cross or the George Cross to reach 100 years of age.

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Michael Blake, American author and screenwriter (born 1945)

Michael Lennox Blake was an American author, best known for the film adaptation of his novel Dances With Wolves, for which he won an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.

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Guy Carawan, American singer and musicologist (born 1927)

Guy Hughes Carawan Jr. was an American folk musician and musicologist. He served as music director and song leader for the Highlander Research and Education Center in New Market, Tennessee.

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Maya Plisetskaya, Russian-Lithuanian ballerina, choreographer, actress, and director (born 1925)

Maya Mikhailovna Plisetskaya was a Soviet and Russian ballet dancer, choreographer, ballet director, and actress. In post-Soviet times, she held both Lithuanian and Spanish citizenship. She danced during the Soviet era at the Bolshoi Theatre under the directorships of Leonid Lavrovsky, then of Yury Grigorovich; later she moved into direct confrontation with him. In 1960, when famed Russian ballerina Galina Ulanova retired, Plisetskaya became prima ballerina assoluta of the company.

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Ruth Rendell, English author (born 1930)

Ruth Barbara Rendell, Baroness Rendell of Babergh, was an English author of thrillers and psychological murder mysteries.

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02/05/2014

Tomás Balduino, Brazilian bishop (born 1922)

Tomás Balduíno, O.P. was a diocesan bishop of the Catholic Church in Brazil.

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Žarko Petan, Slovenian director, playwright, and screenwriter (born 1929)

Žarko Petan was a Slovenian writer, essayist, screenwriter, and theatre and film director. He is best known as a writer of aphorisms.

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Efrem Zimbalist Jr., American actor (born 1918)

Efrem Zimbalist Jr. was an American actor and theatre producer. Known for his "mellifluous voice and air of sophistication," he was known to television audiences for his starring roles on the crime drama series 77 Sunset Strip (1958–64) and The F.B.I. (1965–74), his recurring role as "Dandy Jim" Buckley on Maverick (1957–58), and as the voice of Alfred Pennyworth in the DC Animated Universe. He also appeared in numerous films and on the Broadway stage. He was a Golden Globe Award winner and a two-time Primetime Emmy Award nominee.

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02/05/2013

Ernie Field, English boxer (born 1943)

Ernest "Ernie" Field was an English Amateur Boxing Association of England amateur middleweight and professional light heavy/cruiserweight boxer and rugby league footballer who played in the 1960s. He played at club level for Stanley Rangers ARLFC, Wakefield Trinity (A-Team) and Bramley, as a centre, or loose forward.

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Jeff Hanneman, American guitarist and songwriter (born 1964)

Jeffrey John Hanneman was an American musician, best known as a founding member and co-lead guitarist of the thrash metal band Slayer. Hanneman wrote both music and lyrics for every Slayer album until his death in 2013.

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Joseph P. McFadden, American bishop (born 1947)

Joseph Patrick McFadden was an American prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. Formerly an auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia in Pennsylvania, he was installed as bishop of Harrisburg in Pennsylvania on August 18, 2010. He served in that position until his death in 2013.

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Dvora Omer, Israeli author and educator (born 1932)

Dvora Omer was an Israeli children's author. She is considered one of Israel’s greatest children’s book writers.

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Ivan Turina, Croatian footballer (born 1980)

Ivan Turina was a Croatian professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. He made one appearance for the Croatia national team.

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Charles Banks Wilson, American painter and illustrator (born 1918)

Charles Banks Wilson was an American artist. Wilson was born in Springdale, Arkansas in 1918; his family eventually moved to Miami, Oklahoma, where he spent his childhood. A painter, printmaker, teacher, lecturer, historian, magazine and book illustrator, Wilson's work has been shown in over 200 exhibitions in the United States and across the globe.

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02/05/2012

Fernando Lopes, Portuguese director and screenwriter (born 1935)

Fernando Lopes, GCIH was a Portuguese film director. He was a Film teacher at the Portuguese National Conservatory, nowadays the Lisbon Theatre and Film School. He died, aged 76, in Lisbon due to throat cancer.

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Zenaida Manfugás, Cuban-born American-naturalized pianist (born 1932)

Zenaida Elvira González Manfugás was a Cuban-born American-naturalized pianist, considered to be one of the best Cuban pianists in history.

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Tufan Miñnullin, Russian playwright and politician (born 1936)

Miñnullin Tufan Ğabdulla ulı aka Tufan Miñnullin was a famous Tatar writer, playwright, publicist, Tatarstan State Council deputy and honorary citizen of Kazan. He was a permanent member of State Council of the Republic of Tatarstan since 1990. International PEN club member.

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Endang Rahayu Sedyaningsih, Indonesian physician and politician, Indonesian Minister of Health (born 1955)

Endang Rahayu Sedyaningsih was an Indonesian physician, researcher, and author. She served as Minister of Health of the Republic of Indonesia from 22 October 2009 until 30 April 2012.

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Akira Tonomura, Japanese physicist, author, and academic (born 1942)

Akira Tonomura was a Japanese physicist, best known for his development of electron holography and his experimental verification of the Aharonov–Bohm effect.

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Lourdes Valera, Venezuelan actress (born 1963)

Lourdes del Valle Valera Galvis was a Venezuelan actress who took part in over twenty film and television productions during her career, particularly known for her acting in many telenovelas.

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02/05/2011

Osama bin Laden, Saudi Arabian terrorist, founder of Al-Qaeda (born 1957)

Osama bin Laden was the founder and first general emir of al-Qaeda. A pan-Islamist and Islamic extremist, bin Laden organized and funded numerous jihadist or anti-Western militants and terrorist attacks worldwide. Al-Qaeda's September 11 attacks in 2001 against the United States directly killed 2,977 victims, and began America's global war on terror.

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02/05/2010

Lynn Redgrave, English-American actress and singer (born 1943)

Lynn Rachel Redgrave was a British and American actress. During a career that spanned five decades, she won two Golden Globe Awards and was nominated for two Academy Awards, four British Academy Film Awards, two Emmy Awards, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, three Tony Awards, and a Grammy Award.

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02/05/2009

Marilyn French, American author and academic (born 1929)

Marilyn French was an American radical feminist author, most widely known for her second book and first novel, the 1977 work The Women's Room.

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Kiyoshiro Imawano, Japanese singer-songwriter, producer, and actor (born 1951)

Kiyoshiro Imawano , born Kiyoshi Kurihara , was a Japanese rock musician, lyricist, composer, musical producer, and actor from Tokyo, Japan. He was dubbed "Japan's King of Rock". He formed and led the influential rock band RC Succession. He wrote many anti-nuclear songs following the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. He was known for pioneering the adoption of linguistic characteristics of the Japanese language into his songs.

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Jack Kemp, American football player and politician, 9th United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (born 1935)

Jack French Kemp was an American politician, professional football player, and U.S. Army veteran who served as the ninth U.S. secretary of housing and urban development in the administration of President George H. W. Bush from 1989 to 1993. A member of the Republican Party from New York, he previously served nine terms in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1971 to 1989. He was the Republican Party's vice presidential nominee in the 1996 election, as the running mate of Bob Dole; they lost to incumbent president Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore. Kemp had previously contended for the presidential nomination in the 1988 Republican primaries.

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02/05/2008

Beverlee McKinsey, American actress (born 1940)

Beverlee McKinsey was an American actress. She is best known for her roles on daytime serials, including Iris Cory Carrington on Another World and the spin-off series Texas from 1972 to 1981 and Alexandra Spaulding on Guiding Light from 1984 to 1992.

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Izold Pustõlnik, Ukrainian-Estonian astronomer and academic (born 1938)

Izold Pustõlnik was an eminent Estonian astronomer who authored numerous scientific publications and served as editor of the Central European Journal of Physics and vice-chairman of the non-profit organization Euroscience Estonia.

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02/05/2007

Brad McGann, New Zealand director and screenwriter (born 1964)

Brad McGann MNZM, was a New Zealand film director and screenwriter.

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02/05/2006

Louis Rukeyser, American journalist and author (born 1933)

Louis Richard Rukeyser was an American financial journalist, columnist, and commentator, through print, radio, and television.

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02/05/2005

Wee Kim Wee, Singaporean journalist and politician, 4th President of Singapore (born 1915)

Wee Kim Wee was a Singaporean journalist, diplomat and politician who served as the fourth president of Singapore between 1985 and 1993.

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02/05/2002

W. T. Tutte, English-Canadian mathematician and academic (born 1917)

William Thomas Tutte was an English and Canadian code breaker and mathematician. During the Second World War, he made a fundamental advance in cryptanalysis of the Lorenz cipher, a major Nazi German cipher system which was used for top-secret communications within the Wehrmacht High Command.

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02/05/2000

Sundar Popo, Indo-Trinidadian musician (born 1943)

Sundar Popo HBM, born Sundarlal Popo Bahora, was a Trinidadian and Tobagonian musician. He is credited as being the father of chutney music, beginning with his 1969 hit Nana and Nani.

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02/05/1999

Douglas Harkness, Canadian politician (born 1903)

Douglas Scott Harkness was a Canadian politician.

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Oliver Reed, English actor (born 1938)

Robert Oliver Reed was an English actor, known for his upper-middle class, masculine image and his heavy-drinking, "hellraiser" lifestyle. His screen career spanned over 40 years, between 1955 and 1999. At the peak of his career, in 1971, British exhibitors voted Reed fifth-most-popular star at the box office.

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02/05/1998

hide, Japanese singer-songwriter, guitarist, and producer (born 1964)

Hideto Matsumoto , known professionally as Hide, was a Japanese musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He achieved international fame as the lead guitarist of the rock band X Japan from 1987 to 1997 and rose to prominence in Asia as a solo artist from 1993 to 1998, until his death. He also formed the United States–based rock supergroup Zilch in 1996.

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Justin Fashanu, English footballer (born 1961)

Justinus Soni "Justin" Fashanu was an English footballer who played for a variety of clubs between 1978 and 1997. He was known by his early clubs to be gay, and came out publicly later in his career, becoming the first professional footballer to be openly gay. He was also one of the first footballers to command a £1 million transfer fee, with his transfer from Norwich City to Nottingham Forest in 1981, and had varying levels of success as a player afterwards, until he retired in 1997.

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02/05/1997

John Eccles, Australian neurophysiologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1903)

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

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Paulo Freire, Brazilian philosopher and academic (born 1921)

Paulo Reglus Neves Freire was a Brazilian educator and Marxist philosopher whose work revolutionized global thought on education. He is best known for Pedagogy of the Oppressed, in which he reimagines teaching as a collaborative act of liberation rather than transmission. A founder of critical pedagogy, Freire’s influence spans literacy movements, liberation theology, postcolonial education, Marxism, and contemporary theories of social justice and learning. He is widely regarded as one of the most important educational theorists of the twentieth century, alongside figures such as John Dewey and Maria Montessori, and considered "the Grandfather of Critical Theory".

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02/05/1995

John Bunting, Australian public servant and diplomat, (born 1918)

Sir Edward John Bunting was an Australian public servant and diplomat, whose senior career appointments included Australian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom and Secretary of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.

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Michael Hordern, English actor (born 1911)

Sir Michael Murray Hordern was an English actor. He is best known for his Shakespearean roles, especially King Lear. He often appeared in film, rising from a bit part actor to leading roles; by the time of his death he had appeared in nearly 140 films. His later work was predominantly in television and radio.

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02/05/1994

Dorothy Marie Donnelly, American poet and author (born 1903)

Dorothy Marie Donnelly was a poet and essayist, the author of six books of poetry and prose and numerous articles published in Europe and the United States.

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02/05/1993

André Moynet, French race car driver, pilot, and politician (born 1921)

André Moynet was a much decorated French wartime fighter pilot who moved on to become a test pilot and an entrepreneur-businessman. He was also a politician.

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02/05/1992

Wilbur Mills, American lawyer and politician (born 1909)

Wilbur Daigh Mills was an American Democratic politician and lawyer who represented Arkansas's 2nd congressional district in the United States House of Representatives from 1939 until his retirement in 1977. As chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee from 1958 to 1974, he was often called "the most powerful man in Washington".

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02/05/1991

Gauri Shankar Rai, Indian Politician (born 1924)

Gauri Shankar Rai was a member of the 6th Lok Sabha during 1977-79 representing Ghazipur constituency of Uttar Pradesh. Earlier he had been member of the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly (1957–62) and Legislative Council (1967–76). He served as the Leader of Opposition in Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council.

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Ronald McKie, Australian journalist and author (born 1909)

Ronald Cecil Hamlyn McKie was an Australian novelist. He was born on 11 May 1909 in Toowoomba, Queensland. After receiving his education at the Brisbane Grammar School and the University of Queensland, he worked as a journalist on newspapers in Melbourne, Sydney, Singapore, and China. He served in the AIF during World War II from 1942–1943, following which he served as war correspondent for several Australian and UK newspapers. After the war he worked for Sydney's Daily Telegraph. McKie died from kidney disease on 8 May 1991 in Canterbury, Melbourne, Australia.

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02/05/1990

David Rappaport, English-American actor (born 1951)

David Stephen Rappaport was an English actor with achondroplasia. He appeared in the films Time Bandits and The Bride, and television series L.A. Law, The Wizard and Captain Planet and the Planeteers. He was 3 ft 11 in (1.19 m) in height.

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02/05/1989

Veniamin Kaverin, Russian author (born 1902)

Veniamin Aleksandrovich Kaverin was a Soviet and Russian writer, dramatist and screenwriter associated with the early 1920s movement of the Serapion Brothers.

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Giuseppe Siri, Italian cardinal (born 1906)

Giuseppe Siri was an Italian cardinal of the Catholic Church who served as Archbishop of Genoa from 1946 to 1987, and was elevated to the rank of cardinal in 1953. A protégé of Pope Pius XII, he took part in the Second Vatican Council and was considered a papabile for 20 years, during the conclaves of 1958, 1963, August 1978 and October 1978.

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02/05/1986

Sergio Cresto, American race car driver (born 1956)

Sergio Cresto was the American co-driver of Finnish Henri Toivonen at the Lancia Martini team for the 1986 World Rally Championship season. He was also a former co-driver for fellow Lancia employee Attilio Bettega, who died in an accident during the 1985 Tour de Corse on May 2, 1985. His co-driver Maurizio Perissinot survived the crash uninjured. This event happened exactly one year before the accident that claimed the lives of both Sergio Cresto and his then co-driver Henri Toivonen on May 2, 1986.

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Henri Toivonen, Finnish race car driver (born 1956)

Henri Pauli Toivonen was a Finnish rally driver born in Jyväskylä, the home of Rally Finland. His father, Pauli, was the 1968 European Rally Champion for Porsche and his younger brother, Harri, became a professional circuit racer.

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02/05/1985

Attilio Bettega, Italian race car driver (born 1951)

Attilio Luigi Antonio Bettega was an Italian rally driver.

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Larry Clinton, American trumpet player and bandleader (born 1909)

Larry Clinton was an American musician, best known as a trumpeter who became a prominent American bandleader and arranger.

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02/05/1984

Jack Barry, American game show host and producer, co-founded Barry & Enright Productions (born 1918)

Jack Barry was an American game show host, television personality and executive who made a name for himself in the game show field. Barry served as host of several game shows in his career, many of which he developed along with Dan Enright as part of their joint operation Barry & Enright Productions.

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Bob Clampett, American animator, director, and producer (born 1913)

Robert Emerson Clampett Sr. was an American animator, director, producer and puppeteer best known for his work on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies animated series from Warner Bros. Cartoons as well as the television shows Time for Beany and Beany and Cecil. He was born and raised not far from Hollywood and, early in life, showed an interest in animation and puppetry. After dropping out of high school in 1931, he joined the team at Harman-Ising Productions and began working on the studio's newest short subjects, Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies. Clampett was promoted to a directorial position in 1937. During his 15 years at the studio, he directed 84 cartoons later deemed classic, and designed some of the studio's most famous characters, including Porky Pig, Daffy Duck, and Tweety. Among his most acclaimed films are Porky in Wackyland (1938) and The Great Piggy Bank Robbery (1946). He left Warner Bros. Cartoons in 1946 and turned his attention to television, creating the puppet show Time for Beany in 1949. A later animated version of the series, Beany and Cecil, was initially broadcast on ABC in 1962 and rerun until 1967. It is considered the first fully creator-driven television series and carried the byline "a Bob Clampett Cartoon".

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02/05/1983

Norm Van Brocklin, American football player and coach (born 1926)

Norman Mack Van Brocklin, was an American professional football quarterback and coach who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 12 seasons. Nicknamed "the Dutchman", he spent his first nine seasons with the Los Angeles Rams and his final three with the Philadelphia Eagles. Following his playing career, he was the inaugural head coach of the Minnesota Vikings from 1961 to 1966 and the second head coach of the Atlanta Falcons from 1968 to 1974.

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02/05/1980

Clarrie Grimmett, New Zealand-Australian cricketer (born 1891)

Clarence Victor Grimmett was a New Zealand-born Australian cricketer. He was one of the finest spin bowlers of his time and usually credited as the developer of the flipper.

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George Pal, Hungarian-American animator and producer (born 1908)

George Pal was a Hungarian-American animator, film director and producer. He is known for his stop motion animated film series Puppetoons and his fantasy and science-fiction films. He became an American citizen after emigrating from Europe.

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02/05/1979

Giulio Natta, Italian chemist and engineer, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1903)

Giulio Natta was an Italian chemical engineer and Nobel laureate. He won a Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1963 with Karl Ziegler for work on high density polymers. He also received a Lomonosov Gold Medal in 1969.

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02/05/1977

Nicholas Magallanes, American principal dancer and charter member of the New York City Ballet (born 1922)

Nicholas Magallanes was a Mexican-born American principal dancer and charter member of the New York City Ballet. Along with Francisco Moncion, Maria Tallchief, and Tanaquil Le Clercq, Magallanes was among the core group of dancers with which George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein formed Ballet Society, the immediate predecessor of the New York City Ballet.

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02/05/1974

James O. Richardson, American admiral (born 1878)

James Otto Richardson was an admiral in the United States Navy who served from 1902 to 1947.

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02/05/1972

J. Edgar Hoover, American 1st director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (born 1895)

John Edgar Hoover was an American law enforcement administrator who served as the fifth and final director of the Bureau of Investigation (BOI) and the first director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). President Calvin Coolidge first appointed Hoover as director of the BOI, the predecessor to the FBI, in 1924. After 11 years in the post, Hoover became instrumental in founding the FBI in June 1935, where he remained as director for an additional 37 years until his death in May 1972 – serving a total of 48 years leading both the BOI and the FBI under eight presidents.

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02/05/1969

Franz von Papen, German general and politician, Chancellor of Germany (born 1879)

Franz Joseph Hermann Michael Maria von Papen, Erbsälzer zu Werl und Neuwerk was a German politician, diplomat, army officer and Prussian nobleman. A national conservative, he served as Chancellor of Germany in 1932, and then as Vice-Chancellor under Adolf Hitler from 1933 to 1934. A committed monarchist, Papen is largely remembered for his role in bringing Hitler to power.

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02/05/1964

Nancy Astor, Viscountess Astor, American-English politician (born 1879)

Nancy Witcher Astor, Viscountess Astor was an American-born British politician who was the first woman seated as a Member of Parliament (MP), serving from 1919 to 1945. Astor was born in Danville, Virginia, and raised in Greenwood, Virginia. Her first marriage, to socialite Robert Gould Shaw II, was unhappy and ended in divorce. She then moved to England and married American-born Englishman Waldorf Astor in 1906.

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02/05/1963

Ronald Barnes, 3rd Baron Gorell, English cricketer, peer, politician, poet, author and newspaper editor (born 1884)

Ronald Gorell Barnes, 3rd Baron Gorell, was a British hereditary peer, Liberal politician, poet, author and newspaper editor.

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02/05/1957

Joseph McCarthy, American captain, lawyer, judge, and politician (born 1908)

Joseph Raymond McCarthy was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. senator from Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957. Beginning in 1950, McCarthy became the most visible public face of a period in the United States in which Cold War tensions fueled fears of widespread communist subversion. He alleged that numerous communists and Soviet spies and sympathizers had infiltrated the United States federal government, universities, film industry, and elsewhere. Ultimately, he was censured by the Senate in 1954 for refusing to cooperate with and abusing members of the committee established to investigate whether or not he should be censured. The term "McCarthyism", coined in 1950 in reference to McCarthy's practices, was soon applied to similar anti-communist activities. Today, the term is used more broadly to mean demagogic, reckless, and unsubstantiated accusations, as well as public attacks on the character or patriotism of political opponents.

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02/05/1953

Wallace Bryant, American archer (born 1863)

Wallace Bryant was an American archer who competed in the 1904 Summer Olympics. He won the bronze medal in the team competition. In the Double York round he finished fourth and in the Double American round he finished eighth. Bryant was also a famous portrait artist.

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02/05/1947

Dorothea Binz, German SS officer (born 1920)

Dorothea "Theodora" Binz was a Nazi German officer and supervisor at Ravensbrück concentration camp during the Holocaust. She was known as one of the most brutal, ruthless and sadistic overseers in the Nazi system. She was executed for war crimes on 2 May 1947.

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02/05/1946

Bill Denny, Australian journalist, lawyer, politician, and decorated soldier (born 1872)

William Joseph Denny was an Australian journalist, lawyer, politician and decorated soldier who held the South Australian House of Assembly seats of West Adelaide from 1900 to 1902 and then Adelaide from 1902 to 1905 and again from 1906 to 1933. After an unsuccessful candidacy as a United Labor Party (ULP) member in 1899, he was elected as an "independent liberal" in a by-election in 1900. He was re-elected in 1902, but defeated in 1905. The following year, he was elected as a ULP candidate, and retained his seat for that party until 1931. Along with the rest of the cabinet, he was ejected from the Australian Labor Party in 1931, and was a member of the Parliamentary Labor Party until his electoral defeat at the hands of a Lang Labor Party candidate in 1933.

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02/05/1945

Martin Bormann, German politician (born 1900)

Martin Ludwig Bormann was a German Nazi Party official and head of the Nazi Party Chancellery, private secretary to Adolf Hitler, and a war criminal. Bormann gained immense power by using his position as Hitler's private secretary to control the flow of information and access to Hitler. He used his position to create an extensive bureaucracy and involve himself as much as possible in the decision-making.

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Joe Corbett, American baseball player and journalist (born 1875)

Joseph Aloysius Corbett was an American Major League Baseball starting pitcher who played in the National League. He was born in San Francisco, California.

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02/05/1941

Penelope Delta, Greek author (born 1874)

Penelope Delta was a Greek author. She is widely celebrated for her contributions to the field of children's literature. Her historical novels have been widely read and have influenced popular modern Greek perceptions of national identity and history. Through her long-time association with Ion Dragoumis, Delta was thrust into the middle of turbulent early-20th-century Greek politics, ranging from the Macedonian Struggle to the National Schism.

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02/05/1940

Ernest Joyce, English explorer (born 1875)

Ernest Edward Mills Joyce AM was a Royal Naval seaman and explorer who participated in four Antarctic expeditions during the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, in the early 20th century. He served under both Robert Falcon Scott and Ernest Shackleton. As a member of the Ross Sea party in Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, Joyce earned an Albert Medal for his actions in bringing the stricken party to safety, after a traumatic journey on the Great Ice Barrier. He was awarded the Polar Medal with four bars, one of only two men to be so honoured, the other being his contemporary, Frank Wild.

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02/05/1929

Charalambos Tseroulis, Greek general and politician, Greek Minister for Military Affairs (born 1879)

Charalambos Tseroulis was a distinguished infantry officer of the Hellenic Army who rose to the rank of Lieutenant General.

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02/05/1927

Ernest Starling, English physiologist and academic (born 1866)

Ernest Henry Starling was a British physiologist who contributed many fundamental ideas to this subject. These ideas were important parts of the British contribution to physiology, which at that time led the world.

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02/05/1925

Antun Branko Šimić, Croatian and Bosnian-Herzegovinian poet (born 1898)

Antun Branko Šimić was a Bosnian and Croatian expressionist poet, considered to be one of the most important poets of Croatian literature of the 20th century.

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Johann Palisa, Austrian astronomer (born 1848)

Johann Palisa was an Austrian astronomer, born in Troppau, Austrian Silesia, now Czech Republic. He was a prolific discoverer of asteroids, discovering 122 in all, from 136 Austria in 1874 to 1073 Gellivara in 1923. Some of his notable discoveries include 153 Hilda, 216 Kleopatra, 243 Ida, 253 Mathilde, 324 Bamberga, and the near-Earth asteroid 719 Albert. Palisa made his discoveries without the aid of photography, and he remains the most successful visual (non-photographic) asteroid discoverer of all time. He was awarded the Valz Prize from the French Academy of Sciences in 1906. The asteroid 914 Palisana, discovered by Max Wolf in 1919, and the lunar crater Palisa were named in his honour.

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02/05/1918

Jüri Vilms, Estonian lawyer and politician (born 1889)

Jüri Vilms was a member of the Estonian Salvation Committee and the first Deputy Prime Minister of the Republic of Estonia. Empowered by Maapäev, the Salvation Committee issued the Estonian Declaration of Independence on 24 February 1918 in the middle of a political power vacuum created by the retreating Russian and advancing German troops during World War I. The German forces taking over the country did not recognize the independence of Estonia. The Salvation Committee went underground and Jüri Vilms volunteered to go to Finland to take funds and instructions to the Estonian missions working to get diplomatic recognition for the newly sovereign nation. According to an "official" version, he was captured on reaching the Finnish coast and executed by German troops in Helsinki. According to the latest research Jüri Vilms may have been executed by a unit of the Swedish Brigade in Hauho. Estonia gained its independence after the German troops were withdrawn from Estonia due to the German Revolution and the ensuing Estonian War of Independence ended with Peace Treaty of Tartu.

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02/05/1915

Clara Immerwahr, German chemist (born 1870)

Clara Helene Immerwahr was a German chemist. She was the first German woman to be awarded a doctorate in chemistry from the University of Breslau, and is credited with being a pacifist as well as a "heroine of the women's rights movement". From 1901 until her death from suicide in 1915, she was married to the eventual Nobel Prize-winning chemist Fritz Haber.

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02/05/1912

Homer Davenport, American political cartoonist (born 1867)

Homer Calvin Davenport was a political cartoonist and writer from the United States. He is known for drawings that satirized figures of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, most notably Ohio Senator Mark Hanna. Although Davenport had no formal art training, he became one of the highest paid political cartoonists in the world. Davenport also was one of the first major American breeders of Arabian horses and one of the founders of the Arabian Horse Club of America.

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02/05/1900

Lars Oftedal, Norwegian priest, social reformer, politician, and newspaper editor (born 1838)

Lars Svendsen Oftedal was a Norwegian priest, social reformer, politician, and newspaper editor. He was the founding editor of Stavanger Aftenblad and served as a member of the Storting.

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02/05/1885

Terézia Zakoucs, Hungarian-Slovene author (born 1817)

Terézia Zakoucs was a Hungarian Slovene author.

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02/05/1880

Eberhard Anheuser, German-American businessman, co-founded Anheuser-Busch (born 1805)

Eberhard Anheuser was a German-American soap and candle maker, and the father-in-law of Adolphus Busch, with whom he co-founded the Anheuser-Busch Company.

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Tom Wills, Australian cricketer, co-created Australian rules football (born 1835)

Thomas Wentworth Wills was an Australian sportsman who is credited with being Australia's first cricketer of significance and a founder of Australian rules football. Born in the British penal colony of New South Wales to a wealthy family descended from convicts, Wills grew up in the bush on stations owned by his father, the squatter and politician Horatio Wills, in what is now the state of Victoria. As a child, he befriended local Aboriginal people, learning their language and customs. Aged 14, Wills went to England to attend Rugby School, where he became captain of its cricket team and played an early version of rugby football. After Rugby, Wills represented Cambridge University in the annual cricket match against Oxford, and played at first-class level for Kent and the Marylebone Cricket Club. An athletic bowling all-rounder with tactical nous, he was regarded as one of the finest young cricketers in England.

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02/05/1866

José Gálvez Egúsquiza, Peruvian politician (born 1819)

José Gabriel Gálvez Egúsquiza was a Peruvian lawyer, professor and liberal politician. During the presidential government of Mariano Ignacio Prado he was Secretary—i.e. Minister—of War and Navy (1865). He was killed in action during the Battle of Callao, where he died fighting the Spanish squadron, thus becoming a symbol of the independence of America.

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02/05/1864

Giacomo Meyerbeer, German composer and educator (born 1791)

Giacomo Meyerbeer was a German opera composer, "the most frequently performed opera composer during the nineteenth century, linking Mozart and Wagner". With his 1831 opera Robert le diable and its successors, he gave the genre of grand opera 'decisive character'. Meyerbeer's grand opera style was achieved by his merging of German orchestra style with Italian vocal tradition. These were employed in the context of sensational and melodramatic libretti created by Eugène Scribe and were enhanced by the up-to-date theatre technology of the Paris Opéra. They set a standard that helped to maintain Paris as the opera capital of the nineteenth century.

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02/05/1857

Alfred de Musset, French dramatist, poet, and novelist (born 1810)

Alfred Louis Charles de Musset-Pathay was a French dramatist, poet, and novelist. Along with his poetry, he is known for writing the autobiographical novel La Confession d'un enfant du siècle.

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02/05/1856

James Gates Percival, American poet, surgeon and geologist (born 1795)

James Gates Percival was an American poet, surgeon, and geologist.

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02/05/1832

Zina Hitchcock, New York politician (born 1755)

Zina Hitchcock was a New York politician. A descendant of the early American colonist Samuel Chapin, he was born on November 6, 1755, in Warren or New Milford, Connecticut. His father, John Hitchock, was a member of the Connecticut General Assembly. During the American Revolutionary War, Hitchcock served as an enlisted soldier in the Albany County militia. He moved to Sandy Hill, New York, c. 1783–1784, where he became a prominent landowner, a founding member of the local Masonic Lodge, and built the Zion church. In 1784, he became a founding member of the First Medical Society in Vermont, a predecessor to the Vermont Medical Society.

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02/05/1819

Mary Moser, English painter and academic (born 1744)

Mary Moser was an English painter who was one of the most celebrated female artists in 18th-century Britain. One of only two female founding members of the Royal Academy in 1768, Moser painted portraits but is particularly noted for her depictions of flowers.

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02/05/1810

Henry Jerome de Salis, English priest (born 1740)

Henry Jerome de Salis, DD, FRS, FSA, was an English churchman. He was Rector of St. Antholin in the City of London and Vicar of Wing in Buckinghamshire. He was also known as: Revd Henry Jerome de Salis, MA; the Hon. & Rev. Henry Jerome De Salis, Count of the Holy Roman Empire; Dr. de Salis; Rev. Dr. Henry Jerome de Salis, and, from 1809, Rev. Count Henry Jerome de Salis.

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02/05/1802

Herman Willem Daendels, Dutch general and politician, Governor-General of the Dutch Gold Coast (born 1762)

Herman Willem Daendels was a Dutch military officer and colonial administrator who served as governor-general of the Dutch East Indies from 1808 to 1811.

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02/05/1799

Juan Vicente de Güemes, 2nd Count of Revillagigedo (born 1740)

Juan Vicente de Güemes Padilla Horcasitas y Aguayo, 2nd Count of Revillagigedo was a Spanish military officer and viceroy of New Spain from 17 October 1789 to 11 July 1794. In his role as colonial administrator, he is known as a reformer.

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02/05/1711

Laurence Hyde, 1st Earl of Rochester, English politician, First Lord of the Treasury (born 1641)

Laurence Hyde, 1st Earl of Rochester, was an English statesman and writer. He was originally a supporter of James II but later supported the Glorious Revolution in 1688. He held high office under Queen Anne, daughter of his sister Anne Hyde, but their frequent disagreements limited his influence.

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02/05/1683

Stjepan Gradić, Croatian philosopher and mathematician (born 1613)

Stjepan Gradić, also known as Stefano Gradi was a polymath, philosopher, scientist and a patrician of the Republic of Ragusa.

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02/05/1667

George Wither, English poet and author (born 1588)

George Wither was a prolific English poet, pamphleteer, satirist, and writer of hymns. Wither's life spanned one of the most tumultuous periods in the history of England, during the reigns of Elizabeth I, James I, and Charles I, the Civil War, the Parliamentary period, and the Restoration period.

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02/05/1627

Lodovico Grossi da Viadana, Italian composer and educator (born 1560)

Lodovico Grossi da Viadana was an Italian composer, teacher, and Franciscan friar of the Order of Friars Minor Observants. He was the first significant figure to make use of the newly developed technique of figured bass, one of the musical devices which was to define the end of the Renaissance and beginning of the Baroque eras in music.

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02/05/1564

Rodolfo Pio da Carpi, Italian cardinal (born 1500)

Rodolfo Pio di Savoia, often referred to as Rodolfo Pio da Carpi, was an Italian cardinal, humanist and patron of the arts. The nephew of a diplomat, he himself became a diplomat by the age of thirty, and came to know both Emperor Charles V and King Francis of France, and he negotiated with both on behalf of the pope. His uncle, Alberto III Pio, was Pico della Mirandola's maternal nephew, had been educated by Aldus Manutius and had become a noted humanist scholar. These associations formed Rodolfo's background and education. He formed a notable library and participated in the humanist studies of 16th-century Rome; he also served on the Roman Inquisition. He helped to establish the Inquisition at Milan.

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02/05/1519

Leonardo da Vinci, Italian painter, sculptor, and architect (born 1452)

Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially rested on his achievements as a painter, he has also become known for his notebooks, in which he made drawings and notes on a variety of subjects, including anatomy, astronomy, botany, cartography, painting, and palaeontology. Leonardo is widely regarded as a genius who epitomised the Renaissance humanist ideal, and his collective works contributed to the development of European art to an extent rivalled only by that of his younger contemporary Michelangelo.

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02/05/1450

William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk, English admiral (born 1396)

William de la Pole, 1st Duke of Suffolk, nicknamed Jackanapes, was an English magnate, statesman and military commander during the Hundred Years' War. He became a favourite of Henry VI of England, and consequently a leading figure in the English government where he became associated with many of the royal government's failures of the time, particularly on the war in France. Suffolk also appears prominently in Shakespeare's Henry VI, parts 1 and 2.

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02/05/1300

Blanche of Artois (born 1248)

Blanche of Artois was Queen of Navarre and Countess of Champagne and Brie during her marriage to Henry I of Navarre. After his death she became regent in the name of their infant daughter, Joan I. She passed on the regency of Navarre to Philip III of France, her cousin and her daughter's prospective father-in-law, but retained the administration of Champagne. She later shared the government of Champagne with her second husband, Edmund, until her daughter reached the age of majority.

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02/05/1293

Meir of Rothenburg, German rabbi (born c.1215)

Meir of Rothenburg (c. 1215 – 2 May 1293) was a German Rabbi and poet, as well as a major contributing author of the tosafot on Rashi's commentary on the Talmud. He is also known as Meir ben Baruch, and by the Hebrew language acronym Maharam of Rothenburg. He was referred to by Rabbi Menachem Meiri as the "greatest Jewish leader of Zarfat" alive at the time.

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02/05/1230

William de Braose, English son of Reginald de Braose (born 1197)

William de Braose was the son of Reginald de Braose by his first wife, Grecia Briwere. He was an ill-fated member of the House of Braose, a powerful and long-lived dynasty of Marcher Lords.

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02/05/1219

Leo I, King of Armenia (born 1150)

Leo I was the tenth lord of Armenian Cilicia, ruling from 1187 to 1219, and the first king to be crowned, in 1198/9. Leo eagerly led his kingdom alongside the armies of the Third Crusade and provided the crusaders with provisions, guides, pack animals and all manner of aid.

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02/05/0907

Boris I of Bulgaria

Boris I, venerated as Saint Boris I (Mihail) the Baptizer, was the ruler (knyaz) of the First Bulgarian Empire from 852 to 889. Despite a number of military setbacks, the reign of Boris I was marked with significant events that shaped Bulgarian and European history. With the Christianization of Bulgaria in 864, paganism was abolished. A skillful diplomat, Boris I successfully exploited the conflict between the Patriarchate of Constantinople and the Papacy to secure an autocephalous Bulgarian Church, thus dealing with the nobility's concerns about Byzantine interference in Bulgaria's internal affairs.

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02/05/0821

Liu Zong, general of the Tang dynasty

Liú Zǒng, dharma name Dàjué (大覺), formally Duke of Chǔ (楚公), was a general of the Tang dynasty. He took over control of Lúlóng Circuit in 810 after killing his father Liú Jì (劉濟) as well as his brother Liú Gǔn (劉緄), and thereafter ruled the circuit de facto independently from the imperial government. In 821, he submitted the circuit to imperial control and took tonsure to be a Buddhist monk. He died shortly after.

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02/05/0649

Marutha of Tikrit, Persian theologian of the Syriac Orthodox Church (born 565)

Marutha of Tikrit was the Grand Metropolitan of the East and head of the Syriac Orthodox Church of the East from 628 or 629 until his death in 649. He is commemorated as a saint by the Syriac Orthodox Church.

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02/05/0373

Athanasius of Alexandria, Egyptian bishop and saint (born 298)

Year 373 (CCCLXXIII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Augustus and Valens. The denomination 373 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

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02/05/-1203

Merneptah, pharaoh of Egypt

The 1200s BC is a decade that lasted from 1209 BC to 1200 BC.

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