Today LXIV

Birthdays:

• Francesco Onofrio Manfredini, Baroque composer, violinist, and church musician, June 22, 1684 – October 6, 1762


• George Vancouver, Royal Navy officer and explorer, best known for his exploration of the Pacific coast of North America; several locations called Vancouver are named after him, June 22, 1757 – May 12, 1798


• Paul Charles Morphy, chess player, child chess prodigy, an unofficial world chess champion, June 22, 1837 - July 10, 1884


• Sir Henry RIDER Haggard, Victorian writer of adventure novels set in exotic locations, June 22, 1856 – May 14, 1925


• Hermann Minkowski, mathematician, developed the geometrical theory of numbers, who used geometrical methods to solve difficult problems in number theory, mathematical physics, and the theory of relativity, June 22, 1864 – January 12, 1909


• William McDougall, psychologist, wrote a number of highly influential textbooks, and was important in the development of the theory of instinct and of social psychology, an opponent of behaviourism, June 22, 1871 - November 28, 1938


• Milan Vidmar, electrical engineer, chess player and theorist, philosopher, and writer, a specialist in power transformers and transmission of electric current, June 22, 1885 – October 9, 1962


• Sir Julian Sorell Huxley, FRS, biologist, author, Humanist, and internationalist, known for his popularisations of science in books and lectures, the first director of UNESCO, June 22, 1887 – February 14, 1975


• Erich Paul Remark, aka Erich Maria Remarque, author, most famous for All Quiet on the Western Front, June 22, 1898 – September 25, 1970


• Carl Owen Hubbell, MLB left-handed screwball pitcher, played with the New York Giants from 1928 to 1943, inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1947, June 22, 1903 - November 21, 1988


• Anne Spencer Morrow Lindbergh, pioneering aviator, author, and wife of Charles Lindbergh, June 22, 1906 – February 7, 2001


• Samuel Wilder, aka Billy Wilder, screenwriter, film director, and producer, whose career spanned more than 60 films, June 22, 1906 – March 27, 2002


• Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen, aka Michael Todd, film producer; his production of 1956's Around the World in Eighty Days, won an Academy Award for Best Picture, June 22, 1907 or 1909 - March 22, 1958


• Sir Peter Neville Luard Pears, tenor, and life-long partner of composer Benjamin Britten, June 22, 1910 – April 3, 1986


• Gower Champion, Tony Award-winning theatre director, choreographer, and dancer, June 22, 1919 - August 25, 1980


• Solomon Hersh Frees, aka Paul Frees, voice actor, June 22, 1920 - November 2, 1986


• Joseph Papp, theatrical producer and director, June 22, 1921 - October 31, 1991


• Kris Kristofferson, country music songwriter, singer and actor, recipient of a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford University, 1936


• Ed Bradley, journalist, 1967, 1941


• Klaus Georg Steng, aka Klaus Maria Brandauer, actor and director, 1944


• Peter Asher, guitarist, singer and record producer, one-half of Peter & Gordon, brother of Jane Asher, 1944


• Elíades Ochoa, guitarist/tres player and singer, involved with the Buena Vista Social Club album and film, 1946


• Octavia Estelle Butler, science fiction writer, one of very few black women in the field, winner of both Hugo and Nebula awards, and, in 1995, the first science fiction writer ever to be a recipient of the MacArthur Foundation "Genius" Grant, June 22, 1947 — February 24, 2006


• David Landau, aka David Lander, actor, comedian, composer, musician, and baseball scout, first for the Anaheim Angels, and now for the Seattle Mariners, known for his portrayal of Squiggy on Laverne and Shirley, 1947


• Howard Kaylan, rock and roll musician, a founding member of The Turtles, 1947


• Todd Rundgren, musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer, 1948


• Mary Louise MERYL Streep, two-time Academy Award-winning actress, 1949


• Lindsay Jean Ball, aka Lindsay Wagner, actress, 1949


• Graham Greene, actor, an Oneida Indian, born in Ohsweken on the Six Nations Reserve in Ontario, 1952


• Bruce Campbell, actor, 1958


• Jimmy Somerville, pop singer, former member of Bronski Beat, 1961


• Dan Brown, author of thriller fiction, 1964


• Richard Michael DICKY Barrett, member of The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, 1964


• Steven Jay STEVE Page, lead singer and a primary songwriter for Barenaked Ladies, 1970


• Bradley Bonte BRAD Hawpe, MLB outfielder with the Colorado Rockies since the 2004 season, 1979

RIP:

• Howard Staunton, chess master, newspaper chess columnist, chess book author, and minor Shakespearean scholar, whose name is remembered for the style of chess figures he endorsed, the Staunton pattern of chess pieces, April 1810 - June 22, 1874


• Maria Tănase, singer of Romanian traditional and popular music, September 25, 1913 - June 22, 1963


• David Oliver Selznick, Hollywood producer, best known for producing Gone with the Wind in 1939, which earned him an Oscar for Best Picture; the film also won seven additional Oscars and two special awards; he won the Irving G. Thalberg award that same year, and made film history by winning the Best Picture Oscar a second year in a row for 1940's Rebecca, May 10, 1902–June 22, 1965


• Frances Ethel Gumm, aka Judy Garland, actress and singer, June 10, 1922 – June 22, 1969


• Darius Milhaud, French composer and teacher, a member of Les Six, and one of the most prolific composers of the 20th century, whose compositions were influenced by jazz and known for their use of polytonality, September 4, 1892 – June 22, 1974


• Frederick Austerlitz, aka Fred Astaire, film and Broadway stage dancer, choreographer, singer, and actor, May 10, 1899 – June 22, 1987


• Owen Patrick Eugene McNulty, aka Dennis Day, singer and radio and television personality, May 21, 1916 - June 22, 1988


• Darryl Andrew Kile, MLB right-handed pitcher, last played with the St. Louis Cardinals, December 2, 1968 – June 22, 2002


• Esther EPPIE Pauline Friedman Lederer, aka Ann Landers, syndicated advice columnist, July 4, 1918 – June 22, 2002


• Robert William BOB Bemer, computer scientist, who served on the committee with Grace Hopper that produced the specifications for COBOL, and on the committee which defined the ASCII character codeset in 1960; other contributions to computing include the first publication of the time-sharing concept and the first attempts to prepare for the Year 2000 problem in publications as early as 1971, February 8, 1920 – June 22, 2004