Today CCXXIX

Birthdays:

• Henry Lawes, musician and composer, December 5, 1595 - October 21, 1662


• Francesco Geminiani, violinist, composer, and music theorist, December 5, 1687 – September 17, 1762


• Paul Painlevé, mathematician and politician, who twice as Prime Minister of the [French] Third Republic; in 1921, he introduced a coordinate system for the Schwarzschild solution, the first coordinate chart which clearly reveals that the Schwarzschild radius is a mere coordinate singularity - it represents the event horizon of a black hole, December 5, 1863 – October 29, 1933


• Arnold Johannes Wilhelm Sommerfeld, theoretical physicist, who pioneered developments in atomic and quantum physics, as well as educated a large number of students for the new era of theoretical physics; he introduced the fine-structure constant into quantum mechanics, December 5 – April 26, 1951


• Vítezslav Novák, composer and teacher, December 5, 1870 – July 18, 1949


• Harry Nelson Pillsbury, chess player, U. S. Chess Champion from 1897 until his death, December 5, 1872 - June 17, 1906


• Clyde Vernon Cessna, pilot, and the founder of the Cessna Aircraft Company, December 5, 1879 - November 20, 1954


• Friedrich Anton Christian FRITZ Lang, film director, screenwriter, and occasional film producer, whose famous films are Metropolis and M, December 5, 1890 – August 2, 1976


• Elbert Frank Cox Ph.D., mathematician, who became the first black person in the world to receive a Ph.D. in mathematics, December 5, 1895–November 28, 1969


• Carl Ferdinand Cori, biochemist, who shared the 1947 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with his wife Gerty Cori and physiologist Bernardo Houssay, for their discovery of how glycogen is broken down and resynthesized in the body, December 5, 1896 – October 20, 1984


• Nunnally Johnson, filmmaker, who wrote, produced, and directed films, December 5, 1897 - March 25, 1977


• Mary Willie GRACE Moore, operatic soprano and actress in musical theatre and film,
  December 5, 1898 - January 26, 1947


• Walter Elias WALT Disney, film producer, director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur, and philanthropist, an innovator in animation and theme park design; he was nominated for 48 Academy Awards and 7 Emmys, December 5, 1901 – December 15, 1966


• Milton Hyland Erickson, MD, psychiatrist, specializing in medical hypnosis and family therapy, December 5, 1901 - March 25, 1980


• Werner Karl Heisenberg, physicist, one of the founders of quantum mechanics, known for discovering one of the central principles of modern physics, the Heisenberg uncertainty principle; he invented matrix mechanics, the first formalization of quantum mechanics in 1925, and received the 1932 Nobel Prize in Physics, December 5, 1901 – February 1, 1976


• Cecil Frank Powell, physicist, awarded the 1950 Nobel Prize for Physics for his development of the photographic method of studying nuclear processes and for the resulting discovery of the pion (pi-meson), December 5, 1903 - August 9, 1969


• August Rodney GUS Mancuso, MLB catcher; in a 17-season career, he was a .265 hitter with 53 home runs and 543 RBI in 1460 games; he was an All-Star in 1935 and 1937, December 5, 1905 - October 26, 1984


• Otto Ludwig Preminger, director, December 5, 1906 – April 23, 1986


• Giuseppe BEPPO Occhialini, physicist, contributed to the discovery of the pion or pi-meson decay in 1947, December 5, 1907 - December 30, 1993


• Abraham Lincoln Polonsky, screenwriter and former Communist, blacklisted by Hollywood movie studios in the 1950s, December 5, 1910 - October 26, 1999


• Wladyslaw Szpilman, aka Vladislav Spelman, pianist, composer, and memoirist, known as the protagonist of the Roman Polanski film The Pianist, based on Szpilman's autobiographical book, December 5, 1911–July 6, 2000


• Professor Sheldon Lee Glashow, physicist, a professor at Boston University's department of physics; he shared the 1979 Nobel Prize in Physics with Steven Weinberg and Abdus Salam for the development of the electroweak theory, 1932


• Richard Wayne LITTLE RICHARD Penniman, singer, songwriter, and pianist, an early pioneer of rock 'n' roll, who injected funk into the rock and roll beat in the mid-1950's, 1932


• J.J. Cale, songwriter and musician, known for songs such as After Midnight and Cocaine; he is one of many artists that play the Tulsa Sound, which draws from country, blues, and jazz, 1938


• José Carreras Coll, operatic tenor, 1946


• Andre Youakim, aka Andy Kim, pop singer/songwriter, 1946


• James JIM Messina, musician, a member of Buffalo Springfield, Poco, and Loggins and Messina, 1947


• José Monje Cruz, aka El Camarón de la Isla, flamenco singer, December 5, 1950 - July 2, 1992


• Osvaldo Golijov, composer of classical music, 1960


• Suzanne Cupito, aka Morgan Brittany, actress, 1951


• Krystian Zimerman, classical pianist, best known for his interpretations of Romantic music, 1956


• José Cura, operatic tenor, 1962


• Margaret Cho, comedian, fashion designer, and actress; she won the American Comedy Award for Best Female Comedian in 1994, the same year in which she the first female Asian American to have a television series based around her - All American Girl, 1968


• Mike Mahoney, former MLB catcher with the St. Louis Cardinals, 1972


• Cornelius Clifford CLIFF Floyd, MLB left fielder; entering the 2007 season, the 15th year of his career, he has batted .279 with 213 home runs, 781 RBI, and 147 stolen bases in 1423 games, 1972


• Luboš Motl Ph.D., theoretical physicist, who works on string theory and conceptual problems of quantum gravity, 1973


• Ronnie O'Sullivan, professional snooker player, who won the UK Championship in 1993, 1997, and 2001, and the World Championship in 2001 and 2004, 1975


• Amy Louise Acker, actress; she studied ballet, modern dance, and jazz dance for 13 years - knee surgery in high school ended her ballet career, and she began to study acting; she appeared as Winifred "Fred" Burkle on the second through fourth seasons of Angel and as Fred/Illyria on the fifth and final season; she won the 2003 Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress on Television for this role, 1976

R.I.P.:

• Severo Bonini, composer, organist, and writer on music, December 23, 1582 - December 5, 1663


• Johann Friedrich Fasch, composer, April 15, 1688 – December 5, 1758


• James Stirling, mathematician, after whom the Stirling numbers and Stirling's formula are named, April 22, 1692–December 5, 1770


• Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, aka Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, composer of Classical music; his output of more than six hundred compositions includes works that are widely acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music; he is among the most enduringly popular of European composers, and many of his works are part of the standard concert repertoire, January 27, 1756 – December 5, 1791


• Dumas Davy de la Pailleterie, aka Alexandre Dumas, père, writer, best known for his numerous historical novels, such as The Count of Monte Cristo; he also wrote plays and magazine articles, and was a prolific correspondent, July 24, 1802 – December 5, 1870


• Stanislaw Wladyslaw Rejment, aka Wladyslaw Stanislaw Reymont, author, awarded the 1924 Nobel Prize for Literature, May 7, 1867 – December 5, 1925


• Claude Monet, Impressionist painter; the term Impressionism is derived from the title of his painting Impression, Sunrise, November 14, 1840 – December 5, 1926


• Jan Kubelík, violinist and composer, July 5, 1880 – December 5, 1940


• Joseph Jefferson "Shoeless Joe" Jackson, MLB left fielder; one of the greatest hitters of his era, he was one of eight players banished for life from professional baseball for his alleged participation in the Black Sox scandal, July 16, 1888 – December 5, 1951


• Karl Amadeus Hartmann, composer/symphonist, August 2, 1905 – December 5, 1963


• Joseph Erlanger, physiologist, who shared the 1944 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Herbert Spencer Gasser, January 5, 1874 – December 5, 1965


• Frederick Leonard FRED Clark, character actor, March 19, 1914 - December 5, 1968


• Sir John Michael Pritchard CBE, conductor, the Principal Conductor, of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra from 1957 to 1963, and of the London Philharmonic Orchestra from 1962 to 1966, and Chief Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra from 1982 to 1989, February 5, 1921 – December 5, 1989


• Franco Dino Rasetti, physicist; with Enrico Fermi, he discovered key processes leading to nuclear fission; he refused to work on the Manhattan Project on moral grounds, August 10, 1901 – December 5, 2001