Today CCXXXVII

Birthdays:

• Francesco Bianchini, philosopher and scientist, who worked for the curia of many popes, including being secretary of the commission for the reform of the calendar, December 13, 1662 – March 2, 1729


• Franz Ulrich Theodor Aepinus, natural philosopher, December 13, 1724 – August 10, 1802


• Ernst WERNER von Siemens, inventor and industrialist, December 13, 1816 – December 6, 1892


• Mary Ann Todd Lincoln, First Lady of the United States when her husband, Abraham Lincoln, served as president, from 1861 until 1865, December 13, 1818 – July 16, 1882


• Thomas Augustus Watson, assistant to Alexander Graham Bell, January 8, 1854 - December 13, 1934


• Emily Carr, artist and writer, December 13, 1871 – March 2, 1945


• Josef Lhévinne, pianist and piano teacher, December 13, 1874 – December 2, 1944


• George Pollák, aka George Pólya, mathematician, December 13, 1887 – September 7, 1985


• Sgt. Alvin Cullum York, soldier, famous for his heroism in World War I, awarded the Medal of Honor for leading an attack on a German machine-gun nest, December 13, 1887 – September 2, 1964


• Carlos Montoya, Flamenco guitarist, December 13, 1903 – March 3, 1993


• Emmett Evan VAN Heflin, Jr., film and theatre actor, won the 1942 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, December 13, 1910 – July 23, 1971


• Trygve Magnus Haavelmo, economist, awarded the 1989 Nobel Prize in Economics, December 13, 1911 – July 28, 1999


• Archibald Wright, aka Archie Moore, boxer, the World Light Heavyweight Boxing Champion, December 13, 1913 or 1916 – December 9, 1998


• Curd Gustav Andreas Gottlieb Franz Jürgens, aka Curt Jurgens, stage and motion-picture actor, December 13, 1915 - June 18, 1982


• John Hart, motion picture and television actor; in his early career, he appeared mostly in Westerns; he is known for replacing Clayton Moore in 1952 for two seasons of The Lone Ranger, when Moore demanded a higher salary, 1917


• Philip Warren Anderson, theoretical physicist, who has made contributions to the theories of localization, antiferromagnetism, and high-temperature superconductivity; he shared the 1977 Nobel Prize in Physics with co-researchers Sir Nevill Francis Mott and John van Vleck, 1923


• Lawrence Eugene LARRY Doby, professional baseball player in the Negro Leagues and Major League Baseball, the third American to play in the Japanese Baseball League, December 13, 1923 – June 18, 2003


• Richard Wayne Van DICK Dyke, television and movie actor, known for his starring roles in the films Mary Poppins and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, and on The Dick Van Dyke Show and Diagnosis: Murder, 1925


• Arthur CHRISTOPHER Orme Plummer, CC, award-winning theatre, film, and television actor, 1929


• Richard Darryl Zanuck, film producer, the son of Darryl Zanuck, 1934


• Lyndall Dale LINDY McDaniel, former MLB right-handed relief pitcher, who played for 21 years, from 1955 to 1975, 1935


• Eric Flynn, actor and singer, who appeared in the Doctor Who story The Wheel in Space in 1969 as Leo Ryan, December 13, 1939 - March 4, 2002


• John Davidson, actor and game show host, 1941


• Ferguson Arthur FERGIE Jenkins CM, former MLB right-handed pitcher; a three-time All-Star, he won the NL Cy Young Award in 1971, the first Chicago Cubs pitcher and the first Canadian ever to do so; in 1991, he became the first Canadian ever elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame, 1943


• Hwang Jang Lee, martial artist and film actor, 1944


• Jeff "Skunk" Baxter, rock guitarist, who has played with Steely Dan and the Doobie Brothers, and as a session musician, 1948


• Wendie Malick, actress, voice actor, and former fashion model; her first lead role on a TV series was on Dream On, where she appeared from 1990 until 1996; she appeared as Nina Van Horn on Just Shoot Me!, 1950


• Steven Vincent STEVE Buscemi, film and stage character actor, and film director, 1957


• Harry Gregson-Williams, film score composer, 1961


• Joshua Smith JOSH Fogg, MLB pitcher, who plays for the Colorado Rockies, 1976


• Amy Lynn Lee, singer-songwriter and pianist, a founding member and lead singer of Evanescence, 1981


• Carlos Enrique RICKY Nolasco, MLB right-handed pitcher, who plays for the Florida Marlins, 1982

R.I.P.:

• Moshe ben Maimon, aka Maimonides, rabbi, physician, and philosopher, March 30, 1135 or 1138 – December 13, 1204


• Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi, aka Donatello, artist and sculptor of the early Renaissance, 1386 – December 13, 1466,


• Johann Heidenberg, aka Johannes Trithemius,abbot and cryptographer; his most famous work is Steganographia, which appears to be about black magic, but is actually concerned with cryptography and steganography; the work has lent its name to the modern field of steganography, February 1, 1462 - December 13, 1516


• Niccolò Fontana Tartaglia, mathematician, engineer, surveyor, and bookkeeper, who published many books, including the first Italian translations of Archimedes and Euclid, and a compilation of mathematics, 1499 – December 13, 1557


• Alexander Selcraig, aka Alexander Selkirk, sailor, who spent four years as a castaway on an uninhabited island; it is thought that his story provided the inspiration for Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, 1676 – December 13, 1721


• Pehr Wilhelm Wargentin, astronomer, September 22, 1717 – December 13, 1783


• Anyos Jedlik, inventor, engineer, physicist, and priest, the possible inventor of the dynamo, January 11, 1800 – December 13, 1895


• Woldemar Voigt, physicist, who worked on crystal physics, thermodynamics, and electro-optics, September 2, 1850 - December 13, 1919


• Samuel Gompers, labour and political leader, who founded the American Federation of Labor, January 26, 1850 - December 13, 1924


• Friderik FRITZ Pregl, chemist, awarded the 1923 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for making important contributions to quantitative organic microanalysis, September 3, 1869 – December 13, 1930


• François Auguste Victor Grignard, chemist, who shared the 1912 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Paul Sabatier, May 6, 1871 - December 13, 1935


• Jacques-Arsène d'Arsonval, biophysicist, inventor of the thermocouple ammeter and moving-coil galvanometer, June 8, 1851 - December 13, 1940


• Wassily Kandinsky, painter and art theorist, credited with painting the first modern abstract works, December 16, 1866 – December 13, 1944


• António Caetano de Abreu Freire Egas Moniz, psychiatrist and neurosurgeon, who shared the 1949 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Walter Rudolf Hess, November 29, 1874 - December 13, 1955


• Tim Moore, vaudevillian and comic actor, who starred as George "Kingfish" Stevens on TV's Amos 'n' Andy, December 9, 1887 - December 13, 1958


• Anna Mary Robertson, aka Grandma Moses, folk artist and painter, September 7, 1860 – December 13, 1961


• Spencer Williams, Jr., actor, film director, producer, and writer, who starred as Andy Brown on TV's Amos 'n' Andy, July 14, 1893 — December 13, 1969


• Charles Hall Locher, aka Jon Hall, film actor, February 23, 1915 – December 13, 1979


• Dewey "Pigmeat" Markham, comedian, singer, dancer, and actor, April 18, 1904 - December 13, 1981


• Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney, businessman, film producer, writer, government official, and owner of thoroughbred racehorses, February 20, 1899 - December 13, 1992


• Kenneth Colin [K. C.] Irving, OC, ONB, entrepreneur and industrialist, March 14, 1899 - December 13, 1992


• Zalman ZAL Yanovsky, musician, co-founder, guitarist, and singer for The Lovin' Spoonful, December 19, 1944 – December 13, 2002


• Kenneth ANDRE Ian Rodgers, MLB shortstop, who played from 1957 to 1967; in an 11-year career, he compiled a .249 batting average, with 45 home runs and 245 RBI in 854 games, December 2, 1934 - December 13, 2004


• David John Wheeler, computer scientist; along with Maurice Wilkes and Stanley Gill, he is credited with the invention of the subroutine; in cryptography, he was the designer of the stram cipher WAKE, and the co-designer, with Roger Needham, of the block ciphers TEA and XTEA encryption algorithms, February 9, 1927 – December 13, 2004