- Henry Bliss
Henry Hale Bliss (1831?-September 14, 1899) was the first person killed in a motor vehicle accident in the United States. He was disembarking from a streetcar at West 74th Street and Central Park West in New York City, when an electric-powered taxicab (Automobile No. 43) struck him and crushed his head and chest. He died from his injuries the next morning. - Princess Diana of Wales
Diana, Princess of Wales (Diana Frances; née Spencer; 1 July 1961 - 31 August 1997) was the first wife of Charles, Prince of Wales. Their two sons, Princes William and Harry, are second and third in line to the thrones of the United Kingdom and 15 other Commonwealth Realms. - John Murray
Sir John Murray KCB (3 March 1841 – 6 March 1914) was a pioneering Scots-Canadian oceanographer and marine biologist. Murray was born at Cobourg, Ontario, Canada, to Scottish parents who had emigrated seven years earlier. He returned to Scotland to study, firstly at Stirling High School, and then at the University of Edinburgh, but soon left to join a whaling expedition to Spitsbergen as ships' surgeon in 1868. - Cliff Burton
Clifford Lee Burton (February 10, 1962 - September 27, 1986) was a bass guitarist, best known for his work with the thrash/heavy metal band Metallica from 1982-86. Burton's early influence was essential in creating the unique musical style for which Metallica would later become famous. Burton first joined the band in 1982, and performed on their debut album "Kill 'Em All" (the title of which came from him), … - Grace Kelly
Grace, Princess of Monaco "née" Grace Patricia Kelly was an Academy Award-winning American film and stage actress who, upon marriage to Rainier III, Prince of Monaco in 1956, became Her Serene Highness The Princess of Monaco, but was generally known as Princess Grace of Monaco. Princess Grace maintained dual American and Monegasque citizenship after her marriage. - Jayne Mansfield
Jayne Mansfield (born Vera Jayne Palmer; April 19, 1933-29 June 1967) was an American actress and "Playboy" centerfold. One of the leading sex symbols of the 1950s, like Marilyn Monroe, Mansfield starred in several popular Hollywood films that emphasized her platinum-blonde hair, dramatic hourglass figure and cleavage-revealing costumes. She was a recipient of a Golden Globe Award and a Theatre World Award for two early screen and stage performances. - T. E. Lawrence
Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas Edward Lawrence, CB, DSO (August 16, 1888 - May 19, 1935), known professionally as T. E. Lawrence, was a British soldier renowned especially for his liaison role during the Arab Revolt of 1916-18, but whose vivid personality and writings, along with the extraordinary breadth and variety of his activities and associations, have made him the object of fascination throughout the world as "Lawrence of Arabia". - Mary Ward
Mary Ward (b. Mary King, April 1827 in Ballylin, County Offaly, Ireland; d. 31 August, 1869) was a multi-skilled scientist in the microscopic and telescopic fields. She had the misfortune to fall under the wheels of an experimental steam car built by her cousins. This happened on 31 August, 1869, and may make her the earliest motor vehicle accident victim. - Albert Camus
Albert Camus (November 7, 1913 - January 4, 1960) was a French author and philosopher. Although he is often associated with existentialism, Camus preferred to be known as a man and a thinker, rather than as a member of a school or ideology. He preferred persons over ideas. In an interview in 1945, Camus rejected any ideological associations: “No, I am not an existentialist. - Henri Paul
Henri Paul was the Deputy Head of Security at the Hôtel Ritz Paris and the chauffeur driving at the time of the automobile accident that killed him along with Diana, Princess of Wales, and her companion Dodi Fayed. Trevor Rees-Jones, Al-Fayed's bodyguard, survived (see details of the crash). - John Mayer
John Mayer (b. Calcutta, Bengal, British India, October 28, 1930; d. United Kingdom, March 9, 2004) was an Indian composer known primarily for his fusions of jazz with Indian music. He was born into an Anglo-Indian family and, after studying with Phillipe Sandre in Calcutta and Melhi Mehta in Bombay, he won a scholarship to London's Royal Academy of Music in 1952, where he studied comparative music and religion in eastern and western cultures. - Bridget Driscoll
Bridget Driscoll was one of the first victims of an automobile accident in the United Kingdom. On August 17, 1896, in London, Bridget Driscoll, age 44 or 45, became an early car accident fatality (Mary Ward may have been the first in 1869). As she and her teenage daughter, May, (and possibly one other person) crossed the grounds of the Crystal Palace, … - Victor Davis
Victor Davis, CM (February 10, 1964-November 13, 1989) was a Canadian Olympic and world champion swimmer, the greatest breaststroker Canada has ever produced. He also enjoyed success in the individual medley and the butterfly. - Coluche
Michel Colucci, better known as Coluche, was a French comedian famous for his irreverent sense of humour - Denise Darvall
Denise Ann Darvall was the donor in the world’s first successful human heart transplant, performed at Groote Schuur Hospital, South Africa, by a team of surgeons led by Professor Christiaan Barnard. Darvall was very seriously injured in a car accident in Observatory, Cape Town. Her mother, who was also involved in the crash, died immediately. Darvall sustained a skull fracture and severe head injuries. She could not stay alive without life support, … - Mike Muuss
Michael John Muuss (October 16, 1958 - November 20, 2000) was the author of the freeware network tool Ping. A graduate of Johns Hopkins University, Muuss was a senior scientist at the U.S. Army Research Lab in Maryland when he died, specialising in geometric solid modeling, ray-tracing, MIMD architectures and digital computer networks. - Billy Martin
Alfred Manuel "Billy" Martin was an American second baseman and manager in Major League Baseball who was best known as the manager of the New York Yankees five different times. He won two American League championships taking the Yankees to the World Series in 1976, getting swept by the Cinncinati Reds, and winning the 1977 as their manager, and led four different AL teams to division championships. Martin was known for his ability to win with any team, … - Roland Barthes
Roland Barthes (November 12, 1915 - March 25, 1980) (pronounced) was a French literary critic, literary and social theorist, philosopher, and semiotician. Barthes' work extended over many fields and he influenced the development of schools of theory including structuralism, semiology, existentialism, Marxism and post-structuralism. - Ian Bannen
Ian Bannen (June 29, 1928 - November 3, 1999) was a Scottish character actor and occasional leading man. - Dodi Al-Fayed
Emad El-Din Mohamed Abdel Moneim Fayed, owner of the British department store Harrods, Fulham Football Club and the Hôtel Ritz Paris. His mother was Samira Kashoggi, sister of the notorious weapons dealer, Adnan Khashoggi. Born in Alexandria, Egypt, Fayed was a student at Collège Saint Marc before attending the Institut Le Rosey in Switzerland. - James Dean
James Byron Dean (February 8, 1931 - September 30, 1955) was an American film actor. Dean's status as a cultural icon is best embodied in the title of his most celebrated film, "Rebel Without a Cause", in which he starred as troubled high school rebel Jim Stark. The other two roles that defined his star power were as the awkward loner Cal Trask in "East of Eden", and as the surly, racist farmer Jett Rink in "Giant". - Mel Ott
Melvin Thomas "Mel" Ott, nicknamed "Master Melvin", was a Major League Baseball right fielder who played his entire career for the New York Giants (1926-1947). Ott was born in Gretna, Louisiana. He batted left-handed and threw right-handed. The first National League player to surpass 500 homeruns. He was unusually slight of stature for a power hitter, at 5'9" 170 lb. - Johnny Horton
Johnny Horton was an American country music singer who was most famous for his semi-folk, so-called "saga songs". With them, he had several major crossover hits, most notably in 1959 with "The Battle of New Orleans" which won the 1960 Grammy Award for Best Country & Western Recording. The song was honored with a Grammy Hall of Fame Award and in 2001 was named number 333 of the Songs of the Century. - Jack Johnson
John Arthur Johnson, better known as Jack Johnson and nicknamed the "Galveston Giant", was an American boxer and arguably the best heavyweight of his generation. He was the first black Heavyweight Champion of the World, 1908-1915. In a documentary about his life, Ken Burns said: "For more than thirteen years, Jack Johnson was the most famous, and the most notorious African-American on Earth". - Rich Mullins
Richard Wayne Mullins (October 21, 1955 - September 19, 1997) was an American Christian music singer and songwriter born in Richmond, Indiana. He died in an automobile accident in September of 1997. Mullins is best known for his praise choruses "Awesome God" and "Step by Step", which have been embraced as modern classics by many Christians. Some of his albums are also considered among Christian music's best, including "Winds of Heaven, Stuff of Earth" (1988), … - Margaret Mitchell
Margaret Munnerlyn Mitchell was an American author, who won the Pulitzer Prize in 1937 for her immensely successful novel, "Gone with the Wind," published in 1936. The novel is one of the most popular books of all time, selling more than 28 million copies (see list of best-selling books). An American film adaptation, released in 1939, became the highest-grossing film in the history of Hollywood, and received a record-breaking number of Academy Awards. - Steve Prefontaine
Steve Roland Prefontaine (commonly referred to as Pre by runners and fans) was an American Olympic runner born in Coos Bay, Oregon. Prefontaine was primarily a long distance runner, and at one point held the American record in every running event from the 2000 meters to the 10,000 meters. Prefontaine had one leg longer than the other (a common condition that does not affect running speed), … - Rob Levin
Robert Levin, also known as lilo, was the founder of the freenode IRC network and Executive Director of the PDPC charity that helped fund freenode. A computer programmer since 1968, he worked as an administrator and an applications programmer from 1978 onwards. From 1994 onwards, he worked to encourage the use of Internet Relay Chat for Free and Open Source projects. He was one of the founders of the OpenProjects Network (OPN), … - Alexander Fu Sheng
Alexander Fu Sheng (December 20, 1954-July 7, 1983) was a major Hong Kong martial arts film star in the 1970s. Alexander was born Cheung Fu Sheng in December 20, 1954 in Hong Kong, the son of a wealthy businessman. His youth was characterized by his quick temper, disinterest in school, and fighting in the streets. As a child, his family lived in Hawaii for a few years and there he began training in judo and karate. - James Weldon Johnson
James Weldon Johnson was a leading American author, critic, journalist, poet, anthropologist, educator, lawyer, songwriter, early civil rights activist, and prominent figure in the Harlem Renaissance. Johnson is best remembered for his writing, which includes novels, poems, and collections of folklore. He was also one of the first African-American professors at New York University. Later in life he was a Professor of Creative Literature and Writing at Fisk University. - Linda Lovelace
Linda Susan Boreman, better known by her stage name Linda Lovelace, was a pornographic actress in the 1972 film "Deep Throat", who went on to leave the pornography industry and became a spokeswoman for the anti-pornography movement. "Deep Throat" was notable for beginning a brief fad of porn chic; it was also the inspiration for Bob Woodward's name of his secret Watergate source, W. Mark Felt. - Steve Susskind
Steve Susskind (October 31942 - January 212005 in Springfield, Massachusetts) was an actor who appeared in numerous small parts in both sitcoms, such as "Frasier, Scrubs", and "NewsRadio". Susskind also performed as a voice actor in both numerous films, such as "Friday the 13th Part 3", "Star Trek V: The Final Frontier", "Monsters, … - Amy Gillett
Amy Gillett (January 9, 1976 - July 18, 2005) was an Australian track cyclist and rower who represented Australia in both sports before her death in a training accident when a motorist crashed into the Australian squad of cyclists she was training with. She was born Amy Safe in Adelaide and was a world champion junior rower winning a gold medal in the coxless pairs in the Junior World Championships in 1993 and the women's single scull in 1994. - David McTaggart
David Fraser McTaggart (June 24, 1932 - March 23, 2001) was an Canadian-born environmentalist who played a central part in the foundation of Greenpeace International. In 1972, responding to an ad in the newspapers, he used his personal boat to protest the testing of nuclear weapons in the Pacific by the French Government. After getting his boat damaged and being physically hurt by the French Military, … - Bobby Phills
Bobby Ray Phills II (December 20, 1969 - January 12, 2000) was an American professional basketball player for the National Basketball Association's Cleveland Cavaliers and Charlotte Hornets. A native of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Phills was selected by the Milwaukee Bucks in the 1991 NBA Draft (45th overall). The Southern University graduate ended up being cut by the Bucks in December 1991 without playing a game for them. - Bessie Smith
Bessie Smith (July, 1892 or April, 1894 - September 26, 1937) was the most popular and successful female blues singer of the 1920s and 1930s, and a strong influence on subsequent generations, including Billie Holiday, Mahalia Jackson, Nina Simone and Janis Joplin. - Steven Stayner
Steven Gregory Stayner (April 18, 1965 - September 16, 1989) was an American child who became famous after he was kidnapped as a seven-year-old and held captive by his abductor, to be reunited with his family seven years later. He was also the brother of convicted serial killer Cary Stayner. - Pierre Curie
Pierre Curie was a French physicist, a pioneer in crystallography, magnetism, piezoelectricity and radioactivity. He shared the 1903 Nobel Prize in physics with his wife, Maria Skłodowska-Curie (Marie Curie), and Henri Becquerel, "in recognition of the extraordinary services they have rendered by their joint researches on the radiation phenomena discovered by Professor Henri Becquerel." Pierre Curie was born in Paris, where his father, Eugène, … - Cornelius Cardew
Cornelius Cardew was an English avant-garde composer, and founder (with Howard Skempton and Michael Parsons) of the "Scratch Orchestra", an experimental performing ensemble. Cardew was born in Winchcombe, Gloucestershire. He was the second of three sons whose parents were both artists — his father was potter Michael Cardew. - Junkyard Dog
Sylvester Ritter was an American professional wrestler best known for his work in Mid-South Wrestling and the World Wrestling Federation as The Junkyard Dog (or JYD for short).
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