Anniversaries 12 August

Birth

Robert Southey51

British poet 1774–1843

Edith Hamilton26

American teacher and writer 1867–1963

Radclyffe Hall1

Poet and author 1880–1943

Erwin Schrödinger67

Austrian physicist 1887–1961

Grant MacEwan1

Alberta politician, Mayor of Calgary, Lieutenant Governor o… 1902–2000

Hans Urs Von Balthasar17

Swedish Catholic theologian 1905–1988

Philip Kapleau6

American Zen Buddhist monk 1912–2004

Ajahn Maha Bua3

monk 1913–2011

Vikram Sarabhai21

(1919-1971), Indian physicist 1919–1971

Hajo Meyer2

Dutch physicist 1924–2014

Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq3

6th President of Pakistan 1924–1988

Donald Justice4

Poet, teacher 1925–2004

Patrick Swift60

British artist 1927–1983

Buck Owens3

American country singer-songwriter 1929–2006

George Soros99

Hungarian-American business magnate, investor, and philanth… 1930

John G. Schmitz3

American politician 1930–2001

William Goldman89

American novelist, screenwriter and playwright 1931–2018

Irfan Habib2

Left Leaning Historian 1931

Dallin H. Oaks10

Apostle of the LDs Church 1932

Hans Haacke12

conceptual political artist 1936

Walter Dean Myers8

American writer 1937–2014

Abu Bakar Bashir2

Indoneisan Islamist 1938

David Laidler2

Canadian economist 1938

Richard M. Burton3

1939

David King (chemist)1

British academic and scientific adviser 1939

Sue Monk Kidd100

Novelist 1948

Mark Knopfler14

English guitarist 1949

Martha Stout4

American psychologist 1953

Michael Dine1

American physicist 1953

Leung Chun-ying13

Hong Kong politician 1954

Pat Metheny1

American jazz musician 1954

François Hollande4

24th President of the French Republic 1954

Ann M. Martin8

American writer of children's literature 1955

Amit Ray38

Indian author 1960

Chris Bohjalian7

American novelist 1962

Sir Mix-a-Lot3

American rapper 1963

Brian Evenson1

American writer 1966

Anthony Swofford2

American writer and United States Marine 1970

Donald Miller108

American writer 1971

Michael Ian Black1

American comedian, actor, writer, and director 1971

Muqtada Sadr4

Iraqi politician 1973

Casey Affleck1

American actor 1975

Tyson Fury1

British boxer 1988

Kiki Mordi3

Nkiru "Kiki" Mordi is a Nigerian investigative journalist, … 1991

Death

Cleopatra VII10

last active pharaoh of Ptolemaic Egypt -69–-30 BC

Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak11

vizier 1551–1602

William Blake249

English Romantic poet and artist 1757–1827

Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh1

British politician 1769–1822

George Stephenson8

English civil engineer and mechanical engineer 1781–1848

James Russell Lowell175

American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat 1819–1891

Jozef Israëls33

Dutch painter 1824–1911

Helen Hunt Jackson10

Novelist, poet, writer, activist 1830–1885

María Amparo Ruiz de Burton1

Mexican-American writer 1832–1895

Henry Becque1

French dramatist 1837–1899

Leoš Janáček1

Czech composer 1854–1928

Martin Lomasney5

American politician 1859–1933

Thomas Mann159

German novelist, and 1929 Nobel Prize laureate 1875–1955

Esther Forbes2

Novelist 1891–1967

Henry Fonda2

American actor 1905–1982

Ernst Chain1

German scientist 1906–1979

Ian Fleming44

English author, journalist and naval intelligence officer 1908–1964

William Shockley5

American physicist and inventor 1910–1989

John Cage43

American avant-garde composer 1912–1992

Jean Drapeau3

former mayor of Montreal, Quebec (1954-1957,1960-1986) 1916–1999

Lauren Bacall26

American actress, model 1924–2014

Samir Amin6

Egyptian economist 1931–2018

B. Kliban1

American cartoonist 1935–1990

Джеймс Маккей1

British writer and philatelist 1936–2007

Isaac Bonewits2

Neopagan leader, author, and neo-druid priest 1949–2010

Jean-Michel Basquiat7

American artist 1960–1988

Jake Davison2

British mass murderer, perpetrator of the Plymouth shooting