Anniversaries 17 October
Birth
![Ferdinand Magellan photo]()
Portuguese explorer
1480–1521
![John Wilkes photo]()
English journalist and politician
1725–1797
![William Scott, 1st Baron Stowell photo]()
British politician
1745–1836
![Henri de Saint-Simon photo]()
French early socialist theorist
1760–1825
![John Bowring photo]()
4th Governor of Hong Kong
1792–1872
![William Smith O'Brien photo]()
Irish nationalist politician (1803-1864)
1803–1864
![Georg Büchner photo]()
German dramatist and writer of poetry and prose
1813–1837
![Syed Ahmed Khan photo]()
Indian educator and politician
1820–1898
![Elinor Glyn photo]()
British novelist and scriptwriter
1864–1943
![Győző Zemplén photo]()
Hungarian physicist
1879–1916
![Hereward Carrington photo]()
Jersey parapsychologist
1880–1958
![A.S. Neill photo]()
Scottish educator and theorist
1883–1973
![Paul Bernays photo]()
Swiss mathematician
1888–1977
![Richard Connell photo]()
American author and journalist
1893–1949
![Yvor Winters photo]()
American poet and literary critic
1900–1968
![Nathanael West photo]()
American writer
1903–1940
![Dmitriy Ustinov photo]()
Soviet military commander and politician
1908–1984
![Pope John Paul I photo]()
263rd Pope of the Catholic Church
1912–1978
![Jerry Siegel photo]()
American co-creator of Superman
1914–1996
![Arthur Miller photo]()
playwright from the United States
1915–2005
![Rita Hayworth photo]()
American actress, dancer and director
1918–1987
![Zhao Ziyang photo]()
former General Secretary of the Communist Party of China
1919–2005
![Julie Adams photo]()
American actress
1926–2019
![Jimmy Breslin photo]()
American journalist and author
1928–2017
![James W. Sire photo]()
American writer
1933–2018
![Milkha Singh photo]()
Indian track and field athlete
1935
![Gary Zukav photo]()
American writer and revivalist
1942
![Robert Jordan photo]()
American writer
1948–2007
![David Adams Richards photo]()
Canadian writer and politician
1950
![Prabowo Subianto photo]()
Indonesian general and politician
1951
![David W. Oxtoby photo]()
President of Pomona college
1951
![Mae Jemison photo]()
American doctor and NASA astronaut
1956
![Mark Gatiss photo]()
British actor, screenwriter and novelist
1966
![Anil Kumble photo]()
Former Indian cricketer
1970
![Eminem photo]()
American rapper and actor
1972
![Zbigniew Stonoga photo]()
Polish businessman, video blogger, social and political act…
1974
![Milagros Cabral photo]()
female volleyball player from the Dominican Republic
1978
Death
![Philip Sidney photo]()
English diplomat
1554–1586
![Ninon de L'Enclos photo]()
French author, courtesan, freethinker, and patron of the ar…
1620–1705
![George Colman the Younger photo]()
English dramatist and writer
1762–1836
![Frédéric Chopin photo]()
Polish composer
1810–1849
![Julia Ward Howe photo]()
American abolitionist, social activist, and poet
1819–1910
![Gustav Kirchhoff photo]()
German physicist
1824–1887
![George William Foote photo]()
British secularist and journal editor
1850–1915
![Arthur Schuster photo]()
Anglo-German physicist
1851–1934
![Santiago Ramón y Cajal photo]()
Spanish neuroscientist
1852–1934
![Karl Kautsky photo]()
Czech-Austrian philosopher, journalist, and Marxist theoret…
1854–1938
![William Vaughn Moody photo]()
United States dramatist and poet
1869–1910
![Florence Scovel Shinn photo]()
American writer
1871–1940
![Michael Balcon photo]()
English Film producer
1896–1977
![S.J. Perelman photo]()
American humorist, author, and screenwriter
1904–1979
![Ba Jin photo]()
Chinese novelist
1904–2005
![Raymond Aron photo]()
French philosopher, sociologist, journalist, and political …
1905–1983
![Helmut Gollwitzer photo]()
German theologian and author
1908–1993
![Jean Améry photo]()
Austrian essayist
1912–1978
![Nicholas Metropolis photo]()
Greek American physicist
1915–1999
![Vic Mizzy photo]()
American composer
1916–2009
![Brian Campbell Vickery photo]()
British information theorist
1918–2009
![Ingeborg Bachmann photo]()
Austrian poet and author
1926–1973
![Piri Thomas photo]()
Puerto Rican poet
1928–2011
![Elena Efimovna Kuzmina photo]()
Russian archaeologist
1931–2013
![Norma Fox Mazer photo]()
American children's writer
1931–2009
![Julian May photo]()
American science fiction, fantasy, horror, science and chil…
1931–2017
![Masaru Emoto photo]()
Japanese writer
1943–2014
![Elijah Cummings photo]()
U.S. Representative from Maryland
1951–2019
