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1-50 of 3,763
- Sirkka Sari was born on 1 May 1920 in Raivola, Finland. She was an actress, known for Women of Niskavuori (1938), Rikas tyttö (1939) and Sysmäläinen (1938). She died on 30 July 1939 in Aulanko, Finland.
- María Fernanda Ibáñez was born on 15 January 1920 in Tepic, Nayarit, Mexico. She was an actress, known for La madrina del diablo (1937), Dos cadetes (1938) and These Men (1937). She died on 17 October 1940 in Torreón, Coahuila, Mexico.
- Tove Fønss was born on 7 July 1920. She died on 2 November 1941.
- Gyöngyi Zádor was born on 6 February 1920 in Budapest, Hungary. She was an actress, known for Életre ítéltek! (1941) and Egér a palotában (1943). She died on 14 November 1941 in Budapest, Hungary.
- Mario Giannini was born on 1 May 1920 in Rome, Lazio, Italy. He was an actor, known for La prima donna che passa (1940), L'allegro fantasma (1941) and Disillusion (1940). He died on 24 April 1942 in Falconara Marittima, Marche, Italy.
- Donald Thane Pitman was the only child of Arthur Joseph Pitman and Ethel Thane. He died on the night of 17th January 1943 when his Lancaster bomber was shot down when returning from a raid on Berlin.
Prior to World War 2 Donald was a child actor. He appeared with Richard Tauber in "Blossom Time". He played the part of Davy Ashton in the 1935 film "The Last Light of Day". He played the part of Gussy in the 1935 film "Emil and the Detectives", he also had an uncredited part in "The Ghost Goes West". In his later career he changed his professional name to Stuart Thane.
In World War 2 Donald joined the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve and achieved the rank of Sergeant; his service number was 984566. Donald was awarded the Distinguished Flying Medal in 1942. His award was listed in the Supplement to the London Gazette dated 11th August 1942 (page 3498).
Donald was killed by enemy action on the night of 17th January 1943. He was in an Avro Lancaster, registration number W4772, which took part in the air raid on Berlin that night. His Lancaster is recorded as having crashed in the North Sea 10km West of Vlieland. The island of Vlieland is off the West coast of Holland and is a member of the Dutch Wadden Sea Islands.
In the book 'Nachtjagd, Defenders of the Reich 1940-1943' (ISBN: 9781473849839), at the beginning of chapter 8 the raid on Berlin on the 17th January is described. In this there is a vivid description of an attack on a Lancaster which was shot down by night fighter pilot Uffizier Karl Pfeiffer of the IV/NJG 1, flying a Bf 110 F-4 or Do 215 B-5 from Leeuwarden airfield. The location was at 10km West of Vlieland at 23.29. This is most likely to be the Lancaster W4772 in which Donald was travelling.
Donald's sacrifice is recorded on the Runnymede Memorial, Panel 161. - Actor
Born in Australia to an American father and Australian mother, Noel Coffey was brought to Oakland, California at the age of nineteen months, where he finished high school. He was known as a promising figure skater, winning a number of amateur prizes; after finishing high school, he went professional, appearing with Sonja Henie in one of her shows. With war being declared against Germany and Japan, Noel enlisted in the U. S. Army Air Corps on July 13, 1942, and soon received a commission as a Second Lieutenant, assigned as co-pilot on the "Buzz Wagon" a B-25 (#41-12928) with the 446th Bombardment Squadron, 321st Bombardment Group, 57th Bombardment wing, 12th Air Force, U.S. Army Air Force. He, with the rest of his crew, was killed during a non-battle related incident when the "Buzz Wagon" crashed in a "Test Hop" near Ain M'Lila (Tunisia/North Africa). He was buried at Golden Gate National Cemetery in San Bruno, California.- Robert Lynen was born on 24 May 1920 in Sarrogna, Jura, Franche-Comté, France. He was an actor, known for Sans famille (1934), Poil de carotte (1932) and Bargekeepers Daughter (1938). He died on 1 April 1944 in Karlsruhe, Baden, Germany.
- Friedrich Karl Klausing was born on 24 May 1920 in Munich, Germany. He died on 8 August 1944 in Plötzensee, Berlin, Germany.
- Sándor Csenki was born on 16 March 1920 in Püspökladány, Hungary. Sándor was a writer, known for Cigányballada (1983). Sándor died on 19 January 1945 in Dunapataj, Hungary.
- Actor
- Soundtrack
Robert McClung was born on 20 September 1920 in Fayetteville, West Virginia, USA. He was an actor, known for Paradise Express (1937), Silks and Saddles (1936) and The Toast of New York (1937). He died on 27 January 1945 in Columbia, South Carolina, USA.- Robin 'Pop' Ordell was born on 16 June 1920 in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. He was an actor, known for The Kid Stakes (1927). He died on 3 February 1945 in Netherlands.
- Hannie Schaft was born on 16 September 1920 in Haarlem, Noord-Holland, Netherlands. She died on 17 April 1945 in Bloemendaal, Noord-Holland, Netherlands.
- Jean Mercanton was born on 17 May 1920 in Marseille, France. He was an actor, known for The Phantom Wagon (1939), Il est charmant (1932) and À mi-chemin du ciel (1931). He died on 4 November 1947 in Paris, France.
- Kathleen 'Kick' Kennedy was born on 20 February 1920 in Brookline, Massachusetts, USA. She was married to William Cavendish, Marquess of Hartington. She died on 13 May 1948 in Saint-Bauzile, Ardèche, France.
- Helga Zülch was born on 11 November 1920 in Bockum-Hövel, Lüdinghausen, Westphalia, Germany. She was an actress, known for Wozzeck (1947), Vor uns liegt das Leben (1948) and Die Zaubergeige (1944). She died on 1 February 1949 in Buchholz in der Nordheide, Lower Saxony, Germany.
- Günther Brackmann was born on 1 April 1920 in Berlin, Germany. He was an actor, known for Jugend (1938), Die blonde Carmen (1935) and The Hound of the Baskervilles (1937). He died on 28 March 1949 in Göttingen, Germany.
- Gunnar Planthaber was born on 27 November 1920 in Stockholm, Sweden. He was an actor, known for Kungajakt (1944). He died on 24 September 1949 in Uppsala, Sweden.
- Daisy Daix was born on 2 November 1920 in Gentinnes, Belgium. She was an actress, known for Coeur-sur-Mer (1950), Bichon (1948) and Une femme par jour (1949). She died on 16 August 1950 in Clichy, Hauts-de-Seine, France.
- Fritz Balogh was born on 16 November 1920. He was an actor, known for Das große Spiel (1942). He died on 15 January 1951.
- Actor
- Music Department
- Soundtrack
Shyam was born on 20 February 1920 in Sialkot, British Punjab. He was an actor, known for Albela (1951), Aaj Aur Kal (1947) and Man Ki Jeet (1944). He was married to Tazi. He died on 26 April 1951 in India.- Josefina Romagnoli was born on 18 October 1920 in San Rafael, Veracruz, Mexico. She was an actress, known for Al son de la marimba (1941), El capitán Centellas (1941) and Las abandonadas (1945). She died on 24 June 1951 in Huachinango, Puebla, Mexico.
- Francisco Boix was born on 31 August 1920 in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. He died on 7 July 1951 in Paris, France.
- Actor
Larry Randall was born on 27 August 1920 in Kansas, USA. He was an actor. He died on 17 October 1951 in Ventura, California, USA.- Actor
- Writer
Ermanno Randi was born on 27 April 1920 in Arezzo, Tuscany, Italy. He was an actor and writer, known for The Young Caruso (1951), Tragico ritorno (1952) and Tragic Hunt (1947). He died on 1 November 1951 in Rome, Lazio, Italy.- Silvio D'Arzo was born on 6 February 1920 in Reggio Emilia, Emilia-Romagna, Italy. He was a writer, known for The Anatomy of Love (1954). He died on 30 January 1952 in Reggio Emilia, Emilia-Romagna, Italy.
- Steve Conway was born on 12 October 1920 in Bethnal Green, London, England, UK. He was an actor, known for The Girl on the Pier (1953). He was married to Lilian Doris Butcher. He died on 19 April 1952 in London, England, UK.
- Margit Agrell was born on 30 November 1920. She was an actress, known for Frestelse (1940). She died on 8 August 1952 in Stockholm, Sweden.
- Alfred Burt was born on 22 April 1920 in Marquette, Michigan, USA. He was married to Anne Pearson Shortt. He died on 7 February 1954 in Pacoima, California, USA.
- Betty Grayson was born on 17 January 1920 in New York City, New York, USA. She was married to Clifford Odets. She died on 22 February 1954 in New York City, New York, USA.
- Actress
Eloise Farmer was born on 26 February 1920 in Los Angeles, California, USA. She was an actress. She died on 27 April 1954 in Cairo, Egypt.- Cornelius Peeples was born on 2 January 1920 in Oak Park, Illinois, USA. He was an actor, known for Julius Caesar (1950). He died on 15 November 1954 in Chicago, Illinois, USA.
- Music Department
- Composer
- Soundtrack
Charles Christopher Parker Jr. was born on August 29, 1920, in a suburb of Kansas City, Missouri, to Charles Parker Sr. and his 18-year-old wife Addie. His father ran out on the family when Charlie was just a little boy. When he was 11 his mother bought him an alto saxophone for his birthday. By the time he was 15 Charlie was working as a musician in the flourishing Kansas City jazz scene. He also began drinking heavily and using drugs, which were also a part of the KC jazz scene, as were illegal after-hours gambling casinos.
Charlie became more experienced by playing with various bands, including those of Lawrence Keyes and Harlan Leonard, before joining Jay McShann's band in 1940. The band was widely heard on radio across the country, so Charlie's saxophone playing became well known, even though people didn't know his name, so he became known as the Yardbird, or just The Bird. While still in Kansas City, Charlie reached a breakthrough: tired of playing solo with the same scales, he discovered that if he used a higher interval of the chords from a popular song or melody line, with a pianist or guitarist adding the appropriate new chords, he finally could play the sound he always had been hearing in his head. Essentially turning the melody line inside out, he began experimenting with this new style, which became known as "bebop".
Charlie played with McShann in New York City until 1942, when he left for brief stints with the bands of pianist Earl 'Fatha' Hines and singer Billy Eckstine. The association with the Hines Orchestra was a significant one because of the other musicians, who included trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie. By 1945 Charlie was back in New York and leading his own small groups. He got married, but continued to live like a nomad, traveling from place to place and spending almost every other night in a hotel or boarding house. He also became a drug addict, and as his addiction increased so did his appetite, and he began putting on weight.
Charlie took part in the first bebop recording session in 1945. With Gillespie and Miles Davis, he recorded songs like "Billie's Bounce" and "Koko" for Savoy Records. Not long afterward, he recorded such classic songs as "A Night in Tunisia" and "Yardbird Suite" for another small label, Dial Records. In the late 1940s Charlie toured Europe, where he was received like visiting royalty. He made several tours of Cuba, where he began experimenting with large string sections and Afro-Cuban rhythms. After a few years of relative stability, however, Charlie began a downward slide. He got hooked back on drugs again (heroin was his favorite), he began nodding out on bandstands, getting into fistfights and pawning his saxophones for drug money. Aware of the effects of drug use, he chastised younger sax players who emulated his heroin use.
By the early 1950s Charlie's drinking and drug use made him gray and prematurely lined. His self-abuse began to infringe on his musical ability. During this time, Charlie was befriended by a wealthy European baroness who was living in New York, loved his jazz music and helped him out when he needed it. In early 1955, on his way to a gig in Boston, Charlie stopped by her apartment for a visit. Alarmed by his obvious ill health, she had her personal doctor examine him, which revealed that he had stomach ulcers and many other health problems, the result of his years of drinking and drug use. The doctor recommended hospitalization, but the stubborn Charlie refused to consider it. The baroness got him to rest at her place for a few days.
On March 12, 1955, the baroness found Charlie Parker dead, slumped over in an easy chair in front of the TV set in her apartment. He was 34 years old. An autopsy revealed such damage to the inside of his body that the doctor who performed the autopsy thought Charlie was a man at least 50 years old. Charlie Parker's legend grew even larger after his death. Fans scrawled "Bird Lives!" on walls of jazz clubs from New York, to Los Angeles, to Paris, France. To this day, more than 40 years after his death, Bird remains jazz's single most venerated figure.- William Woodward was born on 12 June 1920 in New York City, New York, USA. He was married to Ann Woodward. He died on 31 October 1955 in Oyster Bay, New York, USA.
- Seessel Anne Johnson was born on 28 December 1920 in Los Angeles, California, USA. She was an actress, known for Riders of the Purple Sage (1925), Sparrows (1926) and Durand of the Bad Lands (1925). She was married to Lang and Custer Lang. She died on 13 January 1956 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Anne Crawford was born on 22 November 1920 in Haifa, Palestine [now Israel]. She was an actress, known for The Peterville Diamond (1943), The Hundred Pound Window (1944) and Knights of the Round Table (1953). She was married to Wallace Douglas and James Hartley. She died on 17 October 1956 in London, England, UK.
- Keith Andrews was born on 15 June 1920 in Denver, Colorado, USA. He died on 15 May 1957 in Indianapolis, Indiana, USA.
- Virginia Serret was born on 9 September 1920 in Veracruz, Veracruz, Mexico. She was an actress and writer, known for Cuando lloran los valientes (1947), Palabras de mujer (1946) and Su gran ilusión (1945). She was married to Álvaro González Saenz and Luis Aldás. She died on 2 May 1958 in Mexico D.F., Mexico.
- Writer
- Additional Crew
A favorite of both James Stewart and Jack Webb, Frank Burt was a prolific writer of film, radio and television stories during the 1940s and 1950s. In radio, his series writing credits include "The Whistler," "Hallmark Hall of Fame," and "The Unexpected." Burt created the well- regarded radio series "The Six Shooter" for Stewart and wrote all but one of its episodes. Stewart purchased three of Burt's scripts and later produced them for television, while the remainder were adapted for television as "The Restless Gun" starring John Payne (although, oddly enough, Burt was uncredited for the use of his character on the pilot to Payne's series). Burt's relationship with Stewart was to continue with a collaboration on one of Stewart's Westerns, "The Man from Laramie." Other writing credits included scripts for Jack Webb's landmark television series "Dragnet." A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Stanford University, Burt died at 38, suddenly and unexpectedly, from a heart attack, in 1958. At the time of his death, Burt was supervising pilot scripts at the Hecht-Hill-Lancaster company.- Writer
- Actor
- Additional Crew
Tao Michaëlis was born on 9 May 1920 in Denmark. He was a writer and actor, known for Hvad vil De ha'? (1956), Fy og Bi på eventyr (1955) and Sol, sommer og badevand (1954). He died on 7 June 1958 in Denmark.- Tony Travers was born on 21 January 1920 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. He was an actor, known for Frankie Laine Time (1955). He died on 16 January 1959 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Actor
- Soundtrack
Indefatigable Ray McDonald was born to dance and dance he did. A New York City native born June 27, 1921, Ray was still in grade school when he and older sister (by three years) Grace McDonald formed a popular vaudeville tap dancing act. By the age of 16 Ray had made it to Broadway in the musical "Babes in Arms", in which he and Grace made quite an impression with the song "I Wish I Was In Love Again."
Talent scouts took both of them to Hollywood, but not as a duo. Grace went to Paramount and later Universal, while Ray was signed by MGM. He seemed to have all the earmarkings of a star. Dark and boyishly handsome with energy to spare, he first played a leading role as a youth in the low-budget programmer Down in San Diego (1941), then kicked up his heels a bit in the Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland musical Babes on Broadway (1941), where he danced to "By the Light of the Silvery Moon." He appeared with Rooney again in the star's vehicle Life Begins for Andy Hardy (1941).
After that, things stopped clicking. The momentum of his career was not helped by war service, where he at least managed to appear in both the stage and film versions of Winged Victory (1944). Unable to rise above the secondary ranks, the June Allyson/Peter Lawford collegiate musical Good News (1947) would prove to be Ray's last feature for MGM. Divorced from actress Elisabeth Fraser whom he met while appearing in the stage show of "Winged Victory" in 1943, he met and subsequently married fellow dancer/singer Peggy Ryan while freelancing in films. They appeared together in Shamrock Hill (1949) and There's a Girl in My Heart (1949) for Eagle-Lion, and later in the musical All Ashore (1953) for Columbia, a poor man's "On the Town" with Mickey Rooney, Dick Haymes and Ray as three swabbies on leave. This would be Ray's last film.
During the subsequent lean years, he and Peggy toured stages and nightclubs until their divorce. Ray popped up on TV variety shows as well and in 1959, while in New York to appear on a show, he died after choking on food in his hotel room. He was only 37. Not remembered well today, as is the case with sister Grace, Ray McDonald nevertheless had a great musical talent and ingratiating presence, which certainly deserves a mention.- Writer
- Producer
- Director
C. Ray Stahl was born on 24 December 1920 in California, USA. He was a writer and producer, known for Geisha Girl (1952), The Scarlet Spear (1954) and Oriental Evil (1951). He was married to Mary Ann Blake and Martha Hyer. He died on 9 April 1959 in Hollywood, California, USA.- Writer
- Actor
- Music Department
Boris Vian was born on 10 March 1920 in Ville d'Avray, Hauts-de-Seine, Île-de-France, France. He was a writer and actor, known for Two Days in Paris (2007), Dangerous Liaisons (1959) and Rocco and His Brothers (1960). He was married to Ursula Kubler and Michelle Vian. He died on 23 June 1959 in Paris, France.- Danny Williams was born on 20 July 1920 in San Diego, California, USA. He died on 6 March 1960 in the USA.
- Vern Bickford was born on 17 August 1920 in Hellier, Kentucky, USA. He died on 6 May 1960 in Richmond, Virginia, USA.
- Yevgeniy Ivanov was born on 6 December 1920 in Petrograd, RSFSR [now St. Petersburg, Russia]. He was an actor, known for Razlom (1952), Lyubov Yarovaya (1953) and Dostigaev i drugie (1961). He died on 3 July 1960 in Leningrad, RSFSR, USSR [now St. Petersburg, Russia].
- Composer
- Actor
- Music Department
Henri Crolla was born on 26 February 1920 in Naples, Campania, Italy. He was a composer and actor, known for La Vie En Rose (2007), Os Bandeirantes (1960) and Naughty Girl (1956). He was married to Colette Ravier. He died on 17 October 1960 in Suresnes, Hauts-de-Seine, France.- Actor
Harold Hensen was born on 16 August 1920 in New Brighton, England, UK. He was an actor. He died on 22 October 1960 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Actor
- Additional Crew
- Soundtrack
Julius Mengarelli was born on 13 April 1920 in Stockholm, Sweden. He was an actor, known for Love, Sunshine and Songs (1948), Smeder på luffen (1949) and Lattjo med Boccaccio (1949). He died on 30 October 1960 in Leksand, Sweden.