Maxine Edwyna Cissel Horner (January 17, 1933 – February 7, 2021) was one of the first African American women to serve in the Oklahoma State Senate, serving from 1986 to 2004, along with Vicki Miles-LaGrange. Horner held the position of Democratic Caucus Chair, as well as Chair of Business and...
Pedro Gomez (August 20, 1962 – February 7, 2021) was an American sports journalist. He worked as a reporter for ESPN from 2003 to 2021, contributing to the network's SportsCenter show. He was primarily a baseball reporter and was also a member of the Baseball Writers' Association of America who...
Ralph Gerald Backstrom (September 18, 1937 – February 7, 2021) was a Canadian professional ice hockey centre and later a coach, entrepreneur and hockey executive. He played in the National Hockey League with the Montreal Canadiens, Los Angeles Kings, and Chicago Black Hawks between 1956 and 1973. He also played...
George Pratt Shultz (/ʃʊlts/; December 13, 1920 – February 6, 2021) was an American economist, diplomat, and businessman. He served in various positions under three different Republican presidents and is one of only two people to have held four different Cabinet-level posts (the other being Elliot Richardson). Shultz played a...
Rajie Cook (July 6, 1930 – February 6, 2021), also known as Roger Cook, was an American graphic designer, artist, Palestinian peace activist, humanitarian and photographer. Cook was born in Newark, New Jersey in 1930, into a Palestinian-Christian family. He was president of Cook and Shanosky Associates, a graphic design...
Thomas Rutherford Brett (October 2, 1931 – February 6, 2021) was a United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma. Born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, Brett received a Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of Oklahoma in 1952, a Bachelor of...
Leon Spinks (July 11, 1953 – February 5, 2021) was an American professional boxer who competed from 1977 to 1995. In only his eighth professional fight, he won the undisputed heavyweight championship in 1978 after defeating Muhammad Ali in a split decision, in what is considered one of the biggest...
Robert Charles Soles Jr. (December 17, 1934 – February 5, 2021) was a Democratic member of the North Carolina Senate, representing the 8th district from 1977 to 2011. His district included Brunswick, Columbus and Pender counties. From 1969 to 1976, Soles served in the North Carolina House of Representatives. Republican...
Rennard Cordon Davis (May 23, 1940 – February 2, 2021) was an American anti-war activist who gained prominence in the 1960s. He was one of the Chicago Seven defendants charged for anti-war demonstrations and large-scale protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. He had a prominent organizational role...
Grant Dwight Jackson (September 28, 1942 – February 2, 2021) was an American professional baseball player who played eighteen seasons as a pitcher in Major League Baseball (MLB). He played for the Philadelphia Phillies, Baltimore Orioles, New York Yankees, Pittsburgh Pirates, Montreal Expos, and Kansas City Royals from 1965 to...
Albert A. Hale (March 13, 1950 – February 2, 2021) was an American attorney and politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he served in the Arizona Senate from 2004 to 2011 and in the Arizona House of Representatives from 2011 to 2017. A member of the Navajo Nation, Hale...
Steven Angelo White (September 18, 1928 – February 1, 2021) was a four-star admiral who served in the United States Navy from 1948 until 1985. He was the 19th and last Chief of Naval Material. In 2004, he joined 120 other retired US flag officers in signing an open letter...
John Joseph Sweeney (May 5, 1934 – February 1, 2021) was an American labor leader who served as president of the AFL-CIO from 1995 to 2009. Sweeney co-edited a study about the labor movement and has co-written two books about unions, including America Needs a Raise: Fighting for Economic Security...
Ricky Powell (November 20, 1961 – February 1, 2021) was an American photographer who documented popular culture including hip hop, punk rock, graffiti, and pop art. His photographs have been featured in The New York Times, the New York Post, the Daily News, The Village Voice, TIME, Newsweek, VIBE, The...
Dustin Neil Diamond (January 7, 1977 – February 1, 2021) was an American actor, director, stand-up comedian, musician, and occasional professional wrestler, best known for his role as Samuel "Screech" Powers throughout the Saved by the Bell franchise. In 2001, Diamond filed for bankruptcy in California. He moved to Port...
Thomas James Acker (March 7, 1930 – January 4, 2021) was an American baseball pitcher who played his entire career for the Cincinnati Reds in four seasons of Major League Baseball (MLB) from 1956 to 1959. He batted and threw right-handed and served primarily as a relief pitcher. Acker was...
Millie Elizabeth Hughes-Fulford (née Hughes; December 21, 1945 – February 2, 2021) was an American medical investigator, molecular biologist, and NASA payload specialist who flew aboard the NASA Space Shuttle Columbia in June 1991. Hughes-Fulford was married twice. Her first marriage was to policeman Rick Wiley, with whom she had...
Donald Eugene Frith (September 16, 1924 – January 6, 2021) was an American ceramic artist and academic known for his unique style of teapots, mixing ceramics with acrylics and wood. Frith was a faculty member at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana from 1952 until his retirement in 1989, and...
Gregory Joseph Sierra (January 25, 1937 – January 4, 2021) was an American actor known for his roles as Detective Sergeant Chano Amengual on Barney Miller, Julio Fuentes, the Puerto Rican neighbor of Fred G. Sanford on Sanford and Son, and as Marruja in The Castaway Cowboy (1974). Sierra was...
Victoria Leigh Roberts (October 15, 1955 – January 4, 2021), known professionally as Tanya Roberts, was an American actress, producer, and model. She is best known for playing Julie Rogers in the final season of the television series Charlie's Angels (1980–1981), Stacey Sutton in the James Bond film A View...
Jonas Neubauer (April 19, 1981 – January 5, 2021) was an American Tetris player, seven-time champion at the Classic Tetris World Championship, and taproom manager. In June 2018, Neubauer set a (then) high-score world record of 1,245,200 points. On January 5, 2021, Neubauer died at age 39 due to a...
John Muckler (April 13, 1934 – January 4, 2021) was a professional hockey coach and executive, who last served as the general manager of the Ottawa Senators of the National Hockey League (NHL). Muckler had over 50 years of professional hockey experience as a part owner, general manager, director of...
Richard Allen Kulpa (January 12, 1953 – January 3, 2021) was an American cartoonist best known for his work for Cracked and Weekly World News. Kulpa died from cancer on January 3, 2021, at the age of 67. – Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License from Wikipedia.
Eric Jerome Dickey (July 7, 1961 – January 3, 2021) was an American author. He wrote several crime novels involving grifters, ex cons, and assassins, the latter novels having more diverse settings, moving from Los Angeles to the United Kingdom to the West Indies, each having an international cast of...
Esser Leopold Breuer (February 6, 1937 – January 3, 2021) was an American playwright, theater director, academic, educator, filmmaker, poet, and lyricist. Breuer taught and directed on six continents. Breuer was born in Philadelphia. He studied English at the University of California, Los Angeles. Breuer married Maleczech in 1978. They...
Paul Douglas Westphal (November 30, 1950 – January 2, 2021) was an American basketball player, head coach, and commentator. Westphal played in the National Basketball Association (NBA) from 1972 to 1984. Playing the guard position, he won an NBA championship with the Boston Celtics in 1974. Westphal played in the...
Gary V. Staples (January 16, 1940 – January 2, 2021) was an American Republican politician. In 2004 he was elected as a member of the Mississippi House of Representatives from the 88th District. Ramona Blackledge defeated incumbent Gary Staples in the Republican primary runoff for Mississippi House of Representatives District...
Michael P. Reese (March 7, 1978 – January 2, 2021) was an American politician. A Republican, he served as a member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives from 2009 until his death in 2021. Reese was secretary of the Pennsylvania House Republican Caucus for the 2019–2020 session, and had been...
Floyd Douglas Little (July 4, 1942 – January 1, 2021) was an American professional football player who was a halfback for the Denver Broncos, initially in the American Football League (AFL) and later the National Football League (NFL). He was a three-time All-American at Syracuse University, and in 1967 was...
George Ancona (December 4, 1929 – January 1, 2021) was an American photo essayist and creator of photo-illustrated children's picture books. He was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, the son of immigrants from Mexico. He is renowned for creating vivid photo essays that invite children to immerse themselves...