Thomas Becket (1118 - 1170)

Becket was born about 1118, or in 1120 according to later tradition. He was born in Cheapside, London, on 21 December, which was the feast day of St Thomas the Apostle. He was the son of Gilbert Beket and Gilbert’s wife Matilda. Gilbert’s father was from Thierville in the lordship of Brionne in Normandy, and […]

Caroline of Ansbach (1683 - 1737)

Caroline was born on 1 March 1683 at Ansbach, the daughter of John Frederick, Margrave of Brandenburg-Ansbach, and his second wife, Princess Eleonore Erdmuthe of Saxe-Eisenach. Her father was the ruler of one of the smallest German states; he died of smallpox at the age of 32, when Caroline was three years old. Caroline and […]

Philippa of Hainault (1314 - 1369)

Philippa was born in Valenciennes in the County of Hainaut, in the Low Countries, a daughter of William I, Count of Hainaut, Holland and Zeeland, and Joan of Valois, the granddaughter of Philip III of France. She was one of eight children and the second of five daughters. Her eldest sister Margaret married Emperor Louis […]

Louis VIII of France (1187 - 1226)

In summer 1195, a marriage between Louis and Eleanor of Brittany niece of Richard I of England was suggested for an alliance between Philip II and Richard, but it failed. It is said that the Emperor Henry VI opposed the marriage; and the failure was also a sign that Richard would replace Arthur, younger brother […]

Richard I of England (1157 - 1199)

Richard was born on 8 September 1157, probably at Beaumont Palace, in Oxford, England, son of King Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine. He was a younger brother of Count William IX of Poitiers, Henry the Young King and Duchess Matilda of Saxony. As the third legitimate son of King Henry II, he […]

Henry the Young King (1155 - 1183)

Little is known of the young prince Henry before the events associated with his marriage and coronation. His mother’s children by her first marriage to Louis VII of France were Marie of France, Countess of Champagne and Alix of France. He had one older brother, William IX, Count of Poitiers (d. 1156), and his younger […]

Grace Kelly (1929 - 1982)

Kelly was born November 12, 1929 in Philadelphia, to an affluent family. Her paternal grandparents were Irish and her maternal grandparents were German. Her father, John B. Kelly, Sr., won three Olympic gold medals for sculler. He later founded a brickwork contracting company that became well known on the East Coast. He registered as a […]

Cecil Frances Alexander (1818 - 1895)

Alexander was born in Dublin, the third child and second daughter of Major John Humphreys (of Norfolk, land-agent to 4th Earl of Wicklow and later to the second Marquess of Abercorn), and Elizabeth (née Reed). She began writing verse in her childhood, being strongly influenced by Dr Walter Hook, Dean of Chichester. Her subsequent religious […]

Mary II of England (1662 - 1694)

Mary, born at St. James’s Palace in London on 30 April 1662, was the eldest daughter of James, Duke of York (the future James II & VII), and his first wife, Anne Hyde. Mary’s uncle was King Charles II, who ruled the three kingdoms of England, Scotland and Ireland; her maternal grandfather, Edward Hyde, 1st […]

John, King of England (1166 - 1216)

John was born to Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine on 24 December 1166. Henry had inherited significant territories along the Atlantic seaboard—Anjou, Normandy and England—and expanded his empire by conquering Brittany. Henry married the powerful Eleanor of Aquitaine, who reigned over the Duchy of Aquitaine and had a tenuous claim to Toulouse […]

Anne, Queen of Great Britain (1665 - 1714)

Anne was born at 11:39 p.m. on 6 February 1665 at St James’s Palace, London, the fourth child and second daughter of James, Duke of York (afterwards James II and VII), and his first wife, Anne Hyde. Her father was the younger brother of King Charles II, who ruled the three kingdoms of England, Scotland […]

Edward I of England (1239 - 1307)

Edward was born at the Palace of Westminster on the night of 17–18 June 1239, to King Henry III and Eleanor of Provence. Edward is an Anglo-Saxon name, as was not commonly given among the aristocracy of England after the Norman Conquest, but Henry was devoted to the veneration of Edward the Confessor, and decided […]

Queen Mary I of England (1516 - 1558)

Mary was born on 18 February 1516 at the Palace of Placentia in Greenwich, London. She was the only child of King Henry VIII and his first wife, Catherine of Aragon, to survive infancy. Her mother had many miscarriages; before Mary’s birth, four previous pregnancies had resulted in a stillborn daughter and three short-lived or […]

Ferdinand Demara (1921 - 1982)

Demara, known locally as ‘Fred’, was born in Lawrence, Massachusetts, in 1921, at 40 Texas Avenue in the lower southwest Tower Hill Neighborhood. His father, Ferdinand Waldo Demara, Sr. was born in Rhode Island and worked in Lawrence’s old Theatre District as a motion picture operator. In those days, his father did financially well and […]

Harold Shipman (1946 - 2004)

Harold Frederick Shipman was born on the Bestwood council estate in Nottingham, England, the second of the four children of Vera and Harold Shipman, a lorry driver. His working class parents were devout Methodists. Shipman was particularly close to his mother, who died of lung cancer when he was 17. Her death came in a […]

Hedy Lamarr (1914 - 2000)

Lamarr was born Hedwig Eva Maria Kiesler in 1914 in Vienna, Austria-Hungary, the only child of Gertrud “Trude” Kiesler (née Lichtwitz; 3 February 1894 – 27 February 1977) and Emil Kiesler (27 December 1880 – 14 February 1935). Her father was born in Lemberg and was a successful bank director. He died before the Holocaust, […]

Norma Shearer (1902 - 1983)

Shearer’s childhood was spent in Montreal and was one of privilege due to the success of her father’s construction business. However, the marriage between her parents was not a happy one. Andrew Shearer was prone to manic depression and “moved like a shadow or a ghost around the house,” while her mother Edith was attractive, […]

Myrna Loy (1905 - 1993)

Loy was born Myrna Adele Williams in Helena, Montana,  to Adelle Mae (née Johnson) and rancher David Franklin Williams, and raised in nearby Radersburg. Her paternal grandparents were natives of Wales, and her maternal grandparents were Swedish and Scottish. Her first name was derived from a whistle stop near Broken Bow, Nebraska, whose name her […]

Janet Gaynor (1906 - 1984)

Janet Gaynor Janet Gaynor was born Laura Augusta Gainor (some sources stated Gainer) in Germantown, Philadelphia. Nicknamed “Lolly” as a child, she was the youngest of two daughters born to Laura and Frank De Witt Gainor. Frank Gainor worked as a theatrical painter and paperhanger. When Gaynor was a toddler, her father began teaching her […]

Dorothy Lamour (1914 - 1996)

Born Mary Leta Dorothy Slaton in New Orleans, the daughter of Carmen Louise (née LaPorte) and John Watson Slaton, both of whom were waiters. Lamour was of French Louisianan, Spanish, and Irish descent. Her parents’ marriage lasted only a few years. Her mother married for the second time to Clarence Lambour, whose surname Dorothy later […]

Percy Sledge (1940 - 2015)

Percy Sledge The singer sky-rocketed to the top of both the Hot 100 and R&B charts with his dramatic, heartrending ballad “When a Man Loves a Woman” – his debut single and one of Rolling Stone’s Greatest Songs of All Time – in 1966. It spent 13 weeks on the Billboard pop chart, and was […]

Hattie McDaniel (1895 - 1952)

Hattie McDaniel was born June 10, 1895, in Wichita, Kansas, to former slaves. She was the youngest of 13 children. Her father, Henry McDaniel, fought in the Civil War with the 122nd USCT and her mother, Susan Holbert, was a singer of religious music. In 1900, the family moved to Colorado, living first in Fort […]

Fay Wray (1907 - 2004)

Wray was born on a ranch near Cardston in the province of Alberta, Canada, to two Mormons, Elvina Marguerite Jones, who was from Salt Lake City, and Joseph Heber Wray, who was from Kingston upon Hull, England. She was one of six children. Her family returned to the United States a few years after she […]

Thelma Ritter (1902 - 1969)

Ritter was born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1902. After appearing in high school plays and stock companies, she trained as an actress at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. She established a stage career but took a hiatus to raise her two children by her husband, Joseph Moran, an actor turned advertising executive.  Ritter […]

Ann Miller (1923 - 2004)

Johnnie Lucille Collier was born in Chireno, Texas to Clara Emma (née Birdwell) and John Alfred Collier, a criminal lawyer who represented the Barrow Gang, Machine Gun Kelly, and Baby Face Nelson, among others.  Her maternal grandmother was Cherokee. Miller’s father insisted on the name Johnnie because he had wanted a boy, but she was […]

Milan Bogdan (1941 - 2015)

Milan Bogdan Faaantastic!Life offers few guarantees, and we should be thankful for the ones we get. The sun will always rise in the east, E will likely always equal MC2, and when you ask Milan Bogdan how he’s doing, he will invariably reply, “Faaan-tastic!” like a boisterous drummer tagging a big blues shuffle. With a […]

Thomas Midgley (1889 - 1944)

Midgley began working at General Motors in 1916. In December 1921, while working under the direction of Charles Kettering at Dayton Research Laboratories, a subsidiary of General Motors, Midgley discovered that the addition of Tetraethyllead to gasoline prevented “knocking” in internal combustion engines. The company named the substance “Ethyl”, avoiding all mention of lead in […]

Max Valier (1895 - 1930)

Valier was born in Bozen (Bolzano) in the County of Tyrol (now South Tyrol) and in 1913 enrolled to study Physics at the University of Innsbruck. He also trained as a machinist at a nearby factory. His studies were interrupted by the First World War, during which he served in the Austro-Hungarian army’s air corps […]

Judith Anderson (1897 - 1992)

Anderson was born Frances Margaret Anderson in 1897 in Adelaide, South Australia to Jessie Margaret (née Saltmarsh; 19 October 1862 – 24 November 1950) and James Anderson Anderson. She attended Norwood High School, and began acting in Australia before moving to New York in 1918. Anderson established herself as a dramatic actress of note, making […]

Ann Rutherford (1917 - 2012)

Rutherford was born in Vancouver, to John Rutherford, a former operatic tenor, and Lucille Mansfield, a silent film actress. While Rutherford was still a baby, the family moved to San Francisco. Soon afterwards, her parents separated and Lucille Mansfield moved to Los Angeles with Ann Rutherford and her sister Judith.  While roller skating home from […]