Bud Abbott (1895 - 1974)

Bud Abbott Abbott was born in Asbury Park, New Jersey, into a show business family. His parents, Rae (Fisher) and Harry Abbott, worked for the Barnum and Bailey Circus. Abbott dropped out of school as a child and began working for his father in Coney Island. His father, now an employee of the Columbia Burlesque […]

Howard Da Silva (1909 - 1986)

Da Silva appeared in a number of Broadway musicals, including the role of Larry Foreman in the legendary first production of Marc Blitzstein’s musical, The Cradle Will Rock (1937). Later, he costarred in the original 1943 stage production of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma!, playing the role of the psychopathic Jud Fry. He was the easygoing […]

Harry Earles (1902 - 1985)

Harry/Kurt (stage name/real name) came over to the U.S. from Germany around 1915 with his sister, Grace/Freida. Once they arrived, they worked for a man named Earles, at which time they adopted his last name. in the early 1920’s, their sister Daisy/Hilda joined them and in the mid- to late- 1920’s, their sister Tiny/Elly arrived. […]

Zoltan Fabri (1917 - 1994)

Zoltán Fábri (15 October 1917 – 23 August 1994) was a Hungarian film director and screenwriter. His films The Boys of Paul Street (1969) and Hungarians (1978) were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. His 1965 film Twenty Hours shared the Grand Prix with War and Peace at the 4th Moscow […]

Enric Arredondo (1940 - 2006)

Had a significant and extensive career in film and in theater and television, not to mention his role as a voice actor.  Protagonist many Study 1 for TVE and numerous plays, achieved great fame following his role in the series Journalists where for four years ( 1998 and 2002 ) he played the fictional editor […]

Adelbert Ames (1835 - 1933)

Ames graduated from the United States Military Academy on May 6, 1861, standing fifth in his class of 45. On that same date he was commissioned a second lieutenant in the 2nd U.S. Artillery. Eight days later he was promoted to first lieutenant and was assigned to the 5th U.S. Artillery. During the First Battle […]

Leonard Alvarado (1947 - 1969)

Alvarado was born in Bakersfield, California on Feb. 13, 1947, and enlisted in the U. S. Army on July 25, 1968, serving in the Vietnam War. He was killed in action, leaving behind his wife and a young daughter.  Alvarado distinguished himself on Aug. 12, 1969, while serving as a rifleman during a mission to […]

Edward Allworth (1895 - 1966)

Allworth was born in Battle Ground, Washington, Allworth graduated from Oregon Agricultural College in 1916. He enlisted at Corvallis, Oregon in 1917 and joined the 60th Infantry Regiment of the 5th Division. On November 5, 1918, mere days from the armistice, Allworth and his company crossed the Meuse River via a canal bridge near the […]

Jay Adams (1961 - 2014)

Jay Adams was born in a part of Santa Monica, California known to locals as “Dogtown”. He grew up with his mother and his stepfather, Kent Sherwood. He began skating and surfing at the age of four. Sherwood worked at Dave Sweet’s Surf Shop under Pacific Ocean Park, where Adams was introduced to skateboarding by […]

Ed Nelson (1928 - 2014)

Nelson was born in New Orleans, Louisiana. He began acting while attending Tulane University in New Orleans. He left college after two years to study at the New York School of Radio and Television Technique. He served a tour of duty with the United States Navy as a radioman on the light cruiser USS Dayton. […]

Charles Keating (1941 - 2014)

Charles Keating Of Irish Catholic extraction, Keating was born in London, England, the son of Charles James Keating and Margaret (née Shevlin) Keating.  He appeared with the Royal Shakespeare Company at Stratford-upon-Avon before turning to television (he was in the pilot episode of the long-running ITV series Crown Court in 1972), winning the role of […]

Don Pardo (1918 - 2014)

Pardo was born in Westfield, Massachusetts to Dominick and Viola Pardo, immigrants from Poland, who owned a bakery. He spent his childhood in Norwich, Connecticut and Providence, Rhode Island. He graduated from Emerson College in 1942.  Pardo was hired for his first radio position at WJAR in Providence in 1938.  He joined NBC as an […]

Charlotta Bass (1874 - 1969)

Charlotta Amanda Spears Bass was born in Sumter, South Carolina, on February 14, 1874, to Hiram and Kate Spears. She was the sixth child of eleven. When she was twenty years old, she moved to live with her brother in Providence, Rhode Island, where she worked for the Providence Watchman. Spears worked for the Providence […]

Joseph Barondess (1863 - 1928)

Joseph Barondess (July 3, 1867–June 19, 1928) was a labor leader and political figure in New York City’s Lower East Side Jewish community in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century. Known as the “King of the Cloakmakers”, whose union he led, he carried himself like an actor, a career he had tried but […]

Thomas John Barnardo (1845 - 1905)

Barnardo was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1845. He was the fourth of five children (one died in childbirth) of John Michaelis Barnardo, a furrier, and his second wife, Abigail, an Englishwoman and member of the Plymouth Brethren. In the early 1840s, John emigrated from Hamburg to Dublin, where he established a business; he married […]

James Allen (1864 - 1912)

Born in Leicester, England, into a working-class family, Allen was the elder of two brothers. His mother could neither read nor write while his father, William, was a factory knitter. In 1879 following a downturn in the textile trade of central England, Allen’s father travelled alone to America to find work and establish a new […]

Wallace Lloyd Algie (1891 - 1918)

He was born on 10 June 1891 at Alton, Ontario, the son of James and Rachel Algie who resided at 1155 King Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Wallace was brought up by his parents in the Presbyterian faith. He graduated from the Royal Military College of Canada. Prior to April 1916 he served as a lieutenant […]

Ernest Alexander (1870 - 1934)

Major General Ernest Wright Alexander VC CB CMG (2 October 1870 – 25 August 1934) was by birth an English recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces.  Alexander was trained at the Royal Military […]

William Alchesay (1853 - 1928)

He was born May 17, 1853 in a part of the Arizona Territory known as Limestone Canyon. He joined the Indian Scouts at Camp Verde December 2, 1872 and served under General George Crook in actions against an uprising of the Chiricahua Apache in the winter of 1872–1873, holding the rank of Sergeant. He was […]

Lewis Albanese (1946 - 1966)

Louie Albanese (in Italian Luigi) was born in Cornedo Vicentino – Vicenza, Italy, graduated from Franklin High School in Seattle, Washington. He briefly worked for Boeing before joining the Army on 26 October 1965. He received basic training with B Co 1st Bn 11th Inf at Fort Carson, Colorado and was sent to Vietnam in […]

Frederick Aiken (1832 - 1878)

Information on Aiken’s early life is largely unknown; his date of birth, city of birth, and even his full name varies depending on source. His official birth records, as well as the 1840 and 1850 census records, indicate that he was born Frederick Augustus Aiken on September 20, 1832, in Lowell, Massachusetts, to Susan (née […]

Frederick George Abberline (1843 - 1929)

Frederick Abberline was the only son of Edward Abberline, a saddlemaker and Sheriff’s Officer and Clerk of the Market, minor local government positions, and his wife Hannah (née Chinn). Edward Abberline died in 1849, and his widow opened a small shop and brought up her four children, Emily, Harriett, Edward and Frederick, alone. Frederick was […]

Robin Williams (1951 - 2014)

Robin Williams Robin McLaurin Williams was born in Chicago, Illinois, on July 21, 1951. His mother, Laurie McLaurin (c. 1923 – September 4, 2001), was a former model from Jackson, Mississippi, whose own great-grandfather was Mississippi senator and governor Anselm J. McLaurin. His father, Robert Fitzgerald Williams (September 10, 1906 – October 18, 1987), was […]

Albert of Saxony (1828 - 1902)

Albert’s education, as usual with German princes, concentrated to a great extent on military matters, but he attended lectures at the University of Bonn. His first experience of warfare came in 1849, when he served as a captain in the First War of Schleswig against Denmark.  When the Austro-Prussian War broke out in 1866, Albert […]

Albert I of Belgium (1875 - 1934)

Born Albert Léopold Clément Marie Meinrad in Brussels, he was the fifth child and second son of Prince Philippe, Count of Flanders, and his wife, Princess Marie of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen. Prince Philippe was the third (second surviving) son of Leopold I, the first King of the Belgians, and his wife, Marie-Louise of France, and the younger […]

Zein al-Sharaf Talal (1916 - 1994)

She was born in Alexandria, Egypt to Sharif Jamal bin Nasser, Governor of Hauran and Wijdan Hanim. Her father was the nephew of Sharif Hussein bin Ali of Mecca and her mother was the daughter of Shakir Pasha, Governor of Cyprus, grandnephew of Kâmil Pasha.  Queen Zein played a major role in the political development […]

Fahd bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (1921 - 2005)

Fahd bin Abdulaziz was born in Riyadh in 1921. He is the eighth son of Ibn Saud. His mother was Hassa Al Sudairi and he was the eldest member of the Sudairi Seven.  Fahd’s education took place at the Princes’ School in Riyadh, a school established by Ibn Saud specifically for the education of members […]

Afonso VI of Portugal (1643 - 1683)

At the age of three, Afonso suffered an illness that left him paralyzed on the left side of his body, as well as leaving him mentally unstable. His father created him 10th Duke of Braganza.  After the 1653 death of his eldest brother Teodósio, Prince of Brazil, Afonso became the heir-apparent to the throne of […]

Adolph Frederick (1710 - 1771)

His father was Christian Augustus (1673—1726) duke and a younger prince of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorp, prince-bishop of Lubeck, and administrator, during the Great Northern War, of the duchies of Holstein-Gottorp for his relative Charles Frederick. His mother was Albertina Frederica of Baden-Durlach. On his mother’s side, Adolf Frederick descended from king Gustav I of Sweden and from […]

Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen (1792 - 1849)

Adelaide was born on 13 August 1792 at Meiningen, Thuringia, Germany. Her father was George I, Duke of Saxe-Meiningen; and her mother was Luise Eleonore, daughter of Prince Christian of Hohenlohe-Langenburg. She was titled Princess Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen, Duchess in Saxony with the style Serene Highness from her birth until the Congress of Vienna (1814–15), […]