Austin Coates (1970 - 1970)

Author. Son of the famous British composer Eric Coates. (bio by: Kieran Smith)

Ronald H. Coase (1910 - 2013)

Nobel Prize-Winning Economist, Author. His revolutionary theory of the significance of transaction costs and property rights for the institutional structure and functioning of the economy earned him the Noble Prize in Economic Sciences in 1991. Born outside of London, both of his parents worked in a telegrapher’s office, he was academically-sound and earned a scholarship […]

Arthur Hugh Clough (1819 - 1861)

English poet. Clough was educated at Rugby and Balliol College, Oxford. He wrote a great deal of poetry but only two volumes appeared during his lifetime: “The Bothie of Tober-na-Vuolich” (1848) and “Ambarvalia” (1849). His posthumous poems include “Amours de Voyage,” the dialogues “Dypsichus,” and the tales “Mari Magno.” Clough is best known for the […]

Margery Kimball Clifford (1908 - 2000)

Author. The wife of former Defense Secretary and presidential adviser Clark M. Clifford, she founded and became the first president of the St. Louis Opera Guild. She was a graduate of the Fannie Farmer School of Cooking in Boston and the author in 1972 of her own cookbook, “Marny Clifford’s Washington Cookbook.” In 1985 she […]

Jon Cleary (1917 - 2010)

Novelist.  The author of over 50 novels,  he is best known for “The Sundowners” (1952) and “Peter’s Pence” (1974). Born into a poverty-stricken family, he was the oldest of seven children. He dropped out of school at age 15 to work in order to provide income for his family, and toiled at many occupations including […]

Virginia Clay-Clopton (1825 - 1915)

Author. She wrote “A Belle of the Fifties,” an account of her life in Washington, DC as the wife of a United States Senator.  Family links:  Children:  Ella Clay (____ – 1952)* *Calculated relationship

Sir Arthur C. Clarke (1917 - 2008)

Author. One of the most prolific science-fiction writers of the 20th Century, he wrote over 100 books on science-fiction and space, and was a commentator during the Apollo moon flights with Walter Cronkite. He battled debilitating post-polio syndrome since the 1960s and was occasionally confined to a wheelchair. Clarke moved to Sri Lanka in 1956. […]

Walter Van Tilburg Clark (1909 - 1971)

Author. He wrote, “The Ox-Bow Incident” (1940) and “The Track Of The Cat” (1949). Both of these books were later made into Hollywood films.  Family links:  Spouse:  Barbara Frances Morse Clark (1906 – 1969)

John Clare (1793 - 1864)

Poet. He was born in Helpston, England. He was best known as the Northamptonshire Peasant Poet. His works include “Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery,” “The Village Minstrel and Other Poems,” “The Shepherd’s Calendar with Village Stories and Other Poems” and his best known book “The Rural Muse.” Today, children at the John Clare […]

Antonio Cisneros (1942 - 2012)

Poet, Author. His works include “Exile” (1961), “David” (1962), “Royal Commentaries” (1964), “The water doesn’t have to drink” (1971), “As a fig tree on a golf course” (1972) , “The book of God and the Hungarians” (1978), “The immense celestial questions” (1992), “A cruise to Galapagos Islands” (2005) and “Diary of a hospitalized diabetic” (2010). […]

Johannes Ciconia (1970 - 1412)

Composer, Theorist. An important figure in music’s transition from the Medieval to Renaissance periods. Belgian by birth, he spent most of his life in Italy and his surviving output blends Franco-Flemish and Italian inflences. This was a step in the growing “internationalism” that had its first great synthesis under Guillaume Dufay. Ciconia was born in […]

Reba Churchill (1923 - 1985)

Churchill, with her sister, Bonnie, wrote newspaper columns and radio broadcasts about Hollywood. They also edited such film magazines as “Silver Screen” and “Screenland.” The sisters also wrote books together. (bio by: Scott G) Cause of death: Respiratory complications

Charles Churchill (1970 - 1764)

Poet, Satirist. He was educated at Westminster School, London, before entering Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1749. He was then made curate of South Cadbury, Somerset, before succeeding his father as curate of Rainham, Essex, in 1756. In 1758 he was elected to the curacy and lectureship of St. John’s, Westminster, and also took a teaching […]

Francis Pharcellus Church (1839 - 1906)

Journalist. He served as the editor at the “New York Sun”, and wrote the famous editorial “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus”, which appeared in print on September 21, 1897, as an answer to the question posed by eight-year-old Virginia O’Hanlon.  Family links:  Parents:  Pharcellus Church (1801 – 1886)  Chara Emily Conant Church (1809 […]

Ralph Chubb (1892 - 1960)

British Poet, Printer, and Artist. He was born in Harpenden, Hertfordshire and he died at Fair Oak Cottage in Hampshire. He was influenced by Whitman, Blake, and the Romantics, and his work was the creation of a personal mythology, one that was anti-materialist and sexually revolutionary. His liberalised, nature based romantic view was set out […]

Charles Chilton (1917 - 2013)

Playwright, Author. He will perhaps be best remembered for penning the story “Oh, What a Lovely War!” (1963) which was made into both a successful stage and film adaptation. Born Charles Frederick William Chilton, his father a clerk for his family business (a painting and decoration company) perished during World War I at the age […]

Beatrice Chase (1874 - 1955)

Author. Beatrice Chase was the pen name of Olive Katherine Parr, a British writer who became well known for her Dartmoor-based novels during the first half of the 20th century. She claimed to be directly descended from William Parr, the brother of Catherine, the sixth wife of Henry VIII. She was born in Harrow, Middlesex, […]

William Ellery Channing (1818 - 1901)

Poet. Often referred to as William Ellery Channing the 2nd or simply Ellery Channing, he was the nephew of Dr. William Ellery Channing, the Unitarian preacher of Boston.  The name they shared was also the name of an ancestor who had signed the Declaration of Independence. The younger Channing dropped out of Harvard College and […]

Houston Stewart Chamberlain (1855 - 1927)

Houston Stewart Chamberlain (born Sept. 9, 1855, Southsea, Hampshire, Eng.—died Jan. 9, 1927, Bayreuth, Ger.) was a British-born Germanophile political philosopher, whose advocacy of the racial and cultural superiority of the so-called Aryan element in European culture influenced pan-German and German nationalist thought, particularly Adolf Hitler’s National Socialist movement. Educated at Versailles, Geneva, and Vienna, Chamberlain became an admirer of Richard Wagner, publishing his first work, Notes sur Lohengrin (“Notes […]

Charles Chadwick (1874 - 1953)

Author. Writer on Football for New York World, also wrote articles in syndication to the Chicago Tribune and other papers. Wrote books which include ‘The Cactus’, ‘The Moving House of Foscaldo.’ also short stories in Century and Ladies’ Home Journal. (bio by: Laurie)

Adémar de Chabannes (1970 - 1970)

Chronicler, Composer, Literary Forger. A controversial French monk of the Middle Ages. His “Apostolic Mass for St. Martial” (1029) is Europe’s earliest surviving music score written in the composer’s own hand – and an extraordinary fraud. Adémar was born in Limoges, Limousin, into a family with prominent ties to the Catholic Church. Before 1000 he […]

Julián Centeya (1910 - 1974)

Noted Poet and Composer. Born in Italy as Amleto Enrique Vergiati, had a long and successful career. He wrote “El Recuerdo de la Enfermería de Jaime,” “La Musa Mistonga,” “La Musa del Barro,” and “Vaciadero.” As a composer wrote the tangos “Claudinette,” “La vi llegar,” “Lluvia de Abril,” and many others. (bio by: 380W)

Agatha Christie (1890 - 1976)

Author. One of the most prominent mystery writers, she was born  in Torquay, England, the youngest daughter of Frederick Alvah and Clarissa Miller. As a child, she was educated at home, and later studied singing and piano in Paris. Her writing career began with the publication of “The Mysterious Affair at Styles” in 1920. She […]

Driss Chraïbi (1926 - 2007)

Author. Born in El Jadida, Morocco, Chraïbi is considered the father of the modern Moroccan novel. He moved to Paris in 1946,  where he spent most of his life. His many works have been translated into several languages and examined themes such as colonialism, culture clashes, generational conflict and the treatment of Islamic women. They […]

Erskine Childers (1870 - 1922)

Robert Erskine Childers. Writer who served in the Boer War and first came to notice with his excellent spy thriller, ‘The Riddle of the Sands’ (1903). Clerk of the House of Commons in London until 1910. Sympathised with Irish Nationalists and in 1914 used his yacht, ‘Asgard,’ to run guns from Germany to the Irish […]

Lydia Maria Francis Child (1802 - 1880)

Author. A native of Medford, Massachusetts, she wrote over fifty books, edited periodicals and wrote many poems during her lifetime. Her most popular book was “The Frugal Housewife” which had thirty-three editions and her most famous poem was the Thanksgiving classic “Over the River and Through the Woods to Grandfather’s House We Go”. In addition […]

Dick Chevillat (1905 - 1984)

Writer for motion pictures and television. Most notable for his work on the long running “The Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet” tv series of the 1950s and 60s. (bio by: A.J. Marik)

G.K. Chesterton (1874 - 1936)

Author. He is best known for his novels about the priest-detective Father Brown. Among others works are “The Napoleon of Nothing Hill,” “The Man Who Was Thursday,” “The Innocence of Father Brown,” “The Trees of Pride” and “The Man Who Knew Too Much.” (bio by: José L Bernabé Tronchoni)  Family links:  Spouse:  Frances Alice Blogg […]

Thomas Morris Chester (1834 - 1892)

Journalist. He was the first African-American to cover the Civil War in the field for a major American daily newspaper. Son of an escaped slave, he spent the earlier part of the war recruiting African-Americans in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania for the Union Army; men he recruited would eventually go on to serve in the famous 54th […]

Charles Waddell Chesnutt (1858 - 1932)

Author, Social Reformer. The grandson of a whiteman and the son of free blacks, he was one of the first black writers to use black dialect. His writings were controversial, dealing with subject matter such as interracial sex and “passing” – people legally defined as black but with skin light enough to permit them to […]