Curated category
1942 births
- Jimi HendrixJimi Hendrix died in London on the 18th of September 1970, at the age of 27, from barbiturate-related asphyxia. He was, by then, the world's highest-paid…
- Martin ScorseseMartin Scorsese had asthma as a boy and could not play sports or join in games with the other children. So his parents and his older brother took him to the…
- Aretha FranklinAretha Franklin heard Otis Redding's reaction to her own version of his song "Respect": "That little girl done took my song away from me." She had added a…
- Harrison FordHarrison Ford was born on the 13th of July, 1942, at the Swedish Covenant Hospital in the Lincoln Square neighborhood of Chicago.
- Roger EbertRoger Ebert typed his last blog post two days before he died on the 4th of April 2013, signing off with words that could have come from any of his 46 years…
- Paul McCartneyPaul McCartney wrote his first song, "I Lost My Little Girl", on a £15 Framus Zenith acoustic guitar he had traded for a nickel-plated trumpet his father…
- Muhammad AliMuhammad Ali walked into the ring on the 25th of February 1964, a 22-year-old from Louisville, Kentucky, facing Sonny Liston, the menacing heavyweight…
- Brian WilsonBrian Douglas Wilson was born on the 20th of June, 1942, in Inglewood, California, and by the age of two he could reproduce a melody after hearing only a few…
- Christina ScullChristina Scull was born on the 6th of March 1942 in Bristol, England, and she would spend much of her life in close proximity to rare and beautiful things.
- Howard KazanjianHoward Kazanjian is nowhere in the credits of The Empire Strikes Back. He took over that production partway through, after original producer Gary Kurtz…
- Janet NelsonJanet Nelson died on the 14th of October 2024, at the age of 82, after years living with Alzheimer's disease. She was known to friends and colleagues by a…
- Magic AlexMagic Alex arrived in England in 1965 with a student visa and a small plastic box full of randomly blinking lights. The box had no purpose. It did nothing.
- David SternDavid Joel Stern was born on the 22nd of September 1942 in Manhattan, and he died on the 1st of January 2020 - New Year's Day - after a brain hemorrhage he…
- Stephen HawkingStephen Hawking spent his final years communicating at roughly one word per minute, twitching a single cheek muscle to select letters from a screen.
- Michael CrichtonMichael Crichton stood 6 feet 9 inches tall, and he spent much of his life feeling out of place because of it. That restlessness never left him.
- Roger McGuinnJames Joseph McGuinn III arrived in Chicago on the 13th of July 1942. His parents worked in journalism and public relations during his childhood years.
- Oscar ZárateOscar Zárate once built a career in advertising in Argentina. He later drew a graphic novel about an advertising man being hunted by a sadistic child.
- Tommy RoeTommy Roe was still soldering wires at a General Electric plant in Atlanta when a phone call changed everything. His song "Sheila" had just reached number 1…
- Patrick OlivellePatrick Olivelle has spent decades asking questions that most people never think to ask: what does it mean to give everything up?
- EusébioEusébio da Silva Ferreira grew up barefoot in the Mafalala neighbourhood of Lourenço Marques, kicking balls made of socks stuffed with newspapers rolled into…
- Richard D. WolffRichard David Wolff was born on the 1st of April 1942 in New Rochelle, New York. His parents had fled Nazism to escape Germany during World War II.
- Gregory NagyGregory Nagy was born Nagy Gergely, in the Hungarian order of family name first, on the 22nd of October 1942, in Budapest.
- Valeri PolyakovValeri Polyakov stepped out of a Soyuz capsule on the 22nd of March 1995 and, refusing the offered chair just a few feet away, walked there himself.
- Jann HaworthJann Haworth was eight years old when she sewed her first petticoat. That small act of making, she would later say, set in motion a way of thinking that…