Curated playlist
1966 deaths
- André BretonSurrealist founder André Breton once wrote that firing a revolver blindly into a crowd was the simplest surrealist act.
- Ludwig BinswangerLudwig Binswanger, a Swiss psychiatrist, was born on the 13th of April 1881 and died on the 5th of February 1966. He is described as the most prominent phenomenological psychologist. He is also the figure who did the most to make…
- Buster KeatonBuster Keaton's deadpan face began when he stopped laughing in his father's vaudeville act.
- Walt DisneyIn 1928, Walt Disney lost his hit cartoon rabbit Oswald to Universal. Only Ub Iwerks stayed, and Mickey Mouse followed.
- Vera WeizmannVera Weizmann met her future husband at a Zionist club in Geneva. She later led WIZO for forty years.
- Anna AkhmatovaAnna Akhmatova wrote poems on scraps of paper that visitors read and then burned in her stove.
- Homi J. Bhabha"I am burning with a desire to do physics." A student at Cambridge wrote those words to his father, and he meant every one of them. The student was Homi Jehangir Bhabha, the Indian theoretical physicist who is widely credited as the father…
- Sergei KorolevSergei Korolev stepped out of a black ZIS 110 limousine with his coat collar turned up and his hat brim pulled low. The cosmonaut Alexei Leonov watched from a window and could not make out the visitor's face. He saw only a man a little…
- Pieter GeylDutch historian Pieter Geyl lectured on Napoleon in 1940 and was taken hostage within weeks.
- Boris PodolskyPhysicist Boris Podolsky may have sold Soviet agents a public science law for $300.
- D. T. SuzukiD. T. Suzuki's Buddhist name means both "Great Humility" and "Greatly Clumsy".
- Vinayak Damodar SavarkarVinayak Savarkar jumped from a ship's window at Marseille and swam to shore.
- Charles WhitmanCharles Whitman climbed to the observation deck of the University of Texas clock tower in Austin on the 1st of August 1966 and began firing at people below. The deck sits on the 28th floor of the Main Building. He kept shooting for 96…
- Georges LemaîtreGeorges Lemaître, a Catholic priest, proposed the Big Bang. He called it the "primeval atom."
- Peter DebyeA unit of measurement, a lunar crater and a minor planet all carry Peter Debye's name.
- Guillermo StábileGuillermo Stábile played in the 1930 World Cup because the starting striker had an anxiety attack.