Biographies
![Notable deaths in 2024](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/68/257668-050-7604C644/Combo-image-of-Louis-Gossett-Jr-Alexei-Navalny-Chita-Rivera.jpg?w=768&h=432&c=crop)
In Memoriam: Deaths in 2024
Here is a list of notable deaths in 2024, arranged in chronological order.
(L-R) © Justin Kase Photography/Shutterstock; © Kirill KUDRYAVTSEV—AFP/Getty Images; © Kristina (Bumphrey/Shutterstock (Assets 257553, 257552, 257554 (L-R))
![Wole Soyinka](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/38/189438-050-1DF9CAA0/Wole-Soyinka-2015.jpg?w=768&h=432&c=crop)
Geraldo Magela/Agência Senado
Wole Soyinka
This Nigerian playwright and political activist was the first Black African to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature.
Geraldo Magela/Agência Senado
Editor's Picks
![Diana, princess of Wales, 1989. (Princess Diana, Lady Diana, Diana Spencer, Diana Frances Spencer)](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/67/194367-050-908BD6E8/Diana-princess-Wales-1989.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
Princess Diana: A Life in Pictures
Remembering the life of “the People’s Princess.”
![Los Angeles Police Department wanted flyer on Elizabeth Short, aka the "Black Dahlia," who was brutally murdered in January 1947. The FBI supported the Los Angeles Police Department in the case, including by identifying Short through her fingerprints that](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/71/196471-131-8FEA8DDD/Daily-Police-Bulletin-Elizabeth-Short-Black-Dahlia-January-1947.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
America’s 5 Most Notorious Cold Cases (Including One You May Have Thought Was Already Solved)
Who wants to play detective?
![Anna May Wong](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/43/230343-050-841F7B56/Anna-May-Wong-1929.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
Anna May Wong
Anna May Wong was an American actress who overcame discrimination and racism to become one of the first Asian Americans to have a successful film career in Hollywood. She appeared in more than 60 movies and also acted on television and on the stage. She was born Wong Liu Tsong in the Chinatown area
![Currier & Ives, the Bloomer costume influenced by Amelia Bloomer who began appearing in public wearing full-cut pantaloons, or "Turkish trousers," under a short skirt nicknamed "bloomers."](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/40/115140-131-CD7510ED/Currier-costume-Ives-Amelia-Jenks-Bloomer.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
12 Influencers Throughout History
Style for the ages.
![Dalip Sing Saund](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/18/252818-050-C87D1D6F/Congressman-Dalip-Singh-Saund-1956.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
Dalip Singh Saund
Dalip Singh Saund was the first Asian American, first Indian American, and first Sikh to be elected to the U.S. Congress. Before serving, he helped change a law so that Indians could become U.S. citizens. Saund was born in Chhajjal Wadi, in the Punjab province of northern India, which at the time
![Tennis player Steffi Graf practices at the 1999 TIG Tennis Classic.](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/41/152041-131-D1F89613/Steffi-Graf-1999.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
10 Queens of the Athletic Realm
Throwing like a girl can be a good thing, too.
![Chandrasekhar, Subrahmanyan](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/08/198708-050-246F4A0D/Subrahmanyan-Chandrasekhar-1983.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar
Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar was an Indian-born American astrophysicist who, with William A. Fowler, won the 1983 Nobel Prize for Physics for key discoveries that led to the currently accepted theory on the later evolutionary stages of massive stars. Chandrasekhar was the nephew of Sir Chandrasekhara
![Lisa Fernandez](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/18/226518-050-9E82D6B4/Lisa-Fernandez-pitches-softball-gold-medal-contest-2004-Summer-Olympics-Athens-Greece-August-23-2004.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
list of Summer Olympic athletes
When sports fans look back and remember the Olympics of years gone by, it is not only their favorite sports that they remember but also the dynamic, talented, and inspiring athletes that made the Games worth watching. Below are select past and future Summer Olympic Games competitors and the
Spotlight: Marie Curie
The Polish-born French physicist was famous for her work on radioactivity, becoming the first woman to win a Nobel Prize in 1903 (for Physics), and later becoming the only woman to win a Nobel in two different fields when, in 1911, she won the Nobel Prize for Chemistry.
Quizzes
![Usain Bolt of Jamaica reacts after breaking the world record with a time of 19.30 to win the gold medal as Churandy Martina (left) of Netherlands Antilles and Brian Dzingai of Zimbabwe come in after him in the Men's 200m Final at the National Stadium during Day 12 of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games on August 20, 2008 in Beijing, China. (Summer Olympics, track and field, athletics)](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/55/235355-131-5EA8CFD4/Usain-Bolt-Jamaica-gold-medal-breaking-world-record-200m-Beijing-Summer-Olympics-August-20-2008.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
I Am the Greatest (Athlete)
Think you know a lot about famous athletes? This quiz might get your GOAT.
![Wheat Field with Cypresses, oil on canvas by Vincent van Gogh, 1889; in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, 73 x 93.4 cm.](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/66/136366-050-224B2E86/Wheat-Field-with-Cypresses-Vincent-van-Gogh-Metropolitan-Museum-of-Art.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
Name that Painter!
Can you tell a Monet from a Manet?
![a postage stamp printed in USA showing an image of Jackie Robinson, CIRCA 1999.](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/29/236229-131-FF5DF4EC/postage-stamp-Jackie-Robinson-circa-1999.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
Who's on that Stamp?
This quiz requires attention—you can't just mail it in.
![(From left): First Ladies Barbara Bush, Nancy Reagan, Rosalynn Carter, Betty Ford, Pat Nixon, and Lady Bird Johnson at the Dedication of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, Simi Valley, California; November 4, 1991. (first lady)](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/89/236189-131-46FF66C0/First-Ladies-dedication-of-Ronald-Reagan-Presidential-Library-November-1991.jpg?w=400&h=225&c=crop)
First Ladies of the United States Quiz
They have been hostesses, helpers, advisers, gatekeepers, guardians, confidantes, and sometimes formidable powers behind the scenes. How much do you know about the first ladies of the United States?
Videos
![David Attenborough: An explorer's life](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/38/253538-138-34445A0B/Biography-Sir-David-Attenborough.jpg)
David Attenborough: An explorer's life
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Galleries
![English naturalist Charles Darwin; undated engraving.](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/47/129247-131-6FFD8CCD/Charles-Darwin.jpg)
Charles Darwin
![Kaiser William II with his second wife Hermine Reuss on their wedding day, November 9, 1922.](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/23/135123-131-1AB67A8C/William-II-Hermine-Reuss-of-Greiz-November-9-1922.jpg)
Royal Weddings
![Bust of ancient greek philosopher and scientist Aristotle.](https://cdn.statically.io/img/cdn.britannica.com/79/142279-131-21B3AA25/Bust-Aristotle.jpg)
Aristotle
Featured Categories
Actors
Katharine Hepburn
Katharine Hepburn was an indomitable American stage and film actress, known as a spirited performer with a touch of eccentricity. She introduced into her roles a strength of character previously considered to be undesirable in Hollywood leading ladies. As an actress, she was noted for her brisk
Sidney Poitier
Sidney Poitier was a Bahamian American actor, director, and producer who broke the colour barrier in the U.S. motion-picture industry by becoming the first African American to win an Academy Award for best actor (for Lilies of the Field [1963]) and the first Black movie star. He also redefined
Dorothy Dandridge
Dorothy Dandridge was an American singer and film actress who was the first black woman to be nominated for an Academy Award for best actress. Dandridge’s mother was an entertainer and comedic actress who, after settling in Los Angeles, had some success in radio and, later, television. The young
Laurence Olivier
Laurence Olivier was a towering figure of the British stage and screen, acclaimed in his lifetime as the greatest English-speaking actor of the 20th century. He was the first member of his profession to be elevated to a life peerage. The son of an Anglican minister, Olivier attended All Saints
Philosophers
Avicenna
Avicenna was a Muslim physician, the most famous and influential of the philosopher-scientists of the medieval Islamic world. He was particularly noted for his contributions in the fields of Aristotelian philosophy and medicine. He composed the Kitāb al-shifāʾ (Book of the Cure), a vast
Plato
Plato was an ancient Greek philosopher, student of Socrates (c. 470–399 bce), teacher of Aristotle (384–322 bce), and founder of the Academy. He is best known as the author of philosophical works of unparalleled influence and is one of the major figures of Classical antiquity. Building on the
Cornel West
Cornel West is an American philosopher, scholar of African American studies, and political activist. His influential book Race Matters (1993) lamented what he saw as the spiritual impoverishment of the African American underclass and critically examined the “crisis” of Black leadership in the
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Russell was a British philosopher, logician, and social reformer, a founding figure in the analytic movement in Anglo-American philosophy, and recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1950. Russell’s contributions to logic, epistemology, and the philosophy of mathematics established
Aviation Legends
Amelia Earhart
Amelia Earhart was an American aviator, one of the world’s most celebrated, who was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. Her disappearance during a flight around the world in 1937 became an enduring mystery, fueling much speculation. Earhart’s father was a railroad lawyer, and her
Charles Lindbergh
Charles Lindbergh was an American aviator, one of the best-known figures in aeronautical history, remembered for the first nonstop solo flight across the Atlantic Ocean, from New York City to Paris, on May 20–21, 1927. Lindbergh’s early years were spent chiefly in Little Falls, Minnesota, and in
Harriet Quimby
Harriet Quimby was an American aviator, the first female pilot to fly across the English Channel. Quimby’s birth date and place are not well attested. (She sometimes claimed 1884 in Arroyo Grande, California.) By 1902, however, it is known that she and her family were living in California, and in
Wright brothers
Wright brothers, were American inventors and aviation pioneers who achieved the first powered, sustained, and controlled airplane flight (1903). Wilbur Wright (April 16, 1867, near Millville, Indiana, U.S.—May 30, 1912, Dayton, Ohio) and his brother Orville Wright (August 19, 1871, Dayton—January