Roberto Benigni is an Italian actor, director and producer best known for his 1997 Oscar winning film La Vita e Bella (Life is Beautiful).
1952-
1951-
Comedian John Cleese is most famous for his work with the comedy group Monty Python, and for the popular British television series Fawlty Towers.
1939-
British navigator James Cook discovered and charted New Zealand and Australia's Great Barrier Reef on his ship Endeavor, and later disproved the existence of the fabled southern continent Terra Australis. His voyages provided the first accurate map of the Pacific.
1728-1779
Ruby Dee is an American actress, playwright, screenwriter, activist, poet and journalist, perhaps best known for starring in the 1961 film A Raisin in the Sun. She's also known for her civic work with husband Ossie Davis.
1924-
John Gotti was an organized crime leader who became head of the Gambino family.
1940-2002
1926-1993
Maxine Hong Kingston is a Chinese American author of memoirs and fiction. Her best known work is The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood among the Ghosts.
1940-
1945-
Modernist abstract painter and collage artist Lee Krasner, wife of Jackson Pollock, created the Little Image painting series and the multimedia collage "Milkweed."
1908-1984
Simon Le Bon was lead singer of the 1980s pop group Duran Duran, known for recording the hit song “Hungry Like the Wolf.” He left the group before they later reunited in 2001.
1958-
Roy Lichtenstein was an American pop artist best known for his boldly-colored parodies of comic strips and advertisements.
1923-1997
1924-2005
Actress, singer and fashion designer Kelly Osbourne is the daughter of heavy-metal musician Ozzy Osbourne.
1984-
Sometimes called "the Devil's Violinist," Niccolò Paganini's virtuoso talent, accompanied by his extraordinary dexterity and flexibility, gave him an almost mythic reputation—he is considered by many to be the greatest violinist of all time.
1782-1840
Sylvia Plath was a gifted, troubled poet, known for the confessional style of her work. She wrote the novel The Bell Jar.
1932-1963
1872-1960
1946-
A New York governor who became the 26th U.S. president, Theodore Roosevelt is remembered for his foreign policy, corporate reforms and ecological preservation.
1858-1919
Isaac Merritt Singer, of Singer Manufacturing Company, invented an affordable sewing machine for use in the home and manufactured it with partner Edward Clark.
1811-1875
1917-1993
Writer Dylan Thomas is best known for the poem "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night," the play "Under Milk Wood," and for his heavy drinking.
1914-1953
Grammy Award-winning singer and songwriter Scott Weiland is best known for performing as lead vocalist for Stone Temple Pilots and Velvet Revolver.
1967-