Famous People Who Died in July a to z

Alexandra Feodorovna was consort of the Russian Czar Nicholas II. Her rule precipitated the collapse of Russia's imperial government. She was murdered, along with her entire family, in 1918.

Antonio Guzmán Fernández was president of the Dominican Republic from 1978 to 1982, helping to stabilize the economy and demilitarize the government.

Sandford Fleming was a civil engineer and scientist best known as the chief railway engineer of Canada in the 19th century.

Betty Ford became the First Lady when President Nixon resigned and made her Vice President husband, Gerald Ford, the acting President.

Lefty Frizzell is widely recognized as one of the most influential country singers in history. Willie Nelson and Randy Travis count him among their influences.

Margaret Fuller is best known for feminist writing and literary criticism in 19th century America.

Actress Eva Gabor played the socialite turned farm wife, Lisa Douglas, on the TV series Green Acres. Her sisters Zsa Zsa and Magda were also entertainers.

Ed Gein was a notorious serial killer and grave robber. He inspired the creation of several film characters, including Norman Bates (Psycho), Jame Gumb (The Silence of the Lambs) and Leatherface (Texas Chainsaw Massacre).

George Gershwin was one of the most significant American composers of the 20th century, known for popular stage and screen numbers as well as classical compositions.

Estelle Getty played Sophia Petrillo on The Golden Girls, and was one of television’s most popular comedic actresses of the 1980s.

Keith Godchaux is known for his tenure as a keyboardist with the Grateful Dead in the 1970s.

American inventor Charles Goodyear discovered the process of vulcanizing rubber. The Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company was posthumously named after him.

Maxim Gorky was a Russian author who wrote about the lower depths of society. He was a critic of both Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin, and died under mysterious circumstances.

Betty Grable was a musical film star and popular pin up model, after starting as a chorus-line dancer in the 1930's.

Kenneth Grahame was a Scottish author best known for writing the children's book The Wind in the Willows.

Ulysses S. Grant was U.S. general and commander of the Union armies during the late years of the American Civil War, and 18th president of the United States.

Hetty Green was an American businesswoman who lived in the 1800s and was best known as one of the first women to make a fortune on Wall Street.

Andy Griffith is an actor and singer best known for his 1960s starring role in The Andy Griffith Show. He later returned to TV in the drama Matlock.

D.W. Griffith was one of cinema's earliest directors and producers, known for his innovations and for directing the 1915 film Birth of a Nation.

Alexander Hamilton, a delegate to the Constitutional Convention and major author of the Federalist papers, was the United States' first secretary of the treasury.

Hannibal Hamlin was a 19th century U.S. senator who became the country’s 15th vice president, serving under Abraham Lincoln.

U.S. Secretary of State John Hay began his career as Abraham Lincoln’s private secretary, and was later known for promoting an "Open Door" policy in China.

Painter, Al Held was know for his painting complex cube-like structures in the 1960s, and his precise and brightly colored geometric forms in the 1980s.

Republican, Jesse Helms was a United States Senator from North Carolina who served for five terms (1973-2003). He was known for his right-wing politics and opposition to civil rights legislation.

Nobel Prize winner Ernest Hemingway is seen as one of the great American 20th century novelists, and is known for works like A Farewell to Arms and The Old Man and the Sea.

Actor Sherman Hemsley played the popular television character George Jefferson in All in the Family and The Jeffersons in the 1970s and 1980s.

Journalist Theodor Herzl responded to the anti-Semitism he witnessed while covering the Dreyfus Affair by starting the World Zionist Organization.

Jimmy Hoffa was became a labor organizer in the 1930s, rising in the Teamsters Union during the next two decades until he reached the office of president.

Billie Holiday was one of the most influential jazz singers of all time. She had a thriving career for many years before she lost her battle with addiction.

Academy Award-winning actress Celeste Holm is known for her roles in the 1943 Broadway musical Oklahoma! and the film Gentleman's Agreement.

Bob Hope was a entertainer and comic actor, known for his rapid-fire delivery of jokes and for his success in virtually all entertainment media.

Statesman Samuel Houston was a key political figure in the creation of the state of Texas. He was elected the first president of the Republic of Texas in 1836.

Kim Il-sung was the leader of North Korea from 1948 until his death in 1994, heading a communist and highly militaristic administration.

James I was a Spanish king best known for fighting the Moors during his reign from 1213-'76. He is also known as James I the Conqueror and James I of Aragon.

Thomas Jefferson was a draftsman of the Declaration of Independence and the third U.S. president (1801-09). He was also responsible for the Louisiana Purchase.

Andrew Johnson was the successor to Abraham Lincoln and was the first president of the United States to be impeached.

The wife of U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson, Lady Bird Johnson served as first lady from 1963 to 1969.

Brian Jones was a guitarist for rock-and-roll band the Rolling Stones.

Benito Juárez was a national hero and president of Mexico, who, for three years (1864-'67), fought against foreign occupation under Maximilian.

Painter Frida Kahlo was a Mexican self-portrait artist who was married to Diego Rivera and is still admired as a feminist icon.

Carolyn Bessette Kennedy married John F. Kennedy Jr. and was considered a trendsetter and fashion icon. She died in a small plane crash in 1999.

Later the publisher of political magazine George, JFK Jr. was the first child ever born to a president-elect, the son of JFK and Jacqueline Kennedy,

Thomas Klestil was an Austrian statesman and the 10th president of Austria.

Charles Kuralt was a multiple Emmy and Peabody Award-winning broadcast journalist who produced the well-loved "On The Road" segments for the CBS Evening News.

Michael Landon was an American actor, writer, director and producer known for his roles in I Was a Teenage Werewolf, Bonanza and Little House on the Prairie.

Laurence Olivier was one of the most acclaimed actors of the 20th century, known for his numerous Shakespeare roles on stage and screen as well as memorable turns in more modern classics.

Best known as Enron business executive who was convicted of conspiracy and fraud. 20,000 Enron employees lost their jobs and life savings.

Bruce Lee was an actor, film producer and director, and the martial arts expert who founded the Jeet Kune Doe martial arts system.

Vivien Leigh was a British actress who achieved film immortality by playing two of American literature's most celebrated Southern belles, Scarlett O'Hara and Blanche DuBois.

Suzanne Lenglen was a French tennis player who won 31 championship titles between 1914 and 1926. She is largely credited as the first female tennis star.

French physicist Gabriel Lippmann created the first color photographic plate. The creation earned him the 1908 Nobel Prize for Physics.

Franz Liszt was a Hungarian pianist and composer of enormous influence and originality. He was renowned in Europe during the Romantic movement.

Jon Lord is best known for his membership in the hard-rock band Deep Purple in the late 1960s, performing songs like "Demon's Eye" and "Space Truckin'." He later joined the band Whitesnake, which gained wide fame in the 1980s.

Dora Maar was a French artist and poet best known as Pablo Picasso's lover and muse.

Dolley Madison is best known as the wife of United States President James Madison, who served from 1809 to 1817.

Herbert Marcuse was an American political philosopher whose Marxists theories of 20th-century Western society influenced liberal student groups in the 1960s.

John Marshall became the fourth chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court in 1801. He is largely responsible for establishing the Supreme Court's role in federal government.

Walter Matthau was an actor known for his gruff on-screen demeanor in such films as The Odd Couple and Grumpy Old Men.

Maurice was duke and elector of Saxony (southeastern Germany) during the 16th century.

Billy the Kid is best known for his time as a thief and gunfighter, constantly on the run from law enforcement.

Pulitzer Prize winning author Frank McCourt wrote the biography Angela’s Ashes after retiring from teaching for 30 years in New York City.

James Abbott McNeill Whistler was a U.S.-born British painter who was highly influential in the late 19th century. His best-known work is "Whistler's Mother."

Tammy Faye Messner was the wife of disgraced televangelist Jim Bakker, with whom she hosted The 700 Club and the Praise the Lord Club. The couple split in 1992, after Jim Bakker's affair with a church secretary surfaced.

Married to Judy Garland and father to Liza Minnelli, film director Vincente Minnelli infused a new sophistication and vitality into movie musicals of the 1940s and '50s.

Jamaican reggae singer-songwriter Sugar Minott was best known for his hit, "Good Thing Going," a cover of Michael Jackson's "We've Got a Good Thing Going." Minott's version reached No. 4 on the British singles chart in 1981.

A legendary tough guy on and off-screen, Robert Mitchum was one of the most memorable leading men of the twentieth century.

The fifth president of the United States, James Monroe is known for his "Monroe Doctrine," disallowing further European colonization in the Americas.

Thomas More is known for his 1516 book Utopia and for his untimely death in 1535, after refusing to acknowledge King Henry VIII as head of the Church of England. He was canonized by the Catholic Church as a saint in 1935.

Jim Morrison was the charismatic singer and songwriter for the 1960 rock group the Doors until his death in a Paris bathtub at age 27.