December 17
December 17 is the 351st day of the year (352nd in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar. There are 14 days remaining.
Events
Births
- 1778 - Humphry Davy, chemist (d. 1829)
- 1796 - Thomas Chandler Haliburton, novelist (d. 1865)
- 1799 - Titian Peale, artist
- 1807 - John Greenleaf Whittier, poet, abolitionist (d. 1892)
- 1830 - Jules Alfred Huot de Goncourt, Prix Goncourt (d. 1870)
- 1853 - Herbert Beerbohm Tree, actor (d. 1917)
- 1872 - Mistinguett, actress, singer (d. 1956)
- 1873 - Ford Madox Ford, writer (d. 1939)
- 1874 - William Lyon Mackenzie King, tenth Prime Minister of Canada (d. 1950)
- 1892 - Sam Barry, Hall of Fame basketball coach
- 1893 - Erwin Piscator, film director (d. 1966)
- 1894 - Arthur Fiedler, conductor (d. 1979)
- 1894 - Hans Henny Jahnn, dramatist, narrator and essayist (d. 1959)
- 1901 - Lee Strasberg, actor, director, acting teacher (d. 1982)
- 1903 - Erskine Caldwell, author (d. 1987)
- 1906 - Simo Häyhä, most successful sniper in history (d. 2002)
- 1906 - Soichiro Honda , automobile pioneer (d. 1992)
- 1908 - Willard Frank Libby, physicist and chemist, inventor of radiocarbon dating (d. 1980)
- 1925 - Rock Hudson, actor (d. 1985)
- 1929 - William Safire, columnist
- 1930 - Armin Mueller-Stahl, actor
- 1930 - Bob Mathias, athlete
- 1930 - Bob Guccione, publisher of Penthouse magazine
- 1931 - Constantin Freiheer von Heeremann, president of Germany's National Farmers' Union
- 1938 - Gordon Lightfoot, musician
- 1938 - Peter Snell, New Zealand athlete
- 1939 - Eddie Kendricks, musician
- 1941 - Gene Clark, musician
- 1942 - Paul Butterfield, musician (d. 1987)
- 1943 - Ron Geesin, musician.
- 1943 - Lauren Hutton, model, actress
- 1944 - Jack L. Chalker, novelist
- 1944 - Danny DeVito, actor
- 1944 - Lorne Michaels, producer
- 1945 - Elvin Hayes, basketball star
- 1947 - Wes Studi, actor
- 1951 - Ken Hitchcock, NHL coach
- 1955 - Brad Davis, basketball player
- 1973 - Paula Radcliffe, distance runner in athletics
- 1975 - Milla Jovovich, actress, model
Deaths
- 1187 - Pope Gregory VIII (b. c. 1100)
- 1273 - Jalal al-Din Muhammad Rumi, Persian poet and sufi mystic (b. 1207)
- 1663 - Nzinga, queen of Ndongo and Matamba (b. 1583)
- 1830 - Simón Bolívar, Latin American politician and activist (b. 1783)
- 1907 - William Thomson, Lord Kelvin, physicist (b. 1824)
- 1909 - King Leopold II of Belgium (b. 1835)
- 1957 - Dorothy L. Sayers, writer (b. 1893)
- 1964 - Victor Franz Hess, US physicist
- 1987 - Irving Allen, producer
- 1987 - Marguerite Yourcenar, novelist (b. 1903)
- 1992 - Dana Andrews, actor (b. 1909)
- 1998 - Claudia Benton, child psychologist
- 1999 - Grover Washington Jr., musician
Holidays and observances
Recorded this day
December 16 - December 18 - November 17 - January 17 -- listing of all days
