Unusual Deaths in 1981
* A 25-year-old dutch woman studying in paris, ren�e hartevelt, was killed and eaten by a classmate, issei sagawa, when he invited her to dinner for a literary conversation. the killer was declared unfit to stand trial and extradited back to japan, where he was released from custody within fifteen months.
* Carl mccunn, in march 1981, paid a bush pilot to drop him at a remote lake near the coleen river in alaska to photograph wildlife, but had not arranged for the pilot to pick him up again in august. rather than starve, mccunn shot himself in the head. his body was found in february 1982.
* Boris sagal, a motion picture-director, died while shooting the tv miniseries world war iii when he walked into the tail-rotor blade of a helicopter and was decapitated.
People who died on April 21 (various years)
* 2006 - T.K. Ramakrishnan, Indian politician
* 2006 - Telê Santana, Brazilian football manager
* 2005 - Gerry Marshall, British racing driver
* 2004 - Mary McGrory, American journalist
* 2003 - Nina Simone, American singer and pianist
* 2000 - Neal Matthews, Jr., American singer
* 1999 - Charles 'Buddy' Rogers, American actor and musician
* 1996 - Jimmy the Greek, American bookie and sports broadcaster
* 1996 - Dzhokhar Dudaev, Chechen leader
* 1991 - Willi Boskovsky, Austrian violinist and conductor
* 1990 - Erté, French artist
* 1989 - Princess Dukhye of Korea
* 1986 - Salah Jaheen, Egyptian poet and cartoonist (b.1930)
* 1985 - Foster Hewitt, Canadian radio pioneer
* 1985 - Tancredo de Almeida Neves, Brazil banker and elected president
* 1985 - Rudi Gernreich, Austrian fashion designer
* 1983 - Walter Slezak, Austrian actor
* 1980 - Sohrab Sepehri, Persian poet and painter
* 1980 - Aleksandr Oparin, Russian biochemist
* 1978 - Thomas Wyatt Turner, American civil rights advocate and agricultural engineer
* 1978 - Sandy Denny, British vocalist
* 1977 - Gummo Marx, American actor and comedian
* 1973 - Arthur Fadden, thirteenth Prime Minister of Australia
* 1971 - François "Papa Doc" Duvalier, Haitian dictator
* 1965 - Edward Victor Appleton, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate
* 1956 - Charles MacArthur, American writer
* 1946 - John Maynard Keynes, English economist
* 1945 - Walter Model, German field marshal
* 1938 - Allama Iqbal, Indian philosopher and poet
* 1930 - Robert Bridges, English poet
* 1924 - Eleonora Duse, Italian actress
* 1918 - Manfred von Richthofen, German pilot
* 1910 - Mark Twain, American author and humorist
* 1868 - Henry James O'Farrell, Australian would-be assassin of Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh (hanged)
* 1852 - Ivan Nabokov, Russian general
* 1825 - Johann Friedrich Pfaff, German mathemattician
* 1815 - Joseph Winston, U.S. Congressman from North Carolina
* 1793 - John Michell, English seismologist
* 1792 - Tiradentes, Brazilian revolutionary
* 1722 - Robert Beverley, Jr., historian of Colonial Virginia
* 1720 - Antoine Hamilton, French writer
* 1719 - Philippe de la Hire, French mathematician and historian
* 1701 - Asano Naganori, Japanese warlord
* 1699 - Jean Racine, French dramatist
* 1574 - Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany
* 1557 - Petrus Apianus, German mathematician
* 1551 - Oda Nobuhide, Japanese warlord
* 1509 - King Henry VII of England
* 1329 - Frederick IV, Duke of Lorraine
* 1142 - Pierre Abélard, French writer
* 1109 - Anselm of Canterbury, Archbishop of Canterbury
* 1073 - Pope Alexander II
* 748 - Empress Genshō of Japan (b. 680)
Unknown Killers Are Quiet
- 15 years, 6 months, 23 days ago
