1552 – Pietro Cataldi, Italian mathematician, born in Bologna, Italy (d. 1626)
1809 – Hermann Grassmann, German linguist and mathematician, born in Stettin, Province of Pomerania, Kingdom of Prussia (d. 1877)
1882 – Giovanni Amendola, Italian anti-fascist and editor-in-chief (Il Mondo), born in Naples, Italy (d. 1926)
1888 – Maximilian Kronberger, German poet, born in Berlin (d. 1904)
1927 – Robert Mills, American physicist (quantum field theory), born in Englewood, New Jersey (d. 1999)
1930 – Richard Davis, American jazz bassist described as “the greatest bass ever heard on a rock album” (Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks), born in Chicago, Illinois
1931 – Tomas Tranströmer, Swedish poet (Nobel Prize for Literature – 2011), born in Stockholm (d. 2015)
1936 – Héctor Quintanar, Mexican composer, born in Mexico City, Mexico (d. 2013)
1951 – Marsha S. Ivins, American astronaut (STS 32, 46, 62, 81), born in Baltimore, Maryland
1985 – John Danks, American baseball player