…(1921–2000), Canadian hockey player; nickname The Rocket; full name Maurice Joseph Henri Richard. Playing for the Montreal Canadiens 1942–60, he was the first professional hockey player to score 50 goals in one season 1944–45, a record that stood until the early 1980s. Hockey Hall of Fame (1961)…
…(b.1940), British pop singer, born in India; born Harry Roger Webb. With his group the Drifters (later called the Shadows), he recorded such songs as ‘Living Doll’ (1959). Since the 1970s he has combined a successful solo pop career with evangelism…
…(1599–1658), English general and statesman, Lord Protector of the Commonwealth 1653-8. Cromwell was the leader of the victorious Parliamentary forces (or Roundheads) in the English Civil War. As head of state he styled himself Lord Protector, and refused Parliament’s offer of the Crown in 1657. His rule was notable for its puritan reforms in the Church of England. He was briefly succeeded by his son Richard (1626–1712), who was forced into exile in 1659…
…the re-establishment of Charles II as King of England in 1660. After the death of Oliver Cromwell in 1658, his son Richard (1626–1712) proved incapable of maintaining the Protectorate, and General Monck organized the king’s return from exile…
…(1888–1957), American explorer, naval officer, and aviator; full name Richard Evelyn Byrd. He claimed to have made the first aircraft flight over the North Pole (1926), although his actual course has been disputed. He was the first to fly over the South Pole (1929)…
…(1817–86), English painter. After killing his father while suffering a mental breakdown, he was confined in asylums, where he produced a series of visionary paintings…
…(1674–1762), Welsh dandy; known as Beau Nash. He was an arbiter of fashion and etiquette in the early Georgian age…
…(1913–94), American Republican statesman, 37th President of the US 1969–74; full name Richard Milhous Nixon. His period of office was overshadowed by the Vietnam War. Re-elected in 1972, he became the first President to resign from office, owing to his involvement in the Watergate scandal…
…(1937-), US race car driver 1958–92. The first stock car driver to achieve career winnings of $1 million, he has 200 career wins and was the first motor sportsman to receive the Medal of Freedom (1992). Motorsports Hall of Fame of America (1989)…
…(circa 1567–1619), English actor. He was the creator of most of Shakespeare’s great tragic roles — Hamlet, Othello, Lear, and Richard III — and was also associated with the building of the Globe Theatre…
…(1925–84), Welsh actor; born Richard Jenkins. He often co-starred with Elizabeth Taylor (to whom he was twice married) in films such as Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)…
…(1804–65), English political reformer, one of the leading spokesmen of the free-trade movement in Britain. From 1838, together with John Bright, he led the Anti-Corn-Law League in its successful campaign for the repeal of the Corn Laws (1846)…
…(b.1941), English biologist. Dawkins’s book The Selfish Gene (1976) did much to popularize the theory of sociobiology. In The Blind Watchmaker (1986) Dawkins discussed evolution by natural selection and suggested that the theory could answer the fundamental question of why life exists…
…(b.1947), American high jumper. He originated the now standard style of jumping known as the ‘Fosbury flop’, in which the jumper clears the bar head first and backwards. In 1968 he won the Olympic gold medal using this technique…
…(circa 1552–1616), English geographer and historian. He compiled Principal Navigations, Voyages, and Discoveries of the English Nation (1598), a collection of accounts of great voyages of discovery…
…(1902–79), American composer; full name Richard Charles Rodgers. He worked with librettist Lorenz Hart (1895–1943) before collaborating with Oscar Hammerstein II on a succession of popular musicals, including The Sound of Music (1959)…
… Baron Rogers of Riverside (b.1933), British architect, born in Italy; full name Richard George Rogers. A leading exponent of high-tech architecture, his major works include the Pompidou Centre in Paris (1971-7), designed with the Italian architect Renzo Piano (b.1937), and the Lloyd’s Building in London (1986)…
…(1864–1949), German composer. With the librettist Hugo von Hofmannsthal he produced operas such as Der Rosenkavalier (1911). Often regarded as the last of the 19th-century romantic composers, Strauss is also known for the tone poem Also Sprach Zarathustra (1896)…
…(1913–75) US opera singer; born Rubin Ticker. A tenor, he sang with the Metropolitan Opera for 30 seasons, beginning with his debut in 1945…
…(1802–78), US architect; born in England. He is best known for his buildings, such as Trinity Church 1839–46 in New York City, that are designed in Gothic Revival style…
…(1813–83), German composer; full name Wilhelm Richard Wagner. He developed an operatic genre which he called music drama, synthesizing music, drama, verse, legend, and spectacle. Notable works: The Flying Dutchman (opera, 1841), Der Ring des Nibelungen (a cycle of four operas, 1847–74), Tristan and Isolde (music drama, 1859), and the Siegfried Idyll (1870)…
… Baron (1913–85), English businessman and engineer. As Chairman of the British Railways Board (1963-5) he was responsible for the closure of a substantial proportion of the British rail network…
…(1831–1916), German mathematician, one of the founders of abstract algebra and modern mathematics…
…(1913–65), English broadcaster; full name Frederick Richard Dimbleby. He was the BBC’s first news correspondent (1936) and was particularly noted for his radio and television commentaries on royal, national, and international events. His sons David (b.1938) and Jonathan (b.1944) have both followed their father into careers in news broadcasting…
…(1844–1901), English impresario and producer. He brought together the librettist Sir W. S. Gilbert and the composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, producing many of their operettas in London’s Savoy Theatre, which he had established in 1881…
…(1848–87), English writer and naturalist renowned for his observation of English rural life; full name John Richard Jefferies. Notable works: Bevis (novel, 1882) and The Story of my Heart (autobiography, 1883)…
…(1618–57), English poet. A Royalist, he was imprisoned in 1642, when he probably wrote his famous poem ‘To Althea, from Prison’…
…(1771–1833), English engineer. His chief contribution was in the use of high-pressure steam to drive a double-acting engine. Trevithick built the world’s first railway locomotive (1804) and many stationary engines…
… Baron Attenborough of Richmond-upon-Thames (b.1923), English film actor, producer, and director; brother of David Attenborough; full name Richard Samuel Attenborough. Notable films directed: Oh! What a Lovely War (1969), Gandhi (1982), and Shadowlands (1993)…
…(1934-), US actor; full name George Richard Chamberlain. Noted for his title role in the television series Dr. Kildare (1961–66), he also starred in the miniseries Shogun (1980) and The Thorn Birds (1983)…
…(1912–2005), English physician; full name William Richard Shaboe Doll. With Sir A. Bradford Hill (1897–1991) he was the first to show a statistical link between smoking and lung cancer…
…(1812–86), American inventor and industrialist. In 1846 he became the first printer to develop a successful rotary press, which greatly increased the speed of printing…
…(1804–92), English anatomist and palaeontologist. Owen made important contributions to evolution, taxonomy, and palaeontology and coined the word dinosaur in 1841. He was a strong opponent of Darwinism…
…(b.1950), English businessman. He made his name with the company Virgin Records, which he set up in 1969. He later influenced the opening up of air routes with Virgin Atlantic Airways, established in 1984…
…(1821–90), English explorer, anthropologist, and translator; full name Sir Richard Francis Burton. He and John Hanning Speke were the first Europeans to see Lake Tanganyika (1858). He translated the Arabian Nights (1885-8), the Kama Sutra (1883), The Perfumed Garden (1886), and other works…
…(1902–76), US politician. As mayor of Chicago 1955–76, he was known as a big-city boss. He also was prominent in the national Democratic Party…
…(1815–82), American adventurer, lawyer, and writer, known for his account of his voyage from Boston round Cape Horn to California, Two Years before the Mast (1840)…
…(b.1951), New Zealand cricketer; full name Sir Richard John Hadlee. An all-rounder, he took a record of 431 Test wickets during his career…
…(1863–1914), US businessman. He founded his first mail-order business, selling watches, in Minneapolis in 1886, moved to Chicago, and sold the business. He then began a partnership with Alvah Curtis Roebuck (1864–1948), a watch repairman, that became Sears, Roebuck & Co. in 1893…
…(1672–1729), Irish essayist and dramatist. He founded and wrote for the periodicals the Tatler (1709–11) and the Spectator (1711–12), the latter in collaboration with Joseph Addison…
…(1732–92), English inventor and industrialist. In 1767 he patented a water-powered spinning machine capable of producing yarn strong enough to be used as warp…
…(1860–1942), British painter, of Danish and Anglo-Irish descent. His subjects are mainly urban scenes and figure compositions, particularly pictures of the theatre and music hall, and drab domestic interiors…
… Earl of (1428–71), English statesman; known as Warwick the Kingmaker. During the Wars of the Roses he fought first on the Yorkist side, helping Edward IV to gain the throne (1461), and then on the Lancastrian side, briefly restoring Henry VI to the throne (1470). Warwick was killed at the battle of Barnet…
…(1918–88), American theoretical physicist, noted for his work on quantum electrodynamics. Nobel Prize for Physics (1965)…
…(1904–89), English economist. He did pioneering work on general economic equilibrium (the theory that economic forces tend to balance one another rather than simply reflect cyclical trends), for which he shared a Nobel Prize with K. J. Arrow in 1972…
…(1840–1902), German physician and psychologist. He established the relationship between syphilis and general paralysis and pioneered the systematic study of aberrant sexual behaviour…
…(1751–1816), Irish dramatist and Whig politician. His plays are comedies of manners; they include The Rivals (1775) and The School for Scandal (1777). In 1780 he entered Parliament, becoming a celebrated orator and holding senior government posts…
