Deaths in 2001

The following is a list of notable deaths in 2001. Names are listed under the date of death, not the date it was announced. Names under each date are listed in alphabetical order by family name.

A typical entry appears in the following sequence:

• Name, age, country of citizenship and reason for notability, established cause of death, reference.

January 2001

• 1 – Ray Walston, 86, American actor, lupus
• 11 – Dorothy M. Horstmann, 89, American virologist who made important discoveries about polio, Alzheimer's disease
• 11 - Sir Denys Lasdun, 86, British architect.
• 12 – Affirmed, 25, American race horse, euthanasia after contracting laminitis
• 12 – William Hewlett, 87, American co-founder of Hewlett-Packard, heart failure
• 13 – Michael Cuccione, 16, Canadian actor and musician, respiratory failure
• 16 – Laurent-Désiré Kabila, 61, President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (1997–2001), assassination
• 17 - Tom Kilburn, 79, British computer scientist.
• 19 - Maxine Mesinger, 75, American newspaper columnist, complications of multiple sclerosis.
• 27 – Mordecai Richler, 69, Canadian author: Jacob Two-Two
• 27 - Sir Colin Woods, 80, British police officer.
• 30 – Jean-Pierre Aumont, 90, French actor, heart attack
• 30 - Johnnie Johnson, 85, British World War II fighter pilot.
• 30 – Joseph Ransohoff, 85, American neurosurgeon
• 30 – John Vernon Taylor, 86, British Anglican bishop
• 31 – Gordon R. Dickson, 77, American science fiction writer, asthma

February 2001

• 4 - Sir David Beattie, 76, New Zealand jurist and Governor-General
• 4 - Pankaj Roy, 72, Indian cricketer.
• 4 – Iannis Xenakis, 78, Greek-French composer
• 4 – J. J. Johnson, 77, American jazz trombonist, suicide
• 7 – Anne Morrow Lindbergh, 94, American author, aviator
• 7 – Dale Evans, 88, actress, singer
• 7 – Sir Michael Grylls, 66, British politician.
• 8 – Leslie Edwards, 84, British ballet dancer.
• 12 – Kristina Söderbaum, 88, German film actress, producer and photographer
• 14 – Richard Laymon, 54, American horror author, heart attack
• 14 – Alan Ross, 78, British poet and editor
• 18 – Balthus, 92, French painter
• 18 – Eddie Mathews, 69, American baseball player, member of the Baseball Hall of Fame, pneumonia
• 18 – Dale Earnhardt, 49, American NASCAR race car driver, crash during race
• 19 – Stanley Kramer, 87, American film director and producer, pneumonia
• 19 – Priscilla Davis, 67, former Fort Worth, Texas socialite, breast cancer
• 19 – Charles Trenet, 87, French singer
• 21 – John MacKay, Baron MacKay of Ardbrecknish, 62, British politician
• 22 – Les Medley, 80, England international footballer, natural causes
• 24 – Claude Elwood Shannon, 84, American electrical engineer and mathematician
• 25 – Sir Donald Bradman, 92, Australian cricketer

March 2001

• 4 – Harold Stassen, 93, American politician.
• 4 – Glenn Hughes, 50, leather dude of the pop group The Village People, lung cancer
• 9 – Leopold Page, 87, Polish-American Holocaust survivor
• 12 – Robert Ludlum, 73, author of spy novels
• 12 – Morton Downey, Jr., 67, American television personality, lung cancer
• 13 - Henry Lee Lucas, 64, American convicted criminal, natural causes
• 15 – Ann Sothern, 92, actress, former wife of the actor Robert Sterling, stroke
• 16 – Dame Marjorie Bean, 91, Bermudian politician
• 18 – John Phillips, 65, American singer, co-founder of The Mamas & the Papas, heart failure
• 21 – Norma Macmillan, 80, American cartoon voice actress
• 21 – Chung Ju-yung, 86, Founder of the Hyundai Group, natural causes
• 22 – Stepas Butautas, 75, Lithuanian basketball player
• 22 – William Hanna, 90, American animator, co-founder (with Joseph Barbera) of the Hanna-Barbera animation studio, throat cancer.
• 22 – Sabiha Gökçen, 88, the first Turkish female aviator and the first female combat pilot of the world
• 25 – Willie Horne, 79, British rugby league player.
• 25 – Brian Trubshaw, 77, British test pilot.
• 28 – Moe Koffman, 72, Canadian flautist and saxophonist, cancer

April 2001

• 3 – Michael Berry, Baron Hartwell, 89, British newspaper proprietor.
• 7 – Sir Derek Lang, 87, British army general.
• 7 – Beatrice Straight, 86, Academy Award-winning actress (Network, Poltergeist)
• 10 – John M. Edmond, 67, British geochemist.
• 10 – Nyree Dawn Porter, 65, New Zealand actress.
• 10 – Willie Stargell, 61, American baseball player, member of the Baseball Hall of Fame
• 11 – Graciela Naranjo, 84, Venezuelan singer and actress; a radio, cinema and television pioneer in her homeland
• 11 – Sir Harry Secombe, 79, Welsh actor, comedian, member of The Goon Show, prostate cancer
• 12 – Harvey Ball, 79, American inventor of the smiley
• 14 – Bryan Ranft, 83, British historian
• 15 – Joey Ramone (b. Jeffry Hyman), 49, American musician, lead singer for The Ramones, lymphoma
• 16 – Alec Stock, 84, English footballer and football manager
• 20 - Bert Sutcliffe, 77, New Zealand cricketer
• 22 - John F. Allen, 92, Canadian physicist.
• 24 – Peter Nugent, 63, Australian politician
• 25 – Michele Alboreto, 44, Italian racing driver

May 2001

• 1? – Chandra Levy, 24, intern at the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Washington, D.C.
• 5 – Charles Black, 85, noted constitutional scholar
• 5 – Cliff Hillegass, 83, American creator of CliffsNotes, stroke
• 11 – Douglas Adams, 49, British author, works included The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the two Dirk Gently novels and serials in the series Doctor Who, heart attack
• 11 – Michael J. Bird, 72, British writer
• 12 – Perry Como, 88, American singer
• 12 – Simon Raven, 73, British writer
• 12 – Corissa Yasen, 27, professional basketball player, suicide
• 22 – Whitman Mayo, 70, actor, heart attack
• 25 – Arturo Maly, 61, Argentine actor
• 26 – Anne Haney, 67, actress, heart failure
• 27 - Jack Scowen, 65, Canadian politician
• 28 – Francisco Varela, 54, Chilean biologist and philosopher

June 2001

• 1 – King Birendra, 55, King of Nepal
• 1 – Queen Aiswarya, 51, Queen of Nepal
• 1 – Hank Ketcham, 81, American cartoonist, creator of Dennis the Menace, prostate cancer
• 1 – Marie Brémont, 115, Oldest Person in the World and last known person documented as born in 1886.
• 2 - Imogene Coca, 92, American actress
• 3 – Anthony Quinn, 86, Mexican-American actor
• 4 – Joey Maxim, 79, world Light Heavyweight champion boxer
• 4 – King Dipendra of Nepal, 29
• 10 – Princess Leila of Iran, 31
• 11 – Timothy McVeigh, 33, American convicted terrorist
• 12 – Thomas Wilson, 73, British composer
• 15 – Henri Alekan, 92, French cinematographer, leukemia
• 18 – Dame Rosamund Holland-Martin, 86, head of the NSPCC
• 20 – Bob Keegan, 80, baseball player
• 21 – Carroll O'Connor, 76 American actor
• 21 – John Lee Hooker, 83, American Blues musician
• 21 – Souad Hosni, 59, Egyptian actress
• 26 - Robert Smith, 88, American actor
• 27 – Tove Jansson, 86, Finnish author
• 27 – Jack Lemmon, 76, American actor and film director, bladder and colorectal cancer
• 28 – Joan Sims, 71, British actress
• 30 – Chet Atkins, 77, American country musician

July 2001

• 3 – Delia Derbyshire, 64, British musician, renal failure
• 5 – Hannelore Kohl, 68, wife of ex-chancellor of Germany Helmut Kohl, suicide
• 12 – John Wright, 72, British boxer
• 11 – Herman Brood, 54, Dutch rock musician, suicide
• 16 – Terry Gordy, 40, pro wrestler; founding member of the Fabulous Freebirds, heart attack
• 18 – Fabio Taglioni, 80, automotive engineer
• 20 – Carlo Giuliani, 19, Italian anarchist, murder
• 21 – Sivaji Ganesan, 74, famous Indian actor, respiratory problems
• 21 – John Hughes, 93, British Anglican prelate
• 21 – Hiroshi Tsuburaya, 37, famous Japanese actor, liver cancer
• 22 - William Llewellyn, 93, British Anglican prelate
• 27 – Leon Wilkeson, 49, American musician, bassist for Lynyrd Skynyrd
• 27 – Thomas Pitt Cholmondeley-Tapper, 90, first New Zealand auto racing driver
• 29 – Wau Holland, 49, German hacker, founder of the CCC, heart attack
• 29 – Edward Gierek, 88, Polish politician
• 29 – Edward Roberts, 93, British prelate
• 31 – A. G. Dickens, 91, British historian

August 2001

• 1 – Joe Lynch, 76, Irish actor
• 1 – Korey Stringer, 26, American football player, complications brought on by heat stroke
• 1 – Poul Anderson, 74, American fantasy and Science Fiction author, cancer
• 3 – Christopher Hewett, 79, British actor
• 4 – Lorenzo Music, 64, American voice actor known for the voice of the cartoon cat Garfield, complications related to lung and bone cancer
• 6 – Jorge Amado, 88, Brazilian writer
• 6 – Dame Dorothy Tutin, 71, British actress
• 9 – Humphry Bowen, 72, British botanist and chemist
• 10 – Bob Johnson, 60, British businessman
• 13 – John C. Elliott, 82, American politician and 39th Governor of American Samoa
• 15 – Jim Russell, 92, Australian cartoonist
• 19 – Donald Woods, 67, South African journalist, newspaper editor, and anti-apartheid activist, made famous by exposing the killing of his friend, Steve Biko, by South African security forces
• 20 – Sir Fred Hoyle, 86, British astronomer and science fiction writer
• 22 – Bobby Johnstone, 71, Scottish footballer (Hibernian, Manchester City, Oldham Athletic, Scotland)
• 25 – Aaliyah, 22, American R&B singer and actress (Plane crash)
• 29 – Graeme "Shirley" Strachan, 50, Australian singer and television presenter

September 2001

• 1 – Bobby Evans, 74, Scottish football player
• 2 – Christiaan Barnard. 78, South African heart surgeon, first to perform a human-to-human heart transplant
• 3 – Frank Billinge. 107, World War I pilot
• 3 – Thuy Trang, 27, Vietnamese American actress, played a role as Trini Kwan from Mighty Morphin Power Rangers
• 3 – Pauline Kael. 82, American movie critic
• 5 – Justin Wilson, 87, Cajun chef and humorist
• 6 – Megan Connolly, 27, Australian actress, heroin overdose
• 7 – Spede Pasanen, 71, Finnish television star
• 9 – Ahmed Shah Massoud, 48, Afghan Northern Alliance military commander
• 11 – The September 11 attacks take place
  • See: Casualties of the September 11 attacks
  • And: Hijackers in the September 11 attacks
• 11 – David Angell, 55, American television producer
• 11 – Garnet Bailey, 53, Canadian ice hockey player and scout
• 11 – Todd Beamer, 32, American airline passenger
• 11 – Berry Berenson, 53, American actress and photographer
• 11 – Mark Bingham, 31, American airline passenger
• 11 – Tom Burnett, 38, American airline passenger
• 11 – Jeremy Glick, 31, American airline passenger
• 11 – Barbara Olson, 45, American television commentator
• 11 - John P. O'Neill, 49, American Counterterrorism expert
• 11 – Alice Stewart Trillin, 63, American author and film producer (heart failure)
• 12 – Victor Wong, 74, American movie actor and artist
• 14 – Barbara Ansell, 78, British rheumatologist
• 15 – June Salter, 69, Australian actor
• 18 – Ernie Coombs, 73, American born actor. Long time host of Canadian children's show Mr. Dressup on CBC
• 19 – David Thomas, 89, Welsh cricketer
• 20 – Hinky Harris, 66, Canadian ice hockey player.
• 22 – Isaac Stern, 81, Ukrainian violinist, congestive heart failure
• 28 – Martin O'Hagan, 51, Irish investigative journalist, murdered.
• 29 – Nguyễn Văn Thiệu, 78, former President of South Vietnam
• 30 – Madhavrao Scindia,56, Prominent Indian politician and minister,a royal family member, Maharaja of Gwalior

October 2001

• 4 – Blaise Alexander, 25, American race car driver, race crash
• 4 – John Collins, 88, American jazz guitarist.
• 7 – Christopher Adams, 46, pro wrestler and judoka, brother of Olympic Judo star Neil Adams
• 9 – Herbert Ross, 74, American film director
• 11 – Nada Mamula, 74, Yugoslavian sevdalinka singer
• 12 – Lord Hailsham of St Marylebone (Quintin Hogg), 94, British lawyer and politician
• 13 – Ubi Dwyer, 68, Irish anarchist.
• 14 - David Lewis, 60, American philosopher
• 15 – Anne Ridler, 89, British poet and editor
• 15 – Zhang Xueliang, 100, Chinese warlord and military figure. Important individual in recent Chinese history
• 17 - Jack Smith, 77, American NASCAR driver.
• 23 - Ken Aston, 86, British football referee
• 26 – John Platts-Mills, 95, British politician and lawyer
• 31 – Angus MacVicar, 93, British author.

November 2001

• 3 – Princess Sophie of Greece and Denmark, 87, European royalty, sister of Prince Philip.
• 9 - Denis Atkinson, 75, Barbadian cricketer, captain of West Indies.
• 10 – Ken Kesey, 66, American author, counter-cultural figure
• 11 - John R. Foley, 84, American politician
• 12 – Tony Miles, 46, English chess player
• 13 – Peggy Mount, 86, English actress (Oliver!, The Princess and the Goblin)
• 16 - Tommy Flanagan, 71, American jazz pianist, brain aneurysm
• 18 – Malcolm McFee, 52, Actor
• 21 - Salahuddin of Selangor, 75, Malaysian head of state.
• 22 – Mary Kay Ash, 83, American businesswoman, founder of Mary Kay Cosmetics
• 23 – Mary Whitehouse, 91, British campaigner against permissiveness.
• 24 – Melanie Thornton, 34, singer, plane crash near Zürich
• 25 – Riaz Ahmed Gohar Shahi, Pakistani author, Spiritual Leader and founder of International Spiritual Movement Anjuman Serfaroshan-e-Islam
• 28 - Michael Yates, 82, British television designer
• 29 – John Knowles, 75, author, A Separate Peace
• 29 – George Harrison, 58, British musician and former member of The Beatles
• 30 – Robert Tools, 59, first recipient of a self-contained artificial heart

December 2001

• 2 – John W. Collins, 89, American chess teacher
• 2 – Valorie Jones, The Jones Girls
• 4 – Sultan Salahuddin Abdul Aziz Shah ibni Almarhum Sultan Hisamuddin Alam Shah Al-Haj, 75, Sultan of Selangor and Yang di-Pertuan Agong of Malaysia
• 5 – Sir Peter Blake, 53, New Zealand sailor and environmentalist, shot by pirates on the Amazon River
• 5 – Franco Rasetti, 100, Italian physicist
• 7 – Sir Raymond Powell, 73, British politician
• 8 – Don Tennant, 79, American advertising executive, inventor of Tony the Tiger and the Marlboro Man
• 8 - George Young, 71, American football executive.
• 9 – Michael Carver, Baron Carver, 86, British Field Marshal
• 13 – Yvan Craipeau, 90, French Trotskyist
• 13 – Chuck Schuldiner, 34, death metal guitarist and vocalist
• 15 – Rufus Thomas, 84, R&B/soul singer
• 16 - Stuart Adamson, 43, singer, songwriter, guitarist of Big Country and The Raphaels
• 20 – Léopold Senghor, 95, first President of Senegal; also a world-renowned poet and writer
• 27 – Ian Hamilton, 63, British critic, poet, magazine publisher
• 27 - Paul Hogarth, 84, British artist
• 28 – William X. Kienzle, 73, author of murder mysteries with Catholic priest detective
• 29 – Takashi Asahina, 93, Japanese conductor
• 30 – Eileen Heckart, 82, Oscar-winning American actor
• 30 – Dame Sheila Sherlock, 83, British physician

External links

For more recent deaths, see Deaths in 2012, Deaths in 2011, Deaths in 2010, Deaths in 2009, Deaths in 2008, Deaths in 2007, Deaths in 2006, Deaths in 2005, Deaths in 2004, Deaths in 2003, Deaths in 2002. For earlier deaths, see Deaths in 2000, Deaths in 1999, Deaths in 1998, 1997, 1996, 1995, 1994, 1993, 1992, 1991, 1990, 1989, 1988, ...