Deaths in 1986

The following is a list of notable deaths in 1986. Entries for each day are listed alphabetically by surname. A typical entry lists information in the following sequence:
 * Name, age, country of citizenship at birth, subsequent country of citizenship (if applicable), reason for notability, cause of death (if known), and reference.

January





 * January 4
 * Christopher Isherwood, English writer (b. 1904)
 * Phil Lynott, Irish musician, lead singer and bassist (Thin Lizzy) (b. 1949)
 * January 5 – Ilmari Salminen, Finnish Olympic athlete (b. 1902)
 * January 6 – Una Merkel, American actress (b. 1903)
 * January 7 – Juan Rulfo, Mexican writer (b. 1917)
 * January 10 – Jaroslav Seifert, Czech writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1901)
 * January 12 – Juan Carlos Corazzo, Uruguayan football player (b. 1907)
 * January 13 – Abdul Fattah Ismail, Leader of the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen (South Yemen) (b. 1939)
 * January 14 – Donna Reed, American actress (b. 1921)
 * January 16 – Herbert W. Armstrong, founded the Worldwide Church of God (b. 1892)
 * January 17 – Abdul Majid Kubar, 4th Prime Minister of Libya (b. 1909)
 * January 23 – Willard Van Dyke, American filmmaker and photographer (b. 1906)
 * January 24
 * Sir Victor Crutchley, British admiral (b. 1893)
 * L. Ron Hubbard, American writer and founder of Scientology (b. 1911)
 * Gordon MacRae, American actor and singer (b. 1921)
 * January 27
 * Nikhil Banerjee, Indian classical sitarist (b. 1931)
 * Lilli Palmer, German actress (b. 1914)
 * January 28 – In the Challenger disaster:
 * Gregory Jarvis, American astronaut (b. 1944)
 * Christa McAuliffe, American astronaut and teacher (b. 1948)
 * Ronald McNair, American astronaut (b. 1950)
 * Ellison Onizuka, American astronaut (b. 1946)
 * Judith Resnik, American astronaut (b. 1949)
 * Dick Scobee, American astronaut (b. 1939)
 * Michael J. Smith, American astronaut (b. 1945)
 * January 29 – Leif Erickson, American actor (b. 1911)

February

 * February 1
 * Alva Myrdal, Swedish politician, diplomat, and writer, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1902)
 * Ida Rhodes, American mathematician, pioneer in computer programming (b. 1900)
 * February 6 – Minoru Yamasaki, Japanese architect, designed the twin towers of the World Trade Center (b. 1912)
 * February 7 – Cheikh Anta Diop, Senegalese historian, anthropologist, physicist, and politician (b. 1923)
 * February 10 – Brian Aherne, British actor (b. 1902)
 * February 11 – Frank Herbert, American author (b. 1920)
 * February 14 – Edmund Rubbra, British composer (b. 1901)
 * February 16 – Howard da Silva, American actor (b. 1909)
 * February 17
 * Jiddu Krishnamurti, Indian philosopher (b. 1895)
 * Paul Stewart, American actor (b. 1908)
 * February 19
 * Francisco Mignone, Brazilian classical music composer (b. 1897)
 * Barry Seal, American smuggler of drugs and arms, aircraft pilot, and money launderer and former Trans Worlds Airlines pilot (b. 1939)
 * Adolfo Celi, Italian actor and director (b. 1922)
 * February 20 – Bert Schneider, Canadian boxer (b. 1897)
 * February 21
 * Helen Hooven Santmyer, American writer (b. 1895)
 * Mart Stam, Dutch architect (b. 1899)
 * February 24 – Tommy Douglas, Canadian politician and "Father of medicare" in Canada (b. 1904)
 * February 25 – Pasquale Festa Campanile, Italian screenwriter, film director and novelist (b. 1927)
 * February 27 – Jacques Plante, Canadian hockey player (b. 1929)
 * February 28 – Olof Palme, Swedish politician, 26th Prime Minister of Sweden (b. 1927)

March

 * March 4
 * Richard Manuel, Canadian musician (The Band) (b. 1943)
 * Howard Greenfield, American songwriter (b. 1936)
 * March 6
 * Adolph Caesar, American actor (b. 1933)
 * Georgia O'Keeffe, American artist (b. 1887)
 * Zhu Guangqian, Chinese esthetician, modern literary theorist, and scholar (b.1897)
 * March 10 – Ray Milland, Welsh-American actor and director (b. 1907)
 * March 13 – Eugen Gerstenmaier, German politician, 20 July Plotter (b. 1906)
 * March 15 – Miguel Darío Miranda y Gómez, Mexican Roman Catholic archbishop and cardinal (b. 1895)
 * March 17 – John Bagot Glubb, British soldier (b. 1897)
 * March 18 – Bernard Malamud, American writer (b. 1914)
 * March 19 – Jon Lormer, American actor (b. 1906)
 * March 22
 * Charles Starrett, American actor (b. 1903)
 * Martin Harlinghausen, German air force general (b. 1902)
 * March 23
 * Moshe Feinstein, Orthodox rabbi (b. 1895)
 * Anastasia Zuyeva, Soviet actress (b. 1896)
 * March 24 – Michael, Prince of Montenegro (b. 1908)
 * March 28 – Virginia Gilmore, American actress (b. 1919)
 * March 29 – Harry Ritz, American actor (b. 1907)
 * March 30 – James Cagney, American actor and dancer (b. 1899)
 * March 31 – Jerry Paris, American actor and director (b. 1925)

April



 * April 1 – Erik Bruhn, Danish ballet dancer and choreographer (b. 1928)
 * April 3 – Sir Peter Pears, English tenor (b. 1910)
 * April 7 – Leonid Kantorovich, Russian economist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1912)
 * April 8 – Yukiko Okada, Japanese idol singer (b. 1967)
 * April 14
 * Simone de Beauvoir, French feminist writer (b. 1908)
 * Jole Bovio Marconi, Italian archaeologist and prehistorian (b. 1897)
 * April 15
 * Jean Genet, French writer (b. 1910)
 * Tim McIntire, American actor (b. 1944)
 * Robert Marjolin, French economist and politician, 1st Secretary-General of the OECD (b. 1911)
 * April 17
 * Paul Costello, American Olympic rower – double sculls (b. 1894)
 * Marcel Dassault, French aircraft industrialist (b. 1892)
 * Bessie Head, South African writer (b. 1937)
 * April 19 – Alvin Childress, American actor (b. 1907)
 * April 20 – Aleksei Arbuzov, Soviet playwright (b. 1908)
 * April 21 – Teodoro Casana Robles, Peruvian lawyer, historian, journalist, archaeologist, photographer and geographer (b. 1900)
 * April 22 – Mircea Eliade, Romanian historian of religions and writer (b. 1907)
 * April 23
 * Harold Arlen, American music composer (b. 1905)
 * Jim Laker, English cricketer (b. 1922)
 * Otto Preminger, Austrian-American film director (b. 1905)
 * April 24 – The Duchess of Windsor (b. 1896)
 * April 26
 * Broderick Crawford, American actor (b. 1911)
 * Bessie Love, American actress (b. 1898)
 * Hermann Gmeiner, Austrian educator (b. 1919)
 * Valery Khodemchuk, Soviet engineer, working at Chernobyl reactor 4 (b. 1951)
 * April 27 – J. Allen Hynek, American ufologist (b. 1910)
 * April 30 – Robert Stevenson, English film director (b. 1905)

May

 * May 2 – Henri Toivonen, Finnish rally car driver (b. 1956)
 * May 3 – Robert Alda, American actor (b. 1914)
 * May 7 – Herma Szabo, Austrian figure skater (b. 1902)
 * May 9
 * Herschel Bernardi, American actor (b. 1923)
 * Tenzing Norgay, Nepalese sherpa (b. 1914)
 * May 11
 * Vladimir Pravik, Soviet firefighter (b. 1962)
 * Aleksandr Akimov, Soviet engineer who was the shift supervisor during the events of the Chernobyl disaster (b. 1953)
 * May 12
 * Elisabeth Bergner, Austrian actress (b. 1897)
 * Alicia Moreau de Justo, Argentine physician, politician, pacifist and human rights activist (b. 1885)
 * May 13 – Vasily Ignatenko, Soviet firefighter who responded to the Chernobyl disaster (b. 1961)
 * May 15
 * Elio de Angelis, Italian race car driver (b. 1958)
 * Theodore White, American writer (b. 1915)
 * May 20 – Helen B. Taussig, American cardiologist (b. 1898)
 * May 22 – Georgie Nokes, American child actor (b. 1936)
 * May 23
 * Sterling Hayden, American actor (b. 1916)
 * Altiero Spinelli, Italian political theorist and European federalist (b. 1907)
 * May 24 – Yakima Canutt, American actor and stuntman (b. 1895)
 * May 25 – Chester Bowles, American politician (b. 1901)
 * May 26 – Gian-Carlo Coppola, American film producer (b. 1963)
 * May 28 – Lurene Tuttle, American actress (b. 1907)
 * May 30 – Perry Ellis, American fashion designer (b. 1940)
 * May 31 – James Rainwater, American physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1917)

June



 * June 3 – Dame Anna Neagle, English actress (b. 1904)
 * June 5 – Bryan Grant, American tennis champion (b. 1909)
 * June 11 – Chesley Bonestell, American painter (b. 1888)
 * June 13 – Benny Goodman, American jazz musician (b. 1909)
 * June 14
 * Alan Jay Lerner, American lyricist (b. 1918)
 * Jorge Luis Borges, Argentine writer (b. 1899)
 * June 16 – Maurice Duruflé, French composer (b. 1902)
 * June 17 – Kate Smith, American singer (b. 1907)
 * June 19
 * Len Bias, American basketball player (b. 1963)
 * Coluche, stage name of Michel Colucci, French comedian and humorist (b. 1944)
 * June 23 – Sir Moses Finley, British classicist (b. 1912)
 * June 26 – Kunio Maekawa, Japanese architect (b. 1905)
 * June 27 – Don Rogers, American football player (b. 1962)
 * June 28 – Mary Anderson, American actress (b. 1897)

July

 * July 3 – Rudy Vallée, American singer, actor, and bandleader (b. 1901)
 * July 4 – Oscar Zariski, Russian mathematician (b. 1899)
 * July 6 – Jagjivan Ram, Indian politician (b. 1908)
 * July 8 – Hyman G. Rickover, American admiral (b. 1900)
 * July 14
 * Raymond Loewy, French-American industrial designer (b. 1893)
 * Joseph Vogt, German classical historian (d. 1895)
 * July 18
 * Buddy Baer, American boxer and actor (b. 1915)
 * Sir Stanley Rous, English administrator, 6th President of FIFA (b. 1895)
 * July 19 – Alfredo Binda, Italian cyclist (b. 1902)
 * July 22 – Floyd Gottfredson, American cartoonist (b. 1905)
 * July 23 – Kazimierz Sikorski, Polish composer (d. 1895)
 * July 24
 * Fritz Albert Lipmann, American biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1899)
 * Yoshiyuki Tsuruta, Japanese Olympic swimmer (b. 1903)
 * July 25
 * Ted Lyons, American baseball player (Chicago White Sox) and member of the MLB Hall of Fame (b. 1900)
 * Vincente Minnelli, American film director (b. 1903)
 * July 26 – W. Averell Harriman, American diplomat and politician (b. 1891)
 * July 31
 * Patriarch Iustin of Romania (b. 1910)
 * Teddy Wilson, American jazz pianist (b. 1912)
 * Chiune Sugihara, Japanese diplomat and humanitarian who saved Jewish WWII refugees (b. 1900)

August





 * August 2 – Roy Cohn, American lawyer (b. 1927)
 * August 6 – Emilio Fernández, Mexican film director, actor and screenwriter (b. 1904)
 * August 11 – Chuck McKinley, American tennis champion (b. 1941)
 * August 19 – Hermione Baddeley, British actress (b. 1906)
 * August 20 – Thad Jones, American jazz musician (b. 1923)
 * August 22 – Celâl Bayar, Turkish politician, 3rd Prime Minister of Turkey and President of Turkey (b. 1883)
 * August 23 – Mikhail Kuznetsov, Soviet actor (b. 1918)
 * August 24 – Harry Benjamin, American endocrinologist and sexologist (b. 1885)
 * August 26 – Ted Knight, American actor (b. 1923)
 * August 27 – George Nēpia, New Zealand Maori rugby player (b. 1905)
 * August 31
 * Jorge Alessandri, Chilean engineer, entrepreneur and politician, 27th President of Chile (b. 1896)
 * Urho Kekkonen, Finnish politician, 21st Prime Minister of Finland and 8th President of Finland (b. 1900)
 * Henry Moore, British sculptor (b. 1898)

September

 * September 1 – Murray Hamilton, American actor (b. 1923)
 * September 3 – Vittorino Veronese, Italian lawyer and international servant, 4th Director-General of UNESCO (b. 1910)
 * September 4 – Hank Greenberg, American baseball player and member of the MLB Hall of Fame (b. 1911)
 * September 4 – Alexei Fofanov, Soviet major and Hero of the Soviet Union
 * September 6 – Blanche Sweet, American actress (b. 1896)
 * September 7 – Omar Ali Saifuddien III, Sultan of Brunei (b. 1914)
 * September 11
 * Jacques Henri Lartigue, French painter (b. 1894)
 * Panagiotis Kanellopoulos, Greek author and politician, 164th Prime Minister of Greece (b. 1902)
 * Henry DeWolf Smyth, American physicist (b. 1898)
 * September 18 – Pat Phoenix, English actress (b. 1923)
 * September 22 – József Asbóth, Hungarian tennis champion (b. 1917)
 * September 23 – Gottfried Freiherr von Banfield, Austro-Hungarian naval aeroplane pilot in the First World War (b. 1890)
 * September 25 – Nikolay Semyonov, Russian chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1896)
 * September 26 – Noboru Terada, Japanese Olympic swimmer (b. 1917)
 * September 27 – Cliff Burton, American musician and songwriter (b. 1962)
 * September 28 – Robert Helpmann, Australian actor, dancer and choreographer (b. 1909)
 * September 29 – Prince Georg of Denmark (b. 1920)

October



 * October 4 – Arno von Lenski, German military officer and general (b. 1893)
 * October 5
 * Hal B. Wallis, American film producer (b. 1898)
 * James H. Wilkinson, British mathematician (b. 1919)
 * October 10 – Michele Pellegrino, Italian Roman Catholic cardinal (b. 1903)
 * October 11 – Georges Dumézil, French philologist and historian (b. 1898)
 * October 14 – Keenan Wynn, American actor (b. 1916)
 * October 16 – Arthur Grumiaux, Belgian violinist (b. 1921)
 * October 19 – Samora Machel, Mozambican military commander, politician and revolutionary, 1st President of Mozambique (b. 1933)
 * October 21 – Fritz Hochwälder, Austrian author (b. 1911)
 * October 22 – Albert Szent-Györgyi, Hungarian physiologist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1893)
 * October 23 – Edward Adelbert Doisy, American biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1893)
 * October 25 – Forrest Tucker, American actor (b. 1919)
 * October 26 – Jackson Scholz, American Olympic athlete (b. 1897)
 * October 28 – Ian Marter, English actor and writer (b. 1944)
 * October 31 – Robert S. Mulliken, American physicist and chemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry (b. 1896)

November

 * November 2 – Paul Frees, American actor, comedian (b. 1920)
 * November 4 – Abdallah El-Yafi, Lebanese politician, 9th Prime Minister of Lebanon (b. 1901)
 * November 5 – Claude Jutra, Canadian film director (b. 1930)
 * November 6 – Elisabeth Grümmer, Alsatian soprano (b. 1911)
 * November 7 – Tracy Pew, Australian musician (b. 1957)
 * November 8
 * Artur London, Czech statesman (b. 1915)
 * Vyacheslav Molotov, Soviet politician (b. 1890)
 * November 11 – Roger C. Carmel, American actor (b. 1932)
 * November 15 – Alexandre Tansman, French composer and virtuoso pianist (b. 1897)
 * November 16 – Siobhán McKenna, Irish actress (b. 1923)
 * November 18 – Gia Carangi, American supermodel (b. 1960)
 * November 21
 * Jerry Colonna, American comedian (b. 1904)
 * Dar Robinson, American stunt performer and actor (b. 1947)
 * November 22
 * Scatman Crothers, American actor, musician (b. 1910)
 * Dinny Pails, Australian tennis player (b. 1921)
 * November 29 – Cary Grant, English actor (b. 1904)

December



 * December 2 – Desi Arnaz, Cuban-American actor, bandleader, musician and television producer (b. 1917)
 * December 8 – Anatoly Marchenko, Soviet dissident and author (b. 1938)
 * December 10 – Susan Cabot, American actress (b. 1927)
 * December 12 – Paul Verner, German politician (b. 1911)
 * December 13
 * Heather Angel, British-American actress (b. 1909)
 * Ella Baker, American civil rights activist (b. 1903)
 * December 14 – Antal Páger, Hungarian actor (b. 1899)
 * December 15 – Serge Lifar, Soviet dancer and choreographer (b. 1905)
 * December 17
 * Guillermo Cano Isaza, Colombian journalist (b. 1925)
 * Wanis al-Qaddafi, Libyan politician, 10th Prime Minister of Libya (b. 1924)
 * December 21 – Willy Coppens, Belgian pilot (b. 1892)
 * December 24
 * Gardner Fox, American writer (b. 1911)
 * Richard van der Riet Woolley, English astronomer (b. 1906)
 * December 26 – Elsa Lanchester, British-American actress (b. 1902)
 * December 29
 * Harold Macmillan, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (b. 1894)
 * Pietro Parente, Italian Roman Catholic cardinal (b. 1891)
 * Andrei Tarkovsky, Russian filmmaker, writer, and film theorist (b. 1932)