Deaths in December 1999

The following is a list of notable deaths in December 1999.

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.

1

 * Gene Baker, 74, American baseball player.
 * Ctirad Benáček, 75, Czech basketball player.
 * Stephen Brooks, 57, American actor (The F.B.I., Days of Our Lives, The Interns), heart attack.
 * Fritz Fischer, 91, German historian.
 * Pop Gates, 82, American basketball player.
 * Santidev Ghosh, 89, Indian author, singer, actor and dancer.
 * Luigi Granelli, 70, Italian politician.
 * Marilyn Harris, 75, American child actress (Frankenstein), cancer.
 * Jaakko Jalas, 79, Finnish botanist.
 * Tomás Pablo, 78, Chilean politician and architect.
 * Victor Perlo, 87, American Marxist economist.
 * Massimo Pupillo, 70, Italian film director.
 * Alexander Tatarenko, 74, Soviet Russian painter and art teacher.

2

 * Joey Adams, 88, American comedian, vaudevillian, radio host, and author.
 * Charlie Byrd, 74, American jazz guitarist, lung cancer.
 * Matt Cohen, 56, Canadian writer, lung cancer.
 * Giorgio Cristallini, 78, Italian screenwriter and film director.
 * Daniel J. Elazar, 65, American professor of political science.
 * Vladimir Kravtsov, 50, Soviet and Russian handball player and Olympic champion.
 * Ethelmary Oakland, 90, American child actress.
 * Mike Ockrent, 53, British stage director.

3

 * John Archer, 84, American actor (White Heat, Blue Hawaii, Lassie), lung cancer.
 * Enrique Cadícamo, 99, Argentine tango lyricist, poet and novelist, heart failure.
 * Anne Francine, 82, American actress (Harper Valley PTA, Crocodile Dundee, All My Children) and cabaret singer, stroke.
 * Conrad Hunte, 67, Barbadian cricketer, heart attack.
 * Scatman John, 57, American jazz musician ("Scatman (Ski-Ba-Bop-Ba-Dop-Bop)", "Scatman's World") and poet, lung cancer.
 * Madeline Kahn, 57, American actress (Young Frankenstein, Blazing Saddles, Clue), Tony winner (1993), ovarian cancer.
 * Boris Kuznetsov, 71, Russian and Soviet football player.
 * Tami Mauriello, 76, American boxer and actor (On the Waterfront).
 * Edmond Safra, 67, Lebanese Brazilian banker, smoke inhalation injury.
 * Walter Schleger, 70, Austrian football player.
 * Jarl Wahlström, 81, Finnish salvationist, 12th General of the Salvation Army.

4

 * Heinrich C. Berann, 84, Austrian painter and cartographer.
 * Rose Bird, 63, American first female justice, breast cancer.
 * Charlotte H. Bruner, 82, American scholar.
 * Sylvester Clarke, 44, West Indian cricketer, heart attack.
 * Slobodan Dimitrijević, 58, Serbian television and film actor.
 * Bert Hoffmeister, 92, Canadian Army officer, businessman, and conservationist.
 * Nilde Iotti, 79, Italian politician of the Communist Party, heart attack.
 * Barry Mahon, 78, American film director, cinematographer and producer.
 * Daishōhō Masami, 32, Japanese sumo wrestler, pancreatic cancer.
 * Sue Partridge, 69, British tennis player.
 * John Douglas Pringle, 87, Australian journalist.
 * Nélida Roca, 70, Argentinian showbusiness diva and sex symbol, heart attack.
 * Edward Vesala, 54, Finnish avant-garde jazz drummer, congestive heart failure.
 * Alick Walker, 74, British palaeontologist.

5

 * Claude Ballot-Léna, 63, French racing driver, cancer.
 * Edvin Biuković, 30, Croatian comics artist, brain tumor.
 * Joseph Andorfer Ewan, 90, American botanist, naturalist, and historian of botany and natural history.
 * Lajos Faluvégi, 75, Hungarian politician.
 * Nathan Jacobson, 89, Polish-American mathematician.
 * Bobby Marchan, 69, American R&B singer-songwriter, liver cancer.
 * Edoardo Martino, 89, Italian politician.
 * Bohumil Musil, 77, Czech football player and manager.
 * Masaru Sato, 71, Japanese film composer (The Hidden Fortress, Throne of Blood, Yojimbo).
 * Kendall Taylor, 94, British pianist.

6

 * Paul Bacon, 92, French politician.
 * Alexander Baron, 82, British author and screenwriter.
 * Gwyn Jones, 92, Welsh novelist and story writer.
 * Martha Sharp, 94, American unitarian.
 * Robert A. Swanson, American venture capitalist, brain cancer.
 * Stan Wallace, 68, American gridiron football player (Chicago Bears).

7

 * Kenny Baker, 78, British jazz musician.
 * Darling Légitimus, 92, French actress.
 * Alfons Moog, 84, German football player.
 * William Wiley, 68, South African cricket player.

8

 * Ernst Günther, 66, Swedish actor and director, diabetes.
 * Rupert Hart-Davis, 92, English publisher.
 * Wally Hebert, 92, American baseball player.
 * František Ipser, 72, Czech football manager and player.
 * Péter Kuczka, 76, Hungarian writer, poet and science fiction editor.
 * Everett Carll Ladd, 62, American political scientist, heart failure.
 * Ange Le Strat, 81, French racing cyclist.
 * Pupella Maggio, 89, Italian film actress, cerebral hemorrhage.
 * Richard P. Powell, 91, American novelist.
 * Antônio Dias dos Santos, 51, Brazilian football player.
 * Néstor Togneri, 57, Argentine football player.

9

 * Oudom Khattigna, 69, Laotian communist politician, Vice President (1998-1999).
 * Whitey Kurowski, 81, American baseball player.
 * Yakov Rylsky, 71, Soviet sabre fencer and Olympic champion, liver cirrhosis.
 * Shinkichi Takemura, 67, Japanese Olympic speed skater.
 * Cecil H. Williamson, 90, British screenwriter, editor and film director.

10

 * Charles Assalé, 88, Cameroonian politician.
 * Antonio Blanco, 87, Spanish and American painter, heart and kidney disease.
 * Rick Danko, 56, Canadian musician (The Band), heart failure.
 * Pietro De Vico, 88, Italian film actor, stroke.
 * Ed Dorn, 70, American poet, pancreatic cancer.
 * Lex Goudsmit, 86, Dutch actor, stroke.
 * Shirley Hemphill, 52, American comedian and actress (What's Happening!!), renal failure.
 * Jean-Claude Michel, 74, French actor and voice actor.
 * Mike Randall, 80, British journalist and editor.
 * Niccolò Tucci, 91, Short story writer and novelist.
 * Franjo Tuđman, 77, Croatian politician, President of Croatia (since 1990), cancer.

11

 * Charles Earland, 58, American jazz organist, heart failure.
 * Enrica Follieri, 73, Italian philologist and paleographer.
 * Ed Jones, 87, American politician.
 * Jack Oldfield, 100, British landowner and politician.
 * Harry Wüstenhagen, 71, German film actor.
 * Hans K. Ziegler, 88, German-American satellite engineer.

12

 * James Balfour, 71, Canadian politician.
 * Huelet Benner, 82, American multi-discipline pistol shooter and Olympic champion.
 * Paul Cadmus, 94, American artist.
 * Gordon Chater, 77, English Australian comedian and actor.
 * Gaston Diehl, 87, French professor of art history and an art critic.
 * Joseph Heller, 76, American novelist (Catch-22), heart attack.
 * Ladislav Józsa, 51, Slovak football player.
 * Matty Kemp, 92, American film actor.
 * Luz Oliveros-Belardo, 93, Filipina pharmaceutical chemist.
 * Ignacio Quirós, 68, Argentine actor, cancer.
 * Leo Smit, 78, American composer and pianist, heart failure.
 * John W. R. Taylor, 77, British aviation expert.
 * Claes Thelander, 83, Swedish actor.

13

 * Peter Adams, 61, New Zealand-Australian actor, cancer.
 * Jill Craigie, 88, English documentary film director, screenwriter and feminist, heart failure.
 * Stane Dolanc, 74, Yugoslav communist politician, cerebral stroke.
 * Maury Gertsman, 92, American cinematographer.
 * Tarmo Uusivirta, 42, Finnish professional boxer, suicide.
 * Robert Wagenhoffer, 39, American figure skater, complications of AIDS.
 * Ian Watt, 82, English literary critic and academic.
 * Lady Mary Whitley, 75, British noblewoman.

14

 * Sven Berlin, 88, English painter, writer and sculptor.
 * Sándor Holczreiter, 53, Hungarian weightlifter and Olympic medalist.
 * Douglas Leigh, 92, American advertising executive.
 * Walt Levinsky, 70, American big band player, composer, arranger and bandleader, brain cancer.
 * J. W. Lockett, 62, American football player.

15

 * Georges Aeby, 86, Swiss football player.
 * Rune Andréasson, 74, Swedish comic creator, cancer.
 * Francis L. K. Hsu, 90, Chinese-American anthropologist.
 * Eddie Kazak, 79, American baseball player.
 * León Martinetti, 73, Argentine basketball player.

16

 * Henry Helstoski, 74, American politician.
 * Dorit Kreysler, 90, Austrian film actress.
 * Ruth Welting, 50, American operatic soprano.
 * Jorge Tuero, Venezuelan television actor and comedian, killed during the Vargas tragedy.

17

 * Rex Allen, 78, American actor and singer-songwriter, traffic accident.
 * Leo P. Carlin, 91, American politician.
 * Ken W. Clawson, 63, American journalist and spokesman for U.S. President Richard Nixon, heart attack.
 * Paolo Dezza, 98, Italian Jesuit cardinal of the Catholic church.
 * François Dyrek, 66, French actor, heart attack.
 * Rufus Lewis, 80, American baseball pitcher.
 * Jürgen Moser, 71, German-American mathematician.
 * Grover Washington, Jr., 56, American jazz saxophonist, heart attack.
 * C. Vann Woodward, 91, American historian and Pulitzer prize winner.

18

 * Þór Beck, 59, Icelandic footballer.
 * Robert Bresson, 98, French film director.
 * Robert Dougall, 86, English broadcaster and ornithologist.
 * Joe Higgs, 59, Jamaican reggae musician, cancer.
 * Dennis W. Sciama, 73, British physicist.
 * John Southgate, 73, British Anglican priest.
 * Benito Stefanelli, 71, Italian film actor, stuntman and weapons master.
 * Bertha Swirles, 96, British physicist.
 * Logan Wright, 66, American pediatric psychologist, heart attack.

19

 * Bal Dani, 66, Indian cricket player.
 * Brendan Hansen, 77, Australian politician.
 * Desmond Llewelyn, 85, British actor (From Russia with Love, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Follyfoot), traffic collision.
 * Marion Worth, 69, American country music singer, complications of emphysema.

20

 * Dick Bertell, 64, American baseball player, influenza.
 * Riccardo Freda, 90, Italian film director.
 * Mario Carreño Morales, 86, Cuban painter.
 * Carin Nilsson, 95, Swedish freestyle swimmer and Olympic medalist.
 * Irving Rapper, 101, American film director.
 * Hank Snow, 85, Canadian country musician, heart failure.
 * James Wainwright, 61, American actor.

21

 * John Arnatt, 82, British actor.
 * Bill Edwards, 81, American actor, rodeo rider, and artist.
 * Michael P. Malone, 59, American historian, cardiomyopathy, heart attack.
 * Bernard Smith, 92, American literary editor, film producer and literary critic.
 * Frank Stanley, 77, American cinematographer (Magnum Force, 10, Grease 2).
 * Jalil Ziapour, 79, Iranian painter and academic.

22

 * Per Aabel, 97, Norwegian actor, artist, dancer and choreographer.
 * Hans Frankenthal, 73, German Holocaust survivor.
 * Tamara Lees, 75, English film actress.
 * Ola Oni, 66, Nigerian political economist, socialist and human right activist.
 * Louis Pohl, 84, American painter, illustrator, printmaker and cartoonist.
 * Benny Quick, 55, German pop and schlager singer, suicide.

23

 * Martin Charteris, Baron Charteris of Amisfield, 86, British Army officer and courtier of Queen Elizabeth II.
 * John Paton Davies, Jr., 91, American diplomat and Medal of Freedom recipient.
 * Wallace Diestelmeyer, 73, Canadian figure skater and Olympic medalist.
 * Timur Gaidar, 73, Soviet and Russian rear admiral, writer and journalist.
 * Silvio Gava, 98, Italian politician.
 * Lois Hamilton, 56, American actress (Summer Rental, The Ropers, The Cannonball Run), suicide.
 * Miroslav Ivanov, 70, Popular Czech nonfiction writer.
 * Vladimir Kondrashin, 70, Soviet and Russian basketball player and coach.
 * Marcel Landowski, 84, French composer, biographer and arts administrator.
 * Billy McGlen, 78, English football player.
 * Eirene White, Baroness White, 90, British politician and journalist.

24

 * Kadathanat Madhavi Amma, 90, Indian Malayalam poet, novelist and short story writer.
 * Tomasz Beksiński, 41, Polish radio presenter, suicide.
 * Peter Boroffka, 67, German politician and member of the Bundestag.
 * Bill Bowerman, 88, American track and field coach and co-founder of Nike, Inc.
 * Reggie Carter, 42, American basketball player.
 * Billy Davenport, 68, American drummer.
 * Maurice Couve de Murville, 92, French politician, 152nd Prime Minister of France.
 * João Figueiredo, 81, 30th President of Brazil, cardiovascular disease.
 * Tito Guízar, 91, American singer and actor, pneumonia.
 * Jiang Hua, 92, President of the Supreme Court of China.
 * Joseph McGahn, 82, American politician.
 * William C. Schneider, 76, American aerospace engineer and NASA mission director.
 * Grete Stern, 95, German-Argentine photographer.

25

 * Arne Ileby, 86, Norwegian football player.
 * Peter Jeffrey, 70, English actor, prostate cancer.
 * Zully Moreno, 79, Argentine film actress, Alzheimer's disease.
 * Michael Bamidele Otiko, 65, Nigerian politician and educator.
 * Alfonso Lastras Ramírez, 75, Mexican lawyer and politician.

26

 * Benny Bartlett, 75, American child actor and musician.
 * Vitold Belevitch, 78, Belgian mathematician and electrical engineer.
 * Ola Skjåk Bræk, 87, Norwegian banker and politician.
 * Prunella Clough, 80, British artist, cancer.
 * Fred Draper, 74, American actor (Faces, A Woman Under the Influence, Columbo).
 * David Duncan, 86, American screenwriter and novelist.
 * Leah Leneman, 55, American historian and cookery writer.
 * Curtis Mayfield, 57, American singer-songwriter ("Superfly", "Move On Up", "Freddie's Dead") and record producer, complications from diabetes.
 * Shankar Dayal Sharma, 81, 9th president of India, heart attack.

27

 * Leslie Brown, 87, British Anglican prelate.
 * Pierre Clémenti, 57, French actor, liver cancer.
 * Leonard Goldenson, 94, American TV and radio executive.
 * Michael McDowell, 49, American novelist and screenwriter (Beetlejuice, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Thinner), AIDS-related illness.
 * Dick Peabody, 74, American actor, prostate cancer.
 * Horst Matthai Quelle, 87, German philosopher.

28

 * Josephine Barnes, 87, English obstetrician and gynaecologist.
 * Joachim Böhmer, 59, East German rower and Olympic medalist.
 * Franco Castellano, 74, Italian screenwriter and film director.
 * Donald Cotton, 71, British writer for radio and television.
 * Louis Féraud, 78, French fashion designer and artist, Alzheimer's disease.
 * Kenneth Hudson, 83, British journalist and broadcaster.
 * Larry Dale Lee, 41, American financial and economic journalist, stabbed.
 * Clayton Moore, 85, American actor (The Lone Ranger), heart attack.
 * Mike Thresher, 68, English football player.

29

 * Robert Hoffstetter, 91, French taxonomist and herpetologist.
 * Edward Hollamby, 78, English architect and town planner, heart disease.
 * Ferenc Rabár, 70, Hungarian politician.
 * Leon Radzinowicz, 93, Polish-British criminologist.
 * José Cláudio dos Reis, 60, Brazilian sports administrator.
 * Gerard Veringa, 75, Dutch politician.
 * Jerzy Waldorff, 89, Polish baron, TV personality and writer.

30

 * Tom Aherne, 80, Irish footballer and hurler.
 * Clint Albright, 73, Canadian ice hockey player.
 * Arthur Bassett, 85, Welsh rugby player.
 * Kjølv Egeland, 81, Norwegian politician.
 * Anna Fehér, 78, Hungarian gymnast and Olympic silver medallist.
 * Sarah Knauss, 119, American supercentenarian and oldest person in the world.
 * Fritz Leonhardt, 90, German structural engineer.
 * Nicholas Marangello, 98, American mobster (Bonanno crime family).
 * Louis Michel, 76, French mathematical physicist.

31

 * Conrado Balweg, 57, Filipino Roman Catholic priest and communist revolutionary, shot.
 * Dean Elliott, 82, American television and film composer, Alzheimer's disease.
 * Ferdinand Finne, 89, Norwegian author, painter, theater decorator and costume designer.
 * William Hughes, Baron Hughes, 88, British politician.
 * Abul Hasan Ali Hasani Nadwi, 85, Indian Islamic scholar and author.
 * Solomiia Pavlychko, 41, Ukrainian literary critic, philosopher, and feminist, carbon monoxide poisoning.
 * Elliot Richardson, 79, American politician and diplomat, cerebral haemorrhage.
 * Hamako Watanabe, 89, Japanese singer, cerebral infarction.