Deaths in February 1997

The following is a list of notable deaths in February 1997.

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

 * Simion Bughici, 82, Romanian politician.
 * Herb Caen, 80, American journalist and columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, lung cancer.
 * Heiner Carow, 67, German film director and screenwriter.
 * Ed Danowski, 85, American football player.
 * Mitchell Goodman, 73, American writer, teacher, and activist.
 * William Kintner, 81, American soldier, foreign policy analyst, and diplomat.
 * Kiki Kogelnik, 62, Austrian painter, sculptor and printmaker, cancer.
 * Thelma Moss, 79, American actress, psychologist and parapsychologist.
 * Lillian Porter, 79, American film and television actress.
 * Marjorie Reynolds, 79, American actress and dancer, heart failure.
 * Bo Russell, 81, American gridiron football player.
 * Francisco Tobar García, 68, Ecuadorian poet, playwright, journalist, and diplomat, lung cancer.
 * Wilcomb E. Washburn, American historian, prostate cancer.

2

 * Godfrey Baseley, 92, British radio executive.
 * Raúl de Anda, 88, Mexican actor, screenwriter, film producer and director.
 * Erich Eliskases, 83, Austrian-Argentinian chess grandmaster.
 * Qin Jiwei, 82, Chinese general and member of the Politburo.
 * Sanford Meisner, 91, American actor and acting teacher.
 * Art Merewether, 94, American baseball player.
 * Martin Mussgnug, 60, German politician.
 * Raimundo Saporta, 70, Spanish club basketball administrator.
 * Chico Science, 30, Brazilian singer and composer, car accident.
 * Theodoros Stamos, 74, Greek-American painter.
 * Seán Ó Síocháin, 82, Irish Gaelic footballer, hurler, and broadcaster.

3

 * Boris de Rachewiltz, 70, Italian-Russian egyptologist and writer.
 * Jerry Beit haLevi, 84, Israeli football player and manager.
 * Bohumil Hrabal, 82, Czech writer, fall.
 * Agi Jambor, 87, Hungarian-American pianist.
 * Stan Kostka, 84, American football player and coach.
 * Harry H. Wachtel, 79, American lawyer and civil rights activist, Parkinson's disease.
 * Mikhail Yakushin, 86, Russian football player and manager.

4

 * Henry H. Barschall, 81, German-American physicist.
 * Robert Clouse, 68, American film director and producer (Enter the Dragon), kidney failure.
 * Benjamin David de Jesus, 56, Philippine prelate of the Catholic Church, murdered.
 * Ross Lee Finney, 90, American composer.
 * Paulo Francis, 66, Brazilian journalist, novelist and critic, heart attack.
 * Robi Ghosh, 65, Indian actor.
 * A R Mallick, 78, Bangladeshi historian and educationist.
 * Alek Rapoport, 63, Russian nonconformist artist.
 * James Tattersall, 56, British tennis player.
 * Cyril Toumanoff, 83, Russian-American historian.
 * Darrell Tully, 79, American football player and coach.

5

 * Frederick J. Almgren, Jr., 63, American mathematician, complication following surgery.
 * Bob Brown, 58, Canadian professional wrestler ("Bulldog" Bob Brown).
 * Robert Elem, 69, American blues guitarist and singer.
 * Dorothy Fosdick, 83, American foreign policy expert.
 * Pamela Harriman, 76, English-American political activist, diplomat, and socialite, cerebral hemorrhage.
 * René Huyghe, 90, French art historian.
 * Jürgen Neukirch, 59, German mathematician.
 * Harry Trotsek, 84, American Thoroughbred racehorses trainer and owner.

6

 * Ernie Anderson, 73, American disc jockey, and television and radio announcer, cancer.
 * Harry Essex, 86, American screenwriter and director.
 * Roger Laurent, 83, Belgian racing driver.
 * Riza Lushta, 81, Kosovar Albanian football striker.

7

 * Nina Albright, 89, American comic book artist.
 * Owen Aspinall, 69, American politician and Governor of American Samoa.
 * John Baker, 59, British musician and composer.
 * Sam DeCavalcante, 84, American mobster, heart attack.
 * Allan Edwall, 72, Swedish actor, author, composer and singer, prostate cancer.
 * Maynard Pirsig, 95, American legal scholar.
 * Daniil Shafran, 74, Soviet/Russian cellist.
 * Rösli Streiff, 96, Swiss alpine skier and world champion.
 * Jose Garcia Villa, 88, Filipino poet, novelist, and painter.
 * Mary Wills, 82, American costume designer, kidney failure.

8

 * Nathan Lerner, 83, American photographer.
 * Henry Margenau, 95, German-American physicist and philosopher of science.
 * Robert Ridgely, 65, American actor (Philadelphia, Beverly Hills Cop II, Blazing Saddles), cancer.
 * Corey Scott, 28, American motorcycle stunt rider, motorcycle accident.
 * Michael Voslenski, 76, Soviet and Russian writer, scientist, diplomat and dissident.
 * Walter Wiora, 90, German musicologist and music historian.

9

 * David Austick, 76, British politician and bookshop owner.
 * Brian Connolly, 51, Scottish singer-songwriter, musician and actor.
 * Taylor Drysdale, 83, American swimmer and swimming coach.
 * Barry Evans, 53, English actor.
 * Fritz Grasshoff, 83, German painter, poet and songwriter.
 * Leni Junker, 91, German sprint runner and Olympian.
 * Jack Owens, 92, American blues singer and guitarist.
 * Williams Sassine, 53, Guinean novelist.
 * Max Tetley, 87, Australian rules footballer.
 * Luis Velásquez, 77, Guatemalan long-distance runner and Olympian.

10

 * Harriet Andreassen, 71, Norwegian labour activist and politician.
 * Conrad M. Arensberg, 86, American anthropologist and scholar, respiratory failure.
 * Lou Bennett, 70, American jazz organist.
 * Milton Cato, 81, Saint Vincentian politician and first Prime Minister of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.
 * Robert Mallary, 79, American sculptor and computer art pioneer, leukemia.
 * Jerome Namias, 86, American meteorologist.

11

 * Nalanda Ellawala, 29, Sri Lankan politician, shot.
 * Robert A. Graham, 84, American Jesuit priest and historian.
 * Lewis Jacobs, 92, American screenwriter, film director and critic.
 * Don Porter, 84, American actor.
 * Ray Terrell, 77, American gridiron football player.

12

 * Nora Beloff, 78, English journalist and political writer.
 * James Cossins, 63, English actor, heart disease.
 * Francis Healy, 86, American Major League Baseball player.
 * Ruth Winifred Howard, 96, American psychologist.
 * Federico Pisani, 22, Italian footballer, car crash.

13

 * Bobby Adams, 75, American baseball player.
 * Thies Christophersen, 79, German neo-nazi and Holocaust denier.
 * Robert Klark Graham, 90, American eugenicist and businessman.
 * Robert Herman, 82, American scientist.
 * Don Jordan, 62, American boxer, complications following robbery.
 * Ernő Rubik, 86, Hungarian aircraft designer.
 * Reg Ryan, 71, Irish football player.
 * Atta Shad, 57, Pakistani poet, playwright, and intellectual.

14

 * Lélia Gousseau, 88, 20th-century French classical pianist.
 * Jack Matheson, 76, American gridiron football player.
 * Charles Moffett, 67, American free jazz drummer.
 * Miguel Rodriguez, 35, Filipino actor and model, pancreatitis.
 * William L. Scott, 81, American politician, Alzheimer's disease.
 * Chōbyō Yara, 94, Japanese politician and teacher.
 * Mohammed Yousuf, 57, Pakistani singer.

15

 * Oscar Adams, 72, American lawyer and first African-American Alabama Supreme Court justice.
 * Arne Berg, 87, Swedish road racing cyclist.
 * Philip Hershkovitz, 87, American mammalogist.
 * Paul Page, 69, American gridiron football player.
 * Frode Rinnan, 91, Norwegian architect and politician.
 * Jack Sparling, 80, Canadian comic book artist (Claire Voyant, Strange Adventures, Ghost Rider).

16

 * Abd al-Fattah Abu Ghudda, 79, Syrian leader of the Muslim Brotherhood.
 * Ethel Owen, 103, American actress.
 * Alvis Vītoliņš, 50, Latvian chess master, suicide.
 * Jack Wilson, 82, British rower and Olympic champion.
 * Chien-Shiung Wu, 84, Chinese-American experimental physicist, watershed stroke.

17

 * Spartaco Bandinelli, 75, Italian boxer and Olympian.
 * Kenny Graham, 72, British jazz saxophonist, arranger and composer.
 * Leonard Ho, 72, Hong Kong film producer.
 * Ichimaru, 90, Japanese recording artist and geisha.
 * Bärbel Inhelder, 83, Swiss psychologist.
 * Joe Kieyoomia, 77, American Navajo prisoner of war during World War II.
 * Darcy Ribeiro, 74, Brazilian anthropologist, historian, sociologist, author and politician, cancer.
 * Georg L. Samuelsen, 87, Faroese editor and voice actor.

18

 * Bozorg Alavi, 93, Iranian writer, novelist, and intellectual, heart attack.
 * Enrique Peralta Azurdia, 88, President of Guatemala.
 * Antonio de Almeida, 69, French conductor and musicologist, lung cancer, liver cancer.
 * Gerd Domhardt, 51, German composer.
 * Eric Fenby, 90, English composer, conductor, pianist and organist.
 * Reggie Forte, 47, American activist and founding member of the Black Panther Party.
 * Jnan Prakash Ghosh, 87, Indian harmonium and tabla player and musicologist.
 * Emily Hahn, 92, American journalist and author.
 * Austin Knickerbocker, 78, American baseball player.
 * Geoffrey Swaebe, 86, American diplomat and ambassador, complications of pneumonia.

19

 * David Ashkenazi, 81, Russian pianist, accompanist and composer.
 * Jarmil Burghauser, 75, Czech composer, conductor, and musicologist.
 * Frank Delfino, 86, American actor, bone marrow cancer.
 * Buddy Edelen, 59, American marathon runner.
 * António Gedeão, 90, Portuguese poet, essayist, writer and playwright.
 * Yutaka Haniya, 87, Japanese writer and critic.
 * Karin Magnussen, 89, German nazi eugenicist, biologist, and researcher during World War II.
 * Lois Marshall, 73, Canadian soprano.
 * Leo Rosten, 78, American humorist.
 * Edsall Walker, 86, American Negro league baseball player.
 * Deng Xiaoping, 92, Chinese politician leader of the People's Republic of China, complications of lung infections.

20

 * Ruth Clark (pollster), American pollster and researcher.
 * Afonsinho, 82, Brazilian football player.
 * Paul Anxionnaz, 94, French politician.
 * Zachary Breaux, 36, American jazz guitarist, drowned.
 * Pierre Gascar, 80, French journalist, literary critic, writer, and screenwriter.
 * Thomas G. Kavanagh, 79, American judge, Chief Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court (1975–1979).
 * Arthur Machado, 88, Brazilian football player and manager.
 * Stan Pearson, 78, English footballer.

21

 * Ziya Bunyadov, 73, Azerbaijani historian and scientist, murdered.
 * Luitgard Im, 67, German actress.
 * Choe Kwang, 78, North Korean army general and politician, heart attack.
 * Mohamed Nasir, 81, Malaysian politician.
 * Merle Pertile, 55, American model and actress.
 * Josef Posipal, 69, Romanian-German footballer, heart failure.
 * Kenneth Rowntree, 81, British artist.
 * Leo Sjogren, 82, American racewalker and Olympian.
 * Eleanor Butler, Lady Wicklow, 82, Irish politician and architect.

22

 * Joseph Aiuppa, 89, American mobster.
 * Urmila Bhatt, 62/63, Indian actress, murdered.
 * William Karush, 79, American mathematician.
 * James A. Lewis, 63, American Libertarian Party politician.
 * Harold Nichols, 79, American wrestler and wrestling coach.
 * Albert Shanker, 68, American labor leader, bladder cancer.
 * Charlie Toogood, 69, American gridiron football player.

23

 * Abdelkader Ben Bouali, 84, French football player.
 * Gordon Glisson, 66, American jockey.
 * Ephraim P. Holmes, 88, United States Navy admiral.
 * Frank Launder, 91, British writer, film director and producer.
 * Oscar Lewenstein, 80, British theatre and film producer.
 * Olivier Masson, 74, French linguist.
 * Jack Slater, 69, Australian politician.
 * Tony Williams, 51, American jazz drummer, heart attack.

24

 * Astrid Fagraeus, 83, Swedish immunologist.
 * Nils-Olof Franzén, 80, Swedish writer.
 * Wolfgang Heinrich Johannes Fuchs, 81, British mathematician.
 * Raymond Lambert, 72, Swiss mountaineer, complications of a lung disorder.
 * Isabelle Lucas, 69, Canadian-British actress and singer, heart attack.
 * Ernest C. Pollard, 90, British professor of physics and biophysics, stroke.
 * Len Vlahov, 56, Australian discus thrower, cancer.
 * Ion Voicu, 73, Romanian violinist and orchestral conductor.

25

 * Cal Abrams, 72, American baseball player, heart attack.
 * Hoss Allen, 74, American radio disc jockey.
 * Louis Auslander, 68, American mathematician.
 * Earle Edwards, 88, American football player and coach.
 * Scott Forbes, 76, British actor and screenwriter.
 * Yi Han-yong, 36, North Korean defector, murdered.
 * Arthur Hewlett, 89, British actor.
 * Danielle de St. Jorre, 55, Seychelles politician.
 * Ugo Poletti, 82, Italian Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church, heart attack.
 * Ted Roach, 87, Australian trade unionist and member of the Communist Party of Australia.
 * Andrei Sinyavsky, 71, Russian writer and Soviet dissident.
 * John Williams, 70, Australian politician.

26

 * Nuccio Bertone, 82, Italian automobile designer and constructor.
 * Mildred Clingerman, 78, American science fiction author.
 * David Doyle, 67, American actor (Charlie's Angels, Capricorn One, Rugrats), heart attack.
 * Vincent Gaddis, 83, American author.
 * Giovanni Ghiselli, 62, Italian sprinter and Olympian.
 * Joseph Anthony Lefante, 68, American politician.
 * Tom O'Connor, 78, Irish Gaelic footballer.
 * Ben Raleigh, 83, American lyricist and composer.
 * Wende Wagner, 55, American actress (The Green Hornet, Rosemary's Baby, Destination Inner Space), cancer.

27

 * Kingsley Davis, 88, American sociologist and demographer.
 * Patricia Felicien, 30, Saint Lucian cricket player.
 * William Gear, 81, Scottish painter.
 * Indeevar, 73, Indian film lyricist.
 * Alpo Jaakola, 67, Finnish painter and sculptor.
 * Mieczysław Jagielski, 73, Polish politician and economist, heart attack.
 * Kim Kwang-jin, 69, North Korean general and politician.
 * Harry Love, 85, American animator, effects animator, and writer, heart attack.
 * William R. Maples, 59, American forensic anthropologist, brain cancer.
 * Edward J. McCormack, Jr., 73, American lawyer and politician, complications from lung cancer.

28

 * Osvaldo Bailo, 84, Italian road cyclist.
 * Donald Carrick, 90, Canadian lawyer, politician, sportsman and Olympian.
 * Harold Dean, 84, Australian politician.
 * Mohammad Moustafa Haddara, 67, Arabic scholar and writer.
 * Örjan Martinsson, 60, Swedish football player.
 * Giuseppe Migneco, 89, Italian painter.
 * Larry Tillman, 88, American professional wrestler and promoter.
 * Hal Turpin, 93, American baseball player.