Deaths in December 1984

The following is a list of notable deaths in December 1984.

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.

• John Alexander Austin, 82, Canadian aviator.
• Wayland Becker, 74, American football player.
• Basanta Kumar Das, 86, Indian politician, MP (1952–1957, 1962–1967).
• Roelof Frankot, 73, Dutch painter.
• Sir William Haworth, 79, Australian politician, MP (1949–1969).
• Sandy Herd, 81, Scottish footballer.
• Živan Knežević, 79, Yugoslav soldier, conspirator in the 1941 Yugoslav coup d'état.
• Sir William McKie, 83, Australian organist and composer.
• Marion Orth, 83, American screenwriter.
• Josef Rodzinski, 77, German footballer.
• Joe Rue, 86, American baseball umpire.
• Alphonse Schepers, 77, Belgian racing cyclist.
• Stephen M. Young, 95, American politician, member of the U.S. Senate (1959–1971) and House of Representatives (1933–1937, 1941–1943, 1949–1951), hemolytic anemia.^[1]

• Ernest Breeze, 74, English footballer.
• Edward James, 77, British poet.
• Shigeru Makino, 56, Japanese baseball player, bladder cancer.
• Tomás Leandro Marini, 82, Argentine icthyologist.
• Charley Mehelich, 62, American football player.
• Karl Merrill, 84, American farmer and cattle breeder.
• Shirō Moritani, 53, Japanese filmmaker.
• Harry Sukman, 72, American composer, heart attack.^[2]
• Leonardo Vitale, 43, Italian mobster, shot.^[3]
• Fatalities of the Kesh ambush:
  • Kieran Fleming, 25, Northern Irish militant (Provisional Irish Republican Army), drowned.
  • Antoine Mac Giolla Bhrighde, 27, Northern Irish militant (Provisional Irish Republican Army), shot.
  • Alistair Slater, 28, British soldier, shot.

• Ustad Daman, 73, Pakistani poet and politician.
• Muharrem Ertaş, 70-71, Turkish folk singer.
• Virginia Lacy Jones, 72, American librarian.^[4]
• Pavel Kutakhov, 70, Soviet flying ace and Air Force commander.^[5]
• John LaRocca, 83, Italian-born American mob boss (Pittsburgh crime family).^[6]
• Vladimir Abramovich Rokhlin, 65, Soviet mathematician.
• Alan Williams, 91, American rugby player.

• Leila Cook Barber, 81, American art historian.
• Wyndham Davies, 58, British politician, MP (1964–1966).
• Seymour Fogel, 73, American artist, heart attack.^[7]
• Narasinh Narayan Godbole, 96, Indian food chemist.
• Charles Oluf Herlofson, 68, Norwegian naval officer.
• Eduard Prchal, 73, Czechoslovak pilot.
• John Rock, 94, American obstetrician and gynecologist, heart attack.^[8]
• Malcolm Shaw, 37, British comic writer, cancer.
• Ștefan Voitec, 84, Romanian politician and journalist.^[9]
• Pearl Anderson Wanamaker, 85, American politician, member of the Washington Senate (1929–1931, 1937–1940).

• William Brown, 61, British soldier, heart attack.
• Cecil M. Harden, 90, American politician, member of the U.S. House of Representatives (1949–1959), cancer.^[10]
• Bob Hogsett, 43, American basketball player and coach, shot.
• Albert Johnson, 49, American politician, leukemia.
• Ethel Mannin, 84, British novelist and political activist.
• Joe Rock, 90, American filmmaker and actor.
• Al Rogers, 75, American racing driver.
• Jaromír Zápal, 61, Czechoslovak illustrator and painter.

• Gray Barker, 59, American ufologist.
• Manny Curtis, 73, American songwriter.
• William Fleming, 18-19, Northern Irish militant (Provisional Irish Republican Army), shot.
• Frank Gerbode, 77, American surgeon.^[11]
• P. K. Manthri, 51, Indian cartoonist.
• Lucie Odier, 98, Swiss nurse.
• Tip O'Neill, 86, American football player.
• Viktor Shklovsky, 91, Soviet literary theorist.^[12]

• San Baw, 62, Burmese surgeon, lung cancer.
• Jackson Beardy, 40, Canadian artist, heart attack.
• Jeanne Cagney, 65, American actress (Yankee Doodle Dandy), lung cancer.^[13]
• Nikolay Emanuel, 69, Soviet chemist.
• Charles Ray Hatcher, 55, American convicted serial killer, suicide by hanging.^[14]
• Jon B. Higgins, 45, American Carnatic musician, traffic collision.^[15]
• Jack Mercer, 74, American voice actor (Popeye, Felix the Cat), stomach cancer.^[16]
• Hashizo Okawa, 55, Japanese actor, cancer.
• Bernard Ormanowski, 77, Polish Olympic rower (1928).
• Howie Reed, 47, American baseball player, heart failure.
• Jan Stegmann, 97, South African rugby player.
• LeeRoy Yarbrough, 46, American racing driver, seizure.^[17]

• Luther Adler, 81, American actor.^[18]
• Walter L. J. Bayler, 79, American general.
• Vladimir Chelomey, 70, Soviet missile designer.^[19]
• Jeanne Chevalier, 92, Canadian figure skater.
• Walter Ciszek, 80, Polish-American priest and missionary.^[20]
• Earl Lemley Core, 82, American botanist.
• Rollie Culver, 76, American jazz drummer.
• Hobart Freeman, 64, American evangelist, pneumonia.^[21]
• Lisa Hession, 14, British schoolgirl, strangled.
• Solange Lamblin, 84, French politician, MP (1945–1946, 1946–1951).
• Robert Jay Mathews, 31, American neo-Nazi militant, house fire.^[22]
• Gene Ramey, 71, American jazz bassist, heart attack.
• Razzle, 24, English musician, traffic collision.
• Semih Sancar, 72-73, Turkish general.
• Paul M. Sand, 70, American jurist.
• Peter Starling, 59, British Olympic gymnast (1952, 1960).
• Mary Terán de Weiss, 66, Argentine tennis player, suicide by jumping.

• Ernesto Botto, 77, Italian flying ace.
• Thomas R. Cullen, 80, Canadian politician.
• David Dietz, 87, American science journalist, Parkinson's disease.^[23]
• Pedro Gamero del Castillo, 74, Spanish politician.
• Petro Kozak, 73, Soviet Ukrainian Greek Catholic prelate.
• William S. Lasdon, 88, American businessman and philanthropist.^[24]
• Ivor Moreton, 76, English pianist.
• Amelio Robles Ávila, 95, Mexican soldier.
• Joseph May Swing, 90, American general, pneumonia.^[25]
• Andy Uram, 69, American football player.^[26]
• Guthrie Wilson, 70, New Zealand-Australian novelist, heart attack.

• Dag Bergman, 70, Swedish diplomat.
• Jean Campbell, 83, Australian novelist.
• Barry Farrell, 49, American journalist, heart attack.^[27]
• Þorsteinn Hjálmarsson, 73, Icelandic Olympic water polo player (1936).
• Luke Johnsos, 79, American football player and coach.^[28]
• Anton Loeb, 76, Hungarian-born American illustrator and animator, cancer.
• Asoka Mehta, 73, Indian politician, MP (1954–1962, 1967–1971).
• Bice Sechi-Zorn, 55-56, Italian-American physicist.
• Adalbert Steiner, 77, Romanian footballer.
• Georges Stockly, 68, Swiss basketball player.
• Donovan Swailes, 92, Canadian politician.
• Brian Taylor, 45, British jockey, fall from horse.
• Charlie Teagarden, 71, American jazz trumpeter.
• Julio Vanzo, 83, Argentine artist.
• Vaughan Watson, 53, English footballer.

• Anton Betz, 91, German journalist.
• Nate Bowman, 41, American basketball player, cardiac arrest.^[29]
• Krafft Arnold Ehricke, 67, German-American rocket scientist.^[30]
• Pentti Hämäläinen, 54, Finnish Olympic boxer (1952, 1956).
• Robert E. Kent, 73, American filmmaker.
• Satya Churn Law, 95-96, Indian naturalist.
• Sam LoPresti, 67, American ice hockey player, heart attack.^[31]
• Fred Lowery, 75, American whistler.^[32]
• Will Paynter, 81, Welsh mining unionist.
• Lake Roberson, 66, American football player.
• Oskar Seidlin, 73, German-American linguist.
• George Waggner, 90, American filmmaker (The Wolf Man).
• Wang Xinting, 75, Chinese general.

• Natalie Robinson Cole, 82-83, American educator.
• Abdul Momen Khan, 65, Bangladeshi politician, MP (1979–1982).
• Gene Layden, 90, American baseball player.
• Red Mitchell, 72, Canadian ice hockey player.
• Walter Paulo, 82, American politician, member of the Ohio House of Representatives (1967–1972).
• Otto Schmidt, 82, German politician.
• Helmut Schreyer, 72, German electrical engineer.
• Ludwig Semrad, 76-77, Austrian humanitarian.
• Chase G. Woodhouse, 94, American politician, member of the U.S. House of Representatives (1945–1947, 1949–1951).^[33]

• Alfred Andrew-Street, 70, Australian cricketer and footballer.
• Francis Cosne, 68, French filmmaker.
• Chester R. Crain, 70, American politician.
• Clemente de la Cerda, 49, Venezuelan film director.
• Rosa Kellner, 74, German Olympic runner (1928).
• Margaret Livingston, 89, American actress.^[34]
• Jules Müller, 76, Luxembourgish football manager.
• Ngô Đình Thục, 87, Vietnamese Roman Catholic prelate.
• Bill Pemberton, 66, American jazz bassist.
• Max Schönherr, 81, Austrian composer.
• Nikolai Shchelokov, 74, Soviet politician and general, suicide by gunshot.^[35]
• Amerigo Tot, 75, Hungarian sculptor and actor.
• José Zampicchiatti, 84, Argentine Olympic cyclist (1924).
• André Zimmer, 72, Luxembourgish Olympic canoeist (1936).

• Vicente Aleixandre, 86, Spanish poet, Nobel Prize recipient (1977), kidney failure.^[36]
• László Baranyai, 64, Hungarian Olympic gymnast (1948).
• Leslie B. Butler, 79, American politician.
• Cheung Ying, 65, Chinese-Canadian actor.
• Richard C. Currier, 92, American film editor.
• Alberto Fernández, 29, Spanish racing cyclist, traffic collision.
• Vivian Granger, 65, South African football administrator.
• P. Balachandra Menon, 73, Indian politician.
• Sir Walter Stansfield, 67, British police officer.
• Robert Waring Stoddard, 78, American businessman and political organizer (John Birch Society).^[37]
• Hugo Weczerek, 74, Austrian Olympic fencer (1936).

• Kurt Axelsson, 43, Swedish footballer, traffic collision.
• Eddie Beal, 74, American jazz pianist.
• Hilde Bruch, 80, German-born American psychiatrist.
• Alonzo Patrick Fox, 89, American general.^[38]
• Traci Hammerberg, 18, American murder victim, blunt force trauma.
• J. Roderick MacArthur, 63, American businessman and philanthropist, pancreatic cancer.^[39]
• James Nimmo, 72, Australian public servant.
• Lennard Pearce, 69, English actor, heart attack.
• Jan Peerce, 80, American singer, complications from a stroke.^[40]
• Frank Spedding, 82, Canadian-born American chemist.^[41]
• George Tomer, 89, American baseball player.

• Matti Aarnio, 83, Finnish soldier.
• Karl Deichgräber, 81, German philologist.
• Debs Garms, 77, American baseball player.
• Gerd Heinrich, 88, German-American zoologist.
• William A. McGillivray, 66, Canadian jurist.
• Wilson Rawls, 71, American writer.^[42]

• Josef Beneš, 82, Czechoslovak linguist.
• Fred Cook, 62, Australian footballer.
• Wendell H. Furry, 77, American physicist.
• Thomas A. Wornham, 81, American general.^[43]
• Sonja Ferlov Mancoba, 73, Danish sculptor.
• Michael Okpara, 63, Nigerian politician.
• Isa Pola, 74, Italian actress.
• Jimmy Preston, 71, American R&B musician.
• Eduardo Quintero, 84, Filipino diplomat.
• Vegard Sletten, 77, Norwegian newspaper editor.

• Valerijonas Balčiūnas, 80, Lithuanian footballer.
• Joe Cackovic, 61, American basketball player and coach.
• Sebö Endrödi, 81, Hungarian entomologist.
• Dame Norma Holyoake, 75, New Zealand community leader, spouse of the prime minister (1957, 1960–1972).
• Ching-Yuen Hsiao, 84, Chinese-American diplomat and engineer.^[44]
• Aris Maliagros, 89, Greek actor.
• Rudolf Platte, 80, German actor.
• Charles Quaid, 76, New Zealand rugby player.
• Katsu Ryuzaki, 44, Japanese actor, cirrhosis.

• Cecil Aagaard, 68, Norwegian jazz musician.
• Harry Bollman, 82, Australian footballer.
• Edward Carrere, 78, Mexican-American art director.
• Nigel Cornwall, 81, English Anglican prelate.
• Loren Ellis, 80, American football and basketball coach.
• Thomas D. Finley, 89, American general.
• Josef Humpál, 66, Czechoslovak football player and manager.
• Michel Magne, 54, French composer, suicide.
• Gonzalo Márquez, 44, Venezuelan baseball player, traffic collision.
• Abdul Quadir, 78, Bangladeshi poet and journalist.
• Henryk Sawistowski, 59, Polish-born English academic administrator.
• Hugh Seton-Watson, 68, British historian.
• Puck van Heel, 80, Dutch footballer.
• Bill Warwick, 87, American baseball player.
• Rowland Winn, 4th Baron St Oswald, 68, British politician and hereditary peer.
• Sakubei Yamamoto, 92, Japanese artist.

• Peter Anderson, 82, American ceramist.
• Cuckoo Christensen, 85, American baseball player.
• Margery Davies, 89, British scouting group executive.
• Ray DeAutremont, 84, American convicted train robber and murderer.^[45]
• Max Deuring, 77, German mathematician.
• Figueiredo, 23, Brazilian footballer, plane crash.
• Wuzzie George, c. 104, American craftsperson and cultural preservationist.
• Isabel Alice Green, 91, Australian event manager.
• J. Lister Hill, 89, American politician, member of the U.S. Senate (1938–1969) and House of Representatives (1923–1938), pneumonia.^[46]
• Mick Kenefick, 60, Irish hurler, stroke.
• Helen Grace McClelland, 97, American nurse.^[47]
• Art McLarney, 76, American baseball player.
• Patrick Mermagen, 73, English cricketer.
• Stanley Milgram, 51, American psychologist, heart attack.^[48]
• Cyril Oxley, 80, English footballer.
• Steve Slayton, 82, American baseball player.
• Grace Cossington Smith, 92, Australian painter.
• Dmitry Ustinov, 76, Soviet field marshal and politician.^[49]

• Sam Barrett, 79, Australian footballer.
• Uri Ben Baruch, 85-86, Ethiopian-Israeli Jewish community leader.
• Margrethe Bohr, 94, Danish science writer.
• Cornelis Eliza Bertus Bremekamp, 96, Dutch botanist.
• Finlay Crisp, 67, Australian political scientist.
• Nicholas Ferraro, 56, American attorney and politician, member of the New York State Senate (1966–1973), heart attack.^[50]
• Seifollah Ghaleb, 68, Egyptian Olympic sports shooter (1952).
• Constance Endicott Hartt, 84, American botanist.
• Arne Johansen, 82, Norwegian footballer.
• Maurice Key, 79, British Anglican prelate.
• Judith Raskin, 56, American singer, ovarian cancer.^[51]
• Hector Riské, 74, Belgian Olympic wrestler (1936).
• José Luis Rodríguez Vélez, 69, Panamanian musician.
• Alcide Simard, 77, Canadian politician, MP (1965–1968).
• Ted Sloane, 81, American football player and politician, member of the Iowa House of Representatives (1943–1953), cancer.

• Leon Burns, 42, American football player, shot.
• Vilhelm Lauritzen, 90, Danish architect.
• Paul Leser, 85, German-American ethnologist.
• Edith Lindeman, 86, American songwriter and film critic.
• Frank McMahon, 65, American-Irish playwright.
• Lucy Graves Taliaferro, 89, American parasitologist.
• Sidney Vivian, 83, British actor.
• Viola Gertrude Wells, 82, American jazz singer.
• C. Brooke Worth, 76, American zoologist and virologist.

• Les Buck, 69, British trade unionist.
• Duncan Fisher, 22, Australian Olympic rower (1984), traffic collision.
• Joan Lindsay, 88, Australian novelist, stomach cancer.
• Joe Nichols, 79, American sports journalist, heart attack.^[52]
• Georg-Maria Schwab, 85, German chemist.
• René Zavaleta Mercado, 47, Bolivian sociologist and politician.

• Jupp Arents, 72, German racing cyclist.
• Eve Ball, 94, American historian.
• Edoardo Detti, 71, Italian architect and urban planner.
• Ian Hendry, 53, English actor (Get Carter, The Lotus Eaters, Live Now – Pay Later), gastrointestinal bleeding.
• Kazimierz Krukowski, 83, Polish singer and actor.
• George J. Lapthorne, 94, American politician, member of the California State Assembly (1960–1961).
• Peter Lawford, 61, English-American actor (Ocean's 11, Easter Parade, Good News), cardiac arrest.^[53]
• Jake Milford, 70, Canadian ice hockey manager, pancreatic cancer.^[54]
• Ryokichi Minobe, 80, Japanese politician, heart attack.^[55]
• Ruth Pickering Pinchot, 91, American writer.
• Tevis Clyde Smith, 76, American writer.
• Harry Waxman, 72, English cinematographer.

• Bengt Linders, 80, Swedish Olympic swimmer (1924).
• John Watson MacNaught, 80, Canadian politician, MP (1945–1957, 1963–1965).
• Raymond Smith, 61, South African cricketer.
• Robert Stott, 86, British soldier.

• Sheila Andrews, 31, American country singer, heart attack.
• Geoffrey Barraclough, 76, English historian.
• Chan Sy, 52, Cambodian politician, prime minister (since 1982).^[56]
• Johnny Gill, 79, American baseball player.
• Gayelord Hauser, 89, American nutritionist, pneumonia.^[57]
• Tebbs Lloyd Johnson, 84, British Olympic racewalker (1936, 1948).
• Bud Nygren, 66, American football player and coach.
• Jim O'Donnell, 72, American basketball player.
• John Sittig, 79, American Olympic runner (1928).
• Melvin Vines, 80, American football player and coach.

• William Black, Baron Black, 91, British vehicle manufacturer.
• Matilda J. Clerk, 68, Ghanaian physician.
• Leslie Compton, 72, English footballer and cricketer, diabetes.
• Paul Davidoff, 54, American urban planner, cancer.^[58]
• Evan-Burrows Fontaine, 86, American dancer.
• William B. Gibbs Jr., 79, American educator and civil rights activist.
• Finn Johannesen, 77, Norwegian footballer.
• Pyare Lal Kureel, 68, Indian politician, MP (1952–1957).
• Hellen Lossi, 57, Guatemalan socialite, first lady (1974–1978).
• Robert Allan Gus Lyons, 94, Canadian politician.
• Gerda Matejka-Felden, 83, Austrian painter.
• Ed Neal, 65, American football player.
• Shirley Petway, 76, American baseball player.
• Xu Hanhao, 76, Taiwanese politician.
• Yevgeny Zababakhin, 67, Soviet physicist.

• Eddie Brown, 52, American percussionist, heart disease.
• Alfred Cowles, 93, American economist.^[59]
• Lucien Fortin, 72, Canadian politician.
• Peter Kihss, 72, American journalist.^[60]
• Isaak Kikoin, 76, Soviet physicist.^[61]
• Hans Larive, 69, Dutch naval officer.
• Wendell D. Mansfield, 85, American football coach.
• Theodore Newcomb, 81, American social psychologist, complications from a stroke.^[62]
• Patrick Joseph Nolan, 90, Irish physicist.
• Sam Peckinpah, 59, American film director (The Wild Bunch, Convoy, Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia), heart failure.^[63]
• Mary Stewart, Baroness Stewart of Alvechurch, 81, British politician and educator.
• Robert Lee Willie, 26, American convicted serial killer, execution by electric chair.^[64]

• Indus Arthur, 43, American actress, brain cancer.
• Aung Zan Wai, 91, Burmese diplomat and politician.
• Stanley Banham, 71, English cricketer.
• Roy Conacher, 68, Canadian ice hockey player, cancer.
• Robert Farren, 75, Irish poet.
• Sidney Garfield, 78, American physician.
• Desmond Governey, 64, Irish politician, TD (1961–1977, 1981–1982).
• Gregor Hradetzky, 75, Austrian Olympic canoeist (1936).
• Walther Hubatsch, 69, German historian.
• Ranginui Parewahawaha Leonard, 112, New Zealand supercentenarian.
• Tadashi Mamiya, 72-73, Japanese painter.
• P. H. Polk, 86, American photographer.
• Leo Robin, 89, American songwriter ("Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend", "Thanks for the Memory").
• Nic Schiøll, 83, Norwegian artist.
• Madan Lal Shukla, 56, Indian politician, MP (1977–1979).
• Siegfried Uiberreither, 76, Austrian Nazi official, complications from Alzheimer's disease.
• R. C. Williams, 96, American public health official.
• Fred Wright, 77, English-born American cartoonist, cancer.

• Giorgio Matteo Aicardi, 93, Italian painter.
• Harry Ellis Blackwell, 76, American politician.
• Sten Bodvar Liljegren, 99, Swedish Anglist.
• Massa, 54, Ghanaian-born American gorilla.^[65]
• Alex Mendur, 77, Indonesian photojournalist.
• Lydia Poser, 75, German politician.
• Howard Richardson, 67, American playwright.^[66]
• Moraima Secada, 54, Cuban singer.
• Jerzy Solarz, 54, Polish Olympic gymnast (1952).
• William Bedell Stanford, 74, Irish politician.
• Barbara M. White, 64, American diplomat and academic administrator, cancer.^[67]
• Juha Widing, 37, Finnish-born Canadian ice hockey player, heart attack.

• Lee Case, 67, American Olympic water polo player (1948).
• Pol Duwez, 77, Belgian-American materials scientist.
• Jean Gilbert-Jules, 81, French politician.
• K. R. Ramanathan, 91, Indian physicist.
• Chester Ronning, 90, Canadian diplomat and politician, pneumonia.^[68]

• List of December 1984 deaths at IMDb