Famous People Who Died In 1884

A scientist, meteorologist, mathematician, and biologist, Gregor Mendel is considered the founder of the modern science of genetics. He conducted a series of experiments on pea plants between 1856 and 1863, establishing many rules of heredity. Besides his work on pea plants, he also described novel plant species and conducted experiments with hawkweed and honeybees.

A walk through the woods in Dundee, changed Allan Pinkerton’s life, as he bumped into a group of counterfeiters and reported them to the police. This incident inspired him to later become Chicago's first full-time detective. His agency’s logo, an unblinking eye, inspired the phrase “Private Eye.”

Bedrich Smetana was a Czech composer remembered for his opera, The Bartered Bride. Considered the father of Czech music, Smetana was a prodigy whose first public performance came at age six. He then went on to establish himself as one of the most important composers of Czech music. Smetana has been honored with a Walk of Fame star in Vienna.

Ottilie Assing was a German-American abolitionist, freethinker, and feminist. She is best remembered for her friendship with American social reformer and abolitionist, Frederick Douglass. Apart from attending numerous conventions and meetings alongside Douglass, Ottilie Assing also translated many of his works to German.  

Jean-Baptiste Dumas was a 19th-century French chemist. He is best remembered for his works on organic analysis and synthesis. He is also credited with developing a method for the analysis of nitrogen in compounds. He was a member of the French Academy of Sciences and one of the founders of the École centrale des arts et manufactures. 

Fanny Elssler was an Austrian ballet dancer of the Romantic Period. Renowned for her beauty and dancing skills, Elssler captivated hearts wherever she performed. Her life and career inspired an eponymous silent film in 1920, where she was played by Lya Mara. Fanny Elssler was also portrayed by Lilian Harvey in the 1937 eponymous film.

Marie Bashkirtseff was a Ukrainian artist who worked and lived in Paris. Bashkirtseff emerged as an intellectual in Paris and produced works like The Meeting and In the Studio before succumbing to tuberculosis in 1884 at age 25. Although many of her works were destroyed by the Nazis, over 60 of her paintings are preserved in places like Musée d'Orsay. 

Initially a member of the Generation of ’37 intellectual movement, Juan Bautista Alberdi opposed Argentine dictator Juan Manuel de Rosas and was thus exiled. He later studied law in Uruguay. He is best remembered for his iconic book Bases and Starting Points for the Political Organization of the Argentine Republic.

Keshab Chunder Sen was an Indian social reformer and philosopher. Although he was born a Hindu, Sen thought highly of Christian theology and wanted to incorporate the theology of Christian practice into the framework of Hindu thought. By the use of Christian missionary methods, Keshab Chunder Sen effected several social reforms in India.

Known for her involvement in various anti-slavery and women’s empowerment campaigns, Frances Dana Barker Gage was a prominent American social reformer. She was also associated with the farmers’ papers Ohio Cultivator and Field Notes. She also worked toward achieving women’s voting rights and property rights.

Johann Gustav Droysen was a German historian. His work pertaining to Alexander the Great was the first work that represented a new school of German thought that introduced the great man theory. Johann Gustav Droysen's book, History of Alexander the Great, remained the best work on the king of Macedonia for a long time.

American academic trauma surgeon Samuel David Gross served as professor of surgery at the University of Louisville and Jefferson Medical College, and as president of the AMA. His best-known work was perhaps the two-volume System of Surgery. He was portrayed in Thomas Eakins’ masterpiece, The Gross Clinic. His bronze-statue made by Alexander Stirling Calder presently finds place at Thomas Jefferson University.

Austrian painter Hans Makart is best known for his colorful historical paintings. He also founded the Makartstil or Makart style of decorating public spaces. He designed furniture and clothes, too. His lack of factual accuracy and his reliance on female nudity were both despised by academics.

Born to a pastor, Charles-Adolphe Wurtz surprisingly studied medicine instead of theology. He later taught chemistry and became the first to chair the organic chemistry department at the Sorbonne. He is best remembered for his pathbreaking research on glycols and the synthesis of many significant compounds.

German-American botanist, physician, and meteorologist George Engelmann is known for his study of Phylloxera Vastatrix. He is also noted for his botanical monographs, particularly his two major works on cacti and A Monography of North American Cuscutineae. He played vital role in elucidating flora of the west of North America that till such time was not much known to Europeans.

Almira Hart Lincoln Phelps was an American educator, scientist, author, and editor. She is best remembered for her botany writings, which influenced several other American women to be botanists like her daughter Augusta Newton Foote Arnold and contemporary Eunice Newton Foote. Almira Hart Lincoln Phelps' long life was dedicated to the education of women, especially young women.

Bernardo Guimarães was a Brazilian novelist and poet. He is best remembered for his popular romantic novels, O Seminarista and A Escrava Isaura. As a poet, he is credited with introducing the verso bestialógico to Brazilian poetry. Bernardo Guimarães also worked as a teacher and taught Rhetoric, Poetics, French, and Latin.