Famous People Who Died In 1921

Bat Masterson was a lawman and professional gambler known for his exploits in the late 19th and early 20th-century American Old West. He was known for his hunting skills and earned fame as a gunfighter. Later in his life, he became a reporter and columnist for The Morning Telegraph and gained popularity as a leading sports writer.

Russian philosopher Peter Kropotkin was a passionate advocate of anarcho-communism. He was also an activist, revolutionary, economist, and sociologist. He was arrested and imprisoned for his activism in 1874. However, he managed to escape and lived in exile for over 40 years in different countries across Europe. He returned to Russia after the Russian Revolution in 1917. 

Born to a church minister, Henrietta Swan Leavitt grew up to work as a “human computer” at the Harvard Observatory. The American astronomer gained fame for discovering the period-luminosity relation of Cepheid variables. However, her brilliant scientific career was halted by her death due to stomach cancer at 53.

Ahmed Raza Khan Barelvi, also known as Ala-Hazrat, was a renowned Islamic scholar and an Urdu poet. Born in Bareilly, British India, he belonged to a family of Rohilla Pushtuns who had migrated from Qandahar. He wrote about various subjects such as philosophy, science, and astronomy.

Enrico Caruso was an operatic tenor who performed at prominent opera houses in the Americas and Europe. His commercially released recordings made him an international star in the early-1900s. Thanks to his illustrious career that spanned 25 years, Caruso became one of the most popular entertainers of his generation. In 1987, he was honored with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

Carl Menger made significant contributions to the marginal utility theory and the subjective theory of value. Born to a lawyer father, he too studied law and also worked as a journalist for a while. He later taught at the University of Vienna and also established the Austrian School of economics.

Widely known as Scotland’s first Black footballer, Andrew Watson was also the first Black player to play international association football. The son of a Guyanese woman and a Scottish plantation owner, he moved to Britain with his father as a child. He was also an engineer and a wholesale business owner.

Gabriel Lippmann was a Franco-Luxembourgish inventor and physicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1908. He is also remembered for inventing an astronomical tool called the coelostat. Lippmann was an influential physicist from Luxembourg; an Institute for scientific research in Luxembourg City was named after him. The Institute was later renamed Luxembourg Institute for Science and Technology (LIST). 

Russian baron Roman von Ungern-Sternberg gained fame as an anticommunist general during the Russian Civil War. Also known as the Mad Baron for his cruelty toward his enemies, he had converted to Buddhism but retained strains of Christianity in his faith. He was eventually executed by a firing squad.

William Friese-Greene was a British photographer and inventor. A pioneer of motion pictures, Friese-Greene is remembered for devising a series of cameras with which he shot moving pictures in London. Despite earning substantial amount of money throughout his career, Friese-Greene died in poverty as he spent his earnings on his inventions. His life inspired a biopic titled The Magic Box.

Emily Davies was an English suffragist and feminist. One of the first campaigners for women's rights to university education, Davies is best remembered for co-founding Girton College, the first university in England to educate women. Emily Davies is also credited with playing an important role in the establishment of Newnham College in 1875.

Spanish countess and novelist Emilia Pardo Bazán had initially gained fame with the essay The Critical Issue. She was an advocate of naturalism and free will. Known for novels such as The House of Ulloa, she also taught Romance literature and was divorced by her husband because of her literary success.

The grandnephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, Charles Joseph Bonaparte was a French-American lawyer and political activist, born and raised in Baltimore. Founder of Baltimore Reform League, his works attracted Theodore Roosevelt’s admiration and serving as U.S. Secretary of the Navy and Attorney General during the latter’s tenure as President, he established Bureau of Investigation, later Day FBI, prosecuting many antitrust suits.

Ivan Vazov was a Bulgarian novelist, poet, and playwright. Considered the patriarch of Bulgarian literature, Vazov is best remembered for his 1888 novel Under the Yoke, which has been translated into more than 30 languages. Ivan Vazov is credited with writing the first Bulgarian fantasy poem and the first Bulgarian science fiction story.

A renowned Swedish operatic soprano from the 19th century, Christina Nilsson ruled the world opera scene for 20 years. She was often compared to fellow opera star Adelina Patti and finds a mention in Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina. One of her most iconic roles was that of Marguerite in Charles Gounod's Faust.

American astronomer Mary Watson Whitney served as a professor and director of the Vassar Observatory for over two decades. Her teaching and research work were related to comets, asteroids, double stars and variable stars and also on measurements by photographic plates. The Vassar Observatory published 102 scientific papers under her direction. She became the first president of Maria Mitchell Association.

One of the best novelists and playwrights from the Naturalist school of Poland, Gabriela Zapolska had initially had a failed acting career. Of her countless works, only a few survive, such as the farce Mrs. Dulska’s Morality. Highly influenced by naturalist author Émile Zola, she also included a journalistic tone.

Swedish archaeologist Oscar Montelius is best remembered for his pioneering research on prehistoric chronology, especially that of the Bronze Age. He was associated with the Museum of National Antiquities in Stockholm, as a professor and as a museum director. He had also won honors such as the Anders Retzius Medal.

Egyptian-origin Ottoman statesman Said Halim Paşa was the grandson of the popular Egyptian viceroy Muhammad Ali. He served as the Ottoman Empire’s foreign minister and grand vizier. He opposed the Ottoman entry into World War I. Exiled to Malta, he later went to Rome, where he was murdered by an Armenian revolutionary.

James Cardinal Gibbons was a prelate of the Catholic Church. From 1868 to 1872, he served as Apostolic Vicar of North Carolina. From 1872 to 1877, he served as the Bishop of Richmond. From 1877 to 1921, he served as the ninth Archbishop of Baltimore. He is also remembered for his writing skills and many of his works remain influential.