1921 births

Carroll Holmes Pratt (April 19, 1921 – November 11, 2010) was an American sound engineer who, along with laugh track inventor Charley Douglass, pioneered the use of prerecorded laughter.

Henry Cedric Scholberg (May 29, 1921 – August 4, 2012) was director and librarian of the Ames Library of South Asia at the University of Minnesota. His works include bibliographies on Indian encyclopedias, on manuals and gazetteers of India, and on the Portuguese in India. He also authored other scholarly works, plays and novels, as well as his own memoirs.

Otis Cary (October 20, 1921 – April 14, 2006) was an American Japanologist.

Reidar Djupedal (March 22, 1921 – July 29, 1989) was a professor of North Germanic languages and literature at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.
Djupedal was born in Oslo. After graduating from the English program at Firda Upper Secondary School in Sandane in 1941, Djupedal studied at the University of Oslo until the fall of 1943. He was arrested on November 30 that year and sent to the Buchenwald concentration camp as one of the approximately 650 male students at the University of Oslo interned in German prison camps during the Second World War II from December 1943 to liberation in May 1945 and known as the "German students" (Norwegian: Tysklandsstudentene). He returned home in the spring of 1945 and resumed his studies at the University of Oslo, and in 1950 he received a degree in historical linguistics with a dissertation titled Noko om Ivar Aasen i åra 1840–60 (Ivar Aasen in the Years 1840–1860).In 1950 and 1951 he worked on the Norsk Ordbok (Norwegian Dictionary). From 1951 to 1956 he taught Norwegian at the University of Copenhagen and in Aarhus, and from 1962 to 1969 he taught Nordic linguistics at the University of Bergen. In 1969 he became a professor at the Norwegian College of General Sciences, remaining in this position until he retired in 1988.
Djupedal is especially known for his work on Ivar Aasen; among other things, he published Aasen's letters and diaries in three volumes, and together with Johannes Gjerdåker he also published Aasen's Norske ordsprog (Norwegian Proverbs) and wrote a long afterword for the work. Djupedal's Aasen collection is kept at the Ivar Aasen Documentation Center (Norwegian: Aasentunet) in Ørsta.Djupedal also wrote extensively about Faroese, Aasmund Olavsson Vinje, the literary magazine Dølen, and Norwegian folk tales and poetry. He also worked to give Olea Crøger the attention he thought she deserved in efforts to collect Norwegian folk tales.
Reidar Djupedal was the father of the politician Øystein Djupedal.

Terkel Nissen Rosenqvist (2 October 1921 – 1 April 2011) was a Norwegian chemist and metallurgist.

Vera-Ellen (born Vera-Ellen Rohe; February 16, 1921 – August 30, 1981) was an American dancer and actress. She is remembered for her solo performances as well as her work with partners Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Danny Kaye, and Donald O'Connor. She is best known for her starring roles in On the Town (1949) with Gene Kelly and White Christmas (1954) with Danny Kaye.

Joseph M. Kremer (19 August 1921 – 30 June 2010) was an American politician.
Joseph Kremer was born in Jesup, Iowa, on 19 August 1921 to Matt Kremer and his wife, Matilda Lardy. Following his graduation from the high school in his hometown in 1939, the younger Kremer served in the United States Army during World War II, through to his discharge in December 1946. Six months after, he married Ellen Janice Harn, with whom he raised eight children. Kremer was active in several county-level civic and agricultural organizations, and retired from farming in 1986.Kremer, a Republican was first elected to the Iowa House of Representatives for Buchanan County in 1984, and served continuously until 1993, when fellow Republican Darrell Hanson represented District 27 for a single term. Kremer returned to the seat in 1995, was reelected once more, and retired at the end of his sixth term in 1999.He died on 30 June 2010 at the Buchanan County Health Center Long-Term Care Unit in Independence, Iowa.

Blean Anson Calkins (August 11, 1921 in Marshalltown, Iowa - March 16, 2003 in Muscatine, Iowa) was a sports radio broadcaster for over 30 years. He was President of the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association (NSSA) 1978-1981, and served on the NSSA Board with such contemporaries as Curt Gowdy, Chris Schenkel, Keith Jackson and Ray Scott.
His birth was a difficult one, the attending doctor was credited with saving his life, so he was named in honor of Dr. Blean.Calkins broadcast Iowa Hawkeyes basketball and football home games along with Iowa high school athletics on KWPC out of Muscatine for over 30 years. Calkins also did morning drive sports on album rock 99 Plus through most of the 1980s. Morning show host Andy Hammer dubbed it "Radio's biggest two minutes".

Ernest Virgil Derr (October 29, 1921 – January 8, 2014) was an American stock car racing driver. He won 12 International Motor Contest Association (IMCA) Stock Car championships, made one start in the NASCAR Grand National Series, and won eleven ARCA Racing Series races. Along with Dick Hutcherson, Ramo Stott and Don White, Derr was a member of the "Keokuk Komets", a collection of racing drivers from Keokuk, Iowa.

Pepe Jaramillo (born José Jaramillo García; October 27, 1921, Lerdo - April 30, 2001, Andalucia) was a notable Mexican pianist, composer, arranger, and recording artist. He was most active in London as an EMI recording artist in the 1960s and 1970s. Born in Lerdo, Durango, he began his professional music career playing in night clubs in México City. Relocating to London in the late 1950s, his many recordings and worldwide concert appearances brought him international fame. He died in his sleep of anemia at his villa in Spain. (On the internet, his activity has often been confused with the Ecuadorean singer of the same name.)