1921 births

Robert_Rollis

Robert Rollis (16 March 1921 - 6 November 2007) was a French actor. He mainly starred as a film actor, but also appeared in television and also in theatre in the 1950s and early 1960s. Amongst many roles, he starred in Yves Robert's War of the Buttons (La Guerre des boutons) in 1962.

Marcella_Pobbe

Marcella Pobbe (13 July 1921 - 17 June 2003) was an Italian operatic soprano who sang a wide range of roles in both the lyric and spinto repertory.Pobbe was born in Montegalda near Vicenza, where she studied with Elena Fava, and later entered the Rossini Conservatory in Pesaro, where she studied with Rinalda Pavoni. She also studied at the Accademia Chigiana in Siena with Giorgio Favaretto. She made her stage debut in Spoleto, as Gounod's Marguerite, in 1949, and the same year, first appeared at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples, where she was to appear regularly until 1973.
She made her debut at the Rome Opera in 1954, in the title role of Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride, and at La Scala in 1955, as Bathseba in the premiere of Darius Milhaud's David. She appeared at the Baths of Caracalla in 1957, as Mathilde in Guglielmo Tell, and in 1959 as Elsa in Lohengrin. She also sang at most major opera houses in Italy, Venice, Parma, Bologna, Florence, Mantua, Palermo, etc., as well as on Italian radio and television.
On the international scene, she made guest appearances at the Monte Carlo Opera, the Zurich Opera, the Vienna State Opera, the Royal Opera House in London, the Liceo in Barcelona. In North America, she sang at the Philadelphia Opera and at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, for a few performances of Marguerite and Mimi during the 1958-59 season.
Her repertory also included; Agathe, Eva, Countess Almaviva, Micaela, Leonora, Maria, Amelia, Desdemona, Maddalena, Tosca, Adriana, Francesca, etc. She can be heard on record as Margherita in Boito's Mefistofele, opposite Ferruccio Tagliavini and Giulio Neri, and in two recitals of arias, which reveal a singer with a voice of considerable beauty and refinement. For Italian television in the 1950s, she appeared in several productions, notably Le nozze di Figaro, Un ballo in maschera and Adriana Lecouvreur, one of her most celebrated roles.
Pobbe went on performing until the late 1970s, and then became a music critic for Vicenza Gazzettino. In 2000, she published a series of interviews she had made with conductors. She died in Milan.

Jean-François_d'Orgeix

Jean-François d'Orgeix (French pronunciation: [ʒɑ̃ fʁɑ̃swa dɔʁʒɛks]; 15 April 1921 – 4 July 2006) was a French equestrian, actor and Olympic medalist. He was born in Cap-d'Ail. He competed in show jumping at the 1948 Summer Olympics in London, where he won a bronze medal in the individual contest. He also competed in show jumping at the 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki and placed fifth with the French team.Under the name of Jean Pâqui he appeared in more than twenty films between 1933 and 1958.

Gerd_Larsen

Gerd Larsen born Gerd Elly (19 February 1921 – 4 October 2001) was a Norwegian ballerina who performed frequently with England's Royal Ballet, in a career lasting over fifty years up until her seventy-fifth birthday. In her later years, she was known for her mime roles.

Leif_Vetlesen

Leif Vetlesen (7 August 1921 – 18 May 2003) was a Norwegian sailor, political worker, organizational worker and writer.
He was born in Kristiania as a son of engineer Alf Vetlesen (1878–1963) and teacher Aagot Bugge (1881–1967). He was a great-grandson of Frederik Moltke Bugge. He finished his secondary education at Oslo Cathedral School in 1939, and then went to sea. He was going to return to land after one year, but when Norway was involved in World War II in April 1940, their merchant fleet became a crucial asset in the war and Vetlesen stayed. He worked at sea for several years, but while hospitalized with jaundice in Cardiff, he became involved with the British Communist Party. As he became known as a good speaker, he was hired in the trade union Norwegian Seafarers' Union in 1944.After the war he launched a campaign for better treatment of war sailors, but his agitation led to him being fired from the union in 1947. In 1949 he was also excluded from the Young Communist League of Norway. His marriage since 1943 to Lorna Dilys Peaty also ended in 1949; in 1951 he married Vesla Gunvor Hansen. After the Soviet invasion of Hungary he renounced Communism and joined the Norwegian Labour Party together with his wife.Vetlesen held various jobs, both as a manual worker and electoral campaigner for the Labour Party, before being hired as information director in the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation. He remained here until 1982 except for three years from 1968 to 1971 in Uganda. From 1982 to 1985 he was secretary-general of Amnesty International Norway. His wife was a government minister from 1986 to 1988.Vetlesen's former work for war sailors was taken up by Thore Horve during the 1960s, and led to an ex gratia monetary payment to sailors in 1972. Vetlesen released several books about the topic, including Sjøfolkenes kamp for det hemmelige fond (1949), Reis ingen monumenter. Kampen om Nortraships hemmelige fond (1981), Med døden i kjølvannet. Av en krigsseilers saga (1989) and Syv fortellinger fra Norges krig på havet (with others, 1993). He also wrote two books about the Communist Party and Peder Furubotn. He was decorated with the HM The King's Medal of Merit in gold in 1997, and died in May 2003 in Oslo.

Henry_Arana

Henry Arana Rodríguez (May 1, 1921 – February 23, 2008) was a composer of popular songs who was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico and lived all but the last years of his life in Puerto Rico. At the time of his death, from complications related to a neurological disease, he was residing in Alabama and was married to Carmen Mártir Santiago. He served in the United States Army in World War II.Arana composed hundreds of songs made popular by a wide variety of Puerto Rican artists, including Cano Estremera, Bobby Valentín, Willie Rosario, El Gran Combo, Cortijo y su Combo, Tito Rojas, Andy Montañez, Gilberto Santa Rosa, La Sonora Ponceña, Mario Ortiz and Mario Hernández, as well as Mexican artists, such as Adrián Alejandro.
Among his best-known compositions are "Mi Puerto Rico", which was played as his remains were laid to rest at the Puerto Rico National Cemetery in Bayamón, Puerto Rico, "La novia automática", "Awilda", "Sanjuanero", "Por culpa de tu amor", "Como sube la gasolina" and "La gringa". His "Samba con Salsa", composed in the 1980s was a precursor of the fusion music that was popularized twenty years later.

Mosse_Jørgensen

Mosse Jørgensen (3 January 1921 – 30 June 2009) was a Norwegian school principal and non-fiction writer.
She is especially remembered as a co-founder and the first principal of a reformed secondary school in Oslo in 1967, Forsøksgymnaset. She published the book Kunsten å overleve med en tenåring i huset in 1969. Her book Fra skoleopprør til opprørsskole from 1971 was translated into eight languages. She was awarded the Medal of St. Hallvard in 1993, and the Ole Brumm prize in 1998.

Dorian_"Doc"_Paskowitz

Dorian "Doc" Paskowitz (March 3, 1921 – November 10, 2014) was an American surfer and physician, who gave up practicing medicine for a living and decided to become a professional surfer. In 1972, he founded a surf camp run by his family, where campers could live alongside and surf with members of the Paskowitz family. He and his family have been referred to as the "First Family of Surfing".