1937 deaths

James Ramsay MacDonald (né James McDonald Ramsay; 12 October 1866 – 9 November 1937) was a British statesman and politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, the first who belonged to the Labour Party, leading minority Labour governments for nine months in 1924 and again between 1929 and 1931. From 1931 to 1935, he headed a National Government dominated by the Conservative Party and supported by only a few Labour members. MacDonald was expelled from the Labour Party as a result.
MacDonald, along with Keir Hardie and Arthur Henderson, was one of the three principal founders of the Labour Party in 1900. He was chairman of the Labour MPs before 1914 and, after an eclipse in his career caused by his opposition to the First World War, he was Leader of the Labour Party from 1922. The second Labour Government (1929–1931) was dominated by the Great Depression. He formed the National Government to carry out spending cuts to defend the gold standard, but it had to be abandoned after the Invergordon Mutiny, and he called a general election in 1931 seeking a "doctor's mandate" to fix the economy.
The National coalition won an overwhelming landslide and the Labour Party was reduced to a rump of around 50 seats in the House of Commons. His health deteriorated and he stood down as Prime Minister in 1935, remaining as Lord President of the Council until retiring in 1937. He died later that year.
MacDonald's speeches, pamphlets and books made him an important theoretician. Historian John Shepherd states that "MacDonald's natural gifts of an imposing presence, handsome features and a persuasive oratory delivered with an arresting Highlands accent made him the iconic Labour leader". After 1931, MacDonald was repeatedly and bitterly denounced by the Labour movement as a traitor to its cause. Since the 1960s, some historians have defended his reputation, emphasising his earlier role in building up the Labour Party, dealing with the Great Depression, and as a forerunner of the political realignments of the 1990s and 2000s.

Helen Margarite Burgess (April 26, 1916 – April 7, 1937) was an American film and stage actress. Discovered by Cecil B. DeMille, she began her acting career in 1936 at age nineteen, playing Louisa Cody in DeMille's Western biopic The Plainsman. She would appear in four films as a contract player for Paramount Pictures before dying at age twenty from pneumonia.

Corneille Lentz (20 July 1879 – 10 March 1937) was a Luxembourgian painter. His work was part of the painting event in the art competition at the 1932 Summer Olympics.

Percival Lancaster (24 February 1880 – 25 October 1937) was a British civil engineer and a writer of boy's adventure fiction, whose progress was derailed by the First World War. Although his full name was William Arthur Percy Lancaster, he generally used the form Percival Lancaster.

Henri Joseph Marcel Gilardoni (28 January 1876 – 21 May 1937) was a French sailor who competed in the 1900 Summer Olympics in Paris, France. Gilardoni took the gold in the 1st race of the 3 to 10 ton.

Hubert Jean Daniel Lefèbvre (28 November 1878 in Paris – 26 September 1937 in Labaroche) was a French rugby union player who competed in the 1900 Summer Olympics. He was a member of the French rugby union team, which won the gold medal. Lefèbvre played forward.Lefèbvre played club rugby with Racing Club de France from 1895 to 1902 and was a member of the 1900 and 1902 French championship teams. In the 1902 final, a 6–0 victory, he scored the final try just before the half.Lefèbvre was educated at the Lycée Charlemagne and Centrale Graduate School in engineering. He served in World War I, rising to the rank of captain.

Karl Christof Friedrich von Gerok (26 May 1854 – 18 September 1937 in Stuttgart) was an officer of Württemberg, general of the infantry of the XXIV Reserve Corps during World War I.

Ludwig Otto Hölder (December 22, 1859 – August 29, 1937) was a German mathematician born in Stuttgart.

Robert P. Dunn (August 28, 1890 – March 24, 1937) was a comic actor who was one of the original Keystone Cops in Hoffmeyer's Legacy.

Walter Gronostay (1906–1937) was a German composer noted for his work on film scores. Gronostay studied under Arnold Schoenberg. From the late 1920s he began working on film music for a mixture of feature films and documentaries. Along with Herbert Windt he composed the music for Leni Riefenstahl's 1938 documentary Olympia, but died unexpectedly at the age of 31 before the film was released.