Portal:Biography/Selected anniversaries/April 17

Births

• 1837 – J.P. Morgan, American financier and philanthropist (d. 1913)
• 1885 – Isak Dinesen, Danish author (d. 1962)
• 1894 – Nikita Khrushchev, Premier of the Soviet Union (d. 1971)
• 1897 – Thornton Wilder, American dramatist (d. 1975)(pictured)
• 1918 – William Holden, American actor (d. 1981)
• 1972 – Jennifer Garner, American actress
• 1974 – Victoria Beckham, English singer

Deaths

• 1790 – Benjamin Franklin, American inventor, diplomat, and printer (b. 1706)
• 1892 – Alexander Mackenzie, 2nd Prime Minister of Canada (b. 1822)
• 1990 – Ralph Abernathy, American civil rights activist (b. 1936)
• 1994 – Roger Wolcott Sperry, American neurobiologist, Nobel laureate (b. 1913)