Famous Birthdays on November 14

Joseph Raymond McCarthy was an American politician who served as a Republican senator from Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957. Beginning in 1950, McCarthy became the most visible public face of a period in the United States in which Cold War tensions fueled fears of widespread communist subversion. He alleged that numerous communists and Soviet spies and sympathizers had infiltrated institutions including the United States federal government and military, universities, and the film industry. Ultimately, he was censured by the Senate in 1954 for refusing to cooperate with and abusing members of the committee established to investigate whether or not he should be censured. The term "McCarthyism", coined in 1950 in reference to McCarthy's practices, was soon applied to similar anti-communist activities and came to refer to the post-war "Red Scare" period as a whole. Today, the term is used more broadly to refer to demagogic, reckless, and unsubstantiated accusations, as well as public attacks on the character or patriotism of political opponents.

DeVonta Versean Smith is an American professional football wide receiver for the Philadelphia Eagles of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football for the Alabama Crimson Tide, where he recorded 1,856 yards with 23 touchdowns as a senior in 2020. Smith was awarded the Heisman Trophy for his accomplishments as a senior alongside several other awards and honors. He was the first wide receiver to win the Heisman since Desmond Howard in 1991 and only the fourth overall. Smith won two national championships at Alabama prior to being selected by the Eagles tenth overall in the 2021 NFL draft. In his fourth season with the Eagles, Smith won Super Bowl LIX, becoming the fifth football player to win the Super Bowl, a college national title, and the Heisman Trophy.

Aaron Copland was an American composer, critic, writer, teacher, pianist, and conductor of his own and other American music. Copland was referred to by his peers and critics as the "Dean of American Music". The open, slowly changing harmonies in much of his music are typical of what many consider the sound of American music, evoking the vast American landscape and pioneer spirit. He is best known for the works he wrote in the 1930s and 1940s in a deliberately accessible style often referred to as "populist" and which he called his "vernacular" style. Works in this vein include the ballets Appalachian Spring, Billy the Kid and Rodeo, his Fanfare for the Common Man and Third Symphony. In addition to his ballets and orchestral works, he produced music in many other genres, including chamber music, vocal works, opera, and film scores.

Astrid Anna Emilia Lindgren was a Swedish writer of fiction and screenplays. She is most notable for several children's book series, featuring Pippi Longstocking, Emil of Lönneberga, Karlsson-on-the-Roof, and The Six Bullerby Children,, and for the children's fantasy novels Mio, My Son; Ronia the Robber's Daughter; The Brothers Lionheart and Nils Karlsson Pyssling. Lindgren worked on the Children's Literature Editorial Board at the Rabén & Sjögren publishing house in Stockholm and wrote more than 30 books for children. In 2017, she was calculated to be the world's 18th most translated author. Lindgren had by 2010 sold roughly 167 million books worldwide. In 1994, she was awarded the Right Livelihood Award for "her unique authorship dedicated to the rights of children and respect for their individuality". Her campaigning for animal welfare led to a new law, Lex Lindgren, in time for her 80th birthday.

Adam Craig Gilchrist is an Australian cricket commentator and former international cricketer and captain of the Australia national cricket team. He was an attacking left-handed batsman and record-breaking wicket-keeper, who redefined the role for the Australia national team through his aggressive batting. Widely regarded as the greatest wicket-keeper-batsman in the history of the game, Gilchrist held the world record for the most dismissals by a wicket-keeper in One Day International (ODI) cricket until it was surpassed by Kumar Sangakkara in 2015 and the most by an Australian in Test cricket. Gilchrist was a member of the Australian team that won three consecutive world titles in a row: the 1999 Cricket World Cup, the 2003 Cricket World Cup, and the 2007 Cricket World Cup, along with winning the 2006 ICC Champions Trophy.

Walter Jackson Freeman II was an American neurologist who claimed that he specialized in lobotomy. Wanting to simplify lobotomies so that it could be carried out by psychiatrists in psychiatric hospitals, where there were often no operating rooms, surgeons, or anesthesia and limited budgets, Freeman popularized a transorbital lobotomy procedure. The transorbital approach involved placing an orbitoclast under the eyelid and against the top of the eye socket; a mallet was then used to drive the orbitoclast through the thin layer of bone and into the brain. Freeman's transorbital lobotomy method did not require a neurosurgeon and could be performed outside of an operating room, often by untrained psychiatrists without the use of anesthesia by using electroconvulsive therapy to induce seizure and unconsciousness. In 1947, Freeman's partner James W. Watts ended their partnership because Watts was disgusted by Freeman's modification of the lobotomy from a surgical operation into a simple "office" procedure.

Kyle Raymond Orton is an American former professional football player who was a quarterback in the National Football League (NFL). He played college football for Purdue, where he started four straight bowl games. He was selected by the Chicago Bears in the fourth round of the 2005 NFL draft. After an injury to Bears starter Rex Grossman, Orton was pressed into service as the starting quarterback during his rookie year, starting the first 14 games of the 2005 season, but was replaced by Grossman for the playoffs that year. Orton did not play at all in 2006, and sparingly in 2007. He regained his starting job from Grossman in 2008, but the team finished a disappointing 9–7 and out of the playoffs. In the offseason of that year, he was traded to the Denver Broncos.

Aaron Matthew Taylor is an American former professional football player who was a guard for six seasons in the National Football League (NFL). He played college football for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish and was a two-time All-American. A first-round pick in the 1994 NFL draft, he played professionally for the Green Bay Packers and the San Diego Chargers of the NFL. Taylor works as a college football analyst and television sportscaster. He is the Founder of the Joe Moore Award for the most outstanding offensive line unit in college football - the only major college football award going to a group versus an individual. Taylor is a speaker on teamwork and performance at summits, events, corporate retreats, universities. In 2021, Taylor was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame

Edyta Anna Górniak is a Polish pop singer. She started her career as a musical theatre actress in 1990, and performed in the Tony Award-nominated Metro, the most successful Polish musical of all time, which was also shown on Broadway. Górniak was Poland's first representative in the Eurovision Song Contest in 1994 with the song "To nie ja". She finished as a runner-up which still remains the country's best result at the competition. This started her decades-long career as a pop singer in her native country and internationally. Górniak is also known for her 1997 single "One and One", which charted on the European Radio Top 50. She is the recipient of the Bronze Medal for Merit to Culture – Gloria Artis for her contributions to the arts.

Thinzar Shunlei Yi is a Burmese pro-democracy activist and television host. Following the 2021 Burmese coup d'état, she helped organize mass protests against the Tatmadaw. Born in Sagaing to a military family, she originally trained to become a high school teacher, graduating from the Yangon University of Education in 2013. Between 2012 and 2016, Thinzar Shunlei Yi was politically active in executive positions of several youth organizations, and later became a television host on Under 30 Dialogue, a youth-oriented television programme. In 2018, she was charged for unlawful protest against the Rohingya genocide, and was convicted in 2020. After organizing protests against the Tatmadaw in the wake of the 2021 coup d'état, she fled to the jungle and briefly joined an armed rebel group. She lives in exile in Thailand as of 2022, and runs the #Sisters2Sisters anti-wartime sexual violence campaign. She has received the Magnitsky Human Rights Award, and further honors from Women of the Future, the Obama Foundation, and the US Department of State.

James Mellaart FBI was a British-Dutch prehistorian and archaeologist. From 1959 to 1961 he was deputy director of the British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara (BIAA), then lecturer in prehistoric archaeology at Istanbul University until 1963. In 1964 he became lecturer in Anatolian archaeology at the Institute of Archaeology in London retiring in 1991. His discoveries at Hacılar, Beycesultan and Çatalhöyük left a lasting mark on prehistoric archaeology; over his career, however, Mellaart also built an extensive system of forgeries to support interpretations that were often speculative from the outset, deliberately trading on his considerable scholarly standing to lend these constructions an appearance of credibility—a strategy that, in retrospect, devalues even his genuine achievements. His manipulations bred distrust among colleagues and at times demonstrably hampered his further career, yet the full extent of his fabrications only became public after his death, not least because of systematic institutional concealment.

David Craig Mackay was a Scottish football player and manager. Mackay was best known for a highly successful playing career with Heart of Midlothian, the double-winning Tottenham Hotspur side of 1961 and winning the league with Derby County as a manager. He also represented Scotland 22 times and was selected for their 1958 FIFA World Cup squad. Mackay tied with Tony Book of Manchester City for the Footballer of the Year award in 1969 and was later listed by the Football League in their "100 Legends", as well as being an inaugural inductee to both the English and Scottish Football Halls of Fame. He was described by Spurs as one of their greatest players and was known as 'the heartbeat' of their most successful ever team.

Harland Michael Williams is a Canadian and American comedian and actor. After several years of performing stand-up comedy in Toronto and Los Angeles, he made his film debut in Dumb and Dumber (1994) before playing starring roles in the short-lived sitcom Simon and the Disney comedy RocketMan (1997). He co-starred in Half Baked and played a psychopathic hitch-hiker in There's Something About Mary in 1998. He later appeared in films such as The Whole Nine Yards (2000), Freddy Got Fingered (2001) and Sorority Boys (2002), and provided voices in works such as Gary & Mike, Robots (2005), Meet the Robinsons (2007), and Sausage Party (2016). He is also an author of children's books, and creator of the children's animated series Puppy Dog Pals (2017–2023).

Sir Charles Lyell, 1st Baronet was a Scottish geologist who demonstrated the power of known natural causes in explaining the earth's history. He is best known today for his association with Charles Darwin and as the author of Principles of Geology (1830–33), which presented to a wide public audience the idea that the earth was shaped by the same natural processes still in operation today, operating at similar intensities. The philosopher William Whewell dubbed this gradualistic view "uniformitarianism" and contrasted it with catastrophism, which had been championed by Georges Cuvier and was better accepted in Europe. The combination of evidence and eloquence in Principles convinced a wide range of readers of the significance of "deep time" for understanding the earth and environment.

Charles Matthew Egerton Hazlewood is a British conductor. After winning the European Broadcasting Union conducting competition in 1995 whilst still in his twenties, Hazlewood has had a career as an international conductor, music director of film and theatre, composer and a curator of music on British radio and television, Motivational Speaker and founder of Paraorchestra – the world's first integrated ensemble of disabled and non-disabled musicians. He was a guest on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs in May 2019 and became Sky Arts' Ambassador for Music in January 2021. In 2023, Hazlewood was recognised for his 'outstanding contribution to the musical life of the UK' when awarded the Sir Charles Groves Prize by music charity Making Music.

Carey Bell Harrington was an American blues musician who played harmonica in the Chicago blues style. Bell played harmonica and bass guitar for other blues musicians from the late 1950s to the early 1970s before embarking on a solo career. Besides his own albums, he recorded as an accompanist or duo artist with Earl Hooker, Robert Nighthawk, Lowell Fulson, Eddie Taylor, Louisiana Red and Jimmy Dawkins and was a frequent partner with his son, the guitarist Lurrie Bell. Blues Revue called Bell "one of Chicago's finest harpists." The Chicago Tribune said Bell was "a terrific talent in the tradition of Sonny Boy Williamson and Little Walter." In 2023, he was inducted in the Blues Hall of Fame.

Lisa Marie De Vanna is an Australian former professional soccer player who played as a forward. She played for Adelaide Sensation, Western Waves, Doncaster Rovers Belles, AIK, Perth Glory, Washington Freedom, Brisbane Roar, magicJack, Newcastle Jets, Linköping, Sky Blue FC, Melbourne Victory, Boston Breakers, Washington Spirit, Melbourne City, North Shore Mariners, Orlando Pride, Canberra United, South Melbourne, Sydney FC, and Fiorentina as well as representing the Australian national team 150 times. She is noted for her pace and dribbling skills. She has been regularly considered one of the greatest female footballers in the world; football analyst and former Socceroo Craig Foster stated that she "ran on jet-fuel; burning up twice as fast, but with incredible impact."

Benjamin Fondane or Benjamin Fundoianu was a Romanian and French poet, critic and existentialist philosopher, also noted for his work in film and theater. Known from his Romanian youth as a Symbolist poet and columnist, he alternated neoromantic and expressionist themes with echoes from Tudor Arghezi, and dedicated several poetic cycles to the rural life of his native Moldavia. Fondane, who was of Jewish Romanian extraction and a nephew of Jewish intellectuals Elias and Moses Schwartzfeld, participated in both minority secular Jewish culture and mainstream Romanian culture. During and after World War I, he was active as a cultural critic, avant-garde promoter and, with his brother-in-law Armand Pascal, manager of the theatrical troupe Insula.

Fred Wallace Haise Jr. is an American former NASA astronaut, engineer, fighter pilot with the U.S. Marine Corps and U.S. Air Force, and test pilot. He is one of the 24 Apollo astronauts to reach the Moon, having served as Lunar Module pilot on Apollo 13. He was to have been the sixth person to walk on the Moon, but the Apollo 13 landing was aborted en route. Haise flew five Space Shuttle Approach and Landing Tests in 1977. He retired from NASA in 1979. He is the last surviving crew member of Apollo 13 and the last surviving Apollo astronaut that reached the Moon without landing.