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Kennedy in the White House, which won the 1966 Pulitzer Prize for Biography or Autobiography.
Notable Deaths on February 28
44 people
628 – 2026
February 28 has seen 44 notable figures pass away throughout recorded history — from 628 – 2026. Below are the most significant names who died on this date.
By thisDay.info Editorial Team · — Wikipedia
2007 — Arthur M. Schlesinger
Jr. American historian and critic (born 1917)
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and a specialist in American history, much of Schlesinger's work explored the history of 20th-century American liberalism
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In the 1952 and 1956 presidential campaigns, he was a primary speechwriter and adviser to the Democratic presidential nominee, Adlai Stevenson II
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Schlesinger served as special assistant and "court historian" to President Kennedy from 1961 to 1963
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He wrote a detailed account of the Kennedy administration, from the 1960 presidential campaign to the president's state funeral, titled A Thousand Days: John F
Shah of Iran, Sasanian Empire (born c. 570)
Khosrow II, commonly known as Khosrow Parviz, is considered to be the last great monarch of pre-Islamic Iran, ruling the Sasanian Empire from 590 to 628, including an interruption of one year.
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628
Grand Duke of Tuscany (born 1590)
Cosimo II de' Medici was Grand Duke of Tuscany from 1609 until his death. He was the elder son of Ferdinando I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, and Christina of Lorraine.
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1621
King of Denmark (born 1577)
Christian IV was King of Denmark and Norway and Duke of Holstein and Schleswig from 1588 until his death in 1648. His reign of 59 years and 330 days makes him the longest-reigning monarch in Scandinavian history.
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1648
Croatian Franciscan and grammarian (born c. 1682)
Lovro Šitović was a Croatian Franciscan friar, grammarian, preacher, and Baroque writer whose works significantly influenced Croatian literature and education in the early 18th century. Born Hasan Šitović in Ljubuški,…
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1729
Italian cardinal and patron of the arts (born 1667)
Pietro Ottoboni was an Italian cardinal and grandnephew of Pope Alexander VIII, who was also born Pietro Ottoboni. He is remembered especially as a great patron of music and art. Ottoboni was the last person to hold the…
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1740
1857
Polish-British chess master and translator (born c. 1811/1812)
Adolf Żytogórski was a Polish-British chess master and translator.
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1882
Austrian physician and immunologist (born 1874)
Clemens Peter Freiherr von Pirquet was an Austrian scientist and pediatrician best known for his contributions to the fields of bacteriology and immunology.
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1929
French astronomer and academic (born 1851)
Camille Guillaume Bigourdan was a French astronomer.
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1932
French biologist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1866)
Charles Jules Henri Nicolle was a French bacteriologist who received the Nobel Prize in Medicine for his identification of lice as the transmitter of epidemic typhus.
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1936
Finnish politician (born 1883)
Isak Penttala was a Finnish newspaper editor, politician and member of the Parliament of Finland, the national legislature of Finland. A member of the Social Democratic Party, he represented Vaasa Province South between…
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1955
American captain, engineer, and astronaut (born 1931)
Charles Arthur Bassett II was an American electrical engineer and United States Air Force test pilot and astronaut. He went to Ohio State University for two years and later graduated from Texas Tech University with a…
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1966
American commander, engineer, and astronaut (born 1927)
Elliot McKay See Jr. was an American engineer, naval aviator, test pilot and NASA astronaut.
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1966
English cricket and music writer (born 1888)
Sir John Frederick Neville Cardus, CBE was an English writer and critic. From an impoverished home background, and mainly self-educated, he became The Manchester Guardian's cricket correspondent in 1919 and its chief…
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1975
American actor and comedian (born 1905)
Edmund Lincoln Anderson was an American actor and comedian known for his gravelly voice. To a generation of early radio and television comedy audiences, he was known as "Rochester".
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1977
American actress (born 1892)
Zara Frances Cully was an American actress. Cully was best known for her role as Olivia "Mother Jefferson" Jefferson in the CBS sitcoms All in the Family and The Jeffersons. In the latter, she portrayed the character of…
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1978
Canadian-American actress and dancer (born 1909)
Ethel Ruby Keeler was a Canadian and American actress, dancer, and singer who was paired on-screen with Dick Powell in a string of successful early musicals at Warner Bros., particularly 42nd Street (1933). From 1928 to…
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1993
Ukrainian diplomat (born 1930)
Arkady Nikolayevich Shevchenko was a Soviet diplomat who was the highest-ranking Soviet official to defect to the West.
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1998
American actress and singer (born 1926)
Mary Stuart was an American actress, guitarist, singer, and songwriter.
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2002
German violinist and composer (born 1920)
Helmut Zacharias was a German violinist and composer who created over 400 works and sold 14 million records. He also appeared in a number of films, usually playing musicians.
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2002
Guyanese-English runner and journalist, co-founded the London Marathon (born 1928)
Christopher William Brasher CBE was a British track and field athlete, Olympic champion, sports journalist and co-founder of the London Marathon.
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2003
American historian and librarian (born 1914)
Daniel Joseph Boorstin was an American historian at the University of Chicago who wrote on many topics in American and world history. He was appointed the twelfth Librarian of the United States Congress in 1975 and…
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2004
English singer and drummer (born 1941)
Chris Curtis was an English musician. He was best known for being with the 1960s beat band The Searchers. He originated the concept behind Deep Purple and formed the band in its original incarnation of 'Roundabout'.
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2005
American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1920)
Owen Chamberlain was an American physicist who shared with Emilio Segrè the Nobel Prize in Physics for the discovery of the antiproton, a sub-atomic antiparticle.
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2006
American radio host (born 1918)
Paul Harvey Aurandt was an American radio broadcaster for ABC News Radio. He broadcast News and Comment on mornings and mid-days on weekdays and at noon on Saturdays and also his famous The Rest of the Story segments.…
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2009
French actress (born 1931)
Annie Suzanne Girardot was a French actress. She often played strong-willed, independent, hard-working, and often lonely women, imbuing her characters with an earthiness and reality that endeared her to women undergoing…
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2011
American physicist and biologist, Nobel Prize laureate (born 1926)
Donald Arthur Glaser was an American physicist and biologist who received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1960 for his invention of the bubble chamber.
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2013
Dutch linguist and author (born 1935)
Hugo Brandt Corstius was a Dutch author, known for his achievements in both literature and science.
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2014
Turkish journalist and author (born 1923)
Yaşar Kemal was a leading Turkish writer of Kurdish descent, who wrote in Turkish and a human rights activist. He received 38 awards during his lifetime and had been a candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature on the…
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2015
American actor (born 1925)
George Harris Kennedy Jr. was an American actor who appeared in more than 100 film and television productions. He played "Dragline" in Cool Hand Luke (1967), winning the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for the…
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2016
German-American pianist, conductor, and composer. (born 1929)
André George Previn was a German and American conductor, composer, and pianist. His career had three facets: Hollywood films, jazz, and classical music. In each he achieved success, and the latter two were part of his…
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2019
founder of Trader Joe's (born 1930)
Joseph Hardin Coulombe was an American entrepreneur who founded the grocery store chain Trader Joe's in 1967 and served as its CEO until his retirement in 1988.
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2020
British-born American physicist and mathematician (born 1923)
Freeman John Dyson was a British-American theoretical physicist and mathematician known for his works in quantum field theory, astrophysics, random matrices, mathematical formulation of quantum mechanics, condensed…
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2020
Australian public servant (born 1917)
Sir Cyrus Lenox Simson Hewitt was an Australian public servant. His career in the Commonwealth Public Service spanned from 1939 to 1980, and included periods as a senior adviser and departmental secretary. His most…
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2020
Bangladeshi convicted murderer (born 1989)
Ahmed Salim was a Bangladeshi painter who was convicted of murdering his Indonesian girlfriend Nurhidayati Wartono Surata on the evening of 30 December 2018 at a hotel in Geylang in Singapore. According to Ahmed,…
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2024
Puerto Rican baseball player and coach (born 1969)
Héctor Ortiz Montañez was a Puerto Rican professional baseball catcher and coach. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Kansas City Royals and Texas Rangers. He also coached in MLB for the Texas Rangers.
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2024
American singer-songwriter (born 1993)
Catherine Janice Ipsan, known professionally as Cat Janice, was an American singer-songwriter. Janice wrote and sang "Dance You Outta My Head", which went viral on TikTok.
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2024
American singer-songwriter and actor (born 1950)
David Roger Johansen was an American singer, songwriter, and actor best known as lead singer of the seminal proto-punk band the New York Dolls. He is also known for his work under the pseudonym Buster Poindexter and for…
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2025
Chilean celebrity, night club owner and amateur musician (born 1954)
José Miguel Carlos "Negro" Piñera Echenique was a Chilean celebrity, night club owner and amateur musician who was the youngest brother of former Chilean President Sebastián Piñera and of economist José Piñera. He…
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2025
American writer (born 1937)
Joseph Aloysius Wambaugh Jr. was an American writer known for his fictional and nonfictional accounts of police work in the United States. Many of his novels are set in Los Angeles and its surroundings and feature Los…
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2025
Supreme Leader of Iran (born 1939)
Ali Hosseini Khamenei was an Iranian politician and Shia cleric who served as the second supreme leader of Iran from 1989 until his assassination in the 2026 Iran war. A member of the Khamenei family, he previously…
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2026
Minister of Defense of the Islamic Republic of Iran (born 1964)
Aziz Nasirzadeh was an Iranian military officer who served as the Minister of Defence of Iran from 2024 to 2026. He previously served as the Deputy of Chief of Staff for the Iranian Armed Forces from September 2021 to…
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2026
commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps of the Islamic Republic of Iran (born 1961)
Mohammad Pakpour was an Iranian military officer who served as the commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) from 2025 until his death in 2026. He had previously served as head of IRGC Ground Forces.…
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2026
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February 28 in the Blog
Budapest Protest Against Soviet Rule - February 28, 1947
1947 Budapest Protest: Hungarians defy Soviet rule in Hungary's capital
Read the full storyNotable deaths
Who died on February 28?
Arthur M. Schlesinger — American intellectual (1917–2007)
FeaturedArthur M. Schlesinger
Death year2007
Known forwas an American historian, social critic, and public intellectual
Deaths on this date44 (628 – 2026)
Explore February 28
Jump between the main pages for this date to compare events, people, and the daily quiz.
Also on February 28 in History
2026
The United States and Israel launch attacks across Iran, assassinating Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. Retaliatory strikes are launched by Iran against US military bases in the Gulf, with explosions reported in Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar and the UAE. Wikipedia →
2024
Prime Minister Modi of India inaugurates the 2nd Space Port of India - Kulasekarapattinam Spaceport. Wikipedia →
2023
See all events on February 28
Two trains collide south of the Vale of Tempe in Greece, leading to the deaths of at least 57 people and leaving 58 missing and 85 injured. Wikipedia →
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