The following is a list of notable deaths in December 1998.

Entries for each day are listed alphabetically by surname. A typical entry lists information in the following sequence:

• Name, age, country of citizenship at birth, subsequent country of citizenship (if applicable), reason for notability, cause of death (if known), and reference.

December 1998

1

• Aisha Abd al-Rahman, 85, Egyptian author and professor of literature, heart attack.^[1]
• Janet Lewis, 99, American novelist, poet, and librettist.^[2]
• Bertil Nordahl, 81, Swedish football player and manager.^[3]
• Vincenzo Pappalettera, 79, Italian writer and historian.
• Donald Smith, 76, Australian operatic tenor.^[4]
• Freddie Young, 96, British cinematographer (Lawrence of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago, Ryan's Daughter), Oscar winner (1963, 1966, 1971).^[5]

2

• Theodora Mead Abel, 99, American clinical psychologist.^[6]
• Ben Guintini, 79, American baseball player.^[7]
• Bob Haggart, 84, American dixieland jazz musician.^[8]
• Cleopa Ilie, 86, Romanian abbot.^[9]
• Mikio Oda, 93, Japanese athlete and the first Japanese Olympic gold medalist.^[10]
• Brian Stonehouse, 80, British painter and SEO agent during World War II.^[11]

3

• Pierre Hétu, 62, Canadian conductor, pianist and politician, cancer.^[12]
• Albert Leman, 83, Soviet composer of classical music.
• Mohammad Mokhtari, 56, Iranian writer, poet and activist, murdered.^[13]
• George Murcell, 73, British actor.
• Robert Rothschild, 86, Belgian diplomat.^[14]
• Ed Widseth, 88, American football player.^[15]

4

• Percy Ames, 66, English footballer.
• Egil Johansen, 64, Norwegian-Swedish jazz musician.^[16]
• Suzanne Jovin, 21, German-born American student, murdered.^[17]
• Milton Marks, 78, American politician.^[18]
• Yury Vengerovsky, 60, Ukrainian volleyball player and Olympic champion.^[19]

5

• Hazel Bishop, 92, American chemist.^[20]
• Jack Connor, 78, English footballer.
• Jean Fenwick, 91, Trinidad-American actress.
• Albert Arnold Gore, 90, American politician and father of Al Gore.^[21]
• John Lions, 61, Australian computer scientist.
• Cheung Tze-keung, 43, Chinese criminal, execution by firing squad.^[22]

6

• César Baldaccini, 77, French sculptor.^[23]
• Georges Borgeaud, 84, Swiss writer and publisher.^[24]
• Robert Marasco, 62, American horror novelist and playwright, lung cancer.^[25]
• Pierre Mousel, 83, Luxembourgian football player.^[26]
• Peg Leg Bates, 91, American entertainer.^[27]
• Radomir Šaper, 72, Yugoslav/Serbian basketball player and executive.
• Hoshiar Singh, 61, Indian Army officer.
• Michael Zaslow, 56, American actor, cancer.^[28]

7

• John Addison, 78, British composer.^[29]
• Carlos Oviedo Cavada, 71, Chilean cardinal of the Catholic Church.
• Daniel Lee Corwin, 40, American serial killer, execution by lethal injection.^[30]
• Voitto Hellstén, 66, Finnish sprinter and Olympic medalist.^[31]
• Tim Kelly, 61, American playwright.
• Martin Rodbell, 73, American scientist and Nobel prize recipient, multiple organ failure.^[32]

8

• Michael Craze, 56, British actor (Doctor Who), heart attack.
• Hamilton H. Howze, 89, American general and commander of the 82nd Airborne Division.^[33]
• George Roden, 60, American leader of the Branch Davidian sect, heart attack.^[34]
• Odo Josef Struger, 67, Austrian automation pioneer, cancer.^[35]

9

• Christine Fulwylie-Bankston, 82, American poet, publisher, and civil rights activist.
• Bill Looby, 67, American soccer player.^[36]
• Archie Moore, 81, American boxing champion, heart failure.^[37]
• Mohammad-Ja'far Pouyandeh, 44, Iranian writer and activist, murdered.

10

• Wim Hora Adema, 84, Dutch children's author and feminist.^[38]
• Bob Brown, 59, American gridiron football player.
• Bob Dille, 81, American basketball player.^[39]
• Buddy Feyne, 86, American lyricist.^[40]
• Wang Ganchang, 91, Chinese nuclear physicist.
• Ray Goossens, 74, Belgian artist, animator, writer and film director (Hergé's Adventures of Tintin).^[41]
• Trygve Haugeland, 84, Norwegian politician .
• Kamel Messaoudi, 37, Algerian Chaabi musician, traffic collision.^[42]
• Charles D. Mize, 77, United States Marine Corps officer, leukemia.^[43]
• Berta Singerman, 97, Belarusian-Argentine singer and actress, cardiovascular disease.
• Vida Tomšič, 85, Slovenian communist and World War II partisan fighter.

11

• Jack Coleman, 74, American basketball player.
• Irma Hünerfauth, 90, German painter and sculptor.
• Gunnar Johansson, 79, Swedish sprint canoeist and Olympian.^[44]
• André Lichnerowicz, 83, French differential geometer and mathematical physicist.^[45]
• Jimmy Mackay, 54, Scottish-Australian football player.^[46]
• Kavi Pradeep, 83, Indian poet and songwriter.^[47]
• Chen Puru, 80, Chinese politician.
• Anton Stankowski, 92, German graphic designer, photographer and painter.^[48]
• Lynn Strait, 30, American singer and vocalist of band Snot, car accident.
• Max Streibl, 66, German politician.^[49]

12

• Max Boydston, 66, American gridiron football player.^[50]
• Lawton Chiles, 68, American politician, heart attack.^[51]
• Marco Denevi, 76, Argentine novelist, lawyer and journalist.
• Jimmy "Orion" Ellis, 53, American singer, murdered during robbery.^[52]
• Denny Galehouse, 87, American baseball player.^[53]
• Willis J. Gertsch, 92, American arachnologist.
• Vadim Gulyaev, 57, Russian water polo player and Olympic champion.^[54]
• William A. Marra, 70, American politician.
• Don Patterson, 88, American producer, animator, and director.
• Mo Udall, 76, American politician, Parkinson's disease.^[55]

13

• Helen Adolf, 102, Austrian–American linguist and literature scholar.^[56]
• Willem den Toom, 87, Dutch politician.^[57]
• Dean Fausett, 85, American painter.^[58]
• Lew Grade, 91, British impresario.^[59]
• Harvey Jones, 77, American gridiron football player.^[60]
• Richard Thomas, 66, British admiral and Black Rod.
• Ariadna Welter, 68, Mexican movie actress.^[61]
• Liang Xiang, 79, Chinese politician.
• Norbert Zongo, 49, Burkinabé investigative journalist, murdered.^[62]

14

• Vittorio Cottafavi, 84, Italian film director and screenwriter.^[63]
• Norman Fell, 74, American actor (Three's Company, The Graduate, Bullitt), bone marrow cancer.^[64]
• A. Leon Higginbotham, Jr., 70, African-American civil rights advocate, author and judge, stroke.^[65]
• Yuriy Hromak, 50, Ukrainian backstroke swimmer and Olympic medalist.^[66]
• James A. Jensen, 80, American paleontologist.^[67]
• Brian Lewis, 55, English footballer.^[68]
• Annette Strauss, 74, American philanthropist and mayor of Dallas, cancer.^[69]
• Will Tremper, 70, German journalist and filmmaker, heart attack.^[70]

15

• Daniel Langrand, 77, French football player and coach.^[71]
• Jan Meyerowitz, 85, American composer, conductor, pianist and writer.^[72]
• Rowena Moore, 88, American civil rights activist.
• Robert Paul, 88, French sprinter and Olympian.^[73]
• Dean Peters, 40, American professional wrestler and referee, car accident.
• Ján Podhradský, 82, Slovak football player.
• Johnny Riddle, 93, American baseball player and coach.^[74]
• Paul Rivière, 86, French Resistance fighter during World War II and politician.^[75]

16

• Clay Blair, 73, American journalist and author, heart attack.^[76]
• Jocelyn Crane, 89, American carcinologist.
• Jean de Montrémy, 85, French industrialist, racing driver, and race car designer.^[77]
• William Gaddis, 75, American novelist, prostate cancer.^[78]
• Johnny Gorsica, 83, American baseball player.^[79]
• Lee Tai-young, 84, Korean lawyer and judge.
• Maneklal Sankalchand Thacker, 94, Indian engineer and academic.
• Philip True, 50, American foreign correspondent, murdered.^[80]

17

• Kevin Brennan, 78, Australian-born British-based film and television actor.
• John Burns Brooksby, 83, Scottish veterinarian.^[81]
• Allan D'Arcangelo, 68, American artist and printmaker.^[82]
• Joseph Esherick, 86, American architect, heart failure.^[83]
• Antonina Khudyakova, 81, Soviet Air Force officer during World War II.
• Dorothy Nyembe, 66, South African activist and politician.
• Harry Osman, 87, English football player.

18

• Agustín Barboza, 85, Paraguayan singer and composer.
• C. S. Chellappa, 86, Indian writer, journalist and political activist.
• Lev Dyomin, 72, Soviet cosmonaut, cancer.^[84]
• Mohammad Taghi Falsafi, 90, Iranian ayatollah and preacher.
• Harry Haddock, 73, Scottish footballer.^[85]
• Abdurajak Abubakar Janjalani, 38–39, Filipino militant, founder of Abu Sayyaf, shot.^[86]
• Vinod Mishra, 51, Indian communist politician, heart attack.
• Edwin E. Moise, 79, American mathematician.^[87]
• Gilberto Muñoz, 75, Chilean football player.
• Tadeusz Rybczynski, 75, Polish-English economist.
• Max Wehrli, 89, Swiss literary scholar and germanist.^[88]

19

• Garry Blaine, 65, Canadian ice hockey player.^[89]
• Cully Dahlstrom, 86, American ice hockey player.^[90]
• Mel Fisher, 76, American treasure hunter.^[91]
• Gordon Gunter, 89, American marine biologist and fisheries scientist.
• Antonio Ordóñez, 66, Spanish bullfighter, liver cancer.^[92]
• Bernhard Tessmann, 86, German rocket scientist during and after World War II.
• Ron Turner, 76, British illustrator and comic book artist, stroke and heart attack.^[93]
• Qian Zhongshu, 88, Chinese literary scholar and writer, cancer.^[94]

20

• André Dewavrin, 87, French officer and resistance member during World War II.^[95]
• E. W. Etchells, 87, American sailor and sailboat designer.^[96]
• Angelo Grizzetti, 82, French-Italian football player and coach.
• Irene Hervey, 89, American actress, heart failure.^[97]
• Alan Lloyd Hodgkin, 84, British scientist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.^[98]
• Kazimierz Kropidłowski, 67, Polish long jumper and Olympian.^[99]
• Bangalore Venkata Raman, 86, Indian astrologer.^[100]
• Miklós Sárkány, 90, Hungarian water polo player and Olympic champion.^[101]

21

• Roger Avon, 84, British actor.
• Gilbert Charles-Picard, 85, French historian and archaeologist.^[102]
• Avril Coleridge-Taylor, 95, English pianist, conductor, and composer.^[103]
• Adelaide Hawley Cumming, 93, American vaudeville performer, radio host, and television personality.
• Karl Denver, 67, Scottish singer, brain tumor.^[104]
• Anne Ferguson, 57, Scottish physician and clinical researcher, pancreatic cancer.^[105]
• Sándor Ivády, 95, Hungarian water polo player and Olympic champion.^[106]
• Ernst Günther Schenck, 94, German doctor and member of the SS.^[107]
• Béla Szőkefalvi-Nagy, 85, Hungarian mathematician.^[108]
• Jerzy Topolski, 70, Polish historian.
• Richard Turnbull, 89, British colonial governor.

22

• Pedro Araya, 73, Chilean basketball player.^[109]
• Leif Erickson, 92, American attorney and politician.^[110]
• Virginia Graham, 86, American talk show host, heart attack.^[111]
• Robert Haynes, 67, Canadian geneticist and biophysicist.^[112]
• Jean Malaquais, 90, French novelist.^[113]
• Subhashis Nag, 43, Indian mathematician.
• Donald Soper, 95, British methodist minister and pacifist.

23

• Mark Chatfield, 45, American breaststroke swimmer, lymphoma.^[114]
• Jack Hilton, 77, English rugby player.
• Peggy Kelman, 89, Australian aviation pioneer.
• Ratnappa Kumbhar, 89, Indian independence activist.
• David Manners, 98, Canadian-American actor (Dracula, The Mummy, A Bill of Divorcement).^[115]
• Joe Orlando, 71, Italian American illustrator, writer and cartoonist.^[116]
• Anatoly Rybakov, 87, Soviet and Russian writer.^[117]
• Michelle Thomas, 30, American actress (Family Matters, The Young and the Restless, The Cosby Show) and comedian, cancer.^[118]
• Pierre Vallières, 60, Québécois journalist and writer, heart failure.^[119]

24

• Syl Apps, 83, Canadian ice hockey player, heart attack.^[120]
• Viola Farber, 67, American choreographer and dancer.^[121]
• Matt Gillies, 77, Scottish football player and manager.^[122]
• Peter Janssens, 64, German musician and composer.
• Daan Kagchelland, 84, Dutch sailor and Olympic champion.^[123]
• William R. Perl, 92, American lawyer and psychologist.^[124]
• Raemer Schreiber, 88, American physicist.^[125]
• Estelle Witherspoon, 82, American artist, civil rights activist and quilter.

25

• Katharina Brauren, 88, German actress.^[126]
• Alfredo Covelli, 84, Italian politician.
• Damita Jo DeBlanc, 68, American actress, comedian, and singer, respiratory disease.^[127]
• Bryan MacLean, 52, American singer, guitarist and songwriter, heart attack.^[128]
• Mike McAlary, 41, American journalist and columnist, colorectal cancer.^[129]
• John McGrath, 60, English football player and manager.
• Hans Oeschger, 71, Swiss climatologist.^[130]
• Richard Paul, 58, American actor, cancer.^[131]
• John Pulman, 75, English snooker player, domestic accident.^[132]

26

• Cathal Goulding, 75, Northern Irish Republican and IRA member, cancer.
• Dick Grove, 71, American musician, composer, and arranger.^[133]
• Hurd Hatfield, 81, American actor, heart attack.^[134]
• Helmut Mahlke, 85, German Oberstleutnant in the Luftwaffe during World War II.
• Michael Sherard, 88, British fashion designer.^[135]
• Ram Swarup, 78, Indian author.

27

• Kevork Ajemian, 66, Lebanese-Armenian writer, journalist, novelist and activist.^[136]
• Dany Bustros, 39, Lebanese belly dancer, socialite and stage actress, suicide.^[137]
• Anita Hoffman, 56, American writer and activist, breast cancer.
• Anne Holm, 76, Danish journalist and children's writer.^[138]
• Robert S. Johnson, 78, American fighter pilot during World War II.^[139]
• Joe Parker, 75, American gridiron football player.^[140]
• Roy Powell, English rugby league player, heart attack.^[141]
• Ralegh Radford, 98, English archaeologist and historian.^[142]
• Ricardo Tormo, 46, Spanish motorcycle road racer, leukemia.

28

• André Bizette-Lindet, 92, French sculptor.
• Herbert Fechner, 85, East German politician.
• William Frankfather, 54, American actor (Death Becomes Her, Harry and the Hendersons, Mouse Hunt), complications from liver disease.
• Edgar Hovhannisyan, 68, Armenian composer.
• Ron Huntington, 77, Canadian politician.
• Werner Müller, 78, German composer and conductor of classical music.^[143]
• Shorty Rollins, 69, American racing driver.
• Robert Rosen, 64, American theoretical biologist.^[144]
• Harold Schindler, 69, American journalist and historian.^[145]
• Ouang Te Tchao, 93, Chinese physicist.^[146]
• Mary Ann Unger, 53, American abstract sculptor, breast cancer.^[147]
• Bjørn Watt-Boolsen, 75, Danish film actor.

29

• Geoff Crawford, 82, Australian politician.^[148]
• George Curran, 80, English rugby league football player.
• Hubert Deschamps, 75, French actor, heart attack.
• Phyllis Kennedy, 84, American film actress.
• Jack D. Moore, 92, American set decorator.
• Don Taylor, 78, American actor and film director, heart failure.^[149]

30

• Joan Brossa, 79, Catalan poet, playwright and visual artist.^[150]
• Jean-Claude Forest, 68, French writer and illustrator of comics, asthma.^[151]
• Jack Graham, 82, American baseball player.^[152]
• Walker Hancock, 97, American sculptor and teacher.^[153]
• Rune Johansson, 78, Swedish ice hockey player.^[154]
• Keisuke Kinoshita, 86, Japanese film director, stroke.^[155]
• Johnny Moore, 64, American R&B singer with The Drifters, pneumonia.^[156]
• Sam Muchnick, 93, American professional wrestling promoter.
• Ansar Razak, 24, Indonesian football player, traffic collision.
• Karl Heinz Rechinger, 92, Austrian botanist and phytogeographer.
• Otto Wachs, 89, German sailor and Olympic medalist.^[157]
• George Webb, 86, British actor.

31

• George Lynn Cross, 93, American botanist and author.^[158]
• H. Dunlop Dawbarn, 83, American businessman, philanthropist and politician.^[159]
• Ted Glossop, 64, Australian rugby player and coach, cancer.
• Les Hammond, 90, Canadian politician.
• Gene Harlow, 79, American football player and coach.
• Alan Morris, 44, English football player, murdered.
• Erling Norvik, 70, Norwegian politician.
• Arnold Stickley, 72, English golfer.
• Jerry Williams, 75, American football player and coach, leukemia.^[160]