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The 1940s decade, known as the forties, ran from 1940 to 1949.

1940s was a period between the radical 1930s
1930s

In Western Europe, Australia and the United States, more progressive reforms occurred as opposed to the extreme measures sought elsewhere. Roosevelt's New Deal attempted to use government spending to combat large-scale unemployment and severely negative growth....
 and the conservative 1950s
1950s

The 1950s decade was the years of 1950 to 1959 inclusive. The Fifties in the developed western world are generally considered social conservative and highly Consumerism in nature....
, which also leads the period to be divided in two halves:

The first half of the decade was dominated by World War II
World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
, the widest and most destructive armed conflict in human history.






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1944 Normandylst
The 1940s decade, known as the forties, ran from 1940 to 1949.

Events and trends

The 1940s was a period between the radical 1930s
1930s

In Western Europe, Australia and the United States, more progressive reforms occurred as opposed to the extreme measures sought elsewhere. Roosevelt's New Deal attempted to use government spending to combat large-scale unemployment and severely negative growth....
 and the conservative 1950s
1950s

The 1950s decade was the years of 1950 to 1959 inclusive. The Fifties in the developed western world are generally considered social conservative and highly Consumerism in nature....
, which also leads the period to be divided in two halves:

The first half of the decade was dominated by World War II
World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
, the widest and most destructive armed conflict in human history. So consequential was this event and its brutal aftermath that it laid the foundation for other major world events and trends for decades to follow. This war was also the first modern civilian war.

The second half of the 1940s marked the beginning of the Cold War
Cold War

The Cold War was the continuing state of conflict, tension and competition that existed between a number of world powers, including the United States, the Soviet Union, People's Republic of China, France, United Kingdom and those countries' respective allies from the mid-1940s to the early 1990s....
, the race between the US and the Soviet Union to invent better technology.

Jackierobinson1945
* Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany and the Third Reich are the colloquial English names for Germany under the regime of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party , which established a Totalitarianism dictatorship that existed from 1933 to 1945....
 loses the Battle of Britain
Battle of Britain

The Battle of Britain is the name given to the sustained strategic effort by the Luftwaffe during the summer and autumn of 1940 to gain air superiority over the Royal Air Force , especially RAF Fighter Command....
 1940
  • Nazi Germany
    Nazi Germany

    Nazi Germany and the Third Reich are the colloquial English names for Germany under the regime of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party , which established a Totalitarianism dictatorship that existed from 1933 to 1945....
     invades Denmark, Norway, Benelux
    Benelux

    The Benelux is an union in Western Europe that comprises three neighboring countries, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg , which lie in the north western European region between France and Germany....
    , and France from 1940-1941
  • The United States enter World War II
    World War II

    World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
     after the attack on Pearl Harbor
    Attack on Pearl Harbor

    The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike conducted by the Empire of Japan Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States' naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on the morning of Sunday, December 7, 1941, later resulting in the United States becoming militarily involved in World War II....
     on December 7, 1941
  • Germany and Japan suffer defeats at Stalingrad
    Battle of Stalingrad

    The Battle of Stalingrad was a battle between Nazi Germany and its allies and the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad in Southern Russia....
    , El Alamein
    Battle of El Alamein

    There were two battles of El Alamein in the Second World War, both fought in 1942. The Battles occurred in Egypt in and around an area named after a railway stop called El Alamein at ....
    , and Midway
    Battle of Midway

    The Battle of Midway was a major naval battle, widely regarded as the most important of the Pacific Theater of Operations of World War II. It took place from 4 June to 7 June 1942, approximately one month after the Battle of the Coral Sea and exactly six months after Empire of Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor....
     in 1942 and 1943
  • Subash Chandra Bose escapes from house-arrest and founds the INA
    Indian National Army

    The Indian National Army or Azad Hind Fauj was an armed force formed by Indian independence movement in 1942 in Southeast Asia during World War II....
     in Singapore
    Singapore

    Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country microstate located at the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula. It lies 137 kilometres north of the equator, south of the Malaysian state of Johor and north of Indonesia's Riau Islands....
    . The INA made of Indian POWs held by the Japanese accompanies the Japanese to the borders of India. However, Axis defeat results in the annihilation of the INA and surrender following Nethaji's death in 1945
  • D-Day
    D-Day

    D-Day is a term often used in military parlance to denote the day on which a combat attack or operation is to be initiated. "D-Day" often represents a variable , designating the day upon which some significant event will occur or has occurred; see Military designation of days and hours for similar terms....
     (June 6, 1944)
  • Germany surrenders May 7, 1945


  • Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
    Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

    The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were nuclear warfares near the end of World War II against the Empire of Japan by the United States at the executive order of President of the United States Harry S....
     (August 6 and August 9, 1945); Japan surrenders on August 15
  • World War II
    World War II

    World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
     officially ends on September 2, 1945
  • The Holocaust (the shoah
    Shoah

    Headline text Shoah is a Hebrew word meaning "disaster" or "conflagration". "The Shoa" or, with the addition of "Ha" , HaShoah is commonly used to refer to the Holocaust....
    )


People

  • President Ismet Inönü
    Ismet Inönü

    Mustafa Ismet In?n? was a Turkey Army General, Prime Minister and the second President of the Republic of Turkey. He is widely referred to as "Milli Sef" , a title he bestowed upon himself when he was elected as the President of Turkey in 1938....
     (Turkey
    Turkey

    Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country that stretches across the Anatolian peninsula in southwest Asia and Thrace in the Balkans region of Southern Europe....
    )
  • Prime Minister Winston Churchill
    Winston Churchill

    Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, Order of the Garter, Order of Merit, Order of the Companions of Honour, Territorial Decoration, Fellow of the Royal Society, Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, Queen's Privy Council for Canada was a Politics of the United Kingdom known chiefly for his leadership of the United King...
     (United Kingdom)
  • Prime Minister Clement Attlee
    Clement Attlee

    Clement Richard Attlee, 1st Earl Attlee, Order of the Garter, Order of Merit, Order of the Companions of Honour, Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, Fellow of the Royal Society was a British people politician, who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1945 to 1951, and leader of the Labour Party from 1935 to 1955....
     (United Kingdom)
  • President Franklin D. Roosevelt
    Franklin D. Roosevelt

    Franklin Delano Roosevelt , often referred to by his initials FDR, was the List of Presidents of the United States President of the United States....
     (United States)
  • President Harry S. Truman
    Harry S. Truman

    Harry S. Truman was the List of Presidents of the United States President of the United States . As the List of Vice Presidents of the United States Vice President of the United States, he succeeded Franklin D....
     (United States)
  • General Secretary Joseph Stalin
    Joseph Stalin

    Joseph Stalin was the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1922 until his death in 1953....
     (Soviet Union
    Soviet Union

    The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a Constitution of the Soviet Union socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991.The name is a translation of the , romanization of Russian Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik, abbreviated ????, SSSR....
    )
  • Governor Luis Muńoz Marín
    Luis Muńoz Marín

    Jos? Luis Alberto Mu?oz Mar?n was a Puerto Rican people poet, journalist, and politician. He was the first Democracy election Governor of Puerto Rico Puerto Rico and considered one of the most important 20th century political figures in the Americas....
     (Commonwealth of Puerto Rico
    Puerto Rico

    Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is a Autonomy Territories of the United States of the United States located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of the Virgin Islands....
    )
  • President Getúlio Vargas
    Getúlio Vargas

    Get?lio Dornelles Vargas served as President of Brazil of Brazil from 1930 to 1945 and from 1951 until his suicide in 1954....
     (Brazil
    Brazil

    Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is a country in South America. It is the List of countries and outlying territories by total area country by geographical area, occupying nearly half of South America, the List of countries by population country, and the fourth most populous democracy in the world....
    )
  • President Juan Perón
    Juan Perón

    Juan Domingo Per?n was an Argentina general and politician, elected three times as President of Argentina, after serving in several government positions, including the Secretary of Labor and the Vice Presidency....
     (Argentina
    Argentina

    Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic , is a country in South America, constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city....
    )
  • Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King
    William Lyon Mackenzie King

    William Lyon Mackenzie King, Queen's Privy Council for Canada, Order of Merit , Order of St Michael and St George was a Canadian lawyer, economist, university professor, civil servant, journalist, and politician....
     (Canada)
  • Chancellor Adolf Hitler
    Adolf Hitler

    Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born Germany politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , popularly known as the Nazi Party....
     (Germany)
  • Prime Minister Benito Mussolini
    Benito Mussolini

    Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini, Order of the Bath Sovereign Military Order of Malta Order of the Tower and Sword was an Italy politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
     (Italy)
  • Prime-Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru (India)
  • General Aung San
    Aung San

    General Bogyoke Aung San ; February 13, 1915 ? July 19, 1947) was a Bamar revolutionary, Nationalism, freedom fighter and founder of the military of Myanmar, the Tatmadaw....
     (Burma)
  • Governor-General Muhammad Ali Jinnah
    Muhammad Ali Jinnah

    Muhammad Ali Jinnah Urdu language: }} , a 20th century politician and statesman, is generally regarded as the father of the state of Pakistan. He served as leader of the Muslim League and served as Pakistan's first Governor-General of Pakistan....
     (Pakistan
    Pakistan

    Pakistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, is a country located in South Asia and borders Central Asia and the Middle East. It has a 1,046 kilometre coastline along the Arabian Sea and Gulf of Oman in the south, and is bordered by Afghanistan and Iran in the west, India in the east and People's Republic of China in th...
    )


Entertainers

  • Dana Andrews
    Dana Andrews

    Dana Andrews was an United States film actor....
  • Fred Astaire
    Fred Astaire

    Fred Astaire was an United States Academy Award-winning film and Broadway theatre dance, choreographer, singer and actor. His stage and subsequent film career spanned a total of seventy-six years, during which he made thirty-one musical films....
  • Mary Astor
    Mary Astor

    Mary Astor was an Academy Awards-winning United States actress. Most famous for her role as Brigid O'Shaughnessy in The Maltese Falcon opposite Humphrey Bogart, Astor began her long film career as a teenager in the silent films of the early 1920 in film....
  • Lauren Bacall
    Lauren Bacall

    Lauren Bacall is an American film and theater actress and Model . Known for her husky voice and sultry looks, she has continued acting to the present day....
  • Anne Baxter
    Anne Baxter

    Anne Baxter was an Academy Award-winning United States actress....
  • Jack Benny
    Jack Benny

    Jack Benny was an American comedian, vaudeville, and actor for radio programming, television, and film.Widely recognized as one of the leading American entertainers of the 20th century, Benny was known for his comic timing and his ability to get laughs with either a pregnant pause or a single expression, such as his signature exasperated "...
  • Ingrid Bergman
    Ingrid Bergman

    was a Swedish people three-time Academy Award-winning and two-time Emmy Award-winning Actor. She also won the Tony Award for Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play in the 1st Tony Awards in 1947....
  • Humphrey Bogart
    Humphrey Bogart

    Humphrey DeForest Bogart was an United_States_of_America actor and cultural icon. In 1997, Entertainment Weekly magazine named him the number one movie legend of all time....
  • Walter Brennan
    Walter Brennan

    Walter Brennan was a three-time Academy Award winning United States actor. He is remembered as one of the premier character actors in motion picture history....
  • James Cagney
    James Cagney

    James Francis Cagney, Jr. was an American film star. Although he won acclaim and major awards for a wide variety of roles, he is best remembered for playing "tough guy"s....
  • Cab Calloway
    Cab Calloway

    Cabell "Cab" Calloway III was a famous American jazz singer and bandleader.Calloway was a master of energetic scat singing and led one of the United States' most popular African American big bands from the start of the 1930s through the late 1940s....
  • Montgomery Clift
    Montgomery Clift

    Edward Montgomery Clift was an United Statesn film actor. He was known for his brooding, sensitive, working-class character roles, and received four Academy Award nominations during his career....
  • Claudette Colbert
    Claudette Colbert

    Claudette Colbert was a French-born American stage and film actress.Born in Saint-Mand?, France and raised in New York City, Colbert began her career in Broadway theater productions during the 1920s, progressing to film with the advent of talking pictures....
  • Gary Cooper
    Gary Cooper

    Frank James ?Gary? Cooper was an Cinema of the United States film actor and iconic star. He was renowned for his quiet, understated acting style and his stoic, individualistic, emotionally restrained, but at times intense screen persona, which was particularly well suited to the many Western movie he made....
  • Abbott and Costello
    Abbott and Costello

    Bud Abbott and Lou Costello performed together as Abbott and Costello, an United States double act whose work in radio, film and television made them the most popular comedy team during the 1940s....
  • Joseph Cotten
    Joseph Cotten

    Joseph Cheshire Cotten was an American actor of stage and film. He was perhaps best known for his collaborations with Orson Welles, which included Citizen Kane, The Third Man, The Magnificent Ambersons and Journey into Fear , which Cotten wrote, and for his work with Alfred Hitchcock in Shadow of a Doubt....
  • Joan Crawford
    Joan Crawford

    Joan Crawford After an absence of nearly two years from the screen, Crawford staged a comeback by starring in Mildred Pierce , for which she won the Academy Award for Academy Award for Best Actress....
  • Bing Crosby
    Bing Crosby

    Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby was an United States popular singer and actor whose career lasted from 1926 until his death.One of the first multimedia stars, from 1934 to 1954 Bing Crosby held a nearly unrivaled command of record sales, radio ratings and motion picture grosses....
  • Dorothy Dandridge
    Dorothy Dandridge

    Dorothy Jean Dandridge was an United States actress and popular singer. Dandridge was the first African American to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress....
  • Bette Davis
    Bette Davis

    Ruth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis was an American actress of film, television and theatre. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres; from contemporary crime films to historical film and period piece and occasional comedy, though her greatest successes were h...
  • Olivia de Havilland
    Olivia de Havilland

    Olivia Mary de Havilland is a two-time Academy Awards-winning actor. She is the older sister of actress Joan Fontaine, also an Academy Award winner....
  • Marlene Dietrich
    Marlene Dietrich

    Marlene Dietrich ; was a German-born American actress, singer and entertainer.Dietrich remained popular throughout her long career by continually re-inventing herself....
  • Walt Disney
    Walt Disney

    Walter Elias Disney was a multiple Academy Award-winning American film producer, film director, screenwriter, voice actor, animator, entrepreneur and philanthropist....
  • Irene Dunne
    Irene Dunne

    Irene Dunne was an American film actor and singer of the 1930s and 1940s. Dunne was nominated for five-time Academy Award for Best Actress for her performances in Cimarron , Theodora Goes Wild , The Awful Truth , Love Affair and I Remember Mama ....
  • Duke Ellington
    Duke Ellington

    Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and bandleader.Duke Ellington was recognized during his life as one of the most influential Jazz royalty, if not in all American music and he is of only four jazz musicians ever to have been featured on the cover of Time magazine ....
  • Alice Faye
    Alice Faye

    Alice Faye was an United States actor and singer. She is remembered first for her stardom at 20th Century Fox and, later, as the radio comedy partner of her second husband, bandleader-comedian Phil Harris....
  • Henry Fonda
    Henry Fonda

    Henry Jaynes Fonda was an United States Academy Awards-winning film and Stage actor, best known for his roles as plain-speaking idealists. Fonda's subtle, Naturalism acting style preceded by many years the popularization of method acting....
  • Joan Fontaine
    Joan Fontaine

    Joan Fontaine is an Academy Awards-winning United Kingdom actress in American films. She became an American citizen in April 1943. She is the younger sister of actress Olivia de Havilland, also an Academy Award winner....
  • Clark Gable
    Clark Gable

    Clark Gable was an Cinema of the United States, nicknamed "The King of Hollywood" in his heyday. In , the American Film Institute named Gable seventh among the AFI's 100 Years......
  • Ava Gardner
    Ava Gardner

    Ava Lavinia Gardner was an Academy Award-nominated United States actress. She is listed as one of the American Film Institute's AFI's 100 Years......
  • Judy Garland
    Judy Garland

    Judy Garland was an American actress and alto singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years, Garland attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage....
  • Greer Garson
    Greer Garson

    'Eileen Evelyn Greer Garson', Order of the British Empire was a United Kingdom-born actor who was very popular during the years of World War II. As one of MGM's major stars of the 1940s, Garson received seven Academy Award nominations, winning the Academy Award for Best Actress award for Mrs....
  • Paulette Goddard
    Paulette Goddard

    Paulette Goddard was an American film and theatre actress. A former child Model and in several Broadway theatre productions as Ziegfeld Follies, she was a major star of the Paramount Studio in the 1940s....
  • Betty Grable
    Betty Grable

    Betty Grable was an American dancer, singer, and actress.Her iconic bathing suit photo made her the number-one pin-up girl of the World War II era....
  • Cary Grant
    Cary Grant

    Archibald Alec Leach , better known by his stage name, Cary Grant, was a British-born American actor. With his distinctive yet not quite placeable accent, he was noted as perhaps the foremost exemplar of the debonair leading man, handsome, virile, charismatic and charming....
  • Carl Stuart Hamblen
    Carl Stuart Hamblen

    Carl Stuart Hamblen was one of Radio programming first singing cowboys in 1926, and later became a Christian songwriter, Temperance movement supporter and recurring candidate for political office....
  • Rita Hayworth
    Rita Hayworth

    Rita Hayworth , was an American actress who attained fame during the 1940s not only as one of the era's top musical stars, but also as the era's defining sex symbol, most notably in the 1946 film Gilda....
  • Katharine Hepburn
    Katharine Hepburn

    Katharine Houghton Hepburn was an United States actress of film, television and stage.Acclaimed throughout her 73-year career, Hepburn holds the record for the most Academy Award for Best Actress Academy Awards wins with four, from 12 nominations....
  • Bob Hope
    Bob Hope

    Bob Hope, Order of the British Empire, Order of St. Gregory the Great , was an British-born American comedian and actor who appeared in vaudeville, on Broadway theatre, and in radio, television and movies....
  • Lena Horne
    Lena Horne

    Lena Mary Calhoun Horne is an American singer and actress. She has recorded and performed extensively, independently and with other jazz notables, including Artie Shaw, Teddy Wilson, Billy Strayhorn, Duke Ellington, Charlie Barnet, Benny Carter, and Billy Eckstine....
  • Jennifer Jones
    Jennifer Jones

    Jennifer Jones is an United States actor. Jones won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in The Song of Bernadette ....
  • Danny Kaye
    Danny Kaye

    Danny Kaye was an American award-winning actor, singer and comedian....
  • Gene Kelly
    Gene Kelly

    Eugene Curran "Gene" Kelly was an United States dancer, actor, singer, film director, Film producer, and choreographer.A major exponent of 20th century filmed dance, Kelly was known for his energetic and athletic dancing style, his good looks and the likeable characters that he played on screen....
  • Veronica Lake
    Veronica Lake

    Veronica Lake was an United States film actor and Pin-up girl who enjoyed both popular and critical acclaim, most notably for her femme fatale roles in film noir with Alan Ladd during the 1940s, as well as her peek-a-boo hairstyle....
  • Hedy Lamarr
    Hedy Lamarr

    Hedy Lamarr was an Austrian-born United States actress and scientist. Though known primarily for her acting , she also co-invented an early form of spread spectrum, a key to modern wireless communication....
  • Dorothy Lamour
    Dorothy Lamour

    Dorothy Lamour was an United States film actor. She is probably best-remembered for appearing in the Road to... movies, a series of successful comedies co-starring Bob Hope and Bing Crosby....
  • Laurel and Hardy
    Laurel and Hardy

    Laurel and Hardy were a popular comedy team of thin, British-born Stan Laurel and heavy, American-born Oliver Hardy . They became famous during the early half of the 20th century for their work in motion pictures and also appeared on stage throughout America and Europe....
  • Peter Lawford
    Peter Lawford

    Peter Sydney Lawford was an English-born actor, member of the "Rat Pack," and brother-in-law to President John F. Kennedy, perhaps more noted in later years for his off-screen activities as a celebrity than for his acting....
  • Vivien Leigh
    Vivien Leigh

    Vivien Leigh, Lady Olivier , was an English actress. She won two Academy Awards for playing "southern belles": Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind and Blanche DuBois in the film version of A Streetcar Named Desire , a role she had also played on stage in London's West End Theatre....
  • Gene Lockhart
    Gene Lockhart

    Eugene "Gene" Lockhart was a Canada Academy Award-nominated character actor, singer, playwright and popular composer.Born in London, Ontario, Lockhart made his professional debut at the age of six when he appeared with The Kilties Band of Canada....
  • June Lockhart
  • Carole Lombard
    Carole Lombard

    Carole Lombard , born Jane Alice Peters in Fort Wayne, Indiana, was an Oscar-nominated United States Actor. She was particularly noted for her comedic roles in several classic films of the 1930s, most notably in the 1936 film My Man Godfrey....
  • Peter Lorre
    Peter Lorre

    Peter Lorre , born L?szl? L?wenstein, was a Hungarian people - Austrian - United States actor frequently typecast as a sinister foreigner....
  • Myrna Loy
    Myrna Loy

    Myrna Loy was an American actress. Trained as a dancer, but after a few minor roles in silent films, she devoted herself fully to an acting career, and from 1925 gradually established herself as a film actress....
  • Ida Lupino
    Ida Lupino

    Ida Lupino was an Anglo-American film actor, film director, and a pioneer among women filmmakers. In her forty-eight year career, she appeared in fifty-nine films, and directed nine others....
  • Vera Lynn
    Vera Lynn

    Dame Vera Lynn Order of the British Empire is a popular United Kingdom vocalist whose career flourished during World War II, when she was nicknamed "Forces Sweetheart"....
  • Fred MacMurray
    Fred MacMurray

    Frederick Martin MacMurray was an United States actor who appeared in more than 100 movies and a highly successful television series during a career that spanned nearly a half-century, starting in 1930 and extending into the 1970s....
  • Fredric March
  • Ray Milland
    Ray Milland

    Ray Milland was a Wales-born United States actor and Film director. His screen career ran from 1929 to 1985, and he is best-remembered for his Academy Award-winning portrayal of an alcoholic writer in The Lost Weekend ....
  • Carmen Miranda
    Carmen Miranda

    Maria do Carmo Miranda da Cunha Order of Infante D. Henrique, better known by the stage name Carmen Miranda was a Portugal-born Brazilian people samba Singing and Actor most popular in the 1940s and 1950s....
  • Margaret O'Brien
    Margaret O'Brien

    Margaret O'Brien is an Academy Award-winning United Statesn film actor, and although her career was brief, was one of the most highly regarded child actors in cinema history....
  • Maureen O'Hara
    Maureen O'Hara

    Maureen O'Hara is an Irish people film actor and singer.Born to Charles Stewart Parnell FitzSimons and Marguerita Lilburn in Ranelagh, County Dublin, Ireland not long before partition, the famously red hair O'Hara has been noted for playing fiercely passionate heroines with a highly sensible attitude....
  • Gregory Peck
    Gregory Peck

    Gregory Peck was an American film actor. He was one of 20th Century Fox's most popular film stars, from the 1940s to the 1960s, and played important roles well into the 1990s....
  • Walter Pidgeon
    Walter Pidgeon

    Walter Davis Pidgeon was an American actor of Canada birth, who lived most of his life in the United States, and eventually became a U.S. citizen....
  • Eleanor Powell
    Eleanor Powell

    Eleanor Torrey Powell was an United States film actress and dancer of the 1930s and 1940s, known for her exuberant solo tap dancing....
  • William Powell
    William Powell

    William Horatio Powell was a three-time Academy Award-nominated American actor, noted for his sophisticated, cynical roles. He was a major MGM film star and is most widely known for portraying the detective Nick and Nora Charles in six The Thin Man films....
  • Claude Rains
    Claude Rains

    William Claude Rains was an England award-winning actor and film star whose career spanned 47 years. He later held Cinema of the United States citizenship and was best known for his many roles in Hollywood films....
  • Basil Rathbone
    Basil Rathbone

    Basil Rathbone, Military Cross , was a South African Republic England actor most famous for his portrayal of Sherlock Holmes and of suave villains in such swashbuckler films as The Mark of Zorro , Captain Blood , and The Adventures of Robin Hood ....
  • Edward G. Robinson
    Edward G. Robinson

    Edward Goldenberg Robinson, Sr. was an honorary Academy Award-winning United States actor born in Romania. Although he has played a wide range of characters, he is best remembered for his roles as a gangster, most notably in his star-making film Little Caesar....
  • Ginger Rogers
    Ginger Rogers

    Ginger Rogers was an Academy Awards-winning United States film and stage actor, dancer and singer. In a film career spanning 50 years, she made a total of 73 films, and is now principally celebrated for her role as Fred Astaire's romantic interest and dancing partner in a series of ten Hollywood musical films that revolutionized the genre....
  • Mickey Rooney
    Mickey Rooney

    Mickey Rooney is an United States film actor and entertainer whose film, television, and theatre appearances span nearly his entire lifetime. During his career he has won multiple awards, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe and an Emmy Award....
  • Rosalind Russell
    Rosalind Russell

    Rosalind Russell was an American actress of theatre and film, perhaps best known for her role as a fast-talking newspaper reporter in the Howard Hawks screwball comedy His Girl Friday, as well as originating the role of Auntie Mame on Broadway theatre and in film....
  • Joseph Schildkraut
    Joseph Schildkraut

    File:Bundesarchiv Bild 102-13226, Josef Schildkraut und Maria Olszewska.jpgJoseph Schildkraut was an Academy Award-winning Austria stage and film actor....
  • Barbara Stanwyck
    Barbara Stanwyck

    Barbara Stanwyck was an United States actor, a star of film and television, known during her 60-year career as a consummate and versatile professional with a strong screen presence, and a favorite of directors such as Cecil B....
  • James Stewart
    James Stewart (actor)

    James Maitland Stewart , popularly known as Jimmy Stewart, was an United States film and stage actor best known for his self-effacing persona....
  • Elizabeth Taylor
    Elizabeth Taylor

    Dame Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor, Order of the British Empire , also known as Liz Taylor, is an England-born American actress.Known for her acting skills and beauty, as well as her Cinema of the United States lifestyle, including many marriages, Taylor is considered one of the great actresses of Hollywood's golden years, as well as a la...
  • Robert Taylor
    Robert Taylor (actor)

    Robert Taylor was an United States actor....
  • Gene Tierney
    Gene Tierney

    Gene Tierney was an United States film and Theatre actor. Acclaimed as one of the great beauties of her day, she is best-remembered for her performance in the title role of Laura and her Academy Award-nominated performance for Academy Award for Best Actress in Leave Her to Heaven ....
  • Spencer Tracy
    Spencer Tracy

    Spencer Tracy was a two-time Academy Award winning actor of theatre and film, who appeared in 74 films from 1930 in film to 1967 in film. He is generally regarded as one of the finest actors in motion picture history....
  • Lana Turner
    Lana Turner

    Lana Turner was an Academy Awards-nominated American film and occasionally television actress. On-screen, she was well-known for the glamour and sensuality she brought to almost all her movie roles....
  • John Wayne
    John Wayne

    John Wayne was an Academy Award- and Golden Globe Award-winning United States film actor. He epitomized rugged masculinity and has become an enduring American icon....
  • Orson Welles
    Orson Welles

    George Orson Welles , better known as Orson Welles, was an Academy Award-winning United States actor, director, writer and producer, who worked extensively in film, theatre, television, and radio....
  • Cornel Wilde
    Cornel Wilde

    Cornelius Louis Wilde was an United States actor and film director....
  • Jane Wyman
    Jane Wyman

    Jane Wyman was an American actor. She began her film career in the 1930s, and was a prolific performer for two decades. She received an Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in Johnny Belinda , and later achieved success during the 1980s for her leading role in the television series Falcon Crest....
  • Loretta Young
    Loretta Young

    Loretta Young was an Academy Award, three time Emmy and two-time Golden Globe-winning American actress....


Musicians

  • Louis Armstrong
    Louis Armstrong

    Louis Daniel Armstrong , nicknamed Satchmo or Pops, was an American jazz trumpeter and singer.Coming to prominence in the 1920s as an innovative cornet and trumpet player, Armstrong was a foundational influence on jazz, shifting the music's focus from collective improvisation to solo performers....
  • Gene Autry
    Gene Autry

    Orvon Gene Autry was an United States performing arts who gained fame as "Singing cowboy" on the Radio in the United States, in Cinema of the United States and on Television in the United States for more than three decades beginning in the 1930s....
  • Count Basie
    Count Basie

    William "Count" Basie was an United States Jazz piano, organist, bandleader, and composer. Widely regarded as one of the most important jazz bandleaders of his time, Basie led his popular Count Basie Orchestra for almost 50 years....
  • Mills Brothers
    Mills Brothers

    The Mills Brothers were a major African-American jazz and pop music vocal quartet of the 20th century producing more than 2,000 recordings that sold more than 50 million copies and garnered at least three dozen gold records....
  • Les Brown
    Les Brown (bandleader)

    Les Brown, Sr. and the Band of Renown are a big band that began in the big band era of the late 1930s and now performs under the direction of his son Les Brown, Jr....
  • Nat King Cole
    Nat King Cole

    Nathaniel Adams Coles , known professionally as Nat King Cole, was an United States musician who first came to prominence as a leading jazz pianist....
  • Perry Como
    Perry Como

    Pierino "Perry" Como was an United States singer and television personality. During a career spanning more than half a century he recorded exclusively for the RCA Victor label after signing with it in 1943....
  • Bing Crosby
    Bing Crosby

    Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby was an United States popular singer and actor whose career lasted from 1926 until his death.One of the first multimedia stars, from 1934 to 1954 Bing Crosby held a nearly unrivaled command of record sales, radio ratings and motion picture grosses....
  • Duke Ellington
    Duke Ellington

    Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and bandleader.Duke Ellington was recognized during his life as one of the most influential Jazz royalty, if not in all American music and he is of only four jazz musicians ever to have been featured on the cover of Time magazine ....
  • Ella Fitzgerald
    Ella Fitzgerald

    Ella Jane Fitzgerald , also known as "Jazz royalty" and the "First Lady of Song", is considered one of the most influential jazz vocalists of the 20th century....
  • Dizzy Gillespie
    Dizzy Gillespie

    John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie [/g?'l?spi/] was an United States jazz trumpeter, bandleader, singer, and composer. He was born in Cheraw, South Carolina, the youngest of nine children....
  • Benny Goodman
    Benny Goodman

    Benjamin David Goodman, was an United States jazz musician, clarinetist and bandleader, known as "King of Swing ", "Patriarch of the Clarinet", "The Professor", and "Swing's Senior Statesman"....
  • Dick Haymes
    Dick Haymes

    Dick Haymes was an actor and one of the most popular Singing of the 1940s and early 1950s....
  • Betty Hutton
    Betty Hutton

    Betty Hutton was an United States Cinema of the United States actor and singer....
  • Harry James
    Harry James

    Harry James was an United States musician and band leader, and a well-known trumpet virtuoso. James was one of the most outstanding instrumentalists of the swing era, employing a bravura playing style that made his trumpet work instantly identifiable....
  • Al Jolson
    Al Jolson

    Al Jolson , born in Lithuania, Russian Empire, was a highly acclaimed American singer, comedian, and actor, and, according to PBS, the "first openly Jewish man to become an entertainment star in America." His career lasted from 1911 until his death in 1950, during which time he was commonly dubbed "the world's greatest entertainer.? Numerous...
  • Sammy Kaye
    Sammy Kaye

    Sammy Kaye was a famous United States bandleader and songwriter, whose tag line "Swing and sway with Sammy Kaye" became one of the most famous of the so-called Big Band Era....
  • Peggy Lee
    Peggy Lee

    Peggy Lee was an United States jazz and traditional pop singer and songwriter and Academy Award-nominated actress. She was born Norma Deloris Egstrom in Jamestown, North Dakota....
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* Johnny Mercer
Johnny Mercer

John Herndon "Johnny" Mercer was an American songwriter and singer. As a songwriter, he is best known as a lyricist, but he also composed music....
  • Glenn Miller
    Glenn Miller

    Alton Glenn Miller , was an United States jazz musician, arranger, composer, and band leader in the Swing era. He was one of the best-selling recording artists from 1939 to 1942, leading one of the best known "Big band"....
  • Charles Mingus
    Charles Mingus

    Charles Mingus was an United States jazz bassist, composer, bandleader, and occasional pianist. He was also known for his activism against racism....
  • Vaughn Monroe
    Vaughn Monroe

    Vaughn Wilton Monroe was an American singer, trumpeter and big band leader, most popular in the 1940s and 1950s. Monroe was born in Akron, Ohio and graduated from Jeannette, Pennsylvania#History High School in Pennsylvania in 1929 where he was senior class president and voted "most likely to succeed." After high school, he attended the Carne...
  • Charlie Parker
    Charlie Parker

    Charles Parker, Jr. was an American jazz saxophonist and composer.Parker is widely considered one of the most influential of jazz musicians, along with Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington....
  • Édith Piaf
    Édith Piaf

    ?dith Piaf was a France singer and cultural icon of partly algeria and Italy descent who "is almost universally regarded as France's greatest popular singer." Her singing reflected her life, with her specialty being ballads....
  • Bud Powell
    Bud Powell

    Earl Rudolph "Bud" Powell was an American Jazz piano. Powell has been described as one of "the two most significant pianists of the style of modern jazz that came to be known as bebop", the other being his friend and contemporary Thelonious Monk....
  • Max Roach
    Max Roach

    Maxwell Lemuel Roach was an American jazz percussionist, drummer, and composer.A pioneer of bebop, Roach went on to work in many other styles of music, and is generally considered one of the most important drummers in history....
  • Artie Shaw
    Artie Shaw

    Arthur Jacob Arshawsky , better known as Artie Shaw, was an United States jazz clarinetist, composer, and bandleader. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest jazz clarinetists of his time....
  • Dinah Shore
    Dinah Shore

    Dinah Shore was an United States singer, actress, and Celebrity. She was most popular during the Big Band era of the 1940s and 1950s.After failing singing auditions for the bands of Benny Goodman and both Jimmy Dorsey and his brother Tommy Dorsey, Shore struck out on her own to become the first singer of her era to achieve huge solo succe...
  • Frank Sinatra
    Frank Sinatra

    Francis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an United States singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became a solo artist with great success in the early to mid-1940s, being the idol of the "bobby soxers"....
  • Kate Smith
    Kate Smith

    Kathryn Elizabeth "Kate" Smith was an American singer, best known for her rendition of Irving Berlin's "God Bless America". Smith had a radio, television and recording career spanning five decades, reaching its most-remembered zenith in the 1940s....
  • Ink Spots
  • Ernest Tubb
    Ernest Tubb

    Ernest Dale Tubb , nicknamed the "Texas Troubadour", was an United States singer and songwriter and one of the pioneers of country music. His biggest career hit song "Walking the Floor Over You" marked the rise of the honky-tonk style of music....
  • Hank Williams
  • Bob Wills
    Bob Wills

    James Robert Wills was an United States Western swing musician, songwriter, and bandleader, considered by many music authorities one of the fathers of Western swing and called by his fans the "King of Western Swing."...
  • The Andrews Sisters
    The Andrews Sisters

    The Andrews Sisters were a close harmony singing group, consisting of sisters LaVerne Sophie Andrews , Maxene Angelyn Andrews , and Patricia Marie Andrews ....


Others

  • Billy Graham
    Billy Graham

    William Franklin Graham Jr. better known as Billy Graham, is an American evangelism and an Evangelicalism Christian . He has been a spiritual adviser to multiple President of the United States and was number seven on The Gallup Organization Gallup's List of Widely Admired People for the 20th century....