List of Famous people who born in 1949

Diana Nyad is an American author, journalist, motivational speaker, and long-distance swimmer. Nyad gained national attention in 1975 when she swam around Manhattan and in 1979 when she swam from North Bimini, The Bahamas, to Juno Beach, Florida. In 2013, on her fifth attempt and at age 64, she became the first person confirmed to swim from Cuba to Florida without the aid of a shark cage, swimming from Havana to Key West. Nyad was also once ranked thirteenth among US women squash players.

Andrew John McKean is an American politician and former attorney in the state of Iowa. He represents District 58 in the Iowa House of Representatives. McKean represented District 23 from 1979 to 1983 and District 44 from 1983 to 1993. Afterward, he served in the Iowa Senate, representing District 28 from 1993 to 2003. He served as a supervisor of Jones County from 2003 to 2011. McKean returned to the Iowa House in 2016 after being elected to District 58, defeating Jessica Kean. In 2018, he was reelected, defeating Joe Oclon.

Hans-Joachim Heist is a German actor and comedian.

Svetislav Pešić, also known by his nickname Kari, is a Serbian professional basketball head coach, most recently for FC Barcelona of the Liga ACB and the EuroLeague. Pešić is one of the most successful European basketball coaches.

Juan Roig Alfonso is a Spanish billionaire businessman, president of Mercadona, the Spanish supermarket chain.

Maw-Kuen Wu is a Taiwanese physicist specializing in superconductivity, low-temperature physics, and high-pressure physics. He was a professor of physics at University of Alabama (Huntsville), Columbia University, and National Tsing Hua University, the Director of the Institute of Physics at Academia Sinica, the president of the National Dong Hwa University, and is currently a distinguished research fellow of the Institute of Physics, Academia Sinica.

Alimzhan Tursunovich Tokhtakhounov is a Russian businessman, suspected criminal, and former sportsman. He is accused in relations with organized crime and bribing of figure skating judges in the 2002 Winter Olympics. His nickname is thought to be "Taiwanchik", which refers to his distinctly Asiatic, as opposed to European, facial features.

Nigel Olsson is an English rock drummer and singer best known for his long-time affiliation with Elton John.

Fernando "Nando" Seler Parrado Dolgay is one of the sixteen Uruguayan survivors of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, which crashed in the Andes mountains on 13 October 1972. After spending two months trapped in the mountains with the other crash survivors, he, along with Roberto Canessa, climbed through the Andes mountains over a 10-day period to find help. His efforts, supported in various ways by the entire group, have been recognized through books and other media. He was portrayed by Ethan Hawke in the 1993 feature film Alive: Miracle in The Andes.

Fumiaki Matsumoto is a Japanese politician of the Liberal Democratic Party and a member of the House of Representatives in the Diet. Matsumoto served as a vice minister for the Cabinet Office between August 2017 and January 2018. He resigned from his post after recorded in the Diet mocking the gravity of US military helicopter accidents in Okinawa.