List of Famous people born in December
Bart De Wever
Bart Albert Liliane De Wever is a Belgian politician. Since 2004 De Wever has been the leader of the New Flemish Alliance (N-VA), a Belgian political party advocating independence for the Flemish region of Belgium within the European Union; he is also a member of the Chamber of Representatives. He played a prominent role in the 2007 Belgian government formation and presided over his party's victory in the 2010 federal elections when N-VA became the largest party in both Flanders and in Belgium as a whole.
King Moody
Robert "King" Moody was an American actor and comedian, best known for playing Shtarker in the television series Get Smart. He also played Ronald McDonald in a series of McDonald's commercials from 1969 to 1985, and the spaceship captain in Teenagers From Outer Space and other roles in some 40 movies and television episodes including Bonanza, The Bob Newhart Show, CHiPs, Combat!, The Man From U.N.C.L.E., Dragnet and Sea Hunt.
Peter Rees, Baron Rees
Peter Wynford Innes Rees, Baron Rees, was a British Conservative politician and barrister. He was Member of Parliament (MP) for Dover and Deal from 1974 to 1983 and MP for Dover from 1970 to 1974 and 1983 to 1987. He was Chief Secretary to the Treasury from 1983 until 1985. He was created a life peer as Baron Rees, of Goytre, in 1987.
Pietro Mascagni
Pietro Mascagni was an Italian composer primarily known for his operas. His 1890 masterpiece Cavalleria rusticana caused one of the greatest sensations in opera history and single-handedly ushered in the Verismo movement in Italian dramatic music. While it was often held that Mascagni, like Ruggiero Leoncavallo, was a "one-opera man" who could never repeat his first success, L'amico Fritz and Iris have remained in the repertoire in Europe since their premieres.
Stanley Unwin
Sir Stanley Unwin, KCMG was a British publisher, who founded the Allen & Unwin publishing firm.
Odd Martinsen
Odd-Willy Martinsen is a retired Norwegian cross-country skier who competed during the 1960s and 1970s. He won three medals at the Winter Olympics, a gold in the 4 × 10 km relay (1968) and silvers in the 30 km (1968) and the 4 × 10 km relay (1976). Martinsen won five medals at the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships, a gold in the 4 × 10 km relay (1966), a silver in the 15 km (1970), and bronzes in the 15 km (1966), 30 km (1970), and 4 × 10 km relay (1974). At the 1969 Holmenkollen ski festival, he won the 15 km race. For his cross-country skiing successes in Norway and abroad, Martinsen received the Holmenkollen medal in 1969. Thirty-two years later, his daughter, Bente Skari, received the Holmenkollen medal, making them the only father-daughter combination to ever win the prestigious honor.
Carla Thomas
Carla Venita Thomas is an American singer, who is often referred to as the Queen of Memphis Soul. Thomas is the daughter of Rufus Thomas.
Roméo LeBlanc
Roméo-Adrien LeBlanc was a Canadian journalist, politician and statesman who served as Governor General of Canada, the 25th since the Canadian Confederation.
Abdolkarim Soroush
Abdolkarim Soroush (عبدالكريم سروش Persian pronunciation: [æbdolkæriːm soruːʃ]; born Hossein Haj Faraj Dabbagh, is an Iranian Islamic thinker, reformer, Rumi scholar, public intellectual, and a former professor of philosophy at the University of Tehran and Imam Khomeini International University. He is arguably the most influential figure in the religious intellectual movement of Iran. Soroush is currently a visiting scholar at the University of Maryland in College Park, MD. He was also affiliated with other prestigious institutions, including Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Columbia, the Leiden-based International Institute as a visiting professor for the Study of Islam in the Modern World and the Wissenschaftskolleg in Berlin. He was named by TIME as one of the world’s 100 most influential people in 2005, and by Prospect magazine as one of the most influential intellectuals in the world in 2008. Soroush's ideas, founded on Relativism, prompted both supporters and critics to compare his role in reforming Islam to that of Martin Luther in reforming Christianity.