List of Famous people who died at 79

Tom Kilburn was an English mathematician and computer scientist. Over the course of a productive 30-year career, he was involved in the development of five computers of great historical significance. With Freddie Williams he worked on the Williams–Kilburn tube and the world's first electronic stored-program computer, the Manchester Baby, while working at the University of Manchester. His work propelled Manchester and Britain into the forefront of the emerging field of computer science.

Hans-Busso von Busse was a German architect and academic.

Sha Yexin was a Chinese playwright and short story writer.

Félicien Vervaecke was a Belgian professional cyclist from 1930 to 1939. In the Tour de France he showed good results, finishing three times on the podium. In 1935 and 1937 he won the mountain classification, and overall he won six stages. In the 1936 Tour de France, Vervaecke was on his way to the second place, but bad luck prevented it. First his bicycle broke, and he had to convince a spectator to lend his. Then he suffered a flat tire, and Tour officials forced him to wait for the reserve car. Antonin Magne passed him. When Vervaecke got his tire, he raced back to Magne, and finished 18 seconds behind him. But he still finished third, as he received 10 minutes penalty because his wife had given him drinks during the race, which was not allowed. In the 1937 Tour de France, Vervaecke won the mountain classification despite not finishing the race, something no longer allowed.

Stuart Rosenberg was an American film and television director whose motion pictures include Cool Hand Luke (1967), Voyage of the Damned (1976), The Amityville Horror (1979), and The Pope of Greenwich Village (1984). He was noted for his work with actor Paul Newman.

Alexei Vasilievich Haieff was an American composer of orchestral and choral works. He is known for following Stravinsky's neoclassicism, observing an austere economy of means, and achieving modernistic effects by a display of rhythmic agitation, often with jazzy undertones.