List of Famous people who died in 1972

Karl Heinrich Lübke was a German politician who was the second President of the West Germany from 1959 to 1969.

Hisayoshi Takeda was a notable Japanese botanist whose father was the British diplomat, Sir Ernest Satow. He was a founder of the Japanese Natural History Society, and is known for his campaign to preserve the environment at Oze, which is now Oze National Park.

Walter Jackson Freeman II was an American physician who specialized in lobotomy.

John Paul Vann was a lieutenant colonel in the United States Army, later retired, who became well known for his role in the Vietnam War. Although separated from the military before the Vietnam War reached its peak, he returned to service as a civilian and by the waning days of the war was the first American civilian to command troops in regular combat there. He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom and was the only civilian in Vietnam to receive the Distinguished Service Cross. He died in a helicopter crash in 1972 at 47 years old.

Erhard Milch was a German Field Marshal who oversaw the development of the Luftwaffe as part of the re-armament of Nazi Germany following World War I. During World War II, he was in charge of aircraft production. He was convicted of war crimes during the Milch Trial held before the U.S. military court in 1947 and sentenced to life imprisonment; he was released in 1954.

Boris Nikolayevich Livanov was a Soviet and Russian actor and theatre director. People's Artist of the USSR (1948). He was a member of the Moscow Art Theatre from 1924 through 1972.

Luang Pho Daeng was a Thai Buddhist monk who died while meditating in 1973. His mummified body is on display at the Wat Khunaram (temple) on Ko Samui island in Thailand's Surat Thani Province. The mummy is notable for sporting a pair of sunglasses, placed by the caretakers to hide the decomposed eye sockets to make the display less disturbing. A native gecko species use the body as a hatchery, with eggs being laid beneath the skin.

Leonid Georgievich Yengibarov was a Soviet clown and actor.

Giangiacomo Feltrinelli was an influential Italian publisher and businessman active following the Second World War. He founded a vast library of documents mainly in the history of international labor and socialist movements. He became a left-wing activist preceding Italy's Years of Lead.

Vadim Borisovich Beroev was a Soviet theatre and film actor of Ossetian origin, best known for roles in Major Whirlwind (1967) and No Path Through Fire (1968). He was awarded Honored Artist of the RSFSR in 1969. He is the grandfather of actor Egor Beroev.