List of Famous people who died in 2009

Michael Joseph Jackson was an American singer, songwriter, and dancer. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century. Through stage and video performances, he popularized complicated dance moves such as the moonwalk, to which he gave the name, and the robot. His sound and style have influenced artists of various genres, and his contributions to music, dance, and fashion, along with his publicized personal life, made him a global figure in popular culture for over four decades. Jackson is the most awarded artist in the history of popular music.

Brittany Anne Murphy-Monjack was an American actress and singer. Born in Atlanta, Murphy moved to Los Angeles as a teenager and pursued a career in acting. Her breakthrough role was as Tai Frasier in Clueless (1995), followed by supporting roles in independent films such as Freeway (1996) and Bongwater (1998). She made her stage debut in a Broadway production of Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge in 1997 before appearing as Daisy Randone in Girl, Interrupted (1999) and as Lisa Swenson in Drop Dead Gorgeous (1999).

Patrick Wayne Swayze was an American actor, dancer, singer, and songwriter. Gaining fame with appearances in films during the 1980s, he became popular for playing tough and romantic male leads, giving him a wide fan base. He was named by People magazine as its Sexiest Man Alive in 1991.

Shyamala Gopalan was an American biomedical scientist born in British India, whose work in isolating and characterizing the progesterone receptor gene stimulated advances in breast biology and oncology.

Natasha Jane Richardson was an English actress of stage and screen. A member of the Redgrave family, Richardson was the daughter of actress Vanessa Redgrave and director/producer Tony Richardson, and the granddaughter of Michael Redgrave and Rachel Kempson.

John Colin Campbell Jordan was a leading figure in post-war neo-Nazism in Great Britain. In the far-right circles of the 1960s, Jordan represented the most explicitly "Nazi" inclination in his open use of the styles and symbols of Nazi Germany. Through his leadership of organisations such as the National Socialist Movement and the World Union of National Socialists, Jordan advocated a pan-Aryan "Universal Nazism". Although later unaffiliated with any political party, Jordan remained an influential voice on the British far right.

Qian Xuesen, or Hsue-Shen Tsien, was a Chinese mathematician, cyberneticist, aerospace engineer, and physicist who made significant contributions to the field of aerodynamics and established engineering cybernetics. Recruited from MIT, he joined Theodore von Kármán's group at Caltech. During WWII, he was involved in the Manhattan Project, which ultimately led to the successful development of the first atomic bomb in America. Later on, under the pressure of deportation for suspicions of association with Communists, he would eventually return to China, where he would make important contributions to China's missile and space program.

Kurt Demmler, born Kurt Abramowitz was a German songwriter. He was a noted lyricist and songwriter for many German rock bands.

John Wilden Hughes Jr. was an American filmmaker. Beginning as an author of humorous essays and stories for National Lampoon, he went on to write, produce and sometimes direct some of the most successful live-action comedy films of the 1980s and 1990s such as National Lampoon's Vacation (1983) and its sequels National Lampoon's European Vacation (1985) and National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (1989), Mr. Mom (1983), Sixteen Candles (1984), Weird Science (1985), The Breakfast Club (1985), Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986), Pretty in Pink (1986), Some Kind of Wonderful (1987), Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987), She's Having a Baby (1988), Uncle Buck (1989), Dutch (1991), Dennis the Menace (1993), Baby's Day Out (1994), the Beethoven franchise and Home Alone (1990) and its sequels Home Alone 2: Lost in New York (1992) and Home Alone 3 (1997).

Edward Moore Kennedy was an American politician and lawyer who served as a U.S. Senator from Massachusetts for almost 47 years, from 1962 until his death in 2009. A member of the Democratic Party and the Kennedy political family, he was the second most senior member of the Senate when he died and is the fourth-longest-continuously-serving senator in United States history. Kennedy was the younger brother of President John F. Kennedy and U.S. Attorney General and U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy, and was the father of Congressman Patrick J. Kennedy.

Farrah Leni Fawcett was an American actress, fashion model and artist. A four-time Primetime Emmy Award nominee and six-time Golden Globe Award nominee, Fawcett rose to international fame when she played a starring role in the first season of the television series Charlie's Angels (1976–1977).

Don Lane was an American-born talk show host and singer, best known for his television career in Australia, especially for hosting The Don Lane Show which aired on the Nine Network from 1975 to 1983, and his appearances opposite Bert Newton.

Allen Klein was an American businessman, music publisher, writers' representative and record label executive. He was known for his tough persona and aggressive negotiation tactics, many of which affected industry standards for compensating recording artists. He founded ABKCO Music & Records Incorporated. Klein increased profits for his musician clients, who previously had been receiving less lucrative record company contracts. He first scored monetary and contractual gains for Buddy Knox and Jimmy Bowen, one-hit rockabillies of the late 1950s, then parlayed his early successes into a position managing Sam Cooke, and eventually managed the Beatles and the Rolling Stones simultaneously, along with many other artists, becoming one of the most powerful individuals in the music industry during his era.

Susan Denise Atkins was an American convicted murderer who was a member of Charles Manson's "Family". Manson's followers committed a series of nine murders at four locations in California, over a period of five weeks in the summer of 1969. Known within the Manson family as Sadie Mae Glutz or Sexy Sadie, Atkins was convicted for her participation in eight of these killings, including the most notorious, the Tate murders in 1969. She was sentenced to death, which was subsequently commuted to life imprisonment when the California Supreme Court invalidated all death sentences issued prior to 1972. Atkins was incarcerated until her death in 2009. At the time of her death, she was California's longest-serving female inmate, long since surpassed by her fellow murderous Manson family members Leslie Van Houten and Patricia Krenwinkel.

Robert Enke was a German professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper.

Maharani Gayatri Devi was the third Maharani consort of Jaipur from 1940 to 1949 through her marriage to Maharaja Sawai Man Singh II. Following her husband's signature for the Jaipur State to become part of the Union of India and her step-son's assumption of the title in 1970, she was known as Maharani Gayatri Devi, Rajmata of Jaipur.

Velupillai Prabhakaran was a Sri Lankan Tamil guerrilla and the founder and leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), a militant organization that sought to create an independent Tamil state in the north and east of Sri Lanka. The LTTE waged war in Sri Lanka for more than 25 years, to create an independent state for the Sri Lankan Tamil people.

Stephen LaTreal McNair, nicknamed "Air McNair", was an American football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 13 seasons, primarily with the Tennessee Titans franchise. He also played for the Baltimore Ravens.

Marcos Arturo Beltrán Leyva was an organized crime figure and the leader of the Mexican drug trafficking organization known as the Beltrán-Leyva Cartel, which he and his brothers Carlos, Alfredo and Héctor founded. His cartel was responsible for cocaine, marijuana, heroin and methamphetamine production, transportation and wholesaling. It controlled numerous drug trafficking corridors into the United States and was responsible for human smuggling, money laundering, extortion, kidnapping, murder, contract killing, torture, gun-running and other acts of violence against men, women, and children in Mexico. The organization was connected with the assassinations of numerous Mexican law enforcement officials.

Oleg Ivanovich Yankovsky was a Soviet and Russian actor who had excelled in psychologically sophisticated roles of modern intellectuals. In 1991, he became, together with Sofia Pilyavskaya, the last person to be named a People's Artist of the USSR.