List of Famous people who died in 2009

Alan Wendell Livingston was an American businessman best known for his tenures at Capitol Records, first as a writer/producer best known for creating Bozo the Clown for a series of record-album and illustrative read-along children's book sets. As Vice-President in charge of Programming at NBC, in 1959 he oversaw the development and launch of the network's most successful television series, Bonanza.

Ali Akbar Khan was an Indian Hindustani classical musician of the Maihar gharana, known for his virtuosity in playing the sarod. Trained as a classical musician and instrumentalist by his father, Allauddin Khan, he also composed numerous classical ragas and film scores. He established a music school in Calcutta in 1956, and the Ali Akbar College of Music in 1967, which moved with him to the United States and is now based in San Rafael, California, with a branch in Basel, Switzerland.

Colonel David de Crespigny Smiley, was a British special forces and intelligence officer. He fought in the Second World War in Palestine, Iraq, Persia, Syria, Western Desert and with Special Operations Executive (SOE) in Albania and Thailand.

Khadijeh Saqafi was the wife of Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of the 1979 Iranian Revolution.