2024 is just hours away. Before the world welcomes a new year, we remember some of the influential people who died in 2023.
Sandra Day O'Connor
We start with U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.
O’Connor died on December 1. She made history in 1981 when she became the first woman appointed to the United States’ highest court. She served in the position for 25 years.
The judge was considered a centrist, or a moderate, in her court opinions. She was often considered the “swing vote” on major issues such as abortion, affirmative action and voting rights.
Sandra Day O’Connor was born in El Paso, Texas in 1930. She grew up on a large cow farm there.
The young Sandra was an excellent student and entered Stanford University in California when she was 16, earning a degree in economics. She went on to study law at Stanford. She graduated in the top 10 percent of her class in 1952.
President Ronald Reagan nominated her to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1981. In announcing his choice, he described the judge as “a person for all seasons.”
American President Joe Biden spoke at her funeral. He called her “a daughter of the West” and “a pioneer in her own right.” He praised her for seeking, in his words, “equal justice under law her whole life.”
O’Connor died from problems linked to the disease dementia and a lung infection. She was 93 years old.
Henry Kissinger
The world also said goodbye to former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who died November 29.
He was 100 years old.
The German-born Jewish refugee served as the U.S. top diplomat under two presidents, Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford. He won praise and severe criticism in the U.S. and around the world.
Kissinger helped restore ties between the United States and China. He also negotiated the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam.
Rosalynn Carter
American former first lady Rosalynn Carter died on November 19. She was the closest adviser to her husband, former President Jimmy Carter.
She served as first lady from 1977 to 1981. She advocated for better mental health care and help for caregivers in millions of American families. Overseas, she fought disease, mass hunger and the abuse of women and girls. She continued humanitarian work with her husband for 40 years following their time in the White House.
The couple had been married for 77 years when Rosalynn Carter died at the age of 96.
Others from the world of politics who died this year include: former Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi, former Pakistani leader Pervez Musharraf, and former Chinese Premier Li Keqiang.
Tina Turner
The world also lost cultural leaders in 2023, including the so-called “Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll.”
American Singer Tina Turner died in May at the age of 83.
The entertainer teamed up with husband Ike Turner for a series of hit records and live shows in the 1960s and ’70s. Ike was abusive and beat Tina. She left the marriage and returned as a solo artist with a best-selling album, Private Dancer, in 1984.
“How do we say farewell to a woman who owned her pain and trauma and used it as a means to help change the world?” actor Angela Bassett said in a statement. Bassett played Turner in the 1993 movie What’s Love Got to Do With It.
Turner sold more than 150 million records worldwide and won 12 Grammys. The performer was voted along with Ike Turner into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991, and individually in 2021. Turner’s life story was made into a movie and Broadway musical.
Mick Jagger of the music group The Rolling Stones called Turner “inspiring, warm, funny and generous” in an Instagram post. And he wrote that Turner “helped me so much when I was young, and I will never forget her.”
Kenzaburo Oe
Several Nobel Prize winners died this year, including Japanese writer Kenzaburo Oe. The Nobel literature laureate wrote darkly poetic novels based on his childhood memories from Japan’s postwar occupation. He also wrote from his experiences as the parent of a disabled son. Oe died on March 3 at the age of 88.
World's oldest person
And the world lost its oldest resident in 2023. French religious worker, or nun, died at home in southern France a few weeks before her 119th birthday.
Sister André, as she was known, was born in the town of Alès, southern France, in 1904. The Gerontology Research Group, which confirms details about people thought to be 110 or older, listed her as the oldest known person in the world after the death of Japan’s Kane Tanaka, aged 119, in 2022.
Sister André was also one of the world’s oldest survivors of COVID-19.
She tested positive for the coronavirus in January 2021, shortly before her 117th birthday. She showed so few signs of the virus that she did not even realize she was infected. News media around the world reported her survival.
In April last year, she was asked about her exceptional longevity through two world wars. Sister André told French media, “Working…makes you live. I worked until I was 108.”
She was also known to enjoy a daily glass of wine and chocolate.
I’m Caty Weaver. And I’m Mario Ritter, Jr.
