* Austin Osman Spare ( 1886 – 1956 ), English artist and magician

* 1956 – Sebastian Spreng, Argentinean artist and journalist

* 1956 – Dilip Vengsarkar, Indian cricketer and administrator

* 1956 – Andy García, Cuban actor

* 1956 – Herbert Grönemeyer, German singer

* 1956 – Former Vice President and Senator Alben Barkley dies during a speech in Virginia.

* 1956 – Lars von Trier, Danish director

* 1956 – After going bankrupt in 1955, the American broadcaster DuMont Television Network makes its final broadcast, a boxing match from St. Nicholas Arena in New York in the Boxing from St. Nicholas Arena series.

* 1956 – Stepfanie Kramer, American actress

* 1878 – Aino Kallas, Finnish-Estonian author ( d. 1956 )

* 1956 – Fulvio Melia, Italian-American physicist, astrophysicist, and author

* 1956 – Jim Neidhart, American wrestler

* 1956 – Isabel Pantoja, Spanish singer

* 2003 – Leslie Cheung, Hong Kong actor and singer ( b. 1956 )

* 1956 – Tom Leykis, American radio host

* 1956 – Kirk Brandon, English singer-songwriter and guitarist ( Theatre of Hate, Spear of Destiny and Dead Men Walking )

* 1956 – Balwinder Sandhu, Indian cricketer

* 1956 –, the world's first successful container ship, leaves Port Newark, New Jersey for Houston, Texas.

Prominent leaders include co-founders Lucien Febvre ( 1878 – 1956 ) and Marc Bloch ( 1886 – 1944 ).

* 1867 – Emil Nolde, German painter ( d. 1956 )

* 1956 – Chris Foreman, English guitarist and songwriter ( Madness )

* 1956 – David Grant, English singer ( Linx )

* 1956 – Branscombe Richmond, American actor

* 1956 – Cecilia Roth, Argentine actress

During the 1950s, Bogarde came to prominence playing a hoodlum who shoots and kills a police constable in The Blue Lamp ( 1950 ) co-starring Jack Warner and Bernard Lee ; a handsome artist who comes to rescue of Jean Simmons during the World's Fair in Paris in So Long at the Fair, a film noir thriller ; an accidental murderer who befriends a young boy played by Jon Whiteley in Hunted ( aka The Stranger in Between ) ( 1952 ); in Appointment in London ( 1953 ) as a young Wing-Commander in Bomber Command who, against orders, opts to fly his 90th mission with his men in a major air offensive against the Germans ; an unjustly imprisoned man who regains hope in clearing his name when he learns his sweetheart, Mai Zetterling, is still alive in Desperate Moment ( 1953 ); Doctor in the House ( 1954 ), as a medical student, in a film that made Bogarde one of the most popular British stars of the 1950s, and co-starring Kenneth More, Donald Sinden and James Robertson Justice as their crabby mentor ; The Sleeping Tiger ( 1954 ), playing a neurotic criminal with co-star Alexis Smith, and Bogarde's first film for American expatriate director Joseph Losey ; Doctor at Sea ( 1955 ), co-starring Brigitte Bardot in one of her first film roles ; as a returning Colonial who fights the Mau-Mau with Virginia McKenna and Donald Sinden in Simba ( 1955 ); Cast a Dark Shadow ( 1955 ), as a man who marries women for money and then murders them ; The Spanish Gardener ( 1956 ), co-starring Michael Hordern, Jon Whiteley, and Cyril Cusack ; Doctor at Large ( 1957 ), again with Donald Sinden, another entry in the " Doctor films series ", co-starring later Bond-girl Shirley Eaton ; the Powell and Pressburger production Ill Met by Moonlight ( 1957 ) co-starring Marius Goring as the German General Kreipe, kidnapped on Crete by Patrick " Paddy " Leigh Fermor ( Bogarde ) and a fellow band of adventurers based on W. Stanley Moss ' real-life account of the WW2 caper ; A Tale of Two Cities ( 1958 ), a faithful retelling of Charles Dickens ' classic ; as a Flt.

Australian Jon Henricks after record-breaking 100 meter freestyle finish at 1956 Summer Olympics | The 1956 Melbourne Summer Olympics

People involved in the arts and born in the town include the actress Kathleen Harrison in 1892 ; Alfred Wainwright, author of the Pictorial Guides to the Lakeland Fells, in 1907 ; broadcaster Russell Harty in 1934 ; the internationally renowned Contemporary artist Ross Eccles in 1937, many of his paintings feature Blackburn and Lancashire scenes and landmarks ; the writer Josephine Cox in 1941 who set many of her novels in Lancashire ; the actor Anthony Valentine in 1939 ; the actor Michael Billington, star of UFO in 1941 ; actor Ian McShane in 1942 ; rock musician Tony Ashton in 1946 ; actor Jon Walmsley in 1956 ; film maker Michael Winterbottom in 1961 ; actor Steve Pemberton in 1967 ; actress Wendi Peters in 1968 ; actor / comedian Lee Mack in 1968 ; television host Debbie Travis ; author Tony O ' Neill in 1978 ; television presenter and documentary director Michael Gibson in 1980 ; and singer and actress Diana Vickers in 1991.

Jonathan Simon " Jon " Speelman ( born 2 October 1956 ) is an English Grandmaster chess player, mathematician and chess writer.

* Jon Johanson ( 1956 -), aviator

* Jon " Bermuda " Schwartz ( born 1956 ), a drummer for " Weird Al " Yankovic

Jon Tester ( born August 21, 1956 ) is the junior United States Senator from Montana, serving since 2007.

* Jon Schwartz ( drummer ) ( born 1956 ), American drummer

Jon " Bermuda " Schwartz ( born August 18, 1956 in Chicago, Illinois ) is a drummer best known for working with the singer-songwriter " Weird Al " Yankovic.

Jon Walmsley ( born 6 February 1956 in Blackburn, Lancashire, England ) is a multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, actor and producer.

Britain began designing the ship in 1956 but got nowhere until the American government decided to end a ban on sharing military secrets with Britain that had been imposed after Fuchs blabbed.

But one thing is for certain: There is no dissension between Mantle, the American League's Most Valuable Player in 1956 and 1957, and Maris, the MVP in 1960.

American TV was the setting for the first dramatic portrayal of Miss Marple with Gracie Fields, the legendary British actress, playing her in a 1956 episode of Goodyear TV Playhouse based on A Murder Is Announced, the 1950 Christie novel.

* 1956 – David McDowell Brown, American astronaut ( d. 2003 )

* 1956 – Jackée Harry, American actress

* 1956 – Rusty Wallace, American race car driver

* Adrian Dantley ( born 1956 ), American retired National Basketball Association ( NBA ) player

* Adrian Rollini ( 1903 – 1956 ), American multi-instrumentalist best known for his jazz music

* 1956 – Adam Arkin, American actor

* 1956 – Skipp Sudduth, American actor

* 1956 – GG Allin, American singer-songwriter ( The Murder Junkies and The Jabbers ) ( d. 1993 )

* 1956 – Mark Morris, American choreographer

* 1923 – Nate Saint, American missionary ( d. 1956 )

* 1956 – Frank Conniff, American writer and actor

* 1956 – Anna Kathryn Holbrook, American actress

* 1956 – Eric Roberts, American actor

* 1956 – Melody Thomas Scott, American actress

Anita Faye Hill ( born July 30, 1956 ) is an American attorney and academic, currently a professor of social policy, law and women's studies at Brandeis University's Heller School for Social Policy and Management.

* 1956 – Fred Ottman, American wrestler