Allan Dwan ( April 3, 1885 – December 28, 1981 ) was a pioneering Canadian-born American motion picture director, producer and screenwriter.

* 1892 – Donald Wills Douglas, Sr., American aviation industrialist ( d. 1981 )

* 1892 – Lowell Thomas, American writer ( d. 1981 )

* 1981 – Robert Earnshaw, Zambian-Welsh footballer

* 1981 – Jeff Faine, American football player and agent

* 1981 – Kari Jobe, American singer and songwriter ( Gateway Worship )

* 1981 – Alex Suarez, American bassist ( Cobra Starship and This Is Ivy League )

* 1981 – The first launch of a Space Shuttle ( Columbia ) takes place-the STS-1 mission.

* 1981 – Nicolás Burdisso, Argentine footballer

* 1981 – Grant Holt, English footballer

* 1981 – Brian Vandborg, Danish cyclist

* 1981 – John O ' Shea, Irish footballer

* 1981 – Emma Pierson, English actress

* 1981 – Kunal Nayyar, Indian-English actor

* 1895 – Andreas Alföldi, Hungarian historian and archaeologist ( d. 1981 )

* 1933 – Joke Smit, Dutch activist and politician ( d. 1981 )

* 1981 – Maxwell Cabelino Andrade, Spanish footballer

* 1981 – Alessandro Gamberini, Italian footballer

* 1981 – Demetria McKinney, American actress

* 1981 – Vitantonio Liuzzi, Italian race car driver

* 1981 – Travie McCoy, American rapper and songwriter ( Gym Class Heroes )

* 1981 – Diána Póth, Hungarian figure skater

* 1981 – Jarvis Hayes, American basketball player

* 1981 – Li Jiawei, Singaporean table tennis player

* 1981 – Claire Dames, American porn actress

There is some pseudo-scholarly literature postulating that Jesus travelled to India after surviving his crucifixion, beginning with Nicolas Notovitch's La vie Inconnue du Jesus Christ ( 1894 ) and Jesus in India ( 1899, 1908, see Roza Bal, Jesus in Ahmadiyya Islam ) and revived in 1980s esotericism ( Holger Kersten 1981, 1983 ).

* 1981 – Christofer Heimeroth, German footballer

* 1981 – Denis Gremelmayr, German tennis player

* 1900 – Hans Adolf Krebs, German physician and biochemist, Nobel Prize laureate ( d. 1981 )

* 1981 – Mustafa Güngör, German rugby player

The first convincing synthesis was in 1981 by a German research team led by Peter Armbruster and Gottfried Münzenberg at the Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung ( Institute for Heavy Ion Research, GSI ) in Darmstadt using the Dubna reaction.

Das Boot ( 1981 ) focused on the German viewpoint of World War II.

Among the commercial successes for German films of the 1980s were the Otto film series beginning in 1985 starring comedian Otto Waalkes, Wolfgang Petersen's adaptation of The NeverEnding Story ( 1984 ), and the internationally successful Das Boot ( 1981 ), which still holds the record for most Academy Award nominations for a German film ( six ).

* 1981 – Jeanette Biedermann, German pop singer

* 1981 – Hanno Balitsch, German footballer

* 1981 – Vanessa Henke, German tennis player

* 1981 – Nora Tschirner, German actress

* 1981 – Timur Tekkal, German rugby player

* 1981 – Wolfram Müller, German athlete

* 1981 – Christopher Weselek, German rugby player

* 1981 – Benjamin Becker, German tennis player

* 1905 – Willy Hartner, German scientist ( d. 1981 )

* 1981 – Michael Wolf, German ice hockey player

* 1981 – Stefan Schumacher, German cyclist

* 1981 – Namosh, German singer and musician

* Johannes Mallow ( b. 1981 ) German memory-sports competitor

* 1981 – Thorsten Stuckmann, German footballer

* 1981 – Tom Starke, German footballer

* 1981 – Karl-Jesco von Puttkamer, German World War II naval adjutant to Adolf Hitler ( b. 1900 )