page_title: 1987
section_title: December
hierarchical_section_title: 1987 / Deaths / December
caption_attribution_description: Photo of Robert Paige as he became the host of the television program The Big Payoff.
context_page_description: 1987 was a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1987th year of the Common Era and Anno Domini designations, the 987th year of the 2nd millennium, the 87th year of the 20th century, and the 8th year of the 1980s decade.
context_section_description: December 1 – James Baldwin, African-American novelist, essayist, playwright and poet (b. 1924)
  December 2
  Juan Alberto Melgar Castro, Honduran military officer (b. 1930)
  Luis Federico Leloir, French-born chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1906)
  Yakov Borisovich Zel'dovich, Russian physicist (b. 1914)
  December 4 – Rouben Mamoulian, Armenian-American film director (b. 1897)
  December 8
  Marcos Calderón, Peruvian football coach (b. 1928)
  José González Ganoza, Peruvian footballer (b. 1954)
  Alfredo Tomassini, Peruvian football player (b. 1964)
  José Casanova, Peruvian footballer (b. 1964)
  Luis Antonio Escobar, Peruvian footballer (b. 1967)
  December 10 – Jascha Heifetz, Lithuanian-born violinist (b. 1901)
  December 13 – Josefina Passadori, Argentinian writer and poet (b. 1900)
  December 14 – Tim Dinsdale, British aeronautical engineer and Loch Ness Monster seeker (b. 1924)
  December 15 – Septima Poinsette Clark, American educator and civil rights activist (b. 1898)
  December 17
  Linda Wong, American pornographic actress (b. 1951)
  Bernardus Johannes Alfrink, Dutch cardinal (b. 1900)
  December 19 – Leo Jung, American rabbi (b. 1892)
  December 21
  Joe Sherman, Major League Baseball pitcher (b. 1890)
  Ralph Nelson, American film and television director, producer, writer, and actor (b. 1916)
  Robert Paige, American actor (b. 1911)
  December 22
  Alice Terry, American actress (b. 1899)
  José do Patrocínio Oliveira, Brazilian musician and voice actor (b. 1904)
  Luca Prodan, Italian–Scottish musician and singer (b. 1953)
  December 23 – Harald Johnsson, Swedish politician (b. 1898)
  December 24
  Joop den Uyl, Dutch politician and journalist, Prime Minister of the Netherlands (1973–1977) (b. 1919)
  M. G. Ramachandran, Indian actor and Chief Minister of the Tamil Nadu (1977–1987) (b. 1917)
  December 25 – Ruf Bonner, Soviet Jewish exilee (b. 1900)
  December 27 – Priscilla Dean, American actress (b. 1896)
  December 29
  Patrick Bissell, American danseur (b. 1957)
  Ellen Louise Mertz, Denmark's first female geologist (b. 1896)
caption: Robert Paige
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