Velma (Margie) Barfield
1984 --- 1st woman executed in US since restoration of death penalty in 1967. (For poisoning her fiancée.)

Cheri Jo Bates
1966 --- 1st victim of the Zodiac killer. Murdered at Riverside Community College in California, her jugular and larynx were severed.)

Rainey Bethea
1936 --- the last publicly executed criminal in US. Executed by hanging.

Bridget Bishop
1692 --- 1st of the witches hung in Salem, Massachusetts. She was executed on June 10.

Ray Brennan
1976 --- on July 27th - 1st person to die of "Legionnaire's Disease."

Charles Brooks, Jr.
1982 --- 1st criminal executed in US by lethal injection.

Nicolae Ceausescu - Romanian president
1989 --- executed by firing squad, on live television, along with his wife.

Raymond Johnson Chapman - Cleveland Indians baseball player
1920 --- died one day after being struck in head by baseball pitch, becoming the only player ever killed as result of major league baseball game.

Edward Despard
1803 --- last executed criminal drawn & quartered in England.

Robert (Bobbie) Franks
1924 --- kidnapped and murdered by Leopold & Loeb.

Frank Hayes - jockey
1923 --- heart attack during a race. His horse, Sweet Kiss, won the race, making Hayes the only deceased jockey to win a race.

Hal Mark Irish
1991 --- was killed in a leap from a hot air balloon in what was believed to be the first US death from the thrill sport of Bungee jumping. Irish fell more than 60 feet to his death on October 29, 1991, after breaking loose from his bungee cord during a demonstration.

Knut Jensen - Olympic cyclist
1960 --- fractured skull during the 1960 Olympics in Rome. In the 93 degree heat, he collapsed from sunstroke and hit his head. He was one of only 2 athletes to die as a result of Olympic competition. (Francisco Lazaro was the other.)

Vladimir Komarov
1967 --- 1st cosmonaut to die in space. (Russian Soyuz 1)

Mary Jo Kopechne
1969 --- drowned when the car she was a passenger in, driven by Sen. Edward Kennedy, fell off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, MA.

Francisco Lazaro - Olympic runner
1912 --- sunstroke and heart trouble. Collapsed toward the end of the 1912 Olympic marathon in Stockholm. Lazaro was one of only two athletes to die as a result of Olympic competition. (Knut Jensen was the other.)

Mark Maples
1964 --- 1st person to be killed on a ride in Disneyland. He stood up while riding the Matterhorn Bobsleds and was thrown to his death. (There have been 7 deaths at Disneyland since its opening in 1955.)

Bill Masterton - hockey player for Minnesota North Stars
1968 --- head injury. He fell over backwards and hit his head on the ice after being checked during a game against the Oakland Seals. His is the only death in pro-hockey during the modern era.

Kenneth Allen McDuff
1998 --- thought to be the only person ever freed from death row and then returned after killing again. Executed by injection, November 17, 1998, in Huntsville, Texas.

Janet Parker - medical photographer
1978 --- last person to die of smallpox.

Laura Patterson - professional bungee jumper
1996 --- killed during rehearsal for the Superbowl at the New Orleans Superdome on Jan. 23. She died of massive head injuries.

Nicolas Jacques Pelletier - French highwayman
1792 --- 1st person beheaded with the guillotine.

Martha Place
1899 --- 1st woman executed in the electric chair, Sing Sing Prison, NY, on March 20. She had murdered her stepdaughter.

Julius & Ethel Rosenberg
1953 --- executed in electric chair on June 19. The 1st husband-and-wife team executed in the US. They had been charged with espionage and spying.

Hugh Scrutton
1985 --- first confirmed Unabomber victim. On Dec. 11, the computer rental store owner opened a package which had been left outside his door.

Thomas A. Selfridge
1908 --- 1st mortality in an airplane crash. He was the passenger when Wilbur Wright crashed a US War Department test plane.