Who Was Alive
Marvin Gaye
Photograph by Jim Britt, whose other (copyrighted) photos of Gaye from the same session—many of them in full color—can b, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Marvin Gaye

American singer

Born 2 April 1939 · died 1 April 1984, aged 44
Also known as Marvin Pentz Gay Jr., Marvin P. Gaye

Who was alive at the same time as Marvin Gaye?

  1. Sigmund Freud, 1856 – 1939
  2. Rabindranath Tagore, 1861 – 1941
  3. Mahatma Gandhi, 1869 – 1948
  4. Winston Churchill, 1874 – 1965
  5. Joseph Stalin, 1878 – 1953
  6. Albert Einstein, 1879 – 1955
  7. Pablo Picasso, 1881 – 1973
  8. Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1882 – 1945
  9. Charlie Chaplin, 1889 – 1977
  10. Adolf Hitler, 1889 – 1945
  11. Salvador Dalí, 1904 – 1989
  12. Ronald Reagan, 1911 – 2004
  13. John F. Kennedy, 1917 – 1963
  14. Nelson Mandela, 1918 – 2013
  15. Elizabeth II, 1926 – 2022
  16. Martin Luther King Jr., 1929 – 1968
  17. Marvin Gaye, 1939 – 1984
  18. Joe Biden, born 1942
  19. Donald Trump, born 1946
  20. George W. Bush, born 1946
  21. Vladimir Putin, born 1952
  22. Bill Gates, born 1955
  23. Michael Jackson, 1958 – 2009
  24. Barack Obama, born 1961

Drag across the timeline, or use the arrow keys, to see who was alive in any year and the age each person reached that year. Dashed lines mark world events. Faded ends mark uncertain dates.

When Marvin Gaye was born, Adolf Hitler was 49, Albert Einstein was 60, Ronald Reagan was 28, Nelson Mandela was 20 and Mahatma Gandhi was 69.

When Marvin Gaye died, Barack Obama was 22, Donald Trump was 37, Michael Jackson was 25, Vladimir Putin was 31 and Ronald Reagan was 73.

Born during Marvin Gaye’s lifetime: Barack Obama, Donald Trump, Michael Jackson, Vladimir Putin, George W. Bush, Joe Biden, Bill Gates and Jimmy Wales.

Not quite contemporaries: Thomas Edison died about 8 years before Marvin Gaye was born, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk died about a year before Marvin Gaye was born, Marie Curie died about 5 years before Marvin Gaye was born and Franz Kafka died about 15 years before Marvin Gaye was born.

What happened in Marvin Gaye’s lifetime

Where Marvin Gaye’s contemporaries were born

Marvin Gaye is labelled; the others are the best-known people we track who lived at the same time. Each dot is a birthplace from Wikidata (78 of 81 placed); tap one to open that person.
Birthplaces as a list

Compare Marvin Gaye

The 150 best-known contemporaries

3,783 of the people we track were surely alive at the same time as Marvin Gaye. The 150 best known are listed here. See also everyone alive in 1962.

  1. Barack Obama born 1961
  2. Donald Trump born 1946
  3. Adolf Hitler 1889 – 1945
  4. Albert Einstein 1879 – 1955
  5. Michael Jackson 1958 – 2009
  6. Vladimir Putin born 1952
  7. Ronald Reagan 1911 – 2004
  8. Nelson Mandela 1918 – 2013
  9. Mahatma Gandhi 1869 – 1948
  10. George W. Bush born 1946
  11. Joseph Stalin 1878 – 1953
  12. Joe Biden born 1942
  13. Pablo Picasso 1881 – 1973
  14. Winston Churchill 1874 – 1965
  15. Charlie Chaplin 1889 – 1977
  16. Elizabeth II 1926 – 2022
  17. Sigmund Freud 1856 – 1939
  18. John F. Kennedy 1917 – 1963
  19. Martin Luther King Jr. 1929 – 1968
  20. Salvador Dalí 1904 – 1989
  21. Rabindranath Tagore 1861 – 1941
  22. Franklin D. Roosevelt 1882 – 1945
  23. Bill Gates born 1955
  24. Marilyn Monroe 1926 – 1962
  25. Jimmy Wales born 1966
  26. Pope Francis 1936 – 2025
  27. Shakira born 1977
  28. Mao Zedong 1893 – 1976
  29. Steve Jobs 1955 – 2011
  30. Che Guevara 1928 – 1967
  31. Bill Clinton born 1946
  32. Charles de Gaulle 1890 – 1970
  33. Angela Merkel born 1954
  34. Nikola Tesla 1856 – 1943
  35. Neil Armstrong 1930 – 2012
  36. Walt Disney 1901 – 1966
  37. François Hollande born 1954
  38. Elvis Presley 1935 – 1977
  39. Volodymyr Zelenskyy born 1978
  40. George Orwell 1903 – 1950
  41. Pope John Paul II 1920 – 2005
  42. Ernest Hemingway 1899 – 1961
  43. Margaret Thatcher 1925 – 2013
  44. James Joyce 1882 – 1941
  45. Gabriel García Márquez 1927 – 2014
  46. Fidel Castro 1926 – 2016
  47. Yuri Gagarin 1934 – 1968
  48. J. R. R. Tolkien 1892 – 1973
  49. Albert Camus 1913 – 1960
  50. Marlene Dietrich 1901 – 1992
  51. Henry Ford 1863 – 1947
  52. Mikhail Gorbachev 1931 – 2022
  53. Elon Musk born 1971
  54. Benito Mussolini 1883 – 1945
  55. Jean-Paul Sartre 1905 – 1980
  56. Stephen Hawking 1942 – 2018
  57. Le Corbusier 1887 – 1965
  58. Frida Kahlo 1907 – 1954
  59. Mother Teresa 1910 – 1997
  60. Jimmy Carter 1924 – 2024
  61. Pope Benedict XVI 1927 – 2022
  62. Emmanuel Macron born 1977
  63. Harry S. Truman 1884 – 1972
  64. Agatha Christie 1890 – 1976
  65. Hillary Clinton born 1947
  66. George H. W. Bush 1924 – 2018
  67. Jorge Luis Borges 1899 – 1986
  68. Nicolas Sarkozy born 1955
  69. Madonna born 1958
  70. Kamala Harris born 1964
  71. Jawaharlal Nehru 1889 – 1964
  72. Dwight D. Eisenhower 1890 – 1969
  73. Alan Turing 1912 – 1954
  74. Richard Nixon 1913 – 1994
  75. Xi Jinping born 1953
  76. Naruhito born 1960
  77. Alfred Hitchcock 1899 – 1980
  78. Noam Chomsky born 1928
  79. John Maynard Keynes 1883 – 1946
  80. Simone de Beauvoir 1908 – 1986
  81. Hugo Chávez 1954 – 2013
  82. George Bernard Shaw 1856 – 1950
  83. Bertrand Russell 1872 – 1970
  84. Niels Bohr 1885 – 1962
  85. Leon Trotsky 1879 – 1940
  86. John Lennon 1940 – 1980
  87. Bob Dylan born 1941
  88. Muammar Gaddafi 1942 – 2011
  89. Sung Jae-gi 1967 – 2013
  90. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan born 1954
  91. Max Planck 1858 – 1947
  92. Pelé 1940 – 2022
  93. Muhammad Ali 1942 – 2016
  94. Henri Matisse 1869 – 1954
  95. J. K. Rowling born 1965
  96. Frank Lloyd Wright 1867 – 1959
  97. Louis Armstrong 1901 – 1971
  98. Andy Warhol 1928 – 1987
  99. Kofi Annan 1938 – 2018
  100. Charles III born 1948
  101. Osama bin Laden 1957 – 2011
  102. Virginia Woolf 1882 – 1941
  103. Akira Kurosawa 1910 – 1998
  104. Lech Wałęsa born 1943
  105. Freddie Mercury 1946 – 1991
  106. Kim Jong Un born 1984
  107. Lyndon B. Johnson 1908 – 1973
  108. Gerald Ford 1913 – 2006
  109. Pope Leo XIV born 1955
  110. Diego Maradona 1960 – 2020
  111. Eminem born 1972
  112. Beyoncé born 1981
  113. Narendra Modi born 1950
  114. Ludwig Wittgenstein 1889 – 1951
  115. Indira Gandhi 1917 – 1984
  116. Rafael Correa born 1963
  117. Huang Xianfan 1899 – 1982
  118. Benjamin Netanyahu born 1949
  119. Angelina Jolie born 1975
  120. Enrico Fermi 1901 – 1954
  121. Naguib Mahfouz 1911 – 2006
  122. Saddam Hussein 1937 – 2006
  123. Aung San Suu Kyi born 1945
  124. Steven Spielberg born 1946
  125. Michael Schumacher born 1969
  126. Nikita Khrushchev 1894 – 1971
  127. Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 1900 – 1944
  128. Anne Frank 1929 – 1945
  129. H. G. Wells 1866 – 1946
  130. Helen Keller 1880 – 1968
  131. 14th Dalai Lama born 1935
  132. Dmitry Medvedev born 1965
  133. Anna Netrebko born 1971
  134. Pablo Neruda 1904 – 1973
  135. Rafael Orozco Maestre 1954 – 1992
  136. Thomas Mann 1875 – 1955
  137. Igor Stravinsky 1882 – 1971
  138. Bruce Lee 1940 – 1973
  139. David Hilbert 1862 – 1943
  140. Erwin Schrödinger 1887 – 1961
  141. Silvio Berlusconi 1936 – 2023
  142. Bob Marley 1945 – 1981
  143. Shinzo Abe 1954 – 2022
  144. Herbert Hoover 1874 – 1964
  145. Hermann Hesse 1877 – 1962
  146. Isaac Asimov c. 1920 – 1992
  147. Tim Berners-Lee born 1955
  148. Ingmar Bergman 1918 – 2007
  149. Federico Fellini 1920 – 1993
  150. Mahathir Mohamad born 1925