of Alberta (b. 1868) December 7 Laurette Taylor, American actress (b. 1884) Sada Yacco, Japanese stage actress (b. 1871) December 10 Walter Johnson, American baseball player (Washington Senators), MLB Hall of Famer (b. 1887) Damon Runyon, American writer (b. 1880) December 12 Ben Carter, American actor (b. 1910) Renée Falconetti, French actress (b. 1892) December 14 – Tom Dowse, Irish major league baseball player in the 1890s (b. 1866) December 16 – Salman al-Murshid, Syrian religious leader, political figure (b. 1907) December 20 – Einosuke Harada, Japanese ophthalmologist (b. 1892) December 22 – Pierre Bénard, French journalist (b. 1898) December 23 – John A. Sampson, American gynecologist (b. 1873) December 25 W. C. Fields, American actor, comedian (b. 1880) Henri Le Fauconnier, French painter (b. 1881) December 26 – Franjo Bučar, Yugoslav writer (b. 1866) December 27 – Pedro Mata Dominguez, Spanish novelist, playwright and poet (b. 1875) December 28 Carrie Jacobs-Bond, American singer, songwriter (b. 1862) Francis Salabert, French publisher (b. 1884) December 29 – John Babington Macaulay Baxter, Canadian politician, 19th Premier of New Brunswick (b. 1858) Nobel Prizes Physics – Percy Williams Bridgman Chemistry – James B. Sumner, John Howard Northrop, Wendell Meredith Stanley Physiology or Medicine – Hermann Joseph Muller Literature – Hermann Hesse Peace – Emily Greene Balch, John Mott References Further reading Goulden, Joseph C. The Best Years: 1945–1950 (1976), popular social history of USA Hennessy, Peter. Never Again: Britain, 1945–1951 (1994)), a scholarly survey. Kynaston, David. Austerity Britain, 1945–1951 (2008) excerpt and text search, a detaied social history. Sebestyen, Victor. 1946: The Making of the Modern World (2015) excerpt Weisbrode, Kenneth. The Year of Indecision, 1946: A Tour Through the Crucible of Harry Truman's America (2016) excerpt External links Newsreel May 23, 1946: Rail strike paralyzes the United States Newsreel May 29, 1946: End of U.S. coal strike