Celebrities who died on December 16

Noble Ray Price (January 12, 1926 – December 16, 2013) was an American country music singer, songwriter, and guitarist. His wide-ranging baritone is regarded as among the best male voices of country music, and his innovations, such as propelling the country beat from 2/4 to 4/4, known as the "Ray Price beat", helped make country music more popular. Some of his well-known recordings include "Release Me", "Crazy Arms", "Heartaches by the Number", "For the Good Times", "Night Life", and "You're the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me". He was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1996. He continued to record and tour into his 80s.

Madlyn Soloman Rhue (née Madeline Roche, October 3, 1935 – December 16, 2003) was an American film and television actress.

Thelma Alice Todd (July 29, 1906 – December 16, 1935) was an American actress and businesswoman often referred to by the nickname "The Ice Cream Blonde", as well as "Hot Toddy". Appearing in around 120 feature films and shorts between 1926 and 1935, she is best remembered for her comedic roles opposite ZaSu Pitts and in films such as Marx Brothers' Monkey Business and Horse Feathers and a number of Charley Chase's short comedies. She co-starred with Buster Keaton and Jimmy Durante in Speak Easily. She also had roles in several Wheeler and Woolsey and Laurel and Hardy films, the last of which (The Bohemian Girl) featured her in a part that was truncated by her suspicious death in 1935 at the age of 29.

Silvana Mangano (Rome 21 April 1930 – Madrid 16 December 1989) was an Italian actress.

Daniel Grayling Fogelberg (August 13, 1951 – December 16, 2007) was an American musician, songwriter, composer, and multi-instrumentalist. He is known for his 1980s songs, including "Longer" (1979), "Same Old Lang Syne" (1980), and "Leader of the Band" (1982).

Dorothy Jacqueline Keely (March 9, 1928 – December 16, 2017), better known as Keely Smith, was an iconic American jazz and popular music singer, who performed and recorded extensively in the 1950s with then-husband Louis Prima, and throughout the 1960s as a solo artist.

Clarence LeRoy "Lee" Van Cleef Jr. (January 9, 1925 – December 16, 1989) was an American actor best known for his roles in Spaghetti Westerns such as For A Few Dollars More and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. He declined to have his nose altered to play a sympathetic character in his film debut, High Noon, and was relegated to a non-speaking outlaw as a result. For a decade he was typecast as a minor villain, his "sinister" features overshadowing his acting skills. After suffering serious injuries in a car crash, Van Cleef had begun to lose interest in his declining career by the time Sergio Leone gave him a major role in For a Few Dollars More. The film made him a box-office draw, especially in Europe.

Lynda Ann Wiesmeier (pronounced WEES-myer, May 30, 1963 – December 16, 2012) was an American model and actress. She made her film debut in American Pop. Wiesmeier was selected as both cover model and Playmate of the Month for the July 1982 issue of Playboy magazine, and her centerfold was photographed by Richard Fegley. Wiesmeier also appeared in several Playboy newsstand special editions and videos, and worked steadily for Playboy for more than five years after she graced the magazine's fold-out page, first as a nude glamour and pin-up model, and then as a promotional model and a feature reporter for the Playboy Channel.

Sylvester James Jr. (September 6, 1947 – December 16, 1988), known mononymously as Sylvester, was an American singer-songwriter. Primarily active in the genres of disco, rhythm and blues, and soul, he was known for his flamboyant and androgynous appearance, falsetto singing voice, and hit disco singles in the late 1970s and 1980s.

Nicolette Larson (July 17, 1952 – December 16, 1997) was an American pop singer. She is perhaps best known for her work in the late 1970s with Neil Young and her 1978 hit single of Young's "Lotta Love", which hit No. 1 on the Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks chart and No. 8 on the pop singles chart. It was followed by four more adult contemporary hits, two of which were also minor pop hits.