Olivia Newton-John, universally beloved pop singer and star of the musical movies Grease and Xanadu, died today at the age of 73. The English-Australian singer and actor had seven Top 10 hits on Billboard's Country chart and four Grammy awards.
She had an interesting childhood and ancestors — her grandfather was Max Born, the Nobel Prize-winning physicist! From Wikipedia:
Newton-John was born on 26 September 1948 in Cambridge, United Kingdom, to Welshman Brinley "Bryn" Newton-John (1914–1992) and Irene Helene (née Born; 1914–2003). Her Jewish maternal grandfather, the Nobel Prize–winning physicist Max Born, fled with his wife and children to Britain from Germany before World War II to escape the Nazi regime. Newton-John's maternal grandmother was of paternal Jewish ancestry as well; through her, she was a third cousin of comedian Ben Elton. Her maternal great-grandfather was the jurist Victor Ehrenberg and her matrilineal great-grandmother's father was the jurist Rudolf von Jhering.
Newton-John's father was an MI5 officer on the Enigma project at Bletchley Park who took Rudolf Hess into custody during World War II.
