138,435 People

Natural disasters in 1980
Grand Island, Nebraska Tornado Outbreak
Kalamazoo Tornado of 1980
"More Trees Down" Derecho
1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens
1980 United States heat wave
Western Wisconsin Derecho

People who died on January 17 (various years)
2007 - Yevhen Kushnaryov, Ukrainian politician
2007 - Art Buchwald, American humorist
2006 - Pierre Grondin, French Canadian cardiac surgeon
2006 - Clarence Ray Allen, American murderer
2005 - Zhao Ziyang, Premier of the People's Republic of China
2005 - Albert Schatz, American microbiologist
2005 - Virginia Mayo, American actress
2005 - Charlie Bell, Australian fast food executive
2004 - Harry Brecheen, American baseball player
2004 - Noble Willingham, American actor
2004 - Ray Stark, American stage and film producer
2004 - Czeslaw Niemen, Polish musician
2003 - Richard Crenna, American actor
2002 - Camilo Jose Cela, Spanish writer, Nobel Prize laureate
2002 - Bishop Karas, First Coptic Bishop of St. Antony Monastery
2001 - Gregory Corso, American poet
1999 - Robert Eads, American transexual
1998 - Junior Kimbrough, American bluesman
1997 - Clyde Tombaugh, American astronomer
1996 - Mostafa Sid Ahmed, Sudanese singer
1996 - Barbara Jordan, American politician
1996 - Amber Hagerman, American namesake of the Amber alert system
1994 - Helen Stephens, American runner
1993 - Albert Hourani, English historian
1991 - King Olav V of Norway
1987 - Hugo Fregonese, Argentine film director
1983 - Doodles Weaver, American actor
1977 - Gary Gilmore, American murderer
1972 - Betty Smith, American writer and singer
1970 - Billy Stewart, American singer
1970 - Simon Kovar, Russian-American bassoonist
1967 - Evelyn Nesbit, American actress
1964 - T.H. White, English author
1961 - Patrice Lumumba, Prime Minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
1947 - Jean-Marie-Rodrigue Villeneuve, French Archbishop of Quebec
1947 - Pyotr Krasnov, Russian counter-revolutionary
1942 - Walther von Reichenau, German field marshal
1933 - Louis Comfort Tiffany, American artist and designer
1931 - Grand Duke Peter Nikolaevich of Russia, son of Grand Duke Nicholas Nikolaevich
1903 - Ignaz Wechselmann, Hungarian architect and philanthropist
1893 - Rutherford B. Hayes, 19th President of the United States
1886 - Amilcare Ponchielli, Italian composer
1884 - Hermann Schlegel, German ornithologist
1863 - Horace Vernet, French painter
1861 - Lola Montez, Irish-born adventurer
1834 - Giovanni Aldini, Italian physicist
1826 - Juan Crisóstomo Arriaga, Spanish composer
1751 - Tomaso Albinoni, Italian composer
1737 - Matthäus Daniel Pöppelmann, German architect
1718 - Captain Benjamin Church, Plymouth Colony settler
1705 - John Ray, English naturalist
1654 - Paulus Potter, Dutch painter
1617 - Faust Vrančić, Croatian inventor
1468 - Skanderbeg, Albanian leader
1369 - King Peter I of Cyprus (murdered)
1229 - Albert of Buxhoeveden, German soldier
395 - Theodosius I, Roman Emperor