Literotica Cemetary

[JennyOmanHill]

Preston Robert Tisch, Owner of Loews Hotels and Giants, Dies

Published: November 16, 2005

Preston Robert Tisch, who with his older brother built a multibillion-dollar business empire and who himself was postmaster general, half-owner of the New York Giants football team and leader of many of the city's top business groups, died yesterday at his home in Manhattan. He was 79 and also had a home in Harrison, N.Y.

The cause was a brain tumor, said Jeffrey Stewart, spokesman for the family.

Wellington Mara, the co-owner of the Giants with Mr. Tisch, died on Oct. 25.

Mr. Tisch was sometimes called "the other Tisch" to differentiate him from his older brother, Laurence, who was known as a no-nonsense financial strategist, partly from being the fiercely cost-conscious chairman of CBS from 1986 to 1995. He died in 2003.

But it was more often Preston Robert Tisch, universally known as Bob, who seized the public view, first as a persuasive marketer for hotels and other companies owned by the Loews Corporation. As operations chief, his attention to detail once included personally hiring all bellmen for Loews hotels. He saw them as his best salesmen.

Mr. Tisch freely gave his talents to New York City. He served as Mayor David N. Dinkins "ambassador" to Washington; was chairman of host committees for the 1976 and 1980 Democratic National Conventions; and led the way in building a new convention center on Manhattan's West Side.

His last campaign, Take the Field, to revitalize the ragged athletic fields of the city's public high schools, raised $140 million in donations.

In recent months, Mr. Tisch continued attending power breakfasts, as well as meetings at Giants Stadium and sports events there and elsewhere.

His speaking schedule was so full that when President Ronald Reagan named him postmaster general in 1986, friends wondered if the job might really be "toastmaster general."

Larry and Bob Tisch were known for their generosity, not least their gifts to New York University where the medical center and arts school both bear the family name. So does a gallery at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the children's zoo in Central Park, not to mention namesake institutions at the University of Michigan, Tufts University and elsewhere.

The Tisch brothers add up to a quintessential Big Apple success story, beginning with playing stickball on the streets of Brooklyn and building to a financial conglomerate with annual sales of more than $15.2 billion and assets of $73.7 billion.

Their holding company, the Loews Corporation, ranks 127th on the Fortune 500, and has subsidiaries engaged in various kinds of insurance, the production and sale of cigarettes and watches, and the operation of hotels and oil and gas drilling rigs.

Preston Robert Tisch was born in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn on April 29, 1926, to parents who came from Russia. His father, Abraham Solomon, known as Al, owned a garment-manufacturing business and bought two summer camps in New Jersey, Laurel and Lincoln, which his wife, the former Sayde Brenner, helped him operate. As teenagers, Larry and Bob worked at the camps.

The family moved every three years to get three months of free rent, a common practice even among the middle class. This meant Mr. Tisch attended DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx for one year and Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn for three.

Mr. Tisch joined the Army after briefly attending Bucknell, and enrolled at the University of Michigan after his discharge in 1944, earning a bachelor's degree in economics.

His wife, the former Joan Hyman, recalled him selling keychains for a dime, or two for 15 cents, in front of the university's football stadium. They married in 1948.

Besides his wife of 57 years, he is survived by two sons, Steven and Jonathan; and a daughter, Laurie.

 

[linuxgeek]

src

Prince in tribute to war veteran

Prince Charles has paid tribute to Scotland's oldest man and the country's longest serving veteran of World War I, who has died at the age of 109.

Alfred Anderson, who served with the 5th Battalion the Black Watch, died in a nursing home in Angus.

Born in 1896, he was in one of the first British contingents to serve on the Western Front.

Prince Charles, who knew the veteran, said: "I was very deeply saddened to hear that Alfred Anderson had died."

Mr Anderson was thought to have been the longest surviving veteran of the 1914 Christmas truce when British and German troops shook hands in no-man's-land.

For a short time he was batman to Captain Fergus Bowes-Lyon, who was the brother of the late Queen Mother.

This special relationship resulted in a private visit by Prince Charles in 2002.

The prince added: "I met Alfred on several occasions, once at his home in the small town of Alyth in Perthshire and more recently at Balhousie Castle in Perth.

"As many in Scotland and beyond will know, he had a legendary reputation within the Black Watch and had a special connection with my grandmother's family through his service with her older brother Captain Fergus Bowes-Lyon at the Battle of Loos in 1915.

"He will be missed by many. We should not forget him, and the others of his generation, who gave so much for their country."

Mr Anderson, from Alyth, in Perthshire, died on Monday morning at Mundamalla Nursing Home in Newtyle.

The Reverend Neil Gardner, of Alyth Parish Church, said: "Alfred passed away peacefully in his sleep this morning.

"He was Scotland's oldest man but he remained lucid almost until the end. He was a very gracious and unassuming man."

Mr Anderson was 18 when he went off to war and saw some of the bloodiest fighting of the campaign.

He suffered a shrapnel wound to the back of the neck in 1916.

He had to lie in a trench throughout the day and was taken away for medical treatment under the cover of darkness.

His injury ended his active service and he spent the rest of the war as an instructor, finishing the war as a staff sergeant.

However, Mr Anderson continued his military service in the Home Guard during World War II.

Speaking when he marked his 106th birthday in 2002, Mr Anderson said: "We lived for each day during the war. At 106, I do much the same again."

Mr Anderson was born in Dundee and was one of six children.

His father had a building and joinery business which Mr Anderson took charge of after the war.

The widower, who had five children, said he had lost count of his grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

'Quick wit'

In 1998 Mr Anderson was awarded France's highest military honour - the Légion d'Honneur - for his services during WWI.

Neil Griffiths, of the Royal British Legion of Scotland, said: "Alfred was a fine old soldier who was a brilliant example of old world courtliness.

"Everyone who met him was always impressed by his vitality and great pride in his personal appearance.

"He was gentle and very humorous, with a quick wit. He used to say until recently that his ambition was to die shot in bed by a jealous lover.

"But I think also there was a great sadness in his heart that he had outlived his generation - all his friends had died."

The government minister with responsibility for veterans, Don Touhig said Mr Anderson's death was "a great loss".

"Not only is he believed to be the longest surviving Scottish WWI veteran but he is also thought to be the last survivor of the 1914 Christmas truce.

"The sacrifices made and remarkable bravery displayed by Mr Anderson and his comrades is a lesson for us all."

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Veteran Actor Harold Stone, 92, Dies

http://dvdtoile.com/ARTISTES/5/5140.jpg
From "The Wrong Man"

The Associated Press
Sunday, November 20, 2005; 3:30 PM

LOS ANGELES -- Harold Stone, a veteran character actor who worked with everyone from Humphrey Bogart to Jerry Lewis over a 40-year career in television and films, has died. He was 92.

Stone died Friday of natural causes at the Motion Picture and Television Country House and Hospital in Los Angeles, his son Michael said.

Known for his chiseled features, Stone appeared in 30 films including "Spartacus," "The Big Mouth," "The Wrong Man" and "The Greatest Story Ever Told."

He also had more than 150 roles on television, mostly in crime shows and police dramas, according to Internet Movie Database.

In 1964, Stone he earned an Emmy nomination for his portrayal of an Army medic who becomes a nurse in an episode of the CBS drama "The Nurses."

"I don't think there are any roles I haven't played," he recently told his granddaughter.

Stone studied medicine at the University of Buffalo but turned to acting after he was forced to drop out to support his mother.

In 1956, he appeared with Bogart in "The Harder They Fall." Lewis directed Stone in three films, including "The Big Mouth," "Which Way to the Front?" and "Hardly Working."

"I learned an awful lot from him," Stone said of Lewis in 2000. "We became great friends."

Stone is survived by two sons, a daughter and four grandchildren.

 

[sweet soft kiss]

Stove Top Stuffing Creator Dies

Stove Top Stuffing Creator Dies
Wednesday, November 23, 2005

EVANSVILLE, Ind. — The home economist who helped create Stove Top Stuffing has died.

Ruth Siems died Nov. 13 after suffering a heart attack in her home in Newburgh, Ind. She was 74.

Siems worked for General Foods for more than 30 years after graduating from Purdue University in 1953 with a degree in home economics.

She helped develop the formula for Stove Top in 1971 while working at General Foods' technical center in White Plains, N.Y.

Siems' brother, David, said she found that precise bread crumb size was the secret in developing an instant stuffing.

Kraft Foods, which now owns the Stove Top brand, sells about 60 million boxes of the five-minute stuffing each year around Thanksgiving.

 

[sweet soft kiss]

World's ugliest dog dies at 14

World's ugliest dog dies at 14
(AP)
Updated: 2005-11-24 07:49

Sam, the tiny dog whose hairless body and crooked teeth earned him a reputation as the World's Ugliest Dog, has died in California, the United States.

Sam, the tiny dog whose hairless body and crooked teeth earned him a reputation as the World's Ugliest Dog, has died in California, the United States. The pooch died Friday, just short of his 15th birthday, his owner said.

"I don't think there'll ever be another Sam," Susie Lockheed said, adding: "Some people would think that's a good thing."

Sam won the ugliest dog contest at the Sonoma-Marin Fair this summer for the third year in a row. It had made appearances on TV in Japan, radio in New Zealand and in Britain's Daily Mirror tabloid. He also had met Donald Trump on a talk show set.

Lockheed said she initially was terrified of Sam when she agreed to take him in as a rescue dog six years ago on a 48-hour trial basis. Although she fell in love with him, his appearance repulsed her then-boyfriend and prompted the man to break up with her.

Later, however, Sam became a matchmaker by bringing together Lockheed and her current beau, who saw a picture of the two on an online dating site.

Lockheed said she had Sam euthanized after she learned Sam's heart was failing.

She said she's felt a little lost ever since, and is sleeping with Sam's favorite toy — a stuffed bear he picked up and carried home.




http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2005-11/24/xin_361102240754671217214.jpg

 

[Denae]

It's amazing how we are affected by the love of and for our pets. R.I.P. Sam

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Cult Movie Star Pamela Duncan Dies at 73

Nov 20, 9:09 PM (ET)

http://www.giantmonstermovies.com/cvr/000031.jpg

(AP) - Pamela Duncan, an actress who starred in the cult classic "Attack of the Crab Monsters" and later appeared in an Academy Award-nominated documentary, has died. She was 73.

Duncan, who had numerous roles in television and film throughout the 1950s and the early 1960s, suffered a stroke and died Nov. 11 at the Lillian Booth Actors' Fund of America Home in Englewood.

She had lived at the home for 10 years and was one of several entertainers who appeared in "Curtain Call," a documentary made in 2000 that focused on the lives and careers of the home's residents.

A native of New York, Duncan won several local beauty pageants as a teenager before heading to Hollywood in the early 1950s. Her first role came in 1951, when she appeared in the film "Whistling Hills," but she was best known for her role in "Attack of the Crab Monsters," a 1957 science-fiction release directed by Roger Corman.

On television, Duncan primarily had roles in westerns, including "The Roy Rogers Show" and "Maverick," but also appeared on shows such as "Perry Mason" and "Dr. Kildare."

 

[sweet soft kiss]

Pat Morita Dies at Age 73

Actor Pat Morita, who was nominated for an Academy Award for his portrayal of the wise and dry-witted Mr. Miyagi in "The Karate Kid," has died. He was 73.

Morita died Thursday at his home in Las Vegas of natural causes, said his wife of 12 years, Evelyn. She said in a statement that her husband, who first rose to fame with a role on "Happy Days," had "dedicated his entire life to acting and comedy."

In 1984, he appeared in the role that would define his career and spawn countless affectionate imitations. As Kesuke Miyagi, the mentor to Ralph Macchio's "Daniel-san," he taught karate while trying to catch flies with chopsticks and offering such advice as "wax on, wax off" to guide Daniel through chores to improve his skills.

Morita said in a 1986 interview with The Associated Press he was billed as Noriyuki (Pat) Morita in the film because producer Jerry Weintraub wanted him to sound more ethnic. He said he used the billing because it was "the only name my parents gave me."

He lost the 1984 best supporting actor award to Haing S. Ngor, who appeared in "The Killing Fields."

For years, Morita played small and sometimes demeaning roles in such films as "Thoroughly Modern Millie" and TV series such as "The Odd Couple" and "Green Acres." His first breakthrough came with "Happy Days," and he followed with his own brief series, "Mr. T and Tina."

"The Karate Kid," led to three sequels, the last of which, 1994's "The Next Karate Kid," paired him with a young Hilary Swank.

Morita was prolific outside of the "Karate Kid" series as well, appearing in "Honeymoon in Vegas,""Spy Hard,""Even Cowgirls Get the Blues" and "The Center of the World." He also provided the voice for a character in the Disney movie "Mulan" in 1998.

Born in northern California on June 28, 1932, the son of migrant fruit pickers, Morita spent most of his early years in the hospital with spinal tuberculosis. He later recovered only to be sent to a Japanese-American internment camp in Arizona during World War II.

"One day I was an invalid," he recalled in a 1989 AP interview. "The next day I was public enemy No. 1 being escorted to an internment camp by an FBI agent wearing a piece."

After the war, Morita's family tried to repair their finances by operating a Sacramento restaurant. It was there that Morita first tried his comedy on patrons.

Because prospects for a Japanese-American standup comic seemed poor, Morita found steady work in computers at Aerojet General. But at age 30 he entered show business full time.

"Only in America could you get away with the kind of comedy I did," he commented. "If I tried it in Japan before the war, it would have been considered blasphemy, and I would have ended in leg irons. "

Morita was to be buried at Palm Green Valley Mortuary and Cemetery.

He is survived by his wife and three daughters from a previous marriage.

 

[Beco]

Actor Pat Morita, who was nominated for an Academy Award for his portrayal of the wise and dry-witted Mr. Miyagi in "The Karate Kid," has died. He was 73.

For years, Morita played small and sometimes demeaning roles in such films as "Thoroughly Modern Millie" and TV series such as "The Odd Couple" and "Green Acres." His first breakthrough came with "Happy Days," and he followed with his own brief series, "Mr. T and Tina."

I wouldn’t call anything Pat Morita was in as " demeaning". Morita was smart enough to continue to do what he did best, he stayed with what worked. As an actor he was typecast so jobs are tough to come by. Some beat reporter categorizes this as demeaning?? Poor choice of words.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Singer-songwriter Chris Whitley, 45, dies of lung cancer

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Chris Whitley, a singer-songwriter who followed his critically acclaimed blues-drenched debut album with a series of recordings that seesawed between musical styles, has died. He was 45.

Whitley, who was diagnosed with lung cancer several weeks ago, died last Sunday at a friend's home in Houston, according to Messenger Records, his record label.

Rolling Stone called the guitarist's first album, "Living With the Law," the "most impressive debut album" of 1991 and praised its "neat trick of making blues material . . . sound contemporary and as old as the hills."

One single, "Kick the Stones," became a cornerstone of the "Thelma & Louise" soundtrack. The title track was a minor hit, and Tom Petty and Bob Dylan hired Whitley to open their tours.

Bruce Springsteen, Dave Matthews and Keith Richards were reported to be among his admirers.

Whitley released more than 10 albums that embraced rock, jazz, electronica, grunge, alt-country and other styles.

"I feel like I'm always doing the same thing; I'm just using different tools and I try different vocabularies," Whitley said in 2004.

Christopher Becker Whitley was born in 1960 in Houston to an advertising art director, who was a blues guitarist on weekends, and his sculptor wife. He grew up moving around the country and lived in Mexico with his mother after his parents divorced when he was 11.

At 17, he quit high school in Vermont to become a street musician in New York City. His signature instrument was a National steel guitar, and he taught himself to play the blues with a bottleneck slide. Eventually, Whitley ended up in Belgium and had some success in a teeny-bop funk band. After six years, marriage and a daughter, he returned to New York in 1988.

Whitley, who was divorced, is survived by his 18-year-old daughter, Trixie of Belgium; his brother, Daniel; his sister, Bridget Whitley Anderson; and his father, Jerry.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Football legend George Best dies

Former football star George Best has died in hospital at the age of 59 after suffering multiple organ failure.

Best, who was admitted eight weeks ago with flu-like symptoms, died at 1255 GMT. London's Cromwell Hospital said it ended "a long and very valiant fight".

Son Calum, 24, who had kept a bedside vigil, said: "Not only have I lost my Dad... we've all lost a wonderful man."

The ex-Manchester United and Northern Ireland star is to be buried in Belfast beside his mother, Ann, late next week.

Best's father Dickie, 87, who was among relatives at his bedside overnight, asked for the family to be left to grieve in peace.

Best's sister, Barbara McNarry, said: "To the thousands upon thousands of people who have sent cards and e-mails, we have taken great comfort from them, especially during the long hours."

Best is widely regarded as one of the greatest players to have graced British and world football.

His heyday occurred during the 1960s, when he brought a pop star image to the game.

Asked later what happened to the money he had earned, Best replied: "I spent a lot of money on booze, birds and fast cars. The rest I just squandered."

A statement released by Best's second wife, Alex, said: "George was the love of my life. He was a unique and talented person who made a lot of people very happy."

Prime Minister Tony Blair led tributes to the man he called "probably the most naturally gifted footballer of his generation, one of the greatest footballers the UK has ever produced".

"Anyone who has seen him as a football fan will never forget it," Mr Blair said from the Commonwealth Head of Governments meeting in Malta.

He had been in hospital since entering with flu-like symptoms on 1 October, later suffering a kidney infection.

His condition deteriorated sharply last Friday with the development of a lung infection that led to internal bleeding.

Best, a recovering alcoholic, was particularly susceptible to infection because of medicines he needed after a 2002 liver transplant.

The Belfast-born former footballer and television pundit had been prescribed medication to suppress the immune system and prevent his body rejecting the new liver.

At the time of his hospital admission in October, Best's agent Phil Hughes said his client had been "off the drink" before being admitted to the hospital.

Dr Akeel Alisa, part of the medical team which had been treating Best, described him as "delightful to look after - he was very brave, a fighter to the end".

Best helped Manchester United win the First Division title in 1965 and 1967 and the European Cup in 1968.

His role in the team's success was recognised by his becoming the European Footballer of the Year in 1968.

Best made 466 appearances for the Old Trafford club, scoring a total of 178 goals.

He also won 37 caps - scoring nine goals - for Northern Ireland.

But despite his talent, his love of a champagne and playboy lifestyle degenerated into alcoholism, bankruptcy, a prison sentence for drink-driving and, eventually, his controversial liver transplant.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Broadway Baritone Keith Andes, of Wildcat, Dead at 85

28 Nov 2005

Keith Andes, the handsome baritone who was leading man to Lucille Ball in the Broadway musical Wildcat, was found dead in his California home Nov. 11.

The 85-year-old Andes had recently battled bladder cancer and other ailments, Associated Press reported. The Los Angeles County coroner's office ruled the death a suicide by asphyxiation, it was reported.

Mr. Andes was also a film and TV actor who appeared in the sitcom "Glynis" (opposite Glynis Johns) and in the 1952 film "Clash By Night," opposite Marilyn Monroe.

Mr. Andes was reportedly picked out of Broadway's Winged Victory in 1943 by Hollywood studio head Darryl F. Zanuck, who saw him go on as an understudy to Barry Nelson (the all-military cast list names him as Pvt. John Andes, according to Internet Broadway Database). He was offered an uncredited spot in the film version of the stage show, and a career in movies followed. His credits include "The Farmer's Daughter," "Away All Boats," "Back From Eternity," "Damn Citizen," "Model for Murder," "Tora! Tora! Tora!," "And Justice for All" and more. He also starred as Police Chief Col. Frank Dawson in the TV series "This Man Dawson."

Mr. Andes won a Theatre World Awards for his performance in the operetta The Chocolate Soldier in 1947. He later starred in Broadway's Kiss Me, Kate (succeeding Alfred Drake as Fred/Petruchio), Maggie (1953) and Cy Coleman and Carolyn Leigh's Wildcat (he played rugged oil rigger Joe Dynamite, and is heard on the original cast recording from 1960). He also starred in a 1963 production of Wildcat at San Diego's New Circle Arts Theatre.

Mr. Andes was born John Charles Andes in Ocean City, NJ. He graduated Upper Darby High School near Philadelphia in 1938, attended Oxford University in England, graduated with a degree in education from Temple University in 1943 and studied voice at the Philadelphia Conservatory of Music. He served in the Air Force during World War II.

Twice divorced, Mr. Andes is survived by son Mark, an original member of the rock groups Canned Heat and Spirit; son Matt; and three grandchildren.

 

[RoryN]

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Wendie Jo Sperber of ‘Bosom Buddies’ dies
Actress fought breast cancer and became advocate for care
Wendie Jo Sperber also appeared in the "Back to the Future" films.

Updated: 12:21 a.m. ET Dec. 1, 2005

LOS ANGELES - Actress Wendie Jo Sperber, who starred opposite Tom Hanks on TV’s “Bosom Buddies” and who in his words became “a walking inspiration” after she contracted cancer, has died. She was in her 40s.

Sperber died at home Tuesday after an eight-year battle with breast cancer, publicist Jo-Ann Geffen said Wednesday.

A Los Angeles native, Sperber appeared in dozens of television shows and movies, including all three “Back to the Future” films.

Her publicist first said Sperber was 46, but later said she was 43 based on an Internet resource. The Associated Press in September reported Sperber’s age as 47.

Sperber also had roles in Steven Spielberg’s “1941,” Robert Zemeckis’ “I Wanna Hold Your Hand,” and Neal Israel’s “Moving Violations” and “Bachelor Party.” Her television credits include “Murphy Brown,” “Private Benjamin,” “Will & Grace” and “8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter.”

After being diagnosed with breast cancer in 1997, the actress became an advocate for cancer care. In 2001, she founded the weSPARK Cancer Support Center, which provides free emotional support, information and social activities for individuals and families affected by cancer.

Sperber helped unveil and promote a breast cancer stamp for the U.S. Postal Service in 1998, Geffen said.

“The memory of Wendie Jo is that of a walking inspiration,” Hanks said in a statement. “She met the challenges of her illness with love, cheer, joy and altruism. We are going to miss her as surely as we are all better for knowing her.”

Sperber is survived by a son and daughter, her parents, two sisters and a brother.

 

[KindaKinky]

I was wondering who'd beat me to it.

for WJS

 

[Violette]

I'm really sad to have to report this one...Richard Pryor has finally left the sunset strip.



Actor-Comedian Dies at 65 of Heart Attack
'He Did Not Suffer, He Went Quickly,' Pryor's Wife Says
By JEREMIAH MARQUEZ, AP

LOS ANGELES (Dec. 10) - Richard Pryor, the groundbreaking comedian whose profanely personal insights into race relations and modern life made him one of Hollywood's biggest stars, died of a heart attack Saturday. He was 65.
Pryor died shortly before 8 a.m. after being taken to a hospital from his home in the San Fernando Valley, said his business manager, Karen Finch. He had been ill for years with multiple sclerosis, a degenerative disease of the nervous system.

Music producer Quincy Jones described Pryor as a true pioneer of his art.

"He was the Charlie Parker of comedy, a master of telling the truth that influenced every comedian that came after him," Jones said in a statement. "The legacy that he leaves will forever be with us."

Pryor lived dangerously close to the edge, both on stage and off.

He was regarded early in his career as one of the most foul-mouthed comics in the business, but he gained a wide following for his universal and frequently personal routines. After nearly losing his life in 1980 when he caught on fire while freebasing cocaine, he incorporated the ordeal into his later routines.

His audacious style influenced generations of stand-up artists, from Eddie Murphy and Chris Rock to Robin Williams and David Letterman, among others.

A series of hit comedies and concert films in the '70s and '80s helped make Pryor one of the highest paid stars in Hollywood, and he was one of the first black performers to have enough leverage to cut his own deals. In 1983, he signed a $40 million, five-year contract with Columbia Pictures.

His films included "Stir Crazy," "Silver Streak," "Which Way Is Up?" and "Richard Pryor Live on the Sunset Strip."

Throughout his career, Pryor focused on racial inequality, once joking as the host of the Academy Awards in 1977 that Harry Belafonte and Sidney Poitier were the only black members of the Academy.

Pryor once marveled "that I live in racist America and I'm uneducated, yet a lot of people love me and like what I do, and I can make a living from it. You can't do much better than that."

But he battled drug and alcohol addictions for years, most notably when he suffered severe burns over 50 percent of his body while freebasing at his home. An admitted "junkie" at the time, Pryor spent six weeks recovering from the burns and much longer from his addictions.

He battled multiple sclerosis throughout the '90s.

In one of his last movies, the 1991 bomb "Another You," Pryor's poor health was clearly evident. Pryor made a comeback attempt the following year, returning to standup comedy in clubs and on television while looking thin and frail, and with noticeable speech and movement difficulties.

In 1995, he played an embittered multiple sclerosis patient in an episode of the television series "Chicago Hope." The role earned him an Emmy nomination as best guest actor in a drama series.

"To be diagnosed was the hardest thing because I didn't know what they were talking about," he said. "And the doctor said 'Don't worry, in three months you'll know.'

"So I went about my business and then, one day, it jumped me. I couldn't get up. ... Your muscles trick you; they did me."

Despite his health troubles, he was happy and in good humor in his final days, said his wife Jennifer Lee Pryor.

"He will be missed, but will forever live in thousands and thousands of hearts and continue to impact and inspire people with his truth and his pain, which he turned into comedy brilliantly," she said.

While Pryor's material sounds modest when compared with some of today's raunchier comedians, it was startling material when first introduced. He never apologized for it.

Pryor was fired by one Las Vegas hotel for "obscenities" directed at the audience. In 1970, tired of compromising his act, he quit in the middle of another Vegas stage show with the words, "What the (blank) am I doing here?" The audience was left staring at an empty stage.

He didn't tone things down after he became famous. In his 1977 NBC television series "The Richard Pryor Show," he threatened to cancel his contract with the network. NBC's censors objected to a skit in which Pryor appeared naked save for a flesh-colored loincloth to suggest he was emasculated.

"I wish that every new and young comedian would understand what Richard was about and not confuse his genius with his language usage," comedian Bill Cosby said through a spokesman Saturday.

In his later years, Pryor mellowed considerably, and his film roles looked more like easy paychecks than artistic endeavors. His robust work gave way to torpid efforts like "Harlem Nights," "Brewster's Millions" and "Hear No Evil, See No Evil."

"I didn't think 'Brewster's Millions' was good to begin with," Pryor once said. "I'm sorry, but they offered us the money. I was a pig, I got greedy."

"I had some great things and I had some bad things. The best and the worst," he said in 1995. "In other words, I had a life."

Recognition came in 1998 from an unlikely source: The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington gave Pryor the first Mark Twain Prize for humor. He said in a statement that he was proud that, "like Mark Twain, I have been able to use humor to lessen people's hatred."

Born in 1940 in Peoria, Ill., Pryor grew up in his grandmother's brothel. His first professional performance came at age 7, when he played drums at a night club.

Following high school and two years of Army service, he launched his performing career, honing his comedy in bars throughout the United States. By the mid-'60s, he was appearing in Las Vegas clubs and on the television shows of Ed Sullivan, Merv Griffin and Johnny Carson.

His first film role came with a small part in 1967's "The Busy Body." He made his starring debut as Diana Ross' piano man in 1972's "Lady Sings the Blues."

Pryor also wrote scripts for the television series "Sanford and Son," "The Flip Wilson Show" and two specials for Lily Tomlin. He collaborated with Mel Brooks on the script for the movie "Blazing Saddles."

Later in his career, Pryor used his films as therapy. "Jo Jo Dancer, Your Life is Calling," was an autobiographical account of a popular comedian re-examining his life while lying delirious in a hospital burn ward. Pryor directed, co-wrote, co-produced and starred in the film.

"I'm glad I did 'Jo Jo,"' Pryor once said. "It helped me get rid of a lot of stuff."

Pryor also had legal problems over the years. In 1974, he was sentenced to three years' probation for failing to file federal income tax returns. In 1978, he allegedly fired shots and rammed his car into a vehicle occupied by two of his wife's friends.

Even in poor health, his comedy was vital. At a 1992 performance, he asked the room, "Is there a doctor in the audience?" All he got was nervous laughter. "No, I'm serious. I want to know if there's a doctor here."

A hand finally went up.

"Doctor," Pryor said, "I need to know one thing. What the (blank) is MS?"

Pryor was married six times. His children include sons Richard and Steven, and daughters Elizabeth, Rain and Renee.

Daughter Rain became an actress. In an interview in 2005, she told the Philadelphia Inquirer that her father always "put his life right out there for you to look at. I took that approach because I saw how well audiences respond to it. I try to make you laugh at life."

 

[sweet soft kiss]

Did you get "Clean with Gene"?

Eugene J. McCarthy, Senate Dove Who Jolted '68 Race, Dies at 89
By FRANCIS X. CLINES

Eugene J. McCarthy, the sardonic Senate dove who stunned the nation by upending President Lyndon B. Johnson's re-election drive amid the Vietnam War turmoil of 1968, died early yesterday. He was 89.

A courtly, sharp-witted presence in capital politics for half a century, Mr. McCarthy, a Minnesota Democrat, died in his sleep at an assisted-living home in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, where he had lived for the last several years.

His son, Michael B. McCarthy, said the cause was complications of Parkinson's disease.

Eugene McCarthy left his mark in a generation's skepticism toward war and the willfulness of political leaders.

"There is only one thing to do - take it to the country!" an angry Senator McCarthy declared in a Capitol corridor 15 months before the 1968 election, after hearing the Johnson administration make its case for the legality of the war.

Mr. McCarthy, a man of needling wit, triggered one of the most tumultuous years in American political history. With the war taking scores of thousands of American and Vietnamese lives, he rallied throngs against this "costly exercise in futility" and stoked a fiery national debate over the World War II model of an all-powerful presidency. He challenged Johnson in a primary, and the president, facing almost certain defeat, ended up withdrawing from the race.

Mr. McCarthy was a disarming presence on the stump as he mixed a wry tone and a hard, existential edge in challenging the White House, the Pentagon and the superpower swagger of modern politicians.

An acid-tongued campaigner, Mr. McCarthy was sometimes a puzzlement, veering from inspired speechifying to moody languishing. But he was the singular candidate of the Vietnam War protest, serving up politics and poetry, theology and baseball in a blend that entranced the "Clean for Gene" legions who flocked to his insurgent's call.

"We do not need presidents who are bigger than the country, but rather ones who speak for it and support it," he told them. His supporters were delighted by what they saw as his candor, yet some were troubled by the diffidence that marked his public persona.

"I'm kind of an accidental instrument, really," he said, "through which I hope that the judgment and the will of this nation can be expressed."

A Self-Styled Outcast

Typically, he only frustrated his followers when he allowed that he was at least "willing" to be president and, yes, might even be an "adequate" one. Questions arose about his passion on the campaign as he built a reputation as an unapologetic contrarian.

In his 1968 challenge and for decades thereafter, Mr. McCarthy played the self-outcast of the Democratic Party, even shunning Jimmy Carter to endorse Ronald Reagan, the Republican candidate for president in 1980. He was a chronic presidential campaigner, running in 1972, 1976 and 1988, 18 years gone from the Senate. He endorsed trade protectionism, the strategic defense initiative advocated by Reagan that was often referred to as Star Wars and, most passionately, the junking of the two-party Establishment whose rules he came to despise.

"It's much easier for me to understand politicians who don't walk away from it," he explained when, at age 71, he once more knew he could not win but ran anyway, hectoring the latest Beltway incumbents.

Mr. McCarthy stayed busy writing poetry and books about the decline of American politics, and kept his eye on Washington from his farmhouse in bucolic Rappahannock County, Va., 70 miles to the west, on 14 acres set amid the Blue Ridge Mountains.

"I think he has a rejection wish," Maurice Rosenblatt, a Washington lobbyist who was a longtime friend, once said of the senator's perplexing mix of quixotic impulse and lethal hesitancy. "He wants to reject others and be rejected by them."

But others, conceding his quirks, rated Mr. McCarthy the one stand-up, cant-free politician of their generation. "Besides his conscience, there is his civility," Joe Flaherty wrote in the antiwar heyday of The Village Voice.

Mr. McCarthy delighted in commenting obliquely on politics and himself by reciting poetry on the hustings. His more zealous volunteers yearned for clarion calls, not pentameter. But this was not the style of a man steeped in the Thomistic tangents of his training as a Roman Catholic college professor.

Standing a lean 6-foot-4, gray-haired and dryly smiling, candidate McCarthy gave a memorable rendering of Yeats ("An Irish Airman Foresees His Death") in suggesting why he ran:

Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,

Nor public men, nor cheering crowds,

A lonely impulse of delight

Drove to this tumult in the clouds.

As a speaker, Mr. McCarthy was an original but hardly stem-winding presence. "Usually the cheers were greater when he came in than when he finished speaking," noted the poet Robert Lowell, who frequently traveled with the candidate.

Mr. McCarthy, an old semipro baseball player, liked to burnish a kind of knuckleball oddness. In one of his own later poems, "Lament for an Aging Politician," he wrote:

I have left Act I, for involution

And Act II. There, mired in complexity

I cannot write Act III.

He identified simplistic partisanship as the ultimate enemy in the domestic strife over the Vietnam War. Invoking Whitman's call to human goodness - "Arouse! for you must justify me" - candidate McCarthy's basic message to Americans was Daniel Webster's dictum to never "give up to party what was meant for mankind."

A Soft-Spoken Campaigner

As crowds rallied to him, he promised no new deals or frontiers. Rather, he slowed his baritone for a plain definition of patriotism: "To serve one's country not in submission but to serve it in truth."

He showed more passion as contrarian than as dogged campaigner. At the 1960 Democratic National Convention, Senator McCarthy showed that speaker's fire so longed for by his later followers when he boldly nominated Adlai E. Stevenson, a twice-defeated presidential candidate, one more time despite - or because of - John F. Kennedy's lock on the nomination.

"Do not reject this man who made us all proud to be Democrats," rang Mr. McCarthy's electrifying loser's plea.

As a senator, Mr. McCarthy was an unabashed liberal unafraid to take on Senator Joseph R. McCarthy of Wisconsin and his alarmist warnings about the Communist menace. More often, as he restlessly paced the backs of committee rooms or brought a tome to read during hearings, Eugene McCarthy was viewed by peers as something of a ruminator and a curmudgeon.

Yet he was the one who dared to step forward and bell the White House cat when other Democrats would only complain. Grasping the unpopularity of the deepening war, he sought to make a party issue of it, announcing his primary candidacy against President Johnson, a fellow Democrat, in the hope of building pressure for a policy change.

"There comes a time when an honorable man simply has to raise the flag," declared the senator, a onetime novice monk whose political role model was Sir Thomas More, the English statesman martyred in resisting Henry VIII's seizure of church power.

Mocked by Johnson loyalists as a mere "footnote in history," Mr. McCarthy prevailed well enough in his time to observe, after driving Johnson into retreat, "I think we can say with Churchill, 'But what a footnote!' "

Senator McCarthy's challenge was intended to prod, more than destroy, the president. But in unnerving Mr. Johnson in office, he shook Senator Robert F. Kennedy of New York from his irresolution about challenging the president. The critical moment came in the New Hampshire primary of March 1968, when Mr. McCarthy beat the pundits' predictions and won 42 percent of the vote. Johnson, despite his incumbent's grip, could score only 49 percent.

Within days, Senator Kennedy entered the race, embittering McCarthy supporters, not to mention their champion. Two weeks later, Johnson pre-empted greater popular rejection and astonished the nation by suddenly announcing in a postscript to a televised speech that he would not seek re-election and would devote his energies to ending the war.

The Chicago Convention

The year's tumult continued. Kennedy was assassinated in June in California as he edged out the McCarthy forces in a key round of the antiwar competition. The Democrats staggered to their convention in Chicago, where civic mayhem erupted.

The party machine forced the nomination of Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey to face Richard M. Nixon, over the objections of war protesters, including draft-ripe college students. Many demonstrators were beaten in the streets by the Chicago police of Mayor Richard J. Daley, a party stalwart.

"I can still smell the tear gas in the Hilton Hotel," Mr. McCarthy said in an interview nearly 30 years later. "I said before the vote we were not going to win, and there was no point in having the student delegations in the streets thinking we could."

"The party hasn't recovered from Chicago; sort of its integrity was lost," he contended in his ninth decade, saying that modern issues of importance were being sidestepped as candidates ran to the drumbeat of the focus group for the office of "Governor of the United States."

Robert Kennedy's brother, Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, said in statement yesterday: "Gene's name will forever be linked with our family. In spite of the rivalry with Bobby in the 1968 campaign, I admired Gene enormously for his courage in challenging a war America never should have fought. His life speaks volumes to us today, as we face a similar critical time for our country."

Mr. McCarthy viewed himself as the classic "messenger who brought the bad news" to the party, never to be forgiven. He withheld his endorsement of Humphrey until a week before the 1968 election, using the intervening time to demand antiwar concessions, but also, in a characteristic display of aloofness, to cover the World Series for Life magazine.

Baseball was his metaphor for politics and life. "We know Nixon's stuff," he said well before Nixon resigned in disgrace from the presidency. "He's got a slider. And he's thrown a spitter so many years he's got seniority rights on it."

Eugene Joseph McCarthy, of Irish-German descent, was born March 29, 1916, in Watkins, Minn., the son of Michael J. and Anna Baden McCarthy. He graduated from St. John's University in Collegeville, Minn., in 1935 and then took a master's degree in economics and sociology at the University of Minnesota. He taught social science in Minnesota high schools for several years, then economics and education at St. John's and sociology at the College of St. Thomas in St. Paul.

The young McCarthy thought he might want to be a Benedictine monk, but he left the monastery after a nine-month novitiate trial. He later married a fellow teacher, Abigail Quigley. They had four children. Soon after the 1968 campaign, the McCarthys separated after 24 years of marriage. They never divorced. In addition to Michael McCarthy, of Seattle, Mr. McCarthy is survived by two daughters, Ellen A. McCarthy of Bethesda, Md., and Margaret A. McCarthy of Takoma Park, Md.; and six grandchildren. He is also survived by a brother and a sister, Austin McCarthy of Wilmer, Minn., and Marian Enright of Walnut Creek, Calif. A daughter, Mary A. McCarthy, died in 1990, Michael McCarthy said.

Public Figure, Private Man

Mr. McCarthy remained active until the last few months. In January, he published a 173-page paperback collection of essays and poems, "Parting Shots From My Brittle Bow: Reflections on American Politics and Life."

"He was actually planning to do a book tour - amazing at his age," Michael McCarthy said. But his health deteriorated early this year and kept him from traveling.

Stirred to politics by the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, Mr. McCarthy was elected to the House of Representatives in 1948 and served five terms before moving to the Senate in 1958, where he served 12 years.

In the 1968 campaign, Mr. McCarthy was the sort of candidate who could accept with equanimity a critic's charge that he ran "against the powers of the presidency."

In manner, he was faulted for arrogance; in strategy, for not broadening his antiwar constituency with stronger ties to blacks and the working poor, as Robert Kennedy did. The McCarthy civil rights record was considered exemplary, yet when asked about the issue at a rally, he dismissively advised his questioner to look up his record.

"Record, hell! Tell us what you feel!" the citizen shot back at candidate.

Although his image was warm and witty on television, Mr. McCarthy stepped back from playing the candidate who engaged by self-revelation. Abigail McCarthy, respected in her own career as a writer, once said: "The essential thing about Gene is that he's a private person, and in an all-confessional age, that's considered almost treachery."

The senator who defied his president and party was confessional in his reliance on Thomas More as "the first modern man, the first political man."

"He was forced to make a kind of individual and personal choice at a time when there was great upheaval," Mr. McCarthy noted with satisfaction as he tried to explain himself to a nation also in upheaval.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Weaponeer on Nagasaki A-bomb dies at age 94

SANTA FE, N.M. He was a member of the crew that dropped the second atomic bomb on Japan.

Beverly native Frederick Ashworth died in Arizona this past weekend. He was 94.

Ashworth was assigned to the Manhattan Project that developed the world's first atomic bomb.

He was the weaponeer on the B-29 that dropped the bomb on Nagasaki on August ninth, 1945, three days after the first bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.

Ashworth retired in 1968 as a Navy vice admiral.

 

[phrodeau]

from Wikipedia:

Stanley Tookie Williams III (December 29, 1953 – December 13, 2005) was the co-founder, with Raymond Washington, of the widely known and notorious Crips street gangs. In 1981, he was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1979 murders of four people in two separate incidents. In 1993, Williams became an anti-gang activist while on Death Row in California, renouncing his gang affiliation and apologizing for the Crips' founding. He co-authored children's books and began programs to prevent youth from joining gangs.

He did not apologize for the crimes for which he was convicted, but continued to proclaim his innocence. Throughout his time in prison, Williams refused to aid police investigations with any information against his gang. He was also involved in attacks on guards and other inmates as well as multiple escape plots until 1993, when he began making drastic changes in his behavior and renounced his gang affiliation. A 2004 biographical feature film entitled Redemption: The Stan Tookie Williams Story featured Jamie Foxx as Williams.

Williams was executed by lethal injection at San Quentin State Prison, California, on December 13, 2005 despite protests demanding clemency; he was declared dead at 12:35 a.m. PST (08:35 UTC). Williams was the 12th person executed by the state since California reinstated the death penalty in 1977.

 

[Avery_Chisholm]

from Wikipedia:

Stanley Tookie Williams III (December 29, 1953 – December 13, 2005) was the co-founder, with Raymond Washington, of the widely known and notorious Crips street gangs. In 1981, he was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1979 murders of four people in two separate incidents. In 1993, Williams became an anti-gang activist while on Death Row in California, renouncing his gang affiliation and apologizing for the Crips' founding. He co-authored children's books and began programs to prevent youth from joining gangs.

He did not apologize for the crimes for which he was convicted, but continued to proclaim his innocence. Throughout his time in prison, Williams refused to aid police investigations with any information against his gang. He was also involved in attacks on guards and other inmates as well as multiple escape plots until 1993, when he began making drastic changes in his behavior and renounced his gang affiliation. A 2004 biographical feature film entitled Redemption: The Stan Tookie Williams Story featured Jamie Foxx as Williams.

Williams was executed by lethal injection at San Quentin State Prison, California, on December 13, 2005 despite protests demanding clemency; he was declared dead at 12:35 a.m. PST (08:35 UTC). Williams was the 12th person executed by the state since California reinstated the death penalty in 1977.

Can you please tell me why its relavent about a gang banger being put down????

 

[pipercatt]

Can you please tell me why its relavent about a gang banger being put down????

Avery, hon. I realize there's a lot of feelings for this particular execution, but you will see that if you read through - every newsworthy death has pretty much been listed here - good, bad, and ugly.

I doubt the poster was making a statement of his feelings, just adding to the thread, whose topic is "Death."

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Film actress Jean Parker

Posted on Mon, Dec. 12, 2005

LOS ANGELES — Jean Parker, the lovely brunette star of "Sequoia," "Little Women," "The Ghost Goes West" and other hit films of the 1930s and '40s, has died. She was 90.
Parker died Nov. 30 of complications from a stroke at the Motion Picture and Television Country House and Hospital, her son, Robert Hanks, told the Los Angeles Times on Friday. He said she had lived at the retirement home since 1998.

A petite beauty from Butte, Mont., the 5-foot-3-inch Parker had her acting career launched by a lucky chain of circumstances, at least according to Hollywood legend.

The actress, whose given name was Louise Stephanie Zelinska, made her debut in 1932 as Duchess Maria in "Rasputin and the Empress," a film that starred three members of acting's Barrymore family, Ethel, Lionel and John.

Her most prestigious films were made by other studios: Frank Capra's "Lady for a Day" in 1933, Rene Clair's "The Ghost Goes West" with Robert Donat in 1935, and notably "Little Women" as Beth in 1933, opposite Katharine Hepburn, Joan Bennett and Francis Dee as the other sisters in the heralded film adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's literary classic.

Some critics considered "Sequoia" in 1934 Parker's finest accomplishment. As the solo star of that film, she played a girl living near a national park who raises an unlikely pair: an orphaned fawn and mountain lion who grow up as friends.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Stan Berenstain co-wrote classics

http://www.pbs.org/parents/images/tvprograms/program-art-berenstainbears.gif

Stan Berenstain, who with his wife, Jan, wrote and illustrated the best-selling Berenstain Bears children's books — soft-sell morality plays that revel in poking fun at and safely solving the everyday travails of family life — has died. He was 82.

Mr. Berenstain died of complications from cancer Saturday in Bucks County, Pa., said his publisher, HarperCollins Children's Books.

The more than 200 books published since 1962 have a Seinfeldian quality, because entire volumes are built around ordinary matters — messy rooms, a visit to the dentist, fear of the dark — that constitute high drama for the younger-than-7 set.

"They were able to take the real issues of children's lives and make them entertaining and not preachy," said Ilene Abramson, director of children's services at the Los Angeles Public Library. "The books had messages of basic character-building, but they were always done with humor and with that strong sense of family."

The bears — who wear clothes — were simply named Mama, Papa, Brother, Sister and, much later, Baby, to capitalize on the "Everybear" concept of the stories, Mr. Berenstain once said.

Stanley Berenstain was born Sept. 29, 1923, into what he described as a gritty, lower-class Philadelphia family.

In 1941, on his first day at what is now the Philadelphia Museum School of Industrial Art, Mr. Berenstain met his future wife when they admired each other's drawings of classical plaster casts.

The couple married in 1946 and embarked on a joint cartooning career.

In recent years, their sons, Leo and Michael, have helped write and illustrate the Berenstain Bears books and will continue the series with their mother.

The couple often admitted that the parent bears reflected their own personalities.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Marc Lawrence, bad guy in dozens of movies, dies at 95

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/2b/Marclaurence.JPG/180px-Marclaurence.JPG

LOS ANGELES - Marc Lawrence, whose pockmarked face and brooding mannerisms made him a natural for roles as the tough guy, gangster and undertaker in dozens of movies beginning in the 1930s, has died. He was 95.

Lawrence died early Monday at his Palm Springs home from heart failure, said Alicia Lawrence, the actor's second wife.

"He was the gangster in his movies, that was definitely his style," said Alicia, a Mexico native who married Lawrence two years ago. "But in real life he was a really good person."
After spending eight days in the hospital a few weeks ago, doctors told the family Lawrence was very sick and likely wouldn't live much longer, Alicia said.

At that point, Lawrence decided he wanted to come home, she said.

Born in New York City in 1910, Lawrence acted in plays through high school before attending City College of New York.

After years of stage performances in Eva Le Gallienne's company, Lawrence signed a contract with Columbia Pictures in 1932.

Over the next 60 years, Lawrence would play the mob boss, thug and general bad guy in dozens of films.

"Lawrence was perhaps the only character actor of the 1930s and 1940s still being cast in similar gangsterish roles in the 1980s and 1990s, in such films as The Big Easy (1987) and Ruby (1992)," wrote Leonard Maltin in "Leonard Maltin's Movie Encyclopedia."
Lawrence, however, also stepped outside the rogue genre, taking on roles like a mountaineer in "Shepherd of the Hills" in 1941 and an old hotel owner in "From Dusk Till Dawn" in 1996.

During the communist scare in the United States in the 1950s, Lawrence was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee, where he admitted he had once been a Communist Party member.

He also reluctantly implicated several co-workers as alleged communist sympathizers, testimony that blacklisted him and brought his U.S. movie career to a halt.

Lawrence then departed for Europe, where he took on diverse roles in dozens of Italian movies in the 1960s, also directing crime films and spaghetti westerns.
Lawrence returned to the United States in the 1980s, resuming his vetted role as underworld thug. He also wrote and directed low-budget movies, keeping busy into his 90s.
His last movie appearance was "Looney Tunes: Back in America" in 2003, a minor role as one of many Acme vice presidents.

Lawrence is survived by a daughter, Toni Lawrence, and son, Michael Lawrence, his wife said.

 

[linuxgeek]

Actor John Spencer

src

Actor John Spencer has died

Publicist says heart attack took ‘West Wing’ star’s life

Updated: 9:41 p.m. ET Dec. 16, 2005

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/msnbc/Components/Photos/051216/051216_johnspencer_vmed_6p.widec.jpg

LOS ANGELES - John Spencer, who played a tough and dedicated politico on “The West Wing” who survived a serious illness to run for vice president, died of a heart attack Friday. He was 58.

Spencer died after being admitted to a Los Angeles hospital during the night, said his publicist, Ron Hofmann. He would have been 59 on Tuesday.

He was “one of those rare combinations of divinely gifted and incredibly generous,” said actor Richard Schiff, who played Toby Ziegler on the NBC series.

“There are very few personal treasures that you put in your knapsack to carry with you for the rest of your life, and he’s one of those,” Schiff said. He said Spencer had been struggling with health issues but seemed to have rebounded.

Spencer played Leo McGarry, the savvy and powerful chief of staff to President Josiah “Jed” Bartlet (Martin Sheen). In a sad parallel to life, Spencer’s character suffered a heart attack that forced him to give up his White House job.

McGarry recovered and was picked as a running mate for Democratic presidential contender Matt Santos, played by Jimmy Smits; the campaign against Republican Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda) has been a central theme for the drama this season.

“John was an uncommonly good man, an exceptional role model and a brilliant actor,” said Aaron Sorkin, who created the series, and Tommy Schlamme, one of the original executive producers, in a joint statement.

“We feel privileged to have known him and worked with him. He’ll be missed and remembered every day by his many, many friends,” they said.

Actress Allison Janney, C.J. Cregg on the series, described Spencer as a consummate professional actor. “Everyone adored him,” she said.

“We have all lost a dear, dear brother,” said Bradley Whitford, who plays Josh *****.

NBC and producer Warner Bros. Television praised Spencer’s talent but did not address how his death would affect the Emmy Award-winning series, in production on its seventh season.

Spencer, who also starred on “L.A. Law” as attorney Tommy Mullaney, received an Emmy Award for his performance on “The West Wing” in 2002 and was nominated four other times for the series.

Actor, character shared similarities

The actor, whose world-weary countenance was perfect for the role of McGarry, mirrored his character in several ways: Both were recovering alcoholics and both, Spencer once said, were driven.

“Like Leo, I’ve always been a workaholic, too,” he told The Associated Press in a 2000 interview. “Through good times and bad, acting has been my escape, my joy, my nourishment. The drug for me, even better than alcohol, was acting.”

Spencer grew up in Paterson, N.J., the son of blue-collar parents. With his enrollment at the Professional Children’s School in Manhattan at age 16, he was sharing classes with the likes of Liza Minnelli and budding violinist Pinchas Zukerman.

As a teenager, he landed a recurring role on “The Patty Duke Show” as the boyfriend of English twin Cathy. Stage and film work followed. Then his big break: playing Harrison Ford’s detective sidekick in the 1990 courtroom thriller “Presumed Innocent.” That role led to his hiring for the final four years of “L.A. Law.”

Spencer played a streetwise lawyer on the David E. Kelley drama that was in sharp contrast to the show’s otherwise glamorous cast and setting.

After attending the Manhattan performing arts school, Spencer studied at Fairleigh Dickenson University. He then began working on stage in New York and in regional theaters, in plays including David Mamet’s “Lakeboat” and Tennessee Williams’ “The Glass Menagerie.”

Spencer won an Obie Award for the 1981 off-Broadway production of “Still Life,” about a Vietnam veteran, and received a Drama Desk nomination for “The Day Room.”

His made his feature film debut with a small role in “War Games,” which was followed by roles in “Sea of Love” and “Black Rain.” Spencer said his work in “Presumed Innocent” represented a “watershed role.”

In recent years, he worked both in studio and independent films, including “The Rock,” “The Negotiator,” “Albino Alligator,” “Lesser Prophets” and “Cold Heart.”

Spencer, an only child, is survived by “cousins, aunts, uncles, and wonderful friends,” Hofmann said.

 

[JennyOmanHill]

Mary Jackson: 'Waltons' actress

http://www.the-waltons.com/graphics/baldwin1.jpg
Miss Emily Baldwin (Mary Jackson, on right)
Miss Mamie Baldwin (Helen Kleeb, on left)
Please Note: Helen Kleeb passed away on 12/28/03 at the age of 96


December 14, 2005
Mary Jackson, an actress best known for playing whiskey-making Miss Emily Baldwin on TV's "The Waltons," died Saturday at her home in Hollywood. She was 95 years old.

Ms. Jackson worked in summer stock and on Broadway as well as in stage productions in Chicago and Los Angeles before her TV and movie career began in the early 1950s.

She appeared in stage productions of "Kiss and Tell" from 1943 to 1945, "Eastward in Eden" in 1947 and "The Trial of the Catonsville Nine" in 1970. She also worked on the West Coast with such notable actors as Shirley Booth in "Desk Set" in 1956 and Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau in "Juno and the Peacock" in 1973.

"The Waltons" had a successful run from 1972 to 1981 on CBS. The show dealt with the life and times of a family living in Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains during the Great Depression.

Ms. Jackson's character, Emily Baldwin, was one of two sisters who lived together and made bootleg whiskey they referred to as, "the recipe." Whenever visitors stopped by, the sisters would invite them to sample the latest batch while they anxiously awaited their reaction.

Ms. Jackson's career spanned several decades. She made many guest appearances in TV shows from "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" in the early 1950s to "Hill Street Blues" and "L.A. Law" in the late '80s. She played Jane Fonda's mother in 1977's "Fun with Dick and Jane," a nun in the first "Airport" movie and dozens of other character roles. She lived in Hollywood for more than 40 years and was a member of the Screen Actors Guild and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Throughout her career, however, she never lost touch with her birthplace in Milford, Michigan, where she regularly returned to visit. A charter member of the Milford Historical Society, Ms. Jackson was instrumental in 1988 in raising money to rebuild the Oak Grove Cemetery Bridge over the Huron River -- a bridge that connected the Village of Milford to its oldest burial grounds.

Though she suffered from Parkinson's disease in her later years, Ms. Jackson continued to work regularly on film projects until a stroke in 1997 made speech more difficult.

She is not survived by any immediate family.