• Signing Off: Media Personalities Remembered June 29 - 3:16 pm

Pioneering heart surgeon Dr. Michael DeBakey died on July 11, 2008. He was 99 years old, two months shy of his 100th birthday. He outlived a wife, a brother and two sons.
If it wasn't for the cardiac bypass techniques pioneered by Dr. DeBakey, a lot of people (including my dad) would not be with us today.
I feel like ripping the media a new one over this. Dr. DeBakey's death was barely reported on by the media. Yet, the deaths of actor Heath Ledger and media whore Anna Nicole Smith were reported on endlessly. Dr. DeBakey did more for the greater good than those two ever did, and deserved better than for this death to be just a footnote.

Estelle Getty of The Golden Girls has passed away at the age of 84. More here.
IIRC, she was actually the youngest of the four Girls, and played the oldest.

As a follow-up to the death of Estelle Getty, one of the dumbest things I ever did (among many, believe me) was blow off a taping of The Golden Girls. I was in L.A. in November 1985. I called up (IIRC) Ren-Mar studios, hoping to attend a taping of It's A Living, as I had a crush on Ann Jillian at the time. The lady on the other end of the phone was pratically begging me to see a taping of Golden Girls. (Girls was taped in front of an audience; Living wasn't.) Unfortunately, I didn't listen to the wise lady on the phone, and blew off what in retrospect would have been a great experience. Girls, which was in its first season in 1985, became a seven year hit, while the days were numbered for It's A Living.

Announcer Don LaFontaine has passed away at the age of 68.

IN A WORLD without Don LaFontaine.....who will narrate our movie trailers?

Will it be....Ashton Smith?

Will it be....Hal Douglas?

Or will it be.....Peter Cullen?

Find out......at a theater near you!

Great video about LaFontaine. Fascinating, and the opening moments of the interview portion, with the LOTR music, the log cabin bit, and the "middle of a sentence" anecdote, were funny.

I saw this guy do this bit years ago, and it's funny. It's on Google Video's main page right now, no doubt because of LaFontaine's passing.

Animator Bob Melendez, best known for bringing the Peanuts characters to life with such classics as A Charlie Brown Christmas and It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown. died Tuesday at the age of 91. According to THR.com:

Melendez, the only animator permitted by Charles M. Schulz to work with the Peanuts characters, earned eight Emmy Awards, 17 Emmy nominations, one Oscar nomination and two Peabody Awards. He began his career at Disney and Warner Bros., working on classic characters at those studios, and spent more than 70 years in the entertainment industry.

Rats. Good Grief.

Sounds like you need some therpy ScottN... I'll go find Lucy.

therpy?

that's five cents!

Forrest J. Ackerman, a name every science fiction fan on this site should know (and if you don't, where have you been?), has died of heart failure on December 4, 2008 at the age of 92.

Along with helping the formation of organized science fiction fandom, Forry Ackerman was the writer/editor of Famous Monsters of Filmdom*, as well as an author, actor, producer and a literary agent. Forry was also credited with "discovering" Ray Bradbury and coining the phrase "sci-fi".

*I remember when I was a little rugrat, the son of a friend of the family had a stack of FMoF. I was often frightened and horrified by some of the images (even if they were in black and white) in those mags. Those pics would be considered tame by today's standards, but back in the late '60s, hoo-boy!

Ackerman had one of the biggest collections of SF memorabilia in existence. I wonder what's gonna become of that.

I've thought of that, Todd. I'd love to be able to dig through and get one or two choice items. Won't happen. My best guess is that it'll all be put up on eBay and sold for some fairly outrageous sums.

I've still got a couple of issues of Famous Monsters stuck away somewhere. I remember seeing him on a segment of "Sci-Fi Buzz" several years ago.

My best guess is that it'll all be put up on eBay and sold for some fairly outrageous sums.

If it's that extensive, it won't go on eBay. It'll go to some auction house, such as Sotheby's or Christie's.

Beverly Garland, who was Fred MacMurray's wife on My Three Sons died on Friday, December 5, 2008 after a "lengthy illness." She was 82.

Garland also appeared in such TV series as Remington Steele, 7th Heaven, Mary Harman, Mary Hartman, Scarecrow and Mrs. King and Lois & Clark. She was also in such movies as D.O.A. (the 1950 version, a personal favorite of mine), Not of This Earth, Gunslinger, It Conquered the World and The Alligator People.

A bit ironically, but Eartha Kitt, most famous for her Yuletide hit, "Santa Baby", has died at the age of 81 on Christmas Day, 2008. Kitt was also one of the three actresses to play Catwoman on the old 1960s Batman series.

With the way she looked, I never thought she was that old.

She definately was the "Cat's Meow"

Nichelle Nichols can do a very good impersonation of her.

Eartha Kitt: Santa Baby

Eartha Kitt at her best

Sorry. For some reason that last link keeps going to "Play all", you'll have to switch that function off to watch it

Bob May, the man inside the Robot B9 suit, has passed away today at the age of 69 due to congestive heart failure.

Legendary Radio Announcer Paul Harvey died at age 90

LINK

David Carradine, star of the TV series "Kung Fu" was found dead in Bangkok this morning. He was 62.

I can't add. 72. (Born December 1936)

Tragically, he hung himself.

Singer/actor Al Martino has passed away at the age of 82. He's best known for the song "Spanish Eyes", and for playing the Frank-Sinatra-type singer/actor Johnny Fontane in The Godfather and The Godfather Part III.

WWF (before it became the WWE) manager Capt. Lou Albano has died at tha age of 76. He's also known for playing Cyndi Lauper's "father" in her "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" video. More here.

Captain Lou Albano has died at the age of 76.

I met Mr. Albano on 6.8.08, when I was covering the Big Apple Con for Wikipedia, photographing the celebrities there whose articles did not have a good photographs. I always walk up to each celebrity, tell them that I'm covering the convention for Wikipedia, and ask if I can take a pic for their article. Albano said I could take a picture of him, but then a woman standing near me stopped me, then spoke with a man seated next to Albano, and that man said that all such pictures were ten bucks. I politely declined.

The creator of Gumby, Art Clokey, has died at the age of 88.

RIP Lena Horne, at age 92.

(also on Misc. Celebrities).

Legendary Lena, RIP

The clock has stopped ticking for Andy Rooney.

RIP Mike Wallace of 60 Minutes, aged 93.

America's Oldest Teenager is no more. Dick Clark has died of a heart attack, at age 82.

For lack of a better place...

Carroll Shelby, automotive legend, dead at 89.

Rev your car up today.

RIP Sheriff John. He hosted a kids show in LA for years in the '60s.

http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-sheriff-john-rovick-20121007,0,2622691.story

RIP Larry Hagman, at 81, from cancer.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/larry-hagman-legendary-actor-ewing-dallas-dies-81-article-1.1207285

Hagman was most famous for his role as J.R. Ewing on "Dallas". Before that, he played Major Tony Nelson on "I Dream of Jeannie".

He died in his home of Texas, appropriately, enough.

Huell Howser, best known for his "California's Gold" magaine, dead at 67.

Conraid Bain, aka "Mr. Drummond", died at age 89.

Whad'jou talkin' bout, Scott?

Someone once said (and I believe it may have been Dana Plato herself) that "Todd Bridges is in jail and Gary Coleman's suing his parents. That Drummond, he sure was a real good father, huh?"

Obviously, this was meant sarcastically. As for Plato, she attempted a robbery and was arrested (Wayne Newton posted her bail), did a lesbian porn film that parodied Different Strokes, and tried to raise her son after having been fired from the show in the 80s, but could not stay off the drugs. And then she did Howard Stern's show where he was cruel and mean-spirited to her, and she was found dead of an overdose the next day. And sadly, her son killed himself a few years ago. Also, Gary passed away after a bad head injury. But at least Bridges is alive, I dont know how he is doing, however.

Coleman's parents, they stole practically his entire fortune, and he was the first celebrity to appear on Divorce Court. And I still dont know why he punched that woman who asked for his autograph!

Bridges is one of the commentators on those "World's Worst" shows, so at least he's working.

Sorry to hear about Mr. Bain.

Pauline Phillips, aka Dear Abby, died today.

Film critic Roger Ebert lost his long running battle with cancer. He joins Gene Siskel in that great balcony in the sky.

Annette Funicello, the mousketeer who fueled many a teenage boy's fantasy in the early 60s, and hung out with Frankie Avalon in the beach movies died today from complications of MS.

Anybody here ever see 1987's "Back To The Beach"? It was an attempted parody of those films Funicello and Avalon did in the 60's. And Pee Wee Herman appears briefly to totally butcher "Surfin' Bird". How unintentionally hilarious was that? Am I right?

I saw Back to the Beach way back when during its theatrical release. It was kind of goofy. I barely remember Pee Wee Herman in it. I do remember Don Adams was in it. Also, the song "I Hate You" from Star Trek IV was used in it. It was during the filming of that movie that Annette Funicello was diagnosed with the MS that would take her life. (The movie was released on DVD in 2004; it's now OOP and fetching outrageous prices from Amazon third party sellers).
RIP, Annette Funicello.

John Galardi, founder of the "Der Weinerschnitzel" hot dog chain, has died of Pancreatic Cancer.

Frank Bank, who played Lumpy on "Leave it to Beaver" has died at age 71.

RIP Alan Arbus at age 95, from heart failure. You probably know him as Dr. Sidney Freedman, from M*A*S*H

Nelson Mandela. (Not sure if this is the proper place for this.)

I posted the same thing in PM.

That's probably the most appropriate place to put it, Scott.

RIP Russell Johnson, best known as The Professor on Gilligan's Island. Dead at 89.

His coffin will be made out of bamboo and coconuts.

R.I.P. Dave Madden, who played band manager Reuben Kincaid on The Partridge Family, dead at 82 congestive heart and kidney failure.

This is the Partridge Family bus and I'm Ruben Kincaid!

RIP, sir.

Don Pardo....age 96

RIP Gary Owens. He is no longer broadcasting from Beautiful Downtown Burbank.

RIP Patrick Macnee, star of The Avengers. Aged 93.

He also appeared in the original "Battlestar Galatica"

RIP to Andy Griffith, Sheriff of Mayberry.

http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/life/people/obit/story/2012-07-03/andy-griffith-appreciation/56000442/1

Oops. Saw the article on FB. That's from 2012, so it's only 3 years late.

RIP George Barris, designer of the TV Batmobile.

RIP Joe Garagiola, who passed away 3/23/2016 at the age of 90. He had a relatively unremarkable career as a catcher for several MLB teams (among them the New York Giants) and an amazing career as a broadcaster (hosting game shows, subbing for Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show and of course baseball broadcasts.) More here.

Morley Safer, best known as a correspondent for 60 Minutes for 46 years, has passed away at the age of 84. He just recently announced his retirement from the broadcast. More here.

Yvonne Craig, deat at 78 from cancer.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/20/arts/television/batgirl-dies-yvonne-craig.html

Ms. Craig also played Marta, the Orion slave girl, in the TOS episode "Whom Gods Destroy".

Oops. That's a year old. Never mind.

Robert Vaughn, perhaps best known as The Man From U.N.C.L.E has died at age 83 from Leukemia

http://abc7.com/entertainment/robert-vaughn-suave-man-from-uncle-star-dies/1602583/

My favorite role of his was as Lee in The Magnificent Seven

RIP Mary Tyler Moore, at 80.

http://www.nbcnews.com/pop-culture/celebrity/mary-tyler-moore-television-legend-dead-80-n712146

Just found this very bad news out myself, Scott. I had heard years ago that Moore wanted her Mary Richards character to be divorced. CBS suits nixed that, as they thought the American viewer would think she divorced Dick Van Dyke. I don't know if that's an urban legend or not.
RIP Mary Tyler Moore.

RIP to TV's Batman, Adam West. Dead at 88 from Leukemia.

You will be missed.

RIP June Foray, voice of Rocky the Flying Squirrel, and of Natasha Fatale.

Hokey Smokes, dahlink, you will truly be missed.

RIP Richard Anderson...

OSI has lost its director, Oscar Goldman....

shame it wasn't Richard Dean Anderson. •••• MacGyver

RIP David Cassidy.

Former teenyboppers are in mourning.

two Partridge children down, three to go...

RIP Jim Nabors

I don't know where else to put this, but - Scientist Stephen Hawking, who explored the secrets of the universe from his wheelchair while suffering from ALS, has passed away at age 76. More here.

It's in Science-Related:Vermes as well.

Former MSNBC host Ed Schultz (The Ed Show) has passed away at his Minnesota home; he was 64. More here.

Neil Simon has made his final exit stage left at age 91. More about his life and work here.

Ken Berry (1933 - 2018)

Kelly's Kids was a •••• idea for a poorly disguised pilot, but that wasn't Berry's fault.

Penny Marshall, age 75, from complications of diabetes.

Ms. Marshall is probably best known as Laverne from "Laverne and Shirley", and for directing "A League of Their Own"

Not a media personality, but definitely a celebrity in some circles.

Alexei Leonov has died at age 85 after a long illness. General Leonov was the first man to walk in space (on the Voshkod II mission) and commanded the Soyuz portion of the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project.

Fly high, Alexei.

Jerry Stiller has passed away at age 92.

Stiller was the father of Ben Stiller, and was married to Ann Meara.

Though he had an extensive career in theater, film, and television, he is probably best remembered today for playing Frank Costanza on "Seinfeld" and for playing Arthur on "The King of Queens".

News show host (The Today Show, 20/20) and game show host (Concentration) Hugh Downs passed away today at the age of 99. More here.

Downs was also a huge supporter of the space program. He was inducted into the International Air & Space Hall of Fame in 1984. He was a member of the National Academy of Science, and served as chair of the National Space Society's board of governors.

The asteroid 71000 Hughdowns is named for him.

Tom Terrific, born George Thomas Seaver, passed away on August 31, 2020. More on his career, including his turn with the Miracle Mets of 1969, here.

Don Everly, of the Everly brothers, dead at 84

Note: "The Day the Music Died" in the Music Catch Basin wasn't working for me

Look if you’re going to link to an article, can you please find one that doesn’t require me to login or sign up to read it?

Try here - https://apnews.com/article/entertainment-music-arts-and-entertainment-don-everly-592d1c75ddf87d6abd8555f04ceb1b08

RIP Ed Asner, at 91.

When she hosted SNL, some years back, Betty White joked that she uses a Ouija Board, not Facebook, to contact a lot of her friends.

Well, she has now outlived all her younger co-stars of two shows* now.


*the Mary Tyler Moore show and The Golden Girls.

RIP Willard Scott, NBC weatherman, at age 87.

Bryant Gumbel is no doubt hoping Willard is now in Rocky Valentine’s “other place”. Cowardly ••••••• •••••• for running to and whining to NBC rather than just admit to his face that he didn’t like him

Willard Scott was the first actor to play Ronald McDonald.

Now he'll never get to announce his own birthday.

Willard didn’t deserve the •••• he got from that stupid •••••• Gumbel.

Natalie if you can't stop cursing, stop posting.

You can make your feelings about Gumbel clear without the curses.

The curses are replaced with red dots, I think that's the gag she's going for.

We know her humor is diametrically perpendicular to seemingly everyone else's, but I think she was simply ranting. That or she copy-pasted someone else's sweary blog comment or tweet which is much more likely.

No, John, I was ranting. My mother died last Thursday morning and the last few days have been very difficult. I lost my temper at the I just. I did control myself a bit. I almost wrote Gumbel should be taken to a cottonwood tree on the edge of town.

I almost wrote Gumbel should be taken to a cottonwood tree on the edge of town.
And yet you just did.....

Gallows humour. No different to the members of Finland’s government who have responded to the modern day Maria Vladimirovna Romanova’s styling herself as Grand Duchess of Finland with Yekaterinburg jokes..

Maria Vladimirovna Romanova’s styling herself as Grand Duchess of Finland

That might be hard because:

1. Finland is a republic.

2. It hasn't been under Russian control in more than a century now.

aristocrats tend to deny that a bunch of smelly peasants can abolish their titles just because they happen to be the government.

Natalie - Gallows humour.

Well, you do seem to be trying to hang yourself.

Perhaps you should take a break from posting for a while?

RIP to Mike Nesmith, 78, of natural causes.

George Michael "Mickey" Dolenz is now the last surviving Monkee.

Ivana Trump, the first ex-wife of you-know-who, has died at the age of 73. Apparently, she fell down the stairs and killed herself.

Elizabeth II has passed away at age 96.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-61585886

Stephen Greif- best known as the first actor to portray the ruthless Travis on “Blake’s 7” has passed away at age 78.
That show has lost a lot of key cast in the last few years.

To save Tim time- “the great celebrity purge continues and yet Trump no Putin still draw breath”.

Actually, the word I'm using is massacre, not purge.

I stand corrected.

Still, one does have to ask why celebrities are being targeted, while Putin and Trump are allowed to live.

Targeted? No. They're famous so their deaths get reported more than "Joe Blow, a nobody from Piddledink, Kentucky, died. Tim McCree cursed the Grim Reaper and handed him a list of people he wanted to see dead."

And is it too much to ask we use these threads to remember those who passed away, what you liked about them, what you'll miss, etc., and not make lists of those we want to see kick the bucket. The bloodthirstiness really makes these threads too grim to read.

But ask yourself this.

What, or whom, allows a man like Douglas Adams, who brought entertainment to many, to be cut down at just 49. On the other hand, Nazi war criminal, Erich Priebke (who had the blood of hundreds of people on his hands), gets to clock up the big 100?

What's wrong with this picture?

Obviously the universe likes evil people.

Or, to put it more pithily, the good die young.

So it would seem.

I hate to be that guy. However, I think it's more that the universe, death and life and just things. They're neutral and don't have concepts of good and evil etc.

Things like cancer, diabetes, stroke etc. are just things (horrible things but still thing) that have no concept of right, wrong, good or evil.

Why is it some try and try, fight and fight and have nothing to show for it but misery and defeat. Others would almost have no work to fail in order to fail?

Why is it some commit some minor offense and while not right, still end up with some disproportionate sentence for it. Meanwhile, others, even some cheering on that sentence do things far worse and get away with it or get some minor slap on the wrist at worst?

I don't think it that the universe likes evil. Though I can see why it seems that way. I think it's more a natural disaster. An earthquake doesn't care if a building has good or evil people are in it. The earthquake just is. That's what makes it so scary. It doesn't matter if you're a nice or bad person. If you're somewhere that can't survive the earthquake...

It's like if you have bad DNA. You're DNA doesn't care if you're a nice person or not. It's just a thing beyond your control that has no will and just is. All you can do is try to work with it to keep any harm it's causing under control. That and hope medical science can find ways to fix it.

Yes, it still sucks that these seemingly random universe things seem to target some people a lot more then others. I wish I knew why that was, I really do.

Perhaps it's not random.

No one knows.

One last celebrity loss for 2022; Anita Pointer of The Pointer Sisters, at age 74.

Wow. Where’s Jeff to offer his opinion on things. This seems like a discussion he’d want to be involved with…..

Oh, dear God, NO!

Raquel Welch has passed away at 82. Her amazing physique graced the walls of many teenagers back in the 60’s.

I would have watched 'Fantastic Voyage' and 'One Million Years B.C.' even without her not in the cast, but she made those movies even better. Not ashamed to say that she was one of my earliest crushes, along with Barbara Eden. Those eyes and lips were just so perfect.
And she kept her looks right to the end.

The weird thing about Raquel Welch is that I didn't find out who she was until several years after "The Fall Guy" went off the air. I'd always thought that Colt got blown up for "rugs of wealth".

Bob Barker, longtime (35 years) host of The Price is Right, and host of other game shows (Truth or Consequences) has passed away at the age of 99. More from NBC News here.

Only a few months from turning 100.

Missed it by that much.

He came as close as possible to 100 without going over.

Betty White also came close to making it to 100. Alas, she didn't make it either.

George Burns made it. Not sure anybody who's a household names in the entertainment industry have since. There are a few who still could. (I mean, technically, every celebrity currently alive still could, but there a few getting close.)

Bob Hope made it to 100 as well.

Kirk Douglas actually made it to 103.

Forgot about Kirk Douglas.

And today I've suddenly seen a good ten Facebook posts related to George Burns...

You can add another centenarian that's alive and kicking to the list; Norman Lear is 101 years old and counting...

I thought you were talking about the guy from Dead Poet's Society and TNG (Picard's teacher) but apparently you're not....

That's Norman Lloyd, Rodney.

Everybody at the Cheers bar; "NORM!"

Not that he's in the entertainment industry, but I was surprised to learn that Henry Kissinger is still alive and he's 100 years old, too!

Pretty cool.