Obituaries

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Cécile Rol-Tanguy (10 April 1919 – 8 May 2020) was a French communist who was a Resistance fighter during World War II. She participated in the liberation of Paris serving as secretariat and a liaison officer, conducting clandestine operations and relaying confidential communications.

Cécile Rol-Tanguy was born Cécile Le Bihan on 10 April 1919 in Royan, Saintonge. Her father, François Le Bihan was an electrician and an important member of the Confédération Générale du Travail Unitaire (CGTU). She grew up in a highly politicised family, as her father co-founded the Parti Communiste Français (PCF) and had hosted a number of foreign communist agitators who exiled from their countries.[1]
In 1936, she became a part of the Comité d’Aide à l’Espagne Républicaine, where she met Henri Tanguy, who was 11 years her senior and a fellow communist. During the early stages of their relationship, he volunteered in the International Brigades fighting in the Spanish Civil War. Shortly after meeting, Henri deployed to the French Section of the International Brigade in the Spanish Civil War.[2]
Rol-Tanguy had four surviving children: Hélène and Jean, who were born during the war, and Claire and Francis, who were born after the war.[3] She and her husband later left Paris to settle by the Loire.

Before turning 18, Rol-Tanguy was a shorthand typist in the Confédération Générale du Travail (CGT) and joined the Union des Jeunes Filles de France, a subgroup of the Fédération des Jeunes Communistes de France. It is within this framework that she became part of the Comité d’Aide à l’Espagne Républicaine, where she met Henri Tanguy. In 1938, she joined the Parti Communiste and got engaged to Henri upon his return from Spain. They would get married in 1939 after learning she was pregnant. Her first child, Françoise, was born in November of that year, but fell ill shortly after and died from dehydration on 12 June 1940, 2 days before the Germans entered Paris.[2] During an interview in 2014, she recalled the painful episode: “I can still remember the terrible pall of burning smoke over Paris and wondering if that was what had made my baby ill. I left her in the hospital overnight, and when I went back the next day, there was another baby in her bed.”[2] Her father was arrested for his activism and communist affiliation around the same time, as his actions were seen as “demoralizing the army,” and deemed illegal.[2]

On the first day of the occupation of Paris the CGT, which was by now banned by the Vichy Government, asked Rol-Tanguy to resume work.[4] Feeling that she had nothing to lose following the imprisonment of her father and the death of her daughter, she accepted and began typing political pamphlets for them.[2][3] After her father’s release from prison, she moved in with her parents, living in a tiny studio and often struggling to get enough to eat. She worked alongside her husband, who had joined the Forces Françaises de l’Intérieure (FFI). Rol-Tanguy was an important member of the FFI, and worked as both a liaison officer and secretary for them.

Rol-Tanguy and her husband were forced to hide both their identities and their relationship during this period due to the secrecy required of them as members of the Résistance.[3] She used code names like Jeanne, Yvette or Lucie when on missions as a liaison officer, and sometimes disguised herself by changing her hairstyle.[2] After the birth of their second child, Henri asked her to consider working elsewhere and leave their daughter with her mother, in order to avoid the possibility of them both being caught.[2] She refused and continued her work, sometimes using her children's strollers to conceal guns, grenades, clandestine newspapers.[5] In 1942, her father was arrested a second time and deported to Auschwitz, where he died shortly after.

Together with her husband, Rol-Tanguy actively participated in the liberation of Paris. In May 1944, under the pseudonym Rol, Henri was appointed regional leader of the FFI, and for several weeks he worked to organize the Liberation of the French capital. She worked with Henri and his staff to set up a command post in an underground shelter in Place Denfert-Rochereau. From this covert command post, the Rol-Tanguy couple received and distributed information and orders for the Résistance.On 19 August 1944 she and Henri published a pamphlet calling citizens in Paris to arms and decreeing general mobilisation. This marked the beginning of the end of the Nazi occupation. Rol-Tanguy described their roles at this time, saying:

Quote:"Henri was circulating a lot at that time, I was stuck down there to relay the communiqués.”[6]

Paris was finally liberated on August 25 by General Leclerc's 2nd Armoured Division. Rol-Tanguy recalls this overwhelming experience, saying that,

Quote:"When they told us, we didn't hear the bells ringing, but we had a pillow fight with the girls who were with me."[6]

After the liberation in 1945, Rol-Tanguy received the Resistance Medal from the French Committee of National Liberation for her contributions to the liberation struggle. Her husband became an officer in the French army. In memory of all the friends they lost during the war, Cécile and Henri made a pact to remain members of the Parti Communiste Français.[3] After the liberation, she also joined the Union des Femmes Françaises working on maintaining the memory of French resistance and anti-fascist fighters.[7]

On 8 September 2002, after a 63-year marriage, her husband Henri Rol-Tanguy died.

In 2008, Rol-Tanguy became the Grand Officer of the Legion d’Honneur. Although she was at first reluctant to take the honorary position, she decided to accept it in the name of all of the female Résistance fighters, who are too often forgotten by history.[7] Cécile Rol-Tanguy died at her home at midday on 8 May 2020, aged 101, on the 75th anniversary of the end of the Second World War in Europe (VE Day).[8]

Rol-Tanguy devoted herself to the memory of the Resistance. She wanted to keep the memory of the past alive in order to protect future generations. "It is out of respect for all those who fell for freedom that I am fulfilling this duty of remembrance," she explained. [6] After the death of her husband in 2002, Rol-Tanguy increased her efforts to commemorate and preserve the memory of those who helped her in the fight to free Paris. She did this through media interviews and by speaking in documentaries. She also spoke at many ceremonies, and frequently travelled to speak at schools throughout France. In these talks she stressed the importance of fighting for one’s freedom. She highlighted Spain’s plan to tighten abortion laws as a worrying development for women’s rights and freedoms. In a speech at a ceremony in Paris, she said, "I am a little surprised to find myself here again 70 years later, but it is to remember all those I knew and who have left.”[6]

Cécile both represented and advocated for the recognition of the role that women played in the resistance. When she received the Legion d’Honneur, she added: “With my last nomination for the Legion d’Honneur, I considered that I represented all the women who had nothing.”[6]

Rol-Tanguy also helped to educate people about the history of the resistance struggle by successfully advocating for the reopening of the Musée de la Libération de Paris, which occurred in August 2019.[9] In this process, the Museum was moved to the Ledoux Pavilionson on Place Denfert-Rochereau, the location from which she and her husband launched the insurrection that led to the liberation of Paris in late summer 1944.[6]


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A9cile_Rol-Tanguy

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LITTLE RICHARD


(really a giant in pop music)

Richard Wayne Penniman (December 5, 1932 – May 9, 2020), better known as Little Richard, was an American singer, songwriter, and musician. An influential figure in popular music and culture for seven decades, he was nicknamed "The Innovator", "The Originator", and "The Architect of Rock and Roll". Penniman's most celebrated work dates from the mid-1950s, when his charismatic showmanship and dynamic music, characterized by frenetic piano playing, pounding backbeat and raspy shouted vocals, laid the foundation for rock and roll. His innovative emotive vocalizations and uptempo rhythmic music also played a key role in the formation of other popular music genres, including soul and funk. He influenced numerous singers and musicians across musical genres from rock to hip hop; his music helped shape rhythm and blues for generations to come.


"Tutti Frutti" (1955), one of Penniman's signature songs, became an instant hit, crossing over to the pop charts in both the United States and the United Kingdom. His next hit single, "Long Tall Sally" (1956), hit No. 1 on the Billboard Rhythm and Blues Best-Sellers chart, followed by a rapid succession of 15 more hit singles in less than three years. His performances during this period resulted in integration between White Americans and African Americans in his audience. In 1962, during a five-year period in which Penniman abandoned rock and roll music for born-again Christianity, concert promoter Don Arden persuaded him to tour Europe. During this time, Arden had the Beatles open for Penniman on some tour dates, capitalizing on his popularity. Penniman advised them on how to perform his songs and taught the band's member Paul McCartney his distinctive vocalizations.
Penniman is cited as one of the first crossover black artists, reaching audiences of all races. His music and concerts broke the color line, drawing blacks and whites together despite attempts to sustain segregation. His contemporaries, including Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, Bill Haley, Jerry Lee Lewis, the Everly Brothers, Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran, all recorded covers of his works. Taken by his music and style, and personally covering four of Penniman's songs on his own two breakthrough albums in 1956, Presley told Penniman in 1969 that his music was an inspiration to him and that he was "the greatest".

Penniman was honored by many institutions. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as part of its first group of inductees in 1986. He was also inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. He was the recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Recording Academy and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Rhythm and Blues Foundation. In 2015, Penniman received a Rhapsody & Rhythm Award from the National Museum of African American Music for his key role in the formation of popular music genres and helping to bring an end to the racial divide on the music charts and in concert in the mid-1950s, changing American culture significantly. "Tutti Frutti" was included in the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress in 2010, which stated that his "unique vocalizing over the irresistible beat announced a new era in music".

Much more at Wikipedia

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Jerry Stiller, another fine Silent comedian:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Stiller

Gerald Isaac Stiller (June 8, 1927 – May 11, 2020) was an American comedian, actor, and author. He spent many years as part of the comedy duo Stiller and Meara with his wife, Anne Meara, to whom he was married for over 60 years until her death in 2015. Stiller saw a late-career resurgence starting in 1993, playing George Costanza's father Frank on the sitcom Seinfeld, a part which earned him an Emmy nomination. The year Seinfeld went off the air, Stiller began his role as the eccentric Arthur Spooner on the CBS comedy series The King of Queens, another role which garnered him widespread acclaim.[1]

Stiller was the father of actor Ben Stiller, and the father and son appeared together in films such as Zoolander, Heavyweights, Hot Pursuit, The Heartbreak Kid, and Zoolander 2. He also performed voice-over work for television and films including The Lion King 1½ and Planes: Fire and Rescue. In his later career, Stiller became known for playing grumpy and eccentric characters who were nevertheless beloved.


The eldest of four children,[4] Stiller was born at Unity Hospital in Brooklyn, New York, to Bella (née Citron; 1902–1954) and William Stiller (1896–1999), a bus driver.[5] His family is Jewish. His paternal grandparents immigrated from Galicia (southeast Poland and western Ukraine), and his mother was born in Poland.[6] He lived in the Williamsburg and East New York neighborhoods before his family moved to the Lower East Side,[7] where he attended Seward Park High School.[8]


Upon his return from service in the U.S. Army during World War II,[9][10] Stiller attended Syracuse University, earning a bachelor's degree in Speech and Drama in 1950.[11] He also studied drama at HB Studio in Greenwich Village.[12] In the 1953 Phoenix Theater production of Coriolanus (produced by John Houseman) Stiller, along with Gene Saks and Jack Klugman formed (as told by Houseman in the 1980 memoir Front and Center) "the best trio of Shakespearian clowns that I have ever seen on any stage".[13]

Also in 1953, Stiller met actress-comedienne, Anne Meara, and they married in 1954. Until Stiller suggested it, Meara had never thought of doing comedy. "Jerry started us being a comedy team," she said. "He always thought I would be a great comedy partner."[14] They joined the Chicago improvisational company The Compass Players (which later became The Second City) and, after leaving, began performing together. In 1961 they were performing in nightclubs in New York City and by the following year were considered a "national phenomenon", said the New York Times.[14]

[/url]
[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stiller_and_Meara]Stiller and Meara

The comedy team Stiller and Meara, composed of Stiller and wife Anne Meara, was successful throughout the 1960s, with numerous appearances on television variety programs, primarily on The Ed Sullivan Show.[15] In 1970, they broke up the live act before it broke up their marriage. They subsequently forged a career in radio commercials, notably the campaign for Blue Nun wine. They also starred in their own syndicated five-minute sketch comedy show on radio, Take Five with Stiller and Meara, from 1977 to 1978.[16]

From 1979 to 1982, Stiller and Meara hosted HBO Sneak Previews, a half-hour show produced monthly on which they described the movies and programs to be featured in the coming month.[5] They also did some comedy sketches between show discussions. The duo had their own 1986 TV sitcom, The Stiller and Meara Show, in which Stiller played the deputy mayor of New York City and Meara portrayed his wife, a TV commercial actress.



Late in his career, Stiller earned the part of the short-tempered Frank Costanza, father of George Costanza, on the sitcom Seinfeld, a role which Stiller played from 1993 until 1998. [17] Stiller's character as initially envisioned was a "meek" and "Thurberesque" character that required him to wear a bald cap. After a couple days of rehearsal Stiller realized the character wasn't working and asked Seinfeld co-creator Larry David if he could perform the character in a different way, which was more in line with his final characterization on the show. [18] [19] For his portrayal of Frank, Stiller gained widespread critical and popular acclaim, including being nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series in 1997 and winning an American Comedy Award for Funniest Male Guest Appearance in a TV Series in 1998.[17][20]

T

After Seinfeld ended, Stiller had planned on retiring. However, Kevin James asked him to join the cast of The King of Queens. James, who played the leading role of Doug Heffernan, had told Stiller that he needed him in order to have a successful show. Stiller agreed and played the role of Arthur Spooner, the father of Carrie Heffernan, from 1998 until 2007. Stiller said that this role tested his acting ability more than any other had, and that, before being a part of The King of Queens, he only saw himself as a "decent actor."[21]

Stiller played himself in filmed skits opening and closing Canadian rock band Rush's 30th Anniversary Tour concerts in 2004. These appearances are seen on the band's DVD R30: 30th Anniversary World Tour, released in 2005. Stiller later appeared in cameos for in-concert films for the band's 2007–08 Snakes & Arrows Tour. Stiller appeared on Dick Clark's $10,000 Pyramid show in the 1970s, and footage of the appearance was edited into an episode of The King of Queens to assist the storyline about his character being a contestant on the show, and, after losing, being bitter about the experience, as he never received his parting gift, a lifetime supply of Rice-a-Roni.[22] He also made several appearances on the game show, Tattletales, with his wife Anne Meara.

In the late 1990s, Stiller appeared in a series of Nike television commercials as the ghost of deceased Green Bay Packers head coach Vince Lombardi. He also appeared in various motion pictures, most notably Zoolander (2001) and Secret of the Andes (1999). On February 9, 2007, Stiller and Meara were honored with a joint star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. On October 28, 2010, the couple appeared on an episode of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Stiller voiced the announcer on the children's educational show Crashbox. Starting in October 2010, Stiller and Meara began starring in Stiller & Meara, a Yahoo web series from Red Hour Digital in which they discussed current topics. Each episode was about two minutes long.[23][24] Stiller also worked as a spokesman for Xfinity.



Stiller wrote the foreword to the 2005 book Festivus: The Holiday for the Rest of Us (ISBN 0-446-69674-9) by Allen Salkin. The book discussed Festivus, the fictional holiday promulgated by Stiller's Seinfeld character Frank Costanza.[25]

Stiller also authored a memoir titled Married to Laughter: A Love Story Featuring Anne Meara, which was published by Simon & Schuster (ISBN 0-684-86903-9).[26]





Stiller was married to Anne Meara for over 60 years, from 1954 until her death on May 23, 2015.[27] The two met in an agent's office. Meara was upset about an interaction with the casting agent, so Stiller took her out for coffee—all he could afford—and they remained together ever since. Their son is actor-comedian Ben Stiller (born 1965) and their daughter is actress Amy Stiller (born 1961).[28] He has two grandchildren through Ben.



Stiller died from natural causes at his home on the Upper West Side of Manhattan on May 11, 2020, at age 92, less than a month before his 93rd birthday. His death was announced by his son, Ben Stiller.[29][30] Many actors Stiller worked with, including Seinfeld castmates Jerry Seinfeld, Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Jason Alexander and King of Queens castmates Kevin James and Leah Remini, paid tributes to him on social media.[31]
Fil

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Any mathematicians out there? This fellow sounds important, but outside my area of knowledge:



Ernest Borisovich Vinberg (Russian: Эрнест Борисович Винберг; 26 July 1937 – 12 May 2020)[1] was a Russian mathematician, who worked on discrete subgroups of Lie groups and representation theory. He introduced Vinberg's algorithm and the Koecher–Vinberg theorem.
He was a recipient of the Humboldt Prize. He was on the executive committee of the Moscow Mathematical Society. In 1983 he was an Invited Speaker with a talk on Discrete reflection groups in Lobachevsky spaces at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Warsaw. In 2010 he was elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
His doctoral students include Victor Kac and Boris Weisfeiler.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernest_Vinberg

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Morris Hood III (May 21, 1965 – May 12, 2020) was an American politician who served as a member of the Michigan Senate. He represented District 3, encompassing Dearborn, Melvindale, and a portion of Detroit from 2011 to 2018.

Hood was born in Detroit. He went to Wayne State University and Henry Ford College.[1] Hood was the son of Morris Hood Jr. and the nephew of Raymond W. Hood.

Prior to his election to the Legislature, Hood was an auto technician at Ford Motor Company's Detroit Engine Fuel Tank Plant. He was an unsuccessful candidate for the House in 1998.[2] Hood was elected to the Michigan House of Representatives in 2003, serving for three terms.[3] He was elected to the Michigan Senate in 2010, also serving as the Michigan Senate Minority Leader until 2018. He was unable to run for re-election due to term-limits, and was succeeded by Sylvia Santana. Hood won his father's legislative seat, as he was the son of former Michigan State Rep. Morris Hood Jr., who died in 1998. Due to term limits, Hood went to work in Wayne County administration after his stint in the Michigan State senate ended. Hood III, a widower, was survived by his second wife. Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a former state lawmaker herself and colleague of Hood, called him "A dear friend and proud Detroiter dedicated to community service."[4]

Hood died on May 12, 2020, of COVID-19, just nine days before his 55th birthday.[5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morris_Hood_III

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"Eddie Haskell"

Kenneth Charles Osmond (June 7, 1943 – May 18, 2020) was an American actor and police officer. Beginning a prolific career as a child actor at the age of four, Osmond is best known for his iconic role as Eddie Haskell on the late 1950s to early 1960s television situation comedy Leave It to Beaver, and for having reprised it on the 1980s revival series The New Leave It to Beaver. Typecast by the role, he found it hard to get other acting work and became a Los Angeles police officer. After retiring from police work, he resumed his acting career.

In the fall of 1957, 14-year-old Osmond was called into a typical "cattle call" audition to read for the role for which he would become most identified, that of Wally Cleaver's best (and worst) friend, Eddie Haskell, on the family sitcom Leave It to Beaver.[2][3] After a series of call-backs to narrow down the field, Osmond eventually landed the role.[2] The character of Eddie was originally intended to be a "one shot" guest appearance, but those involved with the show were impressed with Osmond's portrayal, and Eddie Haskell would eventually become a memorable character on the series throughout its entire six season run.[2][3]


Osmond's portrayal of Eddie Haskell became a cultural reference, recognized as an archetype for the "behind-your-back" rebel. Teenager Eddie Haskell would be polite and obsequious to grownups, but derided adults' social conventions behind their backs. He was constantly trying to involve his friends in activities that would get them into trouble. Parents like Ward and June Cleaver hoped Eddie wouldn't be a model to their children but someone to point out as an example of what not to do. Even today, the term "Eddie Haskell" is known to refer to an insincere flatterer or a sycophant.

In 1983, Osmond appeared as a game show participant / celebrity guest star on the Match Game-Hollywood Squares Hour. Osmond returned to acting in 1983 reprising his role as Eddie Haskell in the CBS made-for-television movie, Still the Beaver, which followed the adult Cleaver boys, their friends, and their families.[3][10][21] The television movie was a success and led to the revival comedy series The New Leave It to Beaver which premiered the following year.[10][22][23] The show ran for four seasons from 1984 to 1989, starting on The Disney Channel, and later moving to WTBS.[22][24][25] On the show, Osmond played Eddie Haskell as a husband and father, while his character's two sons, Freddie Haskell and Edward "Bomber" Haskell Jr., were played by Osmond's two real-life sons, Eric Osmond and Christian Osmond, respectively.[2][24]

In 1987, Osmond was honored by the Young Artist Foundation with its Former Child Star "Lifetime Achievement" Award for his role as Eddie Haskell.[26] He continued to make television appearances throughout the 1980s and 1990s on the shows Happy Days, Rags to Riches, and the television movie High School U.S.A.,[27] as well as cameo appearances in his role as Eddie Haskell on such television shows as Parker Lewis Can't Lose and Hi Honey, I'm Home! Osmond would once again reprise his role as Eddie Haskell in the 1997 feature film Leave It to Beaver. In the film, Osmond played Eddie Haskell, Sr., and Adam Zolotin played his son Eddie Haskell, Jr.[2] He also had a bit part in the 2016 indie movie Characterz.[28][/url]

[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Osmond]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Osmond

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TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — With the Nazis murdering Jews and ransacking their property outside on the infamous nights of Kristallnacht in 1938, 13-year-old David Toren sat in the sunroom of his wealthy great-uncle in Germany admiring a favorite painting depicting two men on horseback on a beach.

Within a year, Toren would be smuggled out in one of the final Kindertransports, a series of rescues for Jewish children organized by several European countries. Left behind, his family would perish in the death camps and their vast art collection would be seized by Nazis and later traded by unscrupulous dealers.

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https://apnews.com/3d99e94dea1becd7b45653e2c8cf3ed4

Lives Lost: Holocaust survivor reclaimed Nazi-looted artwork
By ARON HELLER
May 15, 2020


FILE - In this file photo taken on April 5, 2017, Max Liebermann's "Basket Weavers" painting hangs in a law office in Jerusalem. The painting was returned to David Toren, an American heir of its original Jewish owner, after he sued the government of Germany for his great-uncle’s collection and after a lengthy saga, recovered artworks confiscated by the Nazis, jockeyed by an unscrupulous German art trader and ultimately purchased by an Israeli Holocaust survivor unaware of its murky past. Toren died on April 19 in his Manhattan home from symptoms of the coronavirus. He was 94. He left behind his son Peter and two grandchildren. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit, File)
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — With the Nazis murdering Jews and ransacking their property outside on the infamous nights of Kristallnacht in 1938, 13-year-old David Toren sat in the sunroom of his wealthy great-uncle in Germany admiring a favorite painting depicting two men on horseback on a beach.

Within a year, Toren would be smuggled out in one of the final Kindertransports, a series of rescues for Jewish children organized by several European countries. Left behind, his family would perish in the death camps and their vast art collection would be seized by Nazis and later traded by unscrupulous dealers.


Toren would serve in the Israeli pre-state militia before moving to America with less than $100 to his name. He went on to build a successful law practice with an office on the 54th floor of the World Trade Center. Many of the early-life possessions he kept there were destroyed in the 9/11 attacks, carried out before he arrived to work that day.

But even as a degenerative eye condition robbed him of his sight later in life, the images of his past never escaped him, and he embarked on a quest to reclaim some of what was lost. He sued the government of Germany for his great-uncle’s collection and in 2015, after a lengthy saga, recovered the Max Liebermann work “Two Riders on the Beach” that so moved him in his youth.

“He regarded it as justice and felt very strongly about it,” said his son, Peter Toren. “The art is something that was taken from his family and it was something there was a possibility of getting back. He couldn’t get back all the lives that were exterminated.”

Toren died on April 19 in his Manhattan home from symptoms of the coronavirus. He was 94. He left behind his son Peter and two grandchildren.

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EDITOR’S NOTE: This is part of an ongoing series of stories remembering people who have died from coronavirus around the world.

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Born Klaus-Gunther Tarnowski in Breslau, now part of Poland, Toren and his family at first seemed immune to the rise of the Nazis. His father, a decorated World War I veteran, was a prominent lawyer who was allowed to practice even after the Nazis forbade most Jews from doing so and he published poetry and wrote plays that were performed at local theaters.

But eventually he too was taken away to a concentration camp and came back three weeks later “a broken man,” according to Peter Toren. He and his wife eventually died in Auschwitz.

Toren’s great-uncle, the wealthy Jewish industrialist and art collector David Friedmann, was forced to flee and the Nazis pillaged his extensive collection. Many of the works ended up in the hands of Hildebrand Gurlitt, a notorious German art dealer who traded in what the Nazis called “degenerate art” — works deemed inferior because they were un-German, Jewish or Communist or, as is the case with Impressionist and other Modernist works, did not employ traditionally realistic forms. Still, they were happy to sell the works to help fund their war machine.

Much of Gurlitt’s collection remained unseen for decades and experts feared they had been lost or destroyed. But a vast horde resurfaced by surprise in 2012 when German authorities raided a Munich apartment belonging to his son Cornelius while investigating him for tax evasion. Paintings by artists including Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Henri Matisse were discovered.

Full Coverage: Lives Lost
The reclusive Cornelius Gurlitt, who said he had inherited much of the art from his father, kept more than 1,200 works in his Munich apartment and 250 more in Salzburg, Austria. The discovery brought renewed attention to the many unresolved cases of looted art that was never returned to original Jewish owners or their descendants. Cornelius Gurlitt died in 2014 at age 81, designating Switzerland’s Kunstmuseum Bern as the sole heir to a collection worth billions of dollars.

Friedmann’s daughter Charlotte died in Auschwitz, leaving Toren as the only descendant to stake a claim. After reclaiming “Two Riders on the Beach,” Toren tracked down another piece that had oddly made its way to Israel. After a lengthy negotiation he got back “Basket Weavers” as well, an Impressionist work depicting five boys weaving baskets out of straw.

Peter Toren said his father spent his final years pursuing the art collection and further efforts were ongoing to acquire more than 50 documented antiques seized from Friedmann’s collection.

Despite his background, Toren had no problem using his language skills to cultivate German clients in New York, even those with Nazi connections. As a patent attorney, he once represented a Bavarian farm machinery company with ties to the infamous Nazi doctor Josef Mengele.

“I asked my father how he could deal with Nazi clients and he told me that if he didn’t do the work someone else would,” Peter Toren said, before adding. “And he charged such clients an unofficial 25% Nazi surcharge.”

Toren’s grandson, Ben, said his grandfather pursued the art collection in retirement with the same “unsentimental” focus and tenacity as he did in his law career.

“The artwork thing gave him a new lease on life,” he said. “He very strongly felt that these paintings were his paintings and it gave him a lot of purpose.”

“But he never presented himself as being any kind of victim and he never asked for any pity,” he quickly added. “He was always fairly stoic in his demeanor, in how he carried himself. His life experience required of him to have a rock-solid exterior. That’s how he presented himself to the world.”

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Follow Aron Heller at http://www.twitter.com/aronhellerap

https://apnews.com/3d99e94dea1becd7b45653e2c8cf3ed4

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Annie Glenn, widow of astronaut John Glenn.


Anna Margaret Glenn (née Castor; February 17, 1920 – May 19, 2020) was an American advocate for people with disabilities and communication disorders and the wife of astronaut and senator John Glenn. A stuttererer from an early age, Glenn was notable for raising awareness of stuttering among children and adults as well as other disabilities.

Anna Margaret Castor was born on February 17, 1920, in Columbus, Ohio, to Homer and Margaret (Alley) Castor.[1][2] Her father was a dentist.[3] In 1923, the Castor family moved to New Concord, Ohio.[1]  
Castor met John Glenn at a very young age when her parents became involved in the same community organizations as Glenn's parents.[4] The families developed a friendship which allowed Castor and Glenn to remain close as they grew up.[4] The pair became high school sweethearts and continued dating through college.[4] Castor attended Muskingum College where she majored in music with a minor in secretarial skills and physical education.[4] Castor was an active member of the swim team, volleyball team, and tennis team.[4] She graduated in 1942.[1] Even though she received an offer for a pipe organ scholarship from the Juilliard School, Castor declined the offer,[5] choosing instead to stay in Ohio with Glenn. Castor and Glenn were married on April 6, 1943.[1] They had two children, David, born in 1945, and Lyn, born in 1947.[6]
During the early years of her marriage to John Glenn, Annie Glenn worked as an organist in various churches and taught trombone lessons.[4]

Influence during the Space Race[edit]

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Annie and John Glenn arriving at Schiphol Airport, Amsterdam. 1965

Throughout the middle of the twentieth century, the Cold War tensions between the United States of America and the Soviet Union heightened.[7] In an effort to boost American citizens' confidence in their government, U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower decided to become involved in the Space Race and launch Project Mercury.[7] Seven young men were chosen for this space mission. These all-American astronauts were regarded as wholesome heroes and their wives were the picture of domestic patriotism.[8] Annie Glenn was one of the wives of the Mercury 7 astronauts. These women "rocketed to fame"[9] to became celebrities.

In her book The Astronaut Wives Club[10] (which later became a television miniseries), Lily Koppel relates that Glenn and the other six wives formed a tight-knit support group informally called the "Astronaut Wives Club," which she cites as influential in shaping American identity, as Americans found their values of family, patriotism, and consumerism embodied in Glenn. Koppel states that American women turned to Glenn, who had been elevated in the media because of her all-American family, as a role model on how to maintain a happy home, and also an indirect propagator of the American value of consumption. The appearance of the Astronaut Wives in the media was marketed to average American housewives. For example, when the wives wore a shade of "responsible pink" lipstick to a Life photoshoot, the published photographs showed the wives wearing "patriotic red" lipstick instead. The lip color was changed to represent a new, vibrant period in American history. After the magazine was published, red lipstick became a fad. Similarly, while Mercury 7 astronauts were given sporty Corvettes to drive, the wives were strongly encouraged to keep their family-friendly station wagons, which meant that the average American housewives who were following the Astronaut Wives' example also bought station wagons. As a result of Glenn and the other members of the Astronaut Wives Club, women across the U.S. were inspired to be brave and of course, to buy the same consumer goods Glenn and the other wives had in their homes.[10]

Glenn meeting President Barack Obama in 2012

Like her father, Annie Glenn experienced a speech stutter throughout her life.[1] As a child, Glenn did not feel hindered by her stutter; she happily participated in activities such as softball, girl scouts, school dances, and choir.[4] It was not until sixth grade that she first realized her speech impairment.[4] It was determined that her stutter was present in eighty-five percent of her verbal utterances.[11] Despite her difficulty speaking, she was able to create and maintain close relationships.[4] After graduating college, Glenn wanted to get a job in a different town but because of her disability, her parents were worried about her living independently.[4] However, Glenn found ways to effectively communicate without speaking out loud. For example, before shopping, she would write down exactly what she was looking for and then show the note to the sales clerk when she needed help.[4]
At the age of 53, Glenn discovered and attended a three-week treatment course at Hollins Communications Research Institute in Roanoke, Virginia, to help with her dysfluency.[11] After attending the treatment course, her speech was greatly improved, however, she did not consider herself "cured" of stuttering.[1] Glenn was finally able to confidently verbally interact with others.[12] When her husband began campaigning for the Senate, she was able to support him by giving speeches at public events and at rallies.[1] Glenn used her newfound voice to bring attention to the disabled who she knew had been overlooked so often.[13]
Later, Glenn became an adjunct professor with Ohio State's Speech Pathology Department.[6]

The Glenns in 2012

In 1983, Glenn received the first national award of the [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Speech_and_Hearing_Association]American Speech and Hearing Association for her meritorious service to those with communicative disorders.[1] In 1987, the National Association for Hearing and Speech Action awarded the first annual Annie Glenn Award for achieving distinction despite a communication disorder.[1] Glenn presented the award to James Earl Jones as its first recipient.[1] She was inducted into the National Stuttering Association Hall of Fame in 2004.[14] In 2015, The Ohio State University renamed 17th Avenue (on its campus) to Annie and John Glenn Avenue.[15]
In 2009, the Ohio State University awarded her an honorary Doctorate of Public Service to recognize her work on behalf of children and others.[6] The department awards the "Annie Glenn Leadership Award" annually to a person that has displayed innovative and inspirational work in speech/language pathology.[15]

Organizations in which she was involved include:

• Delta Gamma Theta Sorority (Muskingum College)[16]
  
  
• The Ohio Board of Child Abuse[17]
  
  
• The Board of Columbus (Ohio) Speech and Hearing Center[6]
  
  
• The Society of Sponsors[18]
  
  
• The Board of Trustees of Muskingum College[19]
  
  
• The Advisory Panel of the Central Ohio Speech and Hearing Association[16]
  
  
• The Advisory Board for the National Center for Survivors of Childhood Abuse[16]
  
  
• The Board for the National First Ladies' Library[18]
  
  
• The National Deafness and other Communication Disorders Advisory Council of the National Institutes of Health[20]
  

At the time of her husband's death in December 2016, Annie and John Glenn had been married for 73 years and eight months. During the course of their marriage, the couple had two children—John David, born in 1945, and Carolyn Ann, born in 1947—and two grandchildren.[1]
Glenn turned 100 in February 2020.[21] Three months later, on May 19, 2020, she died at a nursing home in Saint Paul, Minnesota, from complications of COVID-19.[22][23][24]
Portrayals in popular culture[edit]
Glenn was played by Mary Jo Deschanel in the 1983 film The Right Stuff.[25] The film highlighted her stutter, particularly in a scene involving U.S. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson.[25] In a 2015 interview, she and John Glenn indicated that, although they liked the Tom Wolfe book, they did not care for the movie adaptation of The Right Stuff.[26]
In the 2015 ABC-TV series The Astronaut Wives Club, she is portrayed by Azure Parsons.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annie_Glenn

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"Saturn", an alligator in the Moscow Zoo -- in his eighties. Born in Mississippi, he was sent to the Berlin Zoo and was rescued by the British at the end of WWII . He was sent as a gift to the Soviet Union, where he lived in the Moscow Zoo for nearly 75 years.



Saturn (Russian: Сату́рн, IPA: [sɐˈturn]; 1936 – 22 May 2020) was an American alligator residing in the Moscow Zoo. He was the subject of an urban myth that he was previously Adolf Hitler's "pet alligator".

After hatching in Mississippi, Saturn was soon brought to Germany, residing at the Berlin Zoological Garden. It was here that his association with Adolf Hitler originated, as Hitler reportedly enjoyed visiting the zoo and especially liked the alligator. However, while Hitler may have viewed Saturn at the zoo, he was never Hitler's personal pet. During World War II, the Berlin Zoo was destroyed, but Saturn was discovered by British soldiers three years later. The British then gave the alligator to the Soviets in 1946. He lived at the Moscow Zoo until 22 May 2020, when he died of old age[1][2]



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_(alligator)

Can you imagine? This alligator lived in succession in "Kukluxistan" (the Jim Crow South), Nazi Germany, and Stalin's Soviet Union and never became a victim of political persecution despite having a big mouth. Some places are just horrible places for humans. I can imagine using this gator as a narrator for a story on how bad Humanity can be.  

[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_(alligator)#cite_note-bbc-2][/url]

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Mady Mesplé (7 March 1931 – 30 May 2020) was a French opera singer, considered the leading coloratura soprano of her generation in France, and sometimes heralded as the successor to Mado Robin, with Lakmé by Delibes becoming her signature role internationally.[1]

She sang professionally for more than thirty years, with a repertoire that ranged from operetta to contemporary works. After retiring from the stage, she started teaching. Mesplé was the archetype of a light coloratura soprano: technically secure, musically distinctive, and with a charming stage presence. When she developed Parkinson's disease in the mid-1990s, she responded by writing a book about her career and the development of her illness.

Born Madeleine Mesplé in Toulouse on 7 March 1931, she came from a modest family background. She took up music at the age of four, and her mother's recognition of her promise, confirmed by a teacher, led her to attend the music conservatory of her native city from the age of seven.[2] She studied piano and voice, graduating with a gold medal. She played the piano in a local ballroom orchestra for a while and later left for Paris for complementary voice lessons with French soprano Janine Micheau.[3]


Mesplé made her professional debut in Liège in January 1953, in the title role of Lakmé by Delibes, a role with which she remained closely associated throughout her career, singing it an estimated 145 times.[2][3] Lakmé was also her debut role at La Monnaie in Brussels in 1954. She quickly established herself in the standard lyric and coloratura roles of the French repertoire, such as Olympia in The Tales of Hoffmann, Philline in Mignon, Leila in Les pêcheurs de perles, Juliette in Roméo et Juliette, Ophélie in Hamlet, the title roles of Dinorah and Manon, and Sophie in Werther.[2][3]

She made her debut at the Aix-en-Provence Festival in 1956, as Zémire in Grétry's Zémire et Azor.[4] The same year she first sang at the Opéra-Comique, again as Lakmé. Her Palais Garnier debut took place in 1958, as Constance in Poulenc's Dialogues des Carmélites. There in 1960, she took over from Joan Sutherland in a new production of Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor.[3] Other Italian roles included Amina in Bellini's La sonnambula, Rosina in Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia, Norina in Donizetti's Don Pasquale and Gilda in Verdi's Rigoletto.[3][4] She sang only a few German roles: the Queen of the Night in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte, Sophie in Der Rosenkavalier, and Zerbinetta in Ariadne auf Naxos, both by Richard Strauss.[3]

Mesplé also enjoyed a successful career abroad, appearing at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, the Royal Opera House in London, La Scala in Milan,[2] the Metropolitan Opera in New York, where she appeared as Gilda,[4] and Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires.[2]

During the 1960s, Mesplé appeared frequently on French television and started exploring works by contemporary musicians. Charles Chaynes composed his Four Poems of Sappho for her,[1] and in 1963 she appeared as Kitty in the French premiere of Gian Carlo Menotti's The Last Savage.[4] She was also the first to sing the French version of Henze's Elegy for Young Lovers in 1965, and Pierre Boulez chose Mesplé for his performances of Schoenberg's Jacob's Ladder.[1][5]
During the 1970s she added operettas to her repertoire, especially by Jacques Offenbach, such as La Vie parisienne, Orphée aux enfers and La Grande-Duchesse de Gérolstein, opposite Régine Crespin.[6]
Mesplé retired from the stage in 1985 and turned to teaching at the École Normale de Musique de Paris and at the Music Conservatory of Lyon.[2][3]

Mesplé left a discography encompassing opera, operetta, and mélodies, including complete opera and operetta recordings of rarely performed works such as Auber's Fra Diavolo and Manon Lescaut, Lecocq's La fille de Madame Angot, Planquette's Les cloches de Corneville, Ganne's Les saltimbanques, Messager's Véronique, and Hahn's Ciboulette.[7][1] She recorded Lakmé, alongside Charles Burles and Roger Soyer, conducted by Alain Lombard.[3]

The archetype of the light French coloratura soprano, Mady Mesplé was noted for her technical security, musical refinement and charming stage presence. Her voice was particularly recognisable for its quick vibrato, intensely focused intonation, the instrumental-like quality of her runs and an amazing upper register extending easily to high A-flat.[3][1] The French baritone Ludovic Tézier tweeted after her death: "Mady Mesplé s'est envolée, légère comme l'élégance". [2] ("Mady Mesplé has flown away, lightly as elegance".)

In the mid-1990s, Mesplé began suffering from Parkinson's disease, leading her to work closely with the "Association France Parkinson" and to write a book, entitled La Voix du Corps, about her career and the development of her illness.[1][8] She died on 30 May 2020 in her native Toulouse.[2][3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mady_Mespl%C3%A9

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Westley Sissel Unseld (March 14, 1946 – June 2, 2020) was an American professional basketball player, coach and executive. He spent his entire National Basketball Association (NBA) career with the Baltimore/Capital/Washington Bullets. Unseld played college basketball for the Louisville Cardinals and was selected with the second overall pick by the Bullets in the 1968 NBA draft. He was named the NBA Most Valuable Player during his rookie season and joined Wilt Chamberlain as the only two players in NBA history to accomplish the feat. Unseld won an NBA championship with the Bullets in 1978. After retiring from playing in 1981, he worked with the Bullets as a vice president, head coach and general manager.

Unseld was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1988 and the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame in 2006.

Unseld starred for the Seneca High School team that won Kentucky state championships in 1963 and 1964. He was recruited by over 100 colleges, including the University of Kentucky. Unseld became the first African-American athlete to be offered an athletic scholarship to the school when Kentucky Wildcats men's basketball coach Adolph Rupp attempted to recruit him to the team. Integration leaders in Louisville tried to persuade Unseld to attend the University of Kentucky and stated that "it would be good for Kentucky and the Southeastern Conference."[1] However, he chose to enroll at the University of Louisville in 1965 where he played center for the school's freshman team and averaged 35.8 points and 23.6 rebounds over 14 games. Unseld lettered for Louisville as a sophomore (1965–66), junior (1966–67), and senior (1967–68), scored 1,686 points (20.6 average) and grabbed 1,551 rebounds (18.9 average) over 82 games. He led the Missouri Valley Conference in rebounding all three years.

Unseld earned NCAA All-American honors in 1967 and 1968 and led Louisville to a 60–22 record during his collegiate career, making trips to the NIT tournament in 1966 and NCAA tournament in 1967 and 1968. He is a member of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity.

Unseld was selected as the second overall pick by the Baltimore Bullets in the 1968 NBA draft.[2] He was also selected by his hometown Kentucky Colonels of the American Basketball Association (ABA) in the 1968 ABA draft.[3] Unseld was offered contracts by both teams but opted to sign with the Bullets of the more successful NBA despite them allegedly offering less money.[3] After signing Unseld, Bullets owner Earl Foreman proclaimed that "this contract represents the most attractive and rewarding contract that has or will be signed by any player in the NBA this year."[3]

In his first career game, Unseld recorded 8 points and 22 rebounds in a 124–116 Baltimore win over the Detroit Pistons.[4] On October 19, Unseld recorded his first double-double of his career after recording 13 points and 20 rebounds in a 124–121 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers.[5] On November 22, Unseld recorded 20 points and a career-high 29 rebounds in a 121–110 loss to the 76ers.[6]

As a rookie, Unseld helped lead the Bullets (which had finished in last place in the Eastern division the previous year) to a 57–25 record and a division title. Unseld averaged 18.2 rebounds per game that year, and joined fellow future Hall of Famer Wilt Chamberlain to become the second player ever to win the Rookie of the Year Award and the Most Valuable Player Award in the same year. Unseld was also named to the NBA All-Rookie First Team, and also claimed the Sporting News MVP that year.

Unseld was one of the best defensive players of his era, and in 1975, he led the NBA in rebounding. The following season, he led the NBA in field goal percentage with a .561 percentage.

Unseld took the Bullets franchise to four NBA Finals, and won the championship in 1978 over the Seattle SuperSonics, in which he was named the Finals MVP. He ended his playing career following the 1980–81 season, and his No. 41 jersey was retired by the Bullets shortly thereafter.

Famed for his rebounding, bone-jarring picks and ability to ignite a fast break with his crisp, accurate outlet passes, Unseld made up for his lack of size with brute strength and sheer determination. In 984 NBA games – all with the Bullets – Unseld averaged a double-double in points and rebounds, with averages of 10.8 points and 14.0 rebounds per game. He also averaged 3.9 assists, excellent for a center, in the 36 minutes he played per game. Unseld was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1988, and in 1996, he was named as one of the NBA's 50 Greatest Players of all time. [7]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wes_Unseld

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William Sessions, former FBI chief. 1930-2020.

Yup. We are starting to see people born in the 1930's hit the big nine-zero.

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Dame Vera Lynn, British singer of the two eternally-memorable songs of the Blitz:



LONDON (AP) — Dame Vera Lynn, the endearingly popular “Forces’ Sweetheart” who serenaded British troops during World War II, has died at 103.

During the war and long after, Lynn got crowds singing, smiling and crying with sentimental favorites such as “We’ll Meet Again,” and “The White Cliffs of Dover.”

“The family are deeply saddened to announce the passing of one of Britain’s best-loved entertainers at the age of 103,″ her family said in a statement. “Dame Vera Lynn, who lived in Ditchling, East Sussex, passed away earlier today, 18 June 2020, surrounded by her close family.”

https://apnews.com/f3b03161a5fa4e2491c7bc7fb1e7c8b1

Singer of hope... and humanity.... in the free country that needed both most at the time, when the enemy offered nothing but dread, despair, death, and destruction. Do we now have anyone like that?





FILE - In this Friday Aug. 20, 2010 file photo, Dame Vera Lynn attends a ceremony to mark the 70th anniversary of the Battle of Britain. in central London. The family of World War II forces sweetheart Vera Lynn says she has died. She was 103 it was reported on Thursday, June 18, 2020. (AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis, File)

For the adults:





For the children:

[Tim Randal Walker]

Looked at the Wikipedia article for Vera Lynn. She was born March 20th, 1917, during World War I. She was well into her career by the time Britain was confronted by World War II.

The "forces' Sweetheart" would have been 23 years old during the Battle of Britain ( summer of 1940).

Of course, the 20th was a rather tumultuous century, so she would have seen enormous changes during the course of her long life. She a young adult during a Crisis a lifetime ago and survived long enough to reach another Crisis era.

Oddly enough, once someone reaches their hundredth birthday, I think of them as a sort of time traveler.

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(06-19-2020, 01:06 PM)Tim Randal Walker Wrote: Looked at the Wikipedia article for Vera Lynn.  She was born March 20th, 1917, during World War I.  She was well into her career by the time Britain was confronted by World War II.  

The "forces' Sweetheart" would have been 23 years old during the Battle of Britain ( summer of 1940).

Of course, the 20th was a rather tumultuous century, so she would have seen enormous changes during the course of her long life.  She a young adult during a Crisis a lifetime ago and survived long enough to reach another Crisis era.

Oddly enough, once someone reaches their hundredth birthday, I think of them as a sort of time traveler.

She still reaches us in this Crisis Era. She reminds us of the great human needs of a Crisis Era. Do we have anyone like her now?

OK, things are not so desperate now as they were in Britain in 1940... and they are unlikely to ever get that bad here. 

I look at all the dislocations and the friendships on hold, the frustrations of the dreams of many of us. I have gone through some rough times over the last few years... and I personally need to connect with others. In her time, multitudes with deep roots where they were were suddenly relocated to strange and unpleasant places even if they were in the only "good guy" power in Europe then at war. Maybe I say something excessive in self-pity if I say that I am uprooted yet stranded in a place in which I never felt comfortable. 

Were I thinking of the song to sing it would have the title "I Need to Love"... something difficult for someone with my problem on DMS-IV. Better what I have than anything else there, but it is certainly miserable. I don't do bad things to people, but I can certainly make people uncomfortable without trying -- and often despite trying to do so.  But I digress. With someone like her she expresses what everyone feels as if it were unique to the person who hears her song.  But this is a very different Crisis. As late as 1932, persecuting people for a specific religion was something that modern people just did not do. One year later religious bigotry became a core principle of a sick political order. Today we have gotten smug about respiratory infections as killers in their own right... maybe they kill people dying of other causes or poor people in very poor countries, but not here in America except for.... and then 120 thousand Americans die of something that just does not happen here.   

We are all time travelers in a way. Time moves even if we don't. I do a simple mathematical exercise... subtract my age from my year of birth, and I get 1891. Think of how long ago that was. America was a nation on wheels, but those wheels were on a train, bicycle, buggy, or pram. There were still many veterans of the American Civil War around. Telephones, telephones, phonographs, and electric lights were present but rare. Wireless communication )the foundation of radio) had yet to come into existence.  My maternal grandmother was born that year, and she lived until I was seventeen -- so I knew people born back then. So if I seem a fogy when it comes to the newfangled technology of the cell phone... there is a good reason. How far back was 1891? In musical composition. Johannes Brahms, Anton Bruckner, and Giuseppe Verdi were still alive. Sergei Prokofiev and Ernest Honegger were born that year, and they have been gone for nearly seventy years. Politics? Russia had a Tsar, Turkey a Sultan, Iran a shah, China an Emperor, Germany and Austria-Hungary Kaisers, Italy and Portugal kings -- and those are not returning. Colonial rule was the norm except in the Americas and western Europe. America had 44 states, and we were on our 23rd President  (and halfway to our next one). Some things don't change.

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Joe Sinnott (/ˈsɪnət/; October 16, 1926 – June 25, 2020) was an American comic book artist. Working primarily as an inker, Sinnott is best known for his long stint on Marvel Comics' Fantastic Four, from 1965 to 1981 (and briefly in the late 1980s), initially over the pencils of Jack Kirby. During his 60 years as a Marvel freelancer and then salaried artist working from home, Sinnott inked virtually every major title, with notable runs on The Avengers, The Defenders and Thor.

Marvel impresario Stan Lee in the mid-2000s cited Sinnott as the company's most in-demand inker, saying jocularly, "[P]encilers used to hurl all sorts of dire threats at me if I didn't make certain that Joe, and only Joe, inked their pages. I knew I couldn't satisfy everyone and I had to save the very most important strips for [him]. To most pencilers, having Joe Sinnott ink their artwork was tantamount to grabbing the brass ring."[1] Sinnott's art appeared on two US Postal Service commemorative stamps in 2007, and he continued to ink The Amazing Spider-Man Sunday comic strip until his retirement in 2019.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Sinnott

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Good riddance and ROAST IN HELL for one of the most disgusting terrorists in American history. He committed a literal crime against God
 (see below).

Fitting encounter: at the point of judgment he finds that God is African-American. When I made a similar judgment of Holocaust perpetrators I suggested that God might be Jewish. I suppose that if God is omnipotent he can choose whatever identity fits Him... does that make sense?

 
Thomas Edwin Blanton Jr. (June 20, 1938 – June 26, 2020) was an American terrorist and convicted felon, formerly serving a life sentence for his role as conspirator in the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in Birmingham, Alabama in 1963, which killed four young African-American girls (Carole Robertson, Cynthia Wesley, Addie Mae Collins, and Denise McNair).[1] Blanton, along with Bobby Frank Cherry, was convicted in 2001 in a highly publicized trial of the cold case.

Blanton was prosecuted by the state and convicted of murder in a jury trial in 2001. He was sentenced to life in state prison, with the eventual possibility of parole. His Alabama Department of Corrections AIS is 00216691.

He was housed at Holman Correctional Facility in Atmore, Alabama.[3] Blanton went before the parole board on August 3, 2016. Parole was denied and deferred until 2021.[4]


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Edwin_Blanton_Jr.

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Go ahead. Hate this virus.




Over one eighth of a million in America alone. That is nearly four times our usual highway death toll (which has tended to decrease due to better roads, stricter law enforcement, better medical treatment, and safer vehicles).

How big is that death toll?

Bigger than such college towns as

Ann Arbor, Michigan (University of Michigan)
Berkeley, California (University of California)
College Station, Texas (Texas A&M)
Provo, Utah (Brigham Young University)
Norman, Oklahoma (University of Oklahoma)
Columbia, Missouri (University of Missouri).

and the toll likely surpasses Athens, Georgia today (University of Georgia)

Already well more than South Bend, Indiana (Notre Dame -- which is surprisingly not a giant university despite its reputation) and Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and Boulder, Colorado (University of Colorado)... and a city best known for Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut.

all respected colleges in their milieus, Aggie jokes notwithstanding.

Do you remember the movie Fargo?  Fine piece of black humor. The city is the biggest in North Dakota, and bigger than I thought it was. 124,682. Also in the group as biggest cities in their states that the COVID-19 plague has surpassed include Billings, Montana and Manchester, New Hampshire. Next biggest city in a state to be surpassed: Charleston, South Carolina.

State capitals?
Hartford, Connecticut.
Springfield, Illinois. (Abraham Lincoln, whose tomb is there, would not be proud of the job that Donald Trump is doing).
Lansing, Michigan.
Topeka, Kansas.

Columbia, South Carolina -- next on the list to surpass.  

Also noteworthy? I'm trying to avoid suburbs that you would not know about unless you live in the area, as their populations can spike

Independence, Missouri, best known as the political base of a President who shares the first four letters of his surname with you-know-who. Yes, Harry Truman would be disgusted.

It's bigger than Lafayette, Louisiana, the unofficial capital of Cajun Country in Louisiana.  I didn;t realize that that city was as large as it is.  

Peoria, Illinois? If you are old enough you remember the expression "It won't play in Peoria", referring to theatrical flops... need I say more?

About 20,000 more than the population of Green Bay, which is the smallest city to have one a major-league sports team (MLB, NFL, NBA, or NHL ) without being a suburb of a bigger city. (I'm not counting Inglewood , California;  the team isn't called the "Inglewood Lakers") -- but it has 100,000 + residents and is known for little else, aside from being a dump, as where the Los Angeles Lakers play their home games. COVID-19 of course surpassed Inglewood.

If you are wonder about such infamous dumps as Flint, Michigan and Gary, Indiana -- having crossed the 100,000 mark on the downside, they are no longer among America's most infamously-awful big cities. They are now among America's most infamous small cities.  

OK, I may get into some heat for calling some cities "dumps"... but for his incompetence and inattention, President Trump deserves far more heat for all the dead bodies associated with COVID-19.

It's all for perspective, folks. As Josef Stalin said, one death is a tragedy and a million is a statistic.

Just imagine taking a Michigan map and finding that Ann Arbor or Lansing has disappeared.

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Creator of the "I (Heart) New York" logo:



Milton Glaser (June 26, 1929 – June 26, 2020) was an American graphic designer. His designs include the I Love New York logo,[1][2] the psychedelic Bob Dylan poster, and the logos for DC Comics, Stony Brook University, and Brooklyn Brewery.[3] In 1954, he also co-founded Push Pin Studios, co-founded New York magazine with Clay Felker, and established Milton Glaser, Inc. in 1974. His artwork has been featured in exhibits, and placed in permanent collections in many museums worldwide.[4] Throughout his long career, he designed many posters, publications and architectural designs. He received many awards for his work, including the National Medal of the Arts award from President Barack Obama in 2009, and was the first graphic designer to receive this award.[4]





https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milton_Glaser

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CARL REINER

Carlton "Carl" Reiner (March 20, 1922 – June 29, 2020) was an American comedian, actor, director, screenwriter, and publisher whose career spanned seven decades. During the early years of television comedy from 1950 to 1957, he co-wrote and acted on Caesar's Hour and Your Show of Shows, starring Sid Caesar. In the 1960s, Reiner was best known as the creator, producer, writer, and actor on The Dick Van Dyke Show.[3][4]

Reiner famously formed a comedy duo with Mel Brooks in "2000 Year Old Man" and acted in films such as It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963), The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming (1966) and the Ocean's film series (2001–2007). He also had great success as a film director and writer and in the 1970s and 1980s. He co-wrote and directed some of Steve Martin's most successful films, including The Jerk (1979), and also directed notable comedies such as Where's Poppa? (1970), Oh, God! (1977), and All of Me (1984). Over his long and distinguished career, Reiner won many awards and honors including nine Emmy Awards[5], one Grammy Award, and The Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. He was the father of actor and director Rob Reiner, author Annie Reiner, and artist Lucas Reiner, and the grandfather of Tracy Reiner.

In 1943, Reiner was drafted into the Army Air Forces and served during World War II, eventually achieving the rank of corporal. He had initially trained to be a radio operator, but after spending three months in the hospital recovering from pneumonia, he was sent to Georgetown University for ten months of training as a French interpreter; it was here that he had his first experience as a director, putting on a Molière play entirely in French. In 1944, after completing language training, he was sent to Hawaii to work as a teleprinter operator. The night before he was scheduled to ship out for an unknown assignment, he attended a production of Hamlet by the Special Services entertainment unit. Following an audition for actor and Major Maurice Evans, he was subsequently transferred to Special Services. Over the following two years, Reiner performed around the Pacific theater, entertaining troops in Hawaii, Guam, Saipan, Tinian and Iwo Jima until he was honorably discharged in 1946.

.Reiner performed in several Broadway musicals (including Inside U.S.A. and Alive and Kicking) and had the lead role in Call Me Mister. In 1950, he was cast by Max Leibman in Sid Caesar's Your Show of Shows, appearing on air in skits while also working alongside writers, such as Mel Brooks and Neil Simon. Reiner also worked on Caesar's Hour with Brooks, Simon, Woody Allen, Larry Gelbart, Mel Tolkin, Mike Stewart, Aaron Ruben, Sheldon Keller, and Gary Belkin.

Starting in 1960, Reiner teamed with Brooks as a comedy duo on The Steve Allen Show. Their performances on television and stage included Reiner playing the straight man in 2000 Year Old Man. Eventually, the routine expanded into a series of 5 comedy albums and a 1975 animated television special, with the last album in the series winning a Grammy Award for Spoken Comedy Album.[12][13] The act gave Brooks "an identity as a comic performer for the first time," said Reiner.[14] Brooks's biographer, William Holtzman, called their 12-minute act "an ingenious jazz improvisation ...",[14] while Gerald Nachman described Reiner's part in guiding the act:

Quote:The routine relies totally on the team's mental agility and chemistry. It's almost heresy to imagine Brooks performing it with any other straight man. Reiner was a solid straight man to Caesar, but with Brooks he is the second-banana supreme...guiding his partner's churning comic mind.[14][15]

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Reiner with Goldie Hawn on the set of Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In on January 16, 1970

In 1959, Reiner developed a television pilot titled Head of the Family, based on his own personal and professional life. However, the network did not like Reiner in the lead role for unknown reasons. In 1961, it was recast and re-titled The Dick Van Dyke Show and became an iconic series, making stars of his lead actors Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore. In addition to writing many of the episodes, Reiner occasionally appeared as temperamental show host Alan Brady. The series ran from 1961 to 1966. In 1966, Reiner co-starred in The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming.



On The Dick Van Dyke Show, he began his directing career. After the series ended its run, his first film feature was an adaptation of Joseph Stein's play Enter Laughing (1967), which, in turn, was based on Reiner's semi-autobiographical 1958 novel of the same name. Balancing directing, producing, writing, and acting, Reiner worked on a wide range of films and television programs. Films from his early directing career include Where's Poppa? (1970), Oh, God! (1977), and The Jerk (1979).



In one of his memoirs, he writes, "Of all the films I have directed, only Where's Poppa? is universally acknowledged as a cult classic. A cult classic, as you may know, is a film that was seen by a small minority of the world's film goers, who insist it is one of the greatest, most daring, and innovative moving pictures ever made. Whenever two or more cult members meet, they will quote dialogue from the classic and agree that 'the film was ahead of its time.' To be designated a genuine cult classic, it is of primary importance that the film fail to earn back the cost of making, marketing, and distributing it. Where’s Poppa? was made in 1969 for a little over $1 million. According to the last distribution statements I saw, it will not break even until it earns another $650,000."[16]



Reiner had a large role in the early career of Steve Martin, by directing and co-writing four films for the comedian: The Jerk in 1979, Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid in 1982, The Man with Two Brains in 1983, and All of Me in 1984. Reiner also appeared in both The Jerk, playing a version of himself, and Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid.

Reiner with Dick Van Dyke in 2000

In 1989, he directed [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bert_Rigby,_You%27re_a_Fool]Bert Rigby, You're a Fool. In 1990, he narrated the Grimm children's story "The Musicians of Bremen" (music by Bernard Rogers) for a CD of classical music for children.

In 2000, Reiner was honored with the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor at the Kennedy Center, where he was honored by fellow friends and comedians, Mel Brooks, Dick Van Dyke, Mary Tyler Moore, Steve Martin, Rob Reiner, Jerry Seinfeld, Ray Romano, and Joy Behar.



A year later, he portrayed Saul Bloom in Ocean's Eleven, Steven Soderbergh's remake of 1960's Ocean's 11, and later reprised the role in Ocean's Twelve (2004) and Ocean's Thirteen (2007). From 2004 to 2005, Reiner voiced Sarmoti in Father of the Pride.



Reiner was the author of several books, including his 2004 memoir My Anecdotal Life: A Memoir and novels, such as his 2006 novel NNNNN: A Novel. In American Film, he expressed his philosophy on writing comedy: "You have to imagine yourself as not somebody very special, but somebody very ordinary. If you imagine yourself as somebody really normal and if it makes you laugh, it's going to make everybody laugh. If you think of yourself as something very special, you'll end up a pedant and a bore. If you start thinking about what's funny, you won't be funny, actually. It's like walking. How do you walk? If you start thinking about it, you'll trip."

In May 2009, he guest-starred as a clinic patient on the season finale of House. Reiner also voiced Santa in Merry Madagascar and reprised his role in the Penguins of Madagascar episode "The All Nighter Before Christmas." In December 2009, he guest-starred as a television producer Marty Pepper on Two and a Half Men. In June 2010, Reiner guest starred in Hot in Cleveland as Elka Ostrovsky's date and reprised the role in July. He also made appearances in The Cleveland Show as Murray and wrote the story for the episode "Your Show of Shows", named after the program that started his career. In October 2013 and January 2014, Reiner reprised his role on Two and a Half Men.


In 2012, Reiner appeared as a guest on Jerry Seinfeld's show Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. They talked at a diner about his comedy career and Reiner invited Jerry to come and have dinner with Mel Brooks and himself. According to Reiner, every night, Brooks heads to Reiner's house to eat, watch Jeopardy (he tapes it) and watch movies. The one rule for movies: It has to be one where "somebody says, 'Secure the perimeter!' or 'Get some rest.'" Brooks "falls asleep with his mouth open" every time.[17]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Reiner