Obituaries

[pbrower2a]

Just a reminder of the friends that President Trump has.

Quote:A Russian journalist known for his criticism of President Vladimir Putin has died after being beaten by unknown attackers, it has been reported.

Nikolai Andrushchenko, 73, who co-founded the Novy Peterburg newspaper, was attacked six weeks ago and had been in a coma since then.

He died on Wednesday in St Petersburg.

His attackers have not been identified but Novy Peterburg editor Denis Usov linked the assault to articles in the newspaper about corruption in the city.  

Mr Andrushchenko was a member of the St Petersburg city council from 1990 until 1993. He made his name writing about human rights issues and crime.

In 2007 he was imprisoned on charges of defamation and obstruction of justice following his coverage of a murder investigation and trial in St Petersburg, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).

At the time Mr Andrushchenko's colleagues said they thought his detention was due to Novy Peterburg's critical coverage of local authorities ahead of parliamentary elections.

In November that year he was beaten by unidentified attackers, CPJ said.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/...91461.html

[pbrower2a]

Erin Marie Moran (October 18, 1960 – April 22, 2017) was an American actress, best known for playing Joanie Cunningham on the sitcom Happy Days and its spin-off Joanie Loves Chachi.

Moran was cast as Jenny Jones in the television series Daktari, which ran from 1966 to 1969. In 1968, she made her feature-film debut in How Sweet It Is! with Debbie Reynolds. She appeared in 80 Steps to Jonah (1969) and Watermelon Man (1970). She made regular appearances on The Don Rickles Show in 1972. She made guest appearances in The Courtship of Eddie's Father, My Three Sons, Bearcats! and Family Affair. As a young child, she was also on the television series Gunsmoke.

In 1974, Moran was cast to play her best known role, Joanie Cunningham on the sitcom Happy Days. She played the feisty younger sister of Richie Cunningham (Ron Howard). Moran continued the role in 1982 in the short-lived spin-off series Joanie Loves Chachi, alongside Scott Baio. She won the Young Artist Award for Best Young Actress in a New Television Series for her role. After Joanie Loves Chachi's cancellation in 1983, she returned to Happy Days for its final season.

Moran made several other television guest appearances, including The Love Boat, Murder, She Wrote and Diagnosis: Murder.
In 2008, she was a contestant on VH1's reality show Celebrity Fit Club.
In 2010, she made an appearance in the independent comedy feature Not Another B Movie.
In 2013, despite reports that she would be reunited with former Happy Days co-stars Henry Winkler, Ron Howard, and Scott Baio in the fourth season of Arrested Development, she did not appear in the revamped Netflix series.[1][2]

.....

On April 22, 2017, TMZ reported that Moran had died. Harrison County, Indiana, authorities were alerted to an unresponsive female, later identified as Moran. She was 56.[7]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erin_Moran
[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erin_Moran#cite_note-7][/url]

[pbrower2a]

Robert M. Pirsig, author of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_M._Pirsig

[Ragnarök_62]

(04-22-2017, 09:50 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Erin Marie Moran (October 18, 1960 – April 22, 2017) was an American actress, best known for playing Joanie Cunningham on the sitcom Happy Days and its spin-off Joanie Loves Chachi.

<snip>

.....

On April 22, 2017, TMZ reported that Moran had died. Harrison County, Indiana, authorities were alerted to an unresponsive female, later identified as Moran. She was 56.[7]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erin_Moran
[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erin_Moran#cite_note-7][/url]

Damn, that hits way close to home. I remember watching Daktari as a kid, Happy Days as an adolescent. She's only 2 years my elder, even.  For fuck sake, the big "C", even. May she ever rest in peace, man. What a loss.
[I'll be the double nickel next month, May.]  ... I wonder how the "Lassi folks are doing" .

[Eric the Green]

(04-24-2017, 11:03 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Robert M. Pirsig, author of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_M._Pirsig

Respected and influential in counter-cultural circles and among the reflective and rebellious creative folk. His quest for "quality" echoed my own. His philosophy resembles Bergson, William James and Whitehead, as well as influenced strongly by Plato and Buddhism. He burst through the gap between the false isolated self and the world. I heard much about his Zen book without actually ever reading it. Sorry to see another voice of authenticity slip into the next world.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirsig%27s...of_Quality

[pbrower2a]

Robert Jonathan Demme (/ˈdɛmi/; February 22, 1944 – April 26, 2017)[1] was an American filmmaker, producer and screenwriter. Demme rose to prominence in the 1980s with his comedy films Melvin and Howard (1980), Swing Shift (1984), Something Wild (1986) and Married to the Mob (1988). He became best known for directing The Silence of the Lambs (1991), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Director. He later directed the acclaimed films Philadelphia (1993) and Rachel Getting Married (2008).



Much more here.

[pbrower2a]

Good riddance to this vile cult leader and sexual pervert.

Quote:LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) Disgraced preacher Tony Alamo, who was convicted in Arkansas of sexually abusing girls he considered his wives, has died in a North Carolina prison.

He was 82.

The U.S. Bureau of Prisons says Alamo died Tuesday while in a federal prison hospital in Butner, N.C.

Alamo was convicted in 2009 of taking underage girls across state lines for sex, including a 9-year-old.

He was sentenced to 175 years in prison.

The one-time street preacher in Los Angeles expanded his anti-Catholic, apocalyptic ministry into a multimillion-dollar network of businesses and property.

Members were once known for designing elaborate jackets for celebrities, including Michael Jackson.

Alamo preached that polygamy was OK.

Witnesses say he made all the decisions at his compound in southwest Arkansas, including who got married and who was allowed to eat.

http://www.kwtx.com/content/news/Disgrac...ml?ref=483

I suppose that he gets to experience the 'post-life' existence as depicted in Dante's Inferno.

[Ragnarök_62]

(05-05-2017, 10:38 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: This one happened a few weeks ago. RIP John Lever (of the 1961 cohort):

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2017/m...ummer-dies

We Ataris are increasing our rate of demise ....

==============================================

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



Dude.... It's no surprise.   We Joneser X'ers have that as our destiny. We have in all our lives are the high point in
social pathologies. In youth, we set records, and likewise in mid age just continue on with our issues. It's still a live fast, die young. Those of us who live on will break eggs to make omelets.  







Can ya did it, man?

[gabrielle]

Edward Crawford, protester from iconic Ferguson photo, dead from self-inflicted gunshot in St. Louis

Quote:Crawford would become a nationally recognized symbol of the unrest in Ferguson when, dressed in an American flag tank top and clutching a bag of potato chips, he picked up a tear-gas canister and tossed it back toward riot gear-clad officers. The scene was captured by the lens of St. Louis Post-Dispatch photographer Robert Cohen and was part of the package that earned the paper a Pulitzer Prize for their photography of the unrest.

Crawford Jr., 27, died Thursday night after what police say was a self-inflicted gunshot wound, leaving behind four children.

According to police, Crawford was riding in the backseat of a vehicle that evening when he began telling the two other occupants that he was depressed.

“The victim began expressing he was distraught over personal matters to the witnesses,” Leah Freeman, a spokeswoman for the St. Louis Metropolitan Police, said in a statement. “The witnesses heard the victim rummaging in the backseat, then heard a gunshot and observed the victim had sustained a gunshot wound to the head...”

...His death comes eight months after the murder of Darren Seals, a prominent Ferguson activist who was found shot dead in a burning car last September, prompting some to question whether Crawford’s death was truly a suicide. St. Louis County PD said Friday that the investigation into Seals’s death remains active. (Another man, Deandre Joshua was found shot to death in a burning car in Ferguson on the night of the grand jury decision not to indict officer Darren Wilson)...

...Enshrined in the minds of many as a symbol of defiant protest — which he said in interviews had brought attention to issues of police impunity and brutality that had long been overlooked — Crawford always expressed skepticism about whether real, sustained change would ever come to the people of Ferguson.

“You’re gonna write your story, and you’re gonna leave town, and nothing is going to change,” he told this reporter in August 2014. “One day, one month, one year from now, after you leave, it’s still going to be f–ked up in Ferguson.”

[pbrower2a]

Adolph Gustav Kiefer (June 27, 1918 – May 5, 2017[1]) was an American competition swimmer, Olympic competitor, the last surviving gold medalist of the 1936 Summer Olympics and former world record-holder. He was the first man in the world to swim the 100-yard backstroke in under one minute.[2] Kiefer was also an inventor and innovator of new products related to aquatics competition.

He became the first man to break the one-minute mark in the 100-yard backstroke while competing as a 16-year-old in the Illinois High School Championships of 1935, swimming 59.8 seconds. His 1936 Illinois state championship backstroke time of 58.5 seconds was the Illinois state high-school record until 1960. On April 6, 1940, Kiefer set another world record, swimming the 100-yard backstroke in 57.9 seconds. He broke twenty-three records after breaking the one-minute backstroke mark.[4] Kiefer set a world record for the 100-meter backstroke of 1:04.8 on January 18, 1936, at Brennan Pools in Detroit, Michigan.

Eighteen-year-old Kiefer represented the United States at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany.[4] On August 14, Kiefer won the gold medal in the men's 100-meter backstroke.[4] He set new Olympic records in the first-round heats (1:06.9), the second-round heats (1:06.8), and the event final (1:05.9). His Olympic Record would stand for over 20 years, finally broken by David Theile in the 1956 Summer Olympics.

He returned home a national hero, and began traveling with other U.S. Olympic medalists on a tour of Europe, China, Japan, and South America, during which he challenged other great swimmers in those locations to individual races.
In over 2,000 races, Kiefer lost only twice. At the National AAU swimming championship in April 1943, University of Michigan All-American swimmer Harry Holiday, Jr. finally went head-to-head with world-record holder Kiefer. Holiday beat him in the 150-yard backstroke at the AAU meet.[5] The defeat was the first for Kiefer in eight years.[6][7]

In his first two months of varsity competition, Holiday broke two of Kiefer's world records, lowering the 100-yard backstroke mark to 57 seconds and the 200-meter standard to 2:22.9.[8] In August 1943, the NCAA also recognized Holiday as the holder of the new world record in the 150-yard backstroke with a mark of 1:31.5.[9] Shortly thereafter, Kiefer was asked to audition for the role of "Tarzan", but answered the call of arms instead, joining the U.S. Navy.

He joined the U.S. Navy as a Chief Petty Officer in late 1943 and was initially assigned to the physical fitness and swimming division of the United States Navy's Bureau of Naval Personnel (BUPERS) as a Chief Athletics Specialist.[10] When the Navy realized that it was losing more lives to drowning than to enemy bullets, Kiefer was appointed to a committee to set new guidelines for safety and training. He quickly moved through the ranks, becoming Officer in Charge of Swimming for the entire U.S. Navy, training over 13,000 navy swim instructors to do the "Victory backstroke", a term Kiefer coined himself.[2] Victory backstroke was a simplified version of the modern backstroke that allowed novice swimmers to breathe easily (on their backs) while leveraging what Adolph considered to be a more buoyant stroke style for novice swimmers. Victory backstroke was performed with both arms underwater, sweeping down simultaneously (instead of using alternating arms), while using a freestyle kick. The American Red Cross would later add Victory Backstroke to their swim training protocols.
By the war's end, he had reached the rank of Lieutenant, Senior Grade.

In 1947, he established Adolph Kiefer & Associates, Inc. in Chicago, which has provided swimmers with training, safety, and competition equipment.[10] His company was responsible for the development of the nylon tank suit in 1948.[11] and debuted the first nylon swimsuit supplied to the U.S. Olympic Swim Team—a marked improvement over the wool and cotton suits available at the time.
Kiefer subsequently devoted himself to community service, combining swimming and philanthropy in innovative ways. In the 1960s he worked with Mayor Richard J. Daley to build swimming-pools across the inner city of Chicago, providing the facilities needed for thousands of children to learn to swim. Kiefer actively supported Swim Across America, a nonprofit organization that raises funds for cancer research, and participated in SAA public swimming events well into his 70s and 80s.[12]

Kiefer was an "Honor Swimmer" member of the inaugural class inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 1965.[13] In 1966 he patented the first design for a no-wave, non-turbulence racing lane.
In 2008 Kiefer celebrated his 90th birthday in Omaha at the 2008 U.S. Swimming Olympic Trials, where he awarded medals for the 200-meter backstroke. On June 27, 2012, he celebrated his birthday again in Omaha at the 2012 U.S. Swimming Olympic Trials—by awarding the medals for the 200-meter backstroke. In 2013 USA Swimming named Kiefer the "father of American swimming" in recognition of his contributions to American swimming.[14]

On the morning of May 5, 2017, Kiefer died at home in Wadsworth, Illinois.[15]

[pbrower2a]

Great player for the Detroit Lions, one of the last survivors from the last Detroit Lions' championship team of 1957.

The Detroit Lions were not then the laughing stock of the NFL as they have typically been since the 1960s.

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

[pbrower2a]

Mauno Koivisto, President of Finland while his country's giant neighbor to the east and south was undergoing great political upheavals.

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

[pbrower2a]

Powers Allen Boothe (June 1, 1948 – May 14, 2017) was an American television and film actor. Some of his most notable roles include his Emmy-winning portrayal of Jim Jones in Guyana Tragedy: The Story of Jim Jones and his turns as TV detective Philip Marlowe in the 1980s, Cy Tolliver on Deadwood, "Curly Bill" Brocious in Tombstone, Vice-President and subsequently President Noah Daniels on 24, and Lamar Wyatt in Nashville.


Much more here.

I will never forget his scary performance as the traitorous spy John Walker in Family of Spies.  

[pbrower2a]

Pioneering feminist:

Roxcy O'Neal Bolton (June 3, 1926 – May 17, 2017)[1] was an American feminist and civil and women's rights activist.[2]


In 1966, Bolton helped form Florida's National Organization for Women, serving as charter president of the Miami Chapter and National Vice President in 1969. Also in 1969, she successfully challenged the practice that many store restaurants had of keeping a separate "men only" section. In 1972, she founded Women in Distress, a shelter for homeless women.[3]Also in 1972, she encouraged President Nixon to issue a proclamation honoring Women's Equality Day, which he did.[4] His proclamation was presented to her in recognition of her encouragement.[4]

In 1974, she founded the nation's first Rape Treatment Center at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami, later renamed the Roxcy Bolton Rape Treatment Center in 1993.[5] That same year she organized Florida's first Crime Watch meeting to help stem crime against women. She was also instrumental in bringing several rape cases to the attention of the public, despite police concerns.
She challenged N.O.A.A (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) to change the names of hurricanes to include the names of men,[6] which they did.[4]She was inducted into the Florida Women's Hall of Fame in 1984 for "forcing police and prosecutors to make rape crime a priority".[7] A collection of her artifacts is owned by the Museum of Florida History.[8]

Bolton led the effort to create the Miami Women’s Park, which opened in 1992 as the first outdoor space in America honoring past and present women leaders.[9]

Her Coral Gables home was dedicated as a Florida Heritage Site in 1999.[8][10][11]

Bolton died on the morning of May 17, 2017 at her Coral Gables, Florida home at the age of 90.[12][13]


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

[gabrielle]

Chris Cornell (July 20, 1964 – May 17, 2017)

http://wkrn.com/2017/05/18/representativ...at-age-52/

Quote:Rocker Chris Cornell, who gained fame as the lead singer of the bands Soundgarden and later Audioslave, has died at age 52, according to his representative.  Cornell died in Detroit, where he was on tour. (May 18)

Bumbery called the death “sudden and unexpected” and said his wife and family were shocked by it. The statement said the family would be working closely with the medical examiner to determine the cause and asked for privacy.

With his powerful, nearly four-octave vocal range, Cornell was one of the leading voices of the 1990s grunge movement with Soundgarden, which emerged as one of the biggest bands out of Seattle’s emerging music scene, joining the likes of Nirvana, Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains.

FILE – In this Sept. 5, 2008, file photo, musician Chris Cornell performs on stage during Conde Nast’s Fashion Rocks show in New York. According to his representative, rocker Chris Cornell, who gained fame as the lead singer of Soundgarden and later Audioslave, has died Wednesday night in Detroit at age 52. (AP Photo/Jeff Christensen, File)

Formed in 1984 by Cornell, guitarist Kim Thayil and bassist Hiro Yamamoto, Soundgarden’s third studio album, “Badmotorfinger,” in 1991 spawned popular singles “Jesus Christ Pose,” ″Rusty Cage” and “Outshined” that received regular play on alternative rock radio stations.

Cornell also collaborated with members of what would become Pearl Jam to form Temple of the Dog, which produced a self-titled album in 1991 in tribute to friend Andrew Wood, former frontman for Mother Love Bone.

Three years later, Soundgarden broke through on mainstream radio with the album “Superunknown,” which debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and was nominated for a Grammy for Best Rock Record in 1995. It included hit singles “Spoonman,” ″Fell on Black Days,” ″Black Hole Sun,” ″My Wave” and “The Day I Tried to Live.”

Soundgarden disbanded in 1997 due to tensions in the band, and Cornell pursued a solo career. In 2001, he joined Audioslave, a supergroup that included former Rage Against the Machine members Tom Morello, Brad Wilk and Tim Commerford. The band released three albums in six years and also performed at a concert billed as Cuba’s first outdoor rock concert by an American band, though some Cuban artists have disputed that claim.

Audioslave disbanded in 2007, but Cornell and Soundgarden reunited in 2012 and released the band’s sixth studio album, “King Animal” in 2012.

Cornell also released four solo studio albums and a solo live album. He also released the single “The Promise” in March on iTunes, with all proceeds going to the International Rescue Committee, a global humanitarian aid, relief, and development non-governmental organization.

In addition to his music, Cornell also became involved in philanthropy and started the Chris and Vicky Cornell Foundation to support children facing challenges, including homelessness, poverty, abuse and neglect.

[pbrower2a]

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Roger Ailes, founder and former chief executive of Fox News, the cable news channel popular with conservatives that helped reshape the U.S. political landscape, has died at age 77.

Ailes' widow, Elizabeth Ailes, announced his death in a statement posted on the Fox News website on Thursday. The cause of death was not immediately known.

He resigned from Fox News last July following allegations of sexual harassment, marking an abrupt end to his 20-year reign at the most-watched cable channel in the United States.

Fox News, which Ailes started in 1996 with the backing of media mogul Rupert Murdoch, raised the temperature of on-air debate on U.S. television, generally taking a hardline conservative view. It has had a mixed relationship with U.S. President Donald Trump, a longtime friend of Ailes, but was instrumental in his election victory in November.

Ailes received a severance package of about $40 million when he left Fox News, owned by Twenty-First Century Fox Inc, according to a source familiar with the situation. He went on to serve as an informal adviser to Murdoch.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/roger-ail...nance.html

[Ragnarök_62]

Chris Cornell - 1964-2017

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/18/arts/...pe=article

As it is with too many Jonesers .... Death by suicide.

[gabrielle]

Quote:It was a voice that could sail above the grunge barrage of Soundgarden, with an attack to rival the band’s churning guitars; it was also a voice that gave modest acoustic ballads an existential gravity. At the bottom of its nearly four-octave range, Mr. Cornell’s voice was a baritone with endless reserves of breath and the seething tension of contained power.

Mr. Cornell could have used that remarkable instrument and his rock-star looks to play the standard heroic frontman: a chesty, cocky figure like two of his obvious influences, Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin and Paul Rodgers of Free. But he came from a later generation, one that had grown up on punk iconoclasm as well as metal virtuosity and that was far too self-conscious for the old rock machismo. As the main songwriter for Soundgarden — both on his own and supplying lyrics and melodies for other band members’ riffs — Mr. Cornell helped forge grunge: rock that used all its power to question rather than to exult.

Each in its own way, the leading bands of grunge — Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden and Alice in Chains — found commercial traction with music that sabotaged older assumptions about rock. There was still plenty of aggression in the music, but it was directed inward as much as outward. 

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/18/arts/...voice.html

[gabrielle]

Some of those who may not like the more abrasive, grungy stuff might like this country/bluesy number a little better.  This song is from 1992.

[pbrower2a]

Last baseball player to have been on a team that won a World Series against the Chicago Cubs. 


Edward Frank Mierkowicz (March 6, 1924 – May 19, 2017), nicknamed "Butch" and "Mouse," was a Major League Baseball outfielder who played four seasons with the Detroit Tigers (1945, 1947–48) and St. Louis Cardinals (1950).

Born in Wyandotte, Michigan, Mierkowicz was the son of a factory worker who made gaskets. He lettered in three sports at Roosevelt High School in Wyandotte and caught the eye of legendary Detroit scout, Wish Egan, during a high school baseball game. But upon graduating from high school, Mierkowicz was called up by the Army in 1942. Mierkowicz was discharged after contracting rheumatic fever and was signed by Egan and the Detroit Tigers. Mierkowicz played in Hagerstown, Maryland in 1944 and in Buffalo in 1945.

At the end of the 1945 season, with the Tigers in a pennant race, Mierkowicz was called up. He played in 10 games in his rookie season, batting .133 for a Tigers team that won the 1945 World Series. Mierkowicz stayed with the team for the World Series and was put in as a defensive replacement for Hank Greenberg in the 9th inning of Game 7.[1] Mierkowicz did not bat in the Series but he received a World Series ring in his rookie season.[1] In 1946, Mierkowicz spent most of the season in the minor leagues with Buffalo, but he did play in 21 games with the Tigers, batting .190. In 1948, he appeared in 3 games. He finished his major career on April 19, 1950, with the St. Louis Cardinals. He struck out in his one and only at bat for the Cardinals. Mierkowicz continued to play professional baseball until 1957, including stints in Cuba, Mexico, and the Sacramento Solons of the Pacific Coast League in 1955. After his baseball career ended, Mierkowicz worked for 24 years at a waste treatment plant in Wyandotte, Michigan. He retired in 1984.

He said his Major League career "was like a cup of coffee but no cream" but added that "God gave me the ability to play ball. Made a pretty good living. We didn't make a lot of money, but it was a lot of fun."[1]

With the death of Virgil Trucks in 2013, Mierkowicz became the last living Tiger to play in the 1945 World Series and the last player to have played against the Cubs in a World Series until 2016.[1] There are no living players who played in an earlier World Series for the winning team.

Mierkowicz passed away May 19, 2017.[2]

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