Monday, August 6, 2012

Ruggiero Ricci

Violinist -- via the Guardian.








Metin Erksan

Film director and art historian -- via Hurriyet Daily News.

Marguerite Piazza

Soprano -- via the Memphis Commercial Appeal. Best known for her extensive appearances on "Your Shows of Shows" in early television.

Jorge Luke

Actor - via westernsallaitaliana.blogspot.com.


Chavela Vargas aka Isabel Vargas Lizano

Singer of rancheras -- via the L.A. Times.





Sidney Reznick

Comedy writer -- via the Hollywood Reporter. Holy cow -- he worked in radio and TV. He wrote for Hope, Durante, Jolson, Merman, Silvers, Wynn, and Henry Morgan, among others. He wrote for game shows, sitcoms, variety shows.


Bill Doss

Musician -- via the Rolling Stone. He co-founded the Elephant 6 Recording Company; he played with Olivia Tremor Control, the Sunshine Fix, and Apples in Stereo.

Abdi Jeylani Maloq aka Marshale

Comedian -- via the Independent. Murdered for mocking militants.

George Armitage Miller

Cognitive psychologist -- via the New York Times. Best known for his "Magical Number Seven" paper (in which he described the phenomenon that people, on average, can only maintain seven items in their short-term memories), and for Miller's Law, which states, "In order to understand what another person is saying, you must assume it is true and try to imagine what it could be true of."

August Kowalczyk

Actor and Holocaust survivor -- via the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.


Sunday, August 5, 2012

Maeve Binchy

Writer -- via the New York Times.


Jonathan Hardy

Actor, writer, and director -- via the New Zealand Herald. Most notably, he wrote the screen play for "Breaker Morant."



Tony Epper

Stuntman and actor -- via emmys.tv.


Conrade Gamble II

Stuntman and stunt coordinator -- via the Hollywood Reporter.

Paco Moran aka Francisco Moran Ruiz

Actor -- via westernboothill.blogspot.com.

Andrzej Lapicki

Actor -- via rp.pl.

Ismail Hutson aka Datuk Ismail Omar

Actor -- via The Star.

Fern Persons

Actress -- via the Chicago Tribune. Known most for her work on stage and extensive work in Golden Age radio, in such shows as "Jack Armstrong, the All-American Boy," "Author's Playhouse," "The Bartons," "Hot Copy," and "Midstream." Films include "Field of Dreams" and "Hoosiers."


Friday, August 3, 2012

Traleg Kyabgon Rinpoche

Lama -- via Shambala Sun.

Mihaela Ursuleasa

Pianist -- via the BBC.

Mavelikkara K Velukutty Nair

Master of the mridangam -- via Kerala News.

Karl Benjamin

Artist -- via the L.A. Times.




Don Bagley

Jazz bassist -- via asmac.org. He worked with many, many people, including Nat King Cole, Phil Woods, Stan Kenton, Julie London, Dexter Gordon, Zoot Sims, and Ben Webster.





Sepp Mayerl aka Blasl-Sepp

Mountaineer -- via the Austrian Times.

Carol "Siggy" Kendall

Children's author -- via the Lawrence Journal-World. Nicely written!

Thursday, August 2, 2012

Adam Cullen

Artist -- via the Sydney Morning Herald.

Babu Ram Ishara aka Roshan Lal Sharma

Film director and screenwriter -- via the Times of India.

Edward Lee "Big Ed" Stevens

First baseman for the Dodgers and the Pirates -- via legacy.com and the Houston Chronicle. Interestingly, he was replaced in 1947 by Jackie Robinson; in 1948, he replaced Hank Greenberg.


John Keegan

Military historian, writer, and journalist -- via the Telegraph. Best known for his brilliant work "The Face of Battle."


Norman Alden aka Norman Adelberg

Character actor -- via the Hollywood Performer. He was in everything! This remarkable performer amassed 237 IMDb credits. He could be seen in the corner of your screen in everything from "The Untouchables" to "My Three Sons" to "Gunsmoke." He was the voice of Aquaman on "Superfriends." He played Coach Leroy Fedders, who drowned face-down in a bowl of Mary Hartman's soup on "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman." He was Frank Heflin, the scientific mastermind who aided "Electrawoman and Dynagirl" on their cheesy Chicago kids' superheroine series. He was Lou, who ran in the diner in "Back to the Future," and the lackadaisical Cameraman Bill in "Ed Wood." He was always there, and he never phoned it in. A great professional!

Suzy Kalter Gershman

Writer and master shopper; author of the "Born to Shop" series -- via the New York Times.


Big Walter Smith

Blues singer and leader of the Groove Merchants -- via the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.

Darryl Grant Cotton

Singer/songwriter, TV host, and actor -- via The Age.

Larry Hoppen

Singer, guitarist, and co-founder of pop music group Orleans -- via the Poughkeepsie Journal.





Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Franz West

Artist -- via the Guradian.

Marylou Cunningham Belles

Mets fan who got the last laugh -- via Yardbarker.


Oswald Paya Sardinas

Civil rights leader -- via the BBC.


Robert Ledley

Developer of the full-body computerized tomography (CT) scanner -- via the Telegraph.

Thelma Glass

Professor of geography and last surviving organizer of the Montgomery, AL anti-segregation bus boycott -- via the New York Times.


Gore Vidal

Author, playwright and gadfly -- via the New York Times. Always pithy and provocative, Vidal used his insider's perspective on the American political system to inform his contrarian work. Whether he was exploding the myths of American history in his novels, or writing fabulously well-written and -conceived essays, or just spouting off on the usual governmental insanity, he was a lot of fun to listen to and read. He thought of the American Empire as on its last legs, and our state on the verge of becoming a military dictatorship. He might be right. However, despite his cynicism, I believe that he espoused these thoughts in part to stimulate us to turn away from the seeming inevitable and act out of our higher selves.

UPDATE: August 2 -- the New York Times obituary referenced in my initial post contained several egregious errors -- via Gawker.