RIP The Final Impression

On this day 27 April death of Ralph Waldo Emerson – Maud Gonne – Hart Crane – Al Hirt

Posted on 29 ApramSat, 27 Apr 2024 00:24:00 -05002024-04-27T00:24:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

Ralph Waldo Emerson
in 1857

On this day in 1882, essayist, lecturer, philosopher and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson died from pneumonia in Concord, Massachusetts at the age of 78. Born on May 25, 1803 Boston. He led the transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was seen as a champion of individualism and a prescient critic of the countervailing pressures of society. He disseminated his thoughts through dozens of published essays and more than 1,500 public lectures across the United States.

Emerson gradually moved away from the religious and social beliefs of his contemporaries, formulating and expressing the philosophy of transcendentalism in his 1836 essay “Nature”. Following this work, he gave a speech entitled “The American Scholar” in 1837, which Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. considered to be America’s “intellectual Declaration of Independence”.

He is one of the key figures of the American romantic movement, and his work has greatly influenced the thinkers, writers and poets that followed him. When asked to sum up his work, he said his central doctrine was “the infinitude of the private man.” Emerson is also well known as a mentor and friend of Henry David Thoreau, a fellow transcendentalist.

Emerson met his first wife, Ellen Louisa Tucker, in Concord, New Hampshire, on Christmas Day, 1827, and married her when she was 18. The couple moved to Boston, with Emerson’s mother, Ruth, moving with them to help take care of Ellen, who was already ill with tuberculosis. Less than two years later, on February 8, 1831, Ellen died, at the age of 20, after uttering her last words: “I have not forgotten the peace and joy”. Emerson was heavily affected by her death and visited her grave in Roxbury daily. In a journal entry dated March 29, 1832, he wrote, “I visited Ellen’s tomb & opened the coffin”.

On January 24, 1835, Emerson wrote a letter to Lydia Jackson proposing marriage. Her acceptance reached him by mail on the 28th. In July 1835, he bought a house on the Cambridge and Concord Turnpike in Concord, Massachusetts, which he named Bush; it is now open to the public as the Ralph Waldo Emerson House.

Emerson changed his wife’s name to Lidian, and would call her Queenie, and sometimes Asia, and she called him Mr. Emerson.

The Final Footprint

Emerson is buried in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Concord, Massachusetts. He was placed in his coffin wearing a white robe given by the American sculptor Daniel Chester French. Other notable final footprints at Sleepy Hollow include; Louisa May Alcott, William Ellery Channing, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Henry David Thoreau.

On this day in 1953, English-born Irish revolutionary, feminist, actress, and muse of William Butler Yeats, Maud Gonne died in Clonskeagh, Ireland at the age of 86. Born Edith Maud Gonne on 21 December 1866 in Tongham near Farnham, Surrey, England. She was won over to Irish nationalism by the plight of evicted people in the Land Wars. In 1889, she first met Yeats, who fell in love with her. Gonne in turn, was in love with Lucien Millevoye a French journalist and right-wing politician with whom she would have two children. Many of Yeats’s poems are inspired by her, or mention her. He wrote the plays The Countess Cathleen and Cathleen Ní Houlihan for her. His poem Aedh wishes for the Cloths of Heaven ends with a reference to her:

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

Few poets have celebrated a woman’s beauty to the extent Yeats did in his lyric verse about Gonne. From his second book to Last Poems, she became the Rose, Helen of Troy (in No second Troy), the Ledaean Body (Leda and the Swan and Among School Children), Cathleen Ní Houlihan, Pallas Athene and Deirdre. Gonne turned down several proposals from Yeats before marrying John MacBride with whom she would have a son, Seán MacBride. She and MacBride would separate in 1904. Gonne and Yeats reportedly finally consummated their relationship in Paris in 1908. Yeats’ long years of fidelity, so to speak, were rewarded at last, although Yeats would later remark that “the tragedy of sexual intercourse is the perpetual virginity of the soul.” The relationship did not develop into a new phase after their night together. Soon afterwards, Gonne wrote to the poet indicating that despite the physical consummation, they could not continue as they had been: “I have prayed so hard to have all earthly desire taken from my love for you and dearest, loving you as I do, I have prayed and I am praying still that the bodily desire for me may be taken from you too.” By January 1909, Gonne was sending Yeats letters praising the advantage given to artists who abstain from sex. Nearly twenty years later, Yeats recalled the night with Gonne in his poem “A Man Young and Old”:

My arms are like the twisted thorn
And yet there beauty lay;
The first of all the tribe lay there
And did such pleasure take;
She who had brought great Hector down
And put all Troy to wreck.

Gonne published her autobiography in 1938, titled A Servant of the Queen.

The Final Footprint – Gonne is interred in Glasnevin Cemetery in Dublin, the largest nondenominational cemetery in Ireland. Her grave is marked by a simple upright stone marker. Upon their deaths, her son, his wife and their son were interred next to her. Michael Collins is also interred at Glasnevin.

On this day in 1932, poet Hart Crane likely died by suicide by jumping overboard from the steamship Orizaba, in the Gulf of Mexico, at the age of 32. Born Harold Hart Crane on 21 July 1899 in Garrettsville, Ohio. Finding both inspiration and provocation in the poetry of T. S. Eliot, Crane wrote modernist poetry that was difficult, highly stylized, and ambitious in its scope. In perhaps his most ambitious work, The Bridge, Crane sought to write an epic poem, in the vein of The Waste Land, that expressed a more optimistic view of modern, urban culture than the one that he found in Eliot’s work. Crane never married.

The Final Footprint – Although evidently, Crane had been drinking heavily and left no suicide note, witnesses believed his intentions to be suicidal, as several reported that he exclaimed “Goodbye, everybody!” before throwing himself overboard. His body was never recovered. A marker on his father’s tombstone in Garrettsville includes the inscription, “Harold Hart Crane 1899–1932 lost at sea”.

In the years following his death Crane has been hailed by playwrights, poets, and literary critics alike, as being one of the most influential poets of his generation. Crane is the subject of The Broken Tower, a 2011 American student film by the actor James Franco who wrote, directed, and starred in the film which was the Master thesis project for his MFA in filmmaking at New York University. He loosely based his script on Paul Mariani’s 1999 nonfiction book The Broken Tower: A Life of Hart Crane. Beyond poetry, Crane’s suicide inspired several works of art by noted artist Jasper Johns, including “Periscope,” “Land’s End,” and “Diver,” the “Symphony for Three Orchestras” by Elliott Carter (inspired by the “Bridge”) and the painting by Marsden Hartley “Eight Bells’ Folly, Memorial for Hart Crane.”

Al Hirt
in 1966

On this day in 1999, trumpeter and bandleader, Jumbo, The Round Mound of Sound, The King, Al Hirt died from liver failure in New Orleans at the age of 76. Born Alois Maxwell Hirt on November 7, 1922 in New Orleans. Perhaps best remembered for his million-selling recordings of “Java” and the accompanying album Honey in the Horn (1963), and for the theme song to The Green Hornet. Hirt was inducted into The Louisiana Music Hall of Fame in November 2009.

Al Hirt club on the corner of Bourbon Street and St Louis in the French Quarter, 1977

In 1962 Hirt opened his own club on Bourbon Street in the French Quarter, which he ran until 1983. He also became a minority owner in the NFL expansion New Orleans Saints in 1967.

The Final Footprint

Hirt’s cremated remains are inurned at Metairie Cemetery in New Orleans. Other notable final footprints at Metairie include; Pete Fountain, Jim Garrison, Louis Prima, and Stan Rice.

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Posted in Day in History, Literary Footprints | Tagged al hirt, Buried, Cemetery, Glasnevin Cemetery, Ground Burial, hart crane, History, Maud Gonne, ralph waldo emerson, Sean MacBride, William Butler Yeats | 2 Comments

On this day 26 April death of Gypsy Rose Lee – Count Basie – Lucille Ball – Phoebe Snow – George Jones – Jonathan Demme

Posted on 29 ApramFri, 26 Apr 2024 00:18:00 -05002024-04-26T00:18:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

#RIP #OTD in 1970 burlesque entertainer, stripper and vedette, actress, author, playwright, her 1957 memoir was adapted into the 1959 stage musical Gypsy, Gypsy Rose Lee died of lung cancer in Los Angeles, aged 59. Inglewood Park Cemetery in Inglewood, California

On this day in 1984, jazz pianist, bandleader, and composer Count Basie died of pancreatic cancer in Hollywood, Florida at the age of 79. Born William James Basie on August 21, 1904 in Red Bank, New Jersey. His mother taught him to play the piano and he started performing in his teens. Dropping out of school, he learned to operate lights for vaudeville and to improvise accompaniment for silent films at a local movie theater in his home town of Red Bank, New Jersey. By age 16, he increasingly played jazz piano at parties, resorts and other venues. In 1924, he went to Harlem, where his performing career expanded; he toured with groups to the major jazz cities of Chicago, St. Louis and Kansas City.

In 1935, Basie formed his own jazz orchestra, the Count Basie Orchestra, and in 1936 took them to Chicago for a long engagement and their first recording. He led the group for almost 50 years, creating innovations like the use of two “split” tenor saxophones, emphasizing the rhythm section, riffing with a big band, using arrangers to broaden their sound, and others.

On 21 July 1930, Basie married Vivian Lee Winn, in Kansas City, Missouri. They were divorced sometime before 1935. Some time in or before 1935, the now single Basie returned to New York City, renting a house at 111 West 138th Street, Manhattan, as evidenced by the 1940 census. He married Catherine Morgan on 13 July 1940 in the King County courthouse in Seattle, Washington. In 1942, they moved to Queens. The Basies bought a whites-only home in the new neighborhood of Addisleigh Park in 1946 on Adelaide Road and 175th Street, St. Albans, Queens.

On April 11, 1983, Catherine Basie died of a heart attack at the couple’s home in Freeport, Grand Bahama Island. She was 67 years old.

The Final Footprint

Basie and Catherine are entombed in Pinelawn Memorial Park, East Farmingdale, New York.

On this day in 1989, legendary comedian, film, television, stage and radio actress, model, film and television executive, multiple Emmy winner, Lucille Ball died Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles from an aortic aneurysm at the age of 77. Born Lucille Désirée Ball on 6 August 1911 in Jamestown, New York. Perhaps best known as the star of the sitcom I Love Lucy, co-starring her then husband Desi Arnaz as Ricky Ricardo and Vivian Vance and William Frawley as Ethel and Fred Mertz, the Ricardo’s landlords and friends. Ball met and eloped with Cuban bandleader Arnaz in 1940. Ball and Arnaz founded Desilu Productions and Desilu Studios which was home to I Love Lucy and other hit television shows including; Star Trek, The Andy Griffith Show, Mission: Impossible, The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Lucy Show, My Three Sons, Family Affair, The Untouchables, I Spy, Mannix, Gomer Pyle, USMC, and That Girl. On 17 July 1951, almost 40 years old, Ball gave birth to their first child, Lucie Désirée Arnaz. A year and a half later, Ball gave birth to their second child, Desiderio Alberto Arnaz IV, known as Desi Arnaz, Jr. Ball and Arnaz divorced on 4 May 1960. Her second marriage was to Gary Morton (1961-1989 her death).

The Final Footprint – Ball was cremated and her cremated remains were initially interred in Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills Cemetery in Los Angeles. In 2002, her children had her cremated remains moved to the Ball family plot at Lake View Cemetery in Jamestown, New York where Ball’s mother, father, brother, and grandparents are buried. Her grave and her parent’s is marked by a large black granite upright marker with the inscription; “You’ve Come Home”.

#RIP #OTD in 2011 singer-songwriter and guitarist, known for her hit 1975 songs “Poetry Man” and “Harpo’s Blues” and her credited guest vocals backing Paul Simon on “Gone at Last”, Phoebe Snow died from complications of a stroke in Edison, New York, aged 60. Cremation

On this day in 2013, United States Marine Corp veteran, musician and singer, Thumper Jones, No Show Jones, The Possum, George Jones died, aged 81, from hypoxic respiratory failure in Nashville. Born George Glenn Jones on September 12, 1931 in Saratoga, Texas. He achieved fame for his long list of hit records, including perhaps his best known song “He Stopped Loving Her Today”, as well as his distinctive voice and phrasing. Waylon Jennings expressed his opinion on Jones in his song “It’s Alright”: “If we all could sound like we wanted to, we’d all sound like George Jones.” In 1959, Jones recorded “White Lightning,” written by J. P. Richardson, which launched his career as a singer. During his career, Jones had more than 150 hits, both as a solo artist and in duets with other artists.He married his first wife, Dorothy Bonvillion, in 1950, and was divorced in 1951. He married Shirley Ann Corley in 1954. His second marriage ended in divorce in 1968; he married fellow country music singer Tammy Wynette a year later. After his divorce from Wynette in 1975, Jones married his fourth wife, Nancy Sepulvado, in 1983 and became sober for good in 1999.

The Final Footprint

Former first lady Laura Bush was among those eulogizing Jones at his funeral on May 2, 2013. Other speakers were Tennessee governor Bill Haslam, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, news personality Bob Schieffer, and country singers Barbara Mandrell and Kenny Chesney. Alan Jackson, Kid Rock, Ronnie Milsap, Randy Travis, Vince Gill, Patty Loveless, Travis Tritt, the Oak Ridge Boys, Charlie Daniels, Wynonna and Brad Paisley provided musical tributes. Jackson sang “He Stopped Loving Her Today”. The service was broadcast live on CMT, GAC, RFD-TV, The Nashville Network and FamilyNet as well as Nashville stations. SiriusXM and WSM 650AM, home of the Grand Ole Opry, broadcast the event on the radio. The family requested that contributions be made to the Grand Ole Opry Trust Fund or to the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. Jones was buried in Woodlawn Cemetery in Nashville. Other notable final footprints at Woodlawn include; Eddy Arnold, Little Jimmy Dickens, George Jones, Johnny Paycheck, Webb Pierce, Jerry Reed, Marty Robbins, Dan Seals, Red Sovine, Porter Wagoner, and Tammy Wynette.

#RIP #OTD in 2017, film director (Melvin and Howard, The Silence of the Lambs, Philadelphia, Rachel Getting Married), producer and screenwriter Jonathan Demme died at his home in Manhattan from complications from esophageal cancer and heart disease, age 73.

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Posted in American Icon, Day in History, Musical Footprints | Tagged Cemetery, count basie, cremains, Cremation, Desi Arnaz, Desilu, george jones, I Love Lucy, Lake View Cemetery, Lucille Ball, Monument, riptff, tff the final footprint | Leave a comment

On this day 25 April death of Leon Battista Alberti – Louise Labé – Torquato Tasso – Anna Sewell – Ginger Rogers – Lisa Lopes – Harry Belafonte

Posted on 29 ApramThu, 25 Apr 2024 00:24:00 -05002024-04-25T00:24:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1472, Italian author, artist, architect, poet, priest, linguist, philosopher, cryptographer, polymath, Renaissance man, Leon Battista Alberti died in Rome at the age of 68. Born in Genoa on 14 February 1404. Although he is often characterized as an “architect” exclusively, as art historian James Beck has observed, “to single out one of Leon Battista’s ‘fields’ over others as somehow functionally independent and self-sufficient is of no help at all to any effort to characterize Alberti’s extensive explorations in the fine arts.” Alberti’s life was described in Giorgio Vasari‘s Vite de’ più eccellenti pittori, scultori, e architettori or ‘Lives of the most excellent painters, sculptors and architects’.

The Final Footprint – Entombment in Basilica di Santa Croce. Other notable final footprints at Santa Croce include; Ugo Foscolo, Galileo Galilei, Niccolò Machiavelli, Michelangelo, and Gioachino Rossini.

On this day in 1566, La Belle Cordière, (The Beautiful Ropemaker), French poet of the Renaissance, Louise Labé died in Parcieux-en-Dombes, France at the age of about 44. Born in 1520 or 1522 in Lyon. Her Œuvres include two prose works and poetry. Her poetry consists of three elegies in the style of the Heroides of Ovid, and twenty-four sonnets that draw on the traditions of Neoplatonism and Petrarchism. The Debat, the most popular of her works in the sixteenth century, inspired one of the fables of Jean de la Fontaine. The sonnets, remarkable for their frank eroticism, have been her most famous works following the early modern period.

The Final Footprint – La Belle Cordière was interred on her country property close to Parcieux-en-Dombes, outside Lyon.

Ainsi

Amour inconstamment me mène

Et, quand je pense avoir plus de douleur,

Sans y penser je me trouve hors de peine.

Puis, quand je crois ma joie être certaine,

Et être en haut de mon désiré heur,

Il me remet en mon premier malheur.

On this day in 1595, Italian poet Torquato Tasso died at the convent of Sant’Onofrio in Rome at the age of 51. Born in Sorrento, Kingdon of Naples on 11 March 1544. Perhaps best known for his poem La Gerusalemme liberata (Jerusalem Delivered, 1580), in which he depicts a highly imaginative version of the combats between Christians and Muslims at the end of the First Crusade, during the siege of Jerusalem. He suffered from mental illness and died a few days before he was due to be crowned as the king of poets by the Pope. Until the beginning of the 19th century, Tasso remained one of the most widely read poets in Europe.

The Final Footprint – Tasso is entombed in Sant’Onofrio.

#RIP #OTD in 1878 novelist (Black Beauty) Anna Sewell died of hepatitis or tuberculosis in Old Catton, Norfolk, England, aged 58. Quaker burial-ground in Lamas near Buxton, Norfolk

On this day in 1995, Academy Award-winning actress, singer and dancer, Ginger Rogers died in Rancho Mirage, California of congestive heart failure at the age of 83. Born Virginia Catherine McMath on 16 July 1911 in Independence, Missouri. This year, 2011, will mark the 100th anniversary of her birth. Best known for her role as Fred Astaire’s romantic interest and dancing partner in a series of ten Hollywood musical films that revolutionized the genre. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in Kitty Foyle (1940). When Rogers was nine years old, her mother Lela married John Logan Rogers. They lived in Fort Worth, Texas. Rogers reportedly dated Howard Hughes and even turned down his proposal. Rogers was married five times; Jack Pepper (1929-1931 divorce), Lew Ayres (1934-1941 divorce), Jack Briggs (1943-1949 divorce), Jacques Bergerac (1953-1957 divorce), and William Marshall (1961-1969 divorce).

The Final Footprint – Rogers was cremated and her cremains were interred next to her mother’s, and just a short distance from Astaires’s grave, in Oakwood Memorial Park in Chatsworth, California. Another notable final footprint at Oakwood is that of Gloria Grahame .

#RIP #OTD in 2002 singer, rapper (“Not Tonight”, “U Know What’s Up”, “Never Be the Same Again”), member of R&B girl group TLC, Left Eye, Lisa Lopes died in a car crash while organizing charity work in La Ceiba, Honduras, aged 30. Hillandale Memorial Gardens in Lithonia, Georgia

#RIP #OTD in 2023 2023 singer (“Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)”, “Jump in the Line (Shake, Senora)”, “Jamaica Farewell”), actor (Carmen Jones, Island in the Sun, Odds Against Tomorrow, Buck and the Preacher, Uptown Saturday Night), civil rights activist Harry Belafonte died from congestive heart failure at his home on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, New York City, at the age of 96

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Posted in Artistic Footprints, Day in History, Film Footprints, Literary Footprints | Tagged Anna sewell, cremains, Cremation, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Hillandale Memorial Gardens, la belle cordiere, leon battista alberti, Lisa lopes, louise labe, Oakwood Memorial Park, torquato tasso | Leave a comment

On this day 24 April death of Daniel Defoe – Willa Cather – Wallis Simpson – Estée Lauder

Posted on 29 ApramWed, 24 Apr 2024 00:36:00 -05002024-04-24T00:36:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1731, trader, writer, journalist, pamphleteer and spy Daniel Defoe died in London at the age of 70. Born Daniel Foe c. 1660 probably on Fore Street in the parish of St Giles Cripplegate, London. Perhaps most famous for his novel Robinson Crusoe, published in 1719, which is claimed to be second only to the Bible in its number of translations. He has been seen as one of the earliest proponents of the English novel, and helped to popularise the form in Britain. Defoe wrote many political tracts and was often in trouble with the authorities, and spent a period in prison. Intellectuals and political leaders paid attention to his fresh ideas and sometimes consulted with him.

Defoe was a prolific and versatile writer, producing more than three hundred works—books, pamphlets, and journals—on diverse topics, including politics, crime, religion, marriage, psychology, and the supernatural. He was also a pioneer of business journalism and economic journalism.

The Final Footprint

He was interred in Bunhill Fields (today Bunhill Fields Burial and Gardens), Borough of Islington, London, where a monument was erected to his memory in 1870. Other notable final footprints at Bunhill include; John Bunyan and William Blake.

On this day in 1947, author Willa Cather died of a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 73 in her home at 570 Park Avenue in Manhattan. Born Wilella Sibert Cather on 7 December 1873 on her maternal grandmother’s farm in the Back Creek Valley near Winchester, Virginia. Perhaps best known for her novels of frontier life on the Great Plains, in works such as O Pioneers!, My Ántonia, and The Song of the Lark. In 1923 she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for One of Ours (1922), a novel set during World War I. Cather grew up in Nebraska and graduated from the University of Nebraska. She lived and worked in Pittsburgh for ten years. At the age of 33 she moved to New York, where she lived for the rest of her life. Cather never married.

The Final Footprint – Cather was buried in the Old Burying Ground, behind the Jaffrey Center Meeting House in Jaffrey, New Hampshire. Her grave site, which she shares with her long-time friend Edith Wilson, is at the southwest corner of the graveyard. She had first visited Jaffrey in 1917 with Isabelle McClung, staying at the Shattuck Inn, where she came late in life for the seclusion necessary for her writing. The inscription on her tombstone reads:

WILLA CATHER
December 7, 1873 – April 24, 1947
THE TRUTH AND CHARITY OF HER GREAT
SPIRIT WILL LIVE ON IN THE WORK
WHICH IS HER ENDURING GIFT TO HER
COUNTRY AND ALL ITS PEOPLE.
“…that is happiness; to be dissolved
into something complete and great.”
From My Antonia

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

On this day in 1986, the woman who inspired a man to give up a kingdom, The Duchess of Windsor, Wallis Simpson died at her home in the Bois de Boulogne, Paris, age 89. Born Bessie Wallis Warfield on 19 June 1896 in Blue Ridge Summit, Pennsylvania. Wallis met Thelma, Lady Furness, the then-mistress of Edward, Prince of Wales, who would introduce her to the Prince on 10 January 1931. The Prince was the eldest son of King George V and Queen Mary, and heir apparent to the throne. Wallis allegedly became the Prince’s mistress in December 1933. By 1934, the Prince was clearly besotted with Wallis. There was just on small obstacle on their road to ever after; she was still married. To her second husband! Many people believed Wallis was politically, socially and morally unsuitable as a prospective consort and that she was a woman of limitless ambition who was pursuing Edward because of his wealth and position. On 20 January 1936, George V died and Edward ascended the throne as Edward VIII. The monarch of the United Kingdom is Supreme Governor of the Church of England. At the time of the proposed marriage, and until 2002, the Church of England did not permit the re-marriage of divorced people with living ex-spouses. Constitutionally, the King was required to be in communion with the Church of England. The King consulted with the Prime Minister, Stanley Baldwin, on a way to marry Wallis and keep the throne, but it became apparent that Baldwin and the Prime Ministers of Australia and South Africa would not approve the marriage. To avoid a constitutional crisis, the King signed the Instrument of Abdication on 10 December 1936, in the presence of his three surviving brothers, the Duke of York (who would ascend the throne the following day as George VI), the Duke of Gloucester and the Duke of Kent. The next day Edward made an address to the people saying; “I have found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility, and to discharge my duties as King as I would wish to do, without the help and support of the woman I love.” Wallis and Edward married one month later on 3 June 1937 at the Château de Candé, Monts, France. The date would have been King George V’s 72nd birthday. No member of the British Royal Family attended. The marriage produced no children. Her previous two husbands were, Earl Winfield Spencer, Jr. (1916-1927 divorce) and Ernest Aldrich Simpson (1928-1937 divorce). I am not sure if there is any evidence to prove whether Wallis really loved Edward or whether she was after the throne. So, I suppose ther are two ways to look at Wallis and Edward. The cynical view being; she was an ambitious woman who got what she deserved, her prince but not her king. The romantic view of course is that there is a happy ever after. Who needs a throne when one has love? Perhaps a clue can be found in what Wallis reportedly said: “You have no idea how hard it is to live out a great romance.” Is this a classic example of: Be careful what you wish for; you just might get it!

The Final Footprint – Wallis is interred next to Edward in the Royal Burial Grounds at Frogmore in Windsor, England. Her grave is marked by a full ledger marble marker.

#RIP #OTD in 2004 businesswoman, co-founder of her eponymous cosmetics company with her husband, Joseph, Estée Lauder died of cardiopulmonary arrest, aged 95, at her home in Manhattan. Beth-El Cemetery, Paramus, New Jersey

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Posted in Day in History, Literary Footprints, Royal Footprints | Tagged beth-el cemetery, bunhill fields, Buried, Cemetery, daniel defoe, Duchess of Windsor, Edward VIII, Estée lauder, Ground Burial, History, Marker, my antonia, o pioneers, old burying ground, riptff, Royal Burial Grounds at Frogmore, tff the final footprint, the song of the lark, Wallis Simpson, willa cather | 4 Comments

On this day 23 April death of Shakespeare – William Wordsworth – Rupert Brooke – Harold Arlen – Otto Preminger – Paulette Goddard – Cesar Chavez – Howard Cossell – P. L. Travers

Posted on 29 ApramTue, 23 Apr 2024 00:24:00 -05002024-04-23T00:24:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1616, poet and playwright, William Shakespeare died in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England at the age of 52. Born in Stratford-upon-Avon and baptised there on 26 April 1564. His actual birthdate remains unknown, but is traditionally observed on 23 April, St George’s Day, which if right, would have him dying on the day he was born. In my opinion, Shakespeare is the greatest writer in the English language and the world’s pre-eminent dramatist. Few records of Shakespeare’s private life survive, which has fueled considerable speculation about his life including whether the works attributed to him were written by others. Shakespeare was respected in his own day, but his reputation did not rise to its present heights until the 19th century. The Romantics, in particular, acclaimed Shakespeare’s genius, and the Victorians worshipped Shakespeare with a reverence that George Bernard Shaw called “bardolatry.” Shakespeare was married to Anne Hathaway (1582-1616 his death). I am a big, literally and figuratively, fan of the man. His collected works would clearly make my list of a dozen favorite books. My favorite plays are his tragedies; Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, King Lear, and Macbeth. I often quote him in my writing and speech. A few of the best;

All the world’s a stage,

and all the men and women merely players:

they have their exits and entrances;

and one man in his time plays many parts…

As You Like It, Act II, Scene 7

But soft, what light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief
That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.
Romeo And Juliet Act 2, scene 2

And Caesar’s spirit, raging for revenge,
With Ate by his side come hot from hell,
Shall in these confines with a monarch’s voice
Cry “Havoc!” and let slip the dogs of war,
That this foul deed shall smell above the earth
With carrion men, groaning for burial.
Julius Caesar Act 3, scene 1

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.
In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility;
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger. . . .
Henry The Fifth Act 3, scene 1

And of course, the “To be, or not to be” solilioquy from Hamlet.

The Final Footprint – Shakespeare was entombed in the chancel of the Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon. Reportedly, Shakespeare’s body is buried 20 feet deep to prevent its theft. Above the grave a stone slab displays his epitaph: GOOD FREND FOR IESUS SAKE FORBEARE, TO DIGG THE DVST ENCLOASED HEARE. BLESTE BE Y^E MAN Y^T SPARES THES STONES, AND CVRST BE HE Y^T MOVES MY BONES. Perhaps a warning to those who might want to have him moved to Westminster Abbey or exhumed for examination? Sometime before 1623, a funerary monument was erected in his memory on the north wall, with a half-effigy of him in the act of writing. The plaque compares him to Nestor, Socrates, and Virgil. Shakespeare has been commemorated in many statues and memorials around the world, including funeral monuments in Southwark Cathedral and Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey.

On this day in 1850, Romantic poet, William Wordsworth died by aggravating a case of pleurisy at the age of 80 in Cumberland. Born on 7 April 1770 in Wordsworth House in Cockermouth, Cumberland, part of the scenic region in northwest England, the Lake District. With his friend, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Wordsworth helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their 1798 joint publication Lyrical Ballads. Wordsworth’s magnum opus is generally considered to be The Prelude, a semiautobiographical poem of his early years which he revised and expanded a number of times. It was posthumously titled and published, prior to which it was generally known as “the poem to Coleridge”. Wordsworth was Britain’s Poet Laureate from 1843 until his death in 1850.

The Final Footprint – Wordsworth was buried at St. Oswald’s church in the village of Grasmere, in the Lake District, Cumbria, England. It is an active Anglican parish church in the deanery of Windermere, the archdeaconry of Westmorland and Furness, and the diocese of Carlisle. The church has been designated by English Heritage as a Grade I listed building. It is notable for its associations with Wordsworth and his family, and for its annual ceremony of rushbearing.

#RIP #OTD in 1915 poet known for his war sonnets (“The Soldier”), Rupert Brooke died of septicaemia following a mosquito bite whilst aboard a French hospital ship moored off the island of Skyros in the Aegean Sea, aged 27. An olive grove in Skyros

#RIP #OTD in 1986 composer (“Over the Rainbow”, “Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive”, “Come Rain or Come Shine”, “One for My Baby”) Harold Arlen died of cancer at his Manhattan apartment, aged 81. Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York

On this day in 1986, theatre and film director Otto Preminger died in his home on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in 1986, aged 80, from lung cancer while suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. Born Otto Ludwig Preminger 5 December 1905 in Wischnitz, Bukovina, Austro-Hungarian Empire (present-day Vyzhnytsia, Ukraine.

He directed more than 35 feature films in a five-decade career after leaving the theatre. He first gained attention for film noir mysteries such as Laura (1944) and Fallen Angel (1945), while in the 1950s and 1960s, he directed a number of high-profile adaptations of popular novels and stage works. Several of these later films pushed the boundaries of censorship by dealing with themes which were then taboo in Hollywood, such as drug addiction (The Man with the Golden Arm, 1955), rape (Anatomy of a Murder, 1959) and homosexuality (Advise & Consent, 1962). With Exodus (1960) Preminger struck a first major blow against the Hollywood blacklist by acknowledging banned screenwriter Dalton Trumbo. The film is an adaptation of the Leon Uris bestseller about the founding of the state of Israel. He was twice nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director. He also had a few acting roles.

Preminger wed his first wife Marion Mill on 3 August 1932. Having become estranged from Mill, Preminger was living like a bachelor, when he met the burlesque performer Gypsy Rose Lee and began an open relationship with her.

Lee had already attempted to break into movie roles, but she was not taken seriously as anything more than a stripper. She appeared in B pictures in less-than-minor roles.

In May 1946, Mill asked for a divorce, after meeting a wealthy (and married) Swedish financier, Axel Wenner-Gren. The Premingers’ divorce ended smoothly and speedily. Mill did not seek alimony, only personal belongings. Axel’s wife, however, was unwilling to grant a divorce. Mill returned to Otto and resumed appearances as his wife, and nothing more. Preminger had begun dating Natalie Draper, a niece of Marion Davies’.

While filming Carmen Jones (1954), Preminger began an affair with the film’s star, Dorothy Dandridge, which lasted four years. During that period he advised her on career matters, including an offer made to Dandridge for the featured role of Tuptim in The King and I (1956). Preminger advised her to turn it down, as he believed it unworthy of her. She later regretted taking his advice.

The Final Footprint

He was cremated and his ashes are in a niche in the Azalea Room of the Velma B. Woolworth Memorial Chapel at Woodlawn Cemetery, The Bronx, New York. Other notable final footprints at Woodlawn include; Irving Berlin, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Lionel Hampton, Fiorello La Guardia, Rowland Macy, Bat Masterson, Herman Melville, J. C. Penney, and Joseph Pulitzer.

Paulette Goddard
Studio publicity portrait from the 1940s

On this day in 1990, actress Paulette Goddard died from heart failure and emphysema in Ronco sopra Ascona, Ticino, Switzerland, at the age of 79. Born Marion Levy on June 3, 1910 in Whitestone Landing, Queens, New York. A child fashion model and a performer in several Broadway productions as a Ziegfeld Girl; she became a major star of Paramount Pictures in the 1940s. Perhaps her best known films were her first major role, as Charlie Chaplin’s leading lady in Modern Times, and Chaplin’s subsequent film The Great Dictator. She was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in So Proudly We Hail! (1943).

Studio publicity portrait for Modern Times (1936), in which Goddard had her first substantial film role.

publicity shot for A Stranger Came Home (1954)

After her marriage to Erich Maria Remarque, Goddard largely retired from acting and moved to Ronco sopra Ascona, Switzerland. Upon Remarque’s death, Goddard inherited much of his money and several important properties across Europe, including a wealth of contemporary art, which augmented her own long-standing collection. During this period, her talent at accumulating wealth became a byword among the old Hollywood élite. During the 1980s, she became a fairly well known (and highly visible) socialite in New York City, appearing covered with jewels at many high-profile cultural functions with several well-known men, including Andy Warhol, with whom she sustained a friendship for many years until his death in 1987.

With Phillip Reed in 1957

Goddard married the much older lumber tycoon Edgar James on June 28, 1927, when she was 17 years old; the couple moved to North Carolina. They separated two years later and divorced in 1932.

In 1932, Goddard began a relationship with Charlie Chaplin. She later moved into his home in Beverly Hills. They were reportedly married in secret in Canton, China, in June 1936. Aside from referring to Goddard as “my wife” at the October 1940 premiere of The Great Dictator, neither Goddard nor Chaplin publicly commented on their marital status. On June 4, 1942, Goddard was granted a Mexican divorce from Chaplin.

In May 1944, she married Burgess Meredith at David O. Selznick‘s home in Beverly Hills. They divorced in June 1949.

In 1958, Goddard married author Erich Maria Remarque. They remained married until Remarque’s death in 1970. After her marriage to Remarque, Goddard largely retired from acting and moved to Ronco sopra Ascona, Switzerland. Upon Remarque’s death, Goddard inherited much of his money and several important properties across Europe, including a wealth of contemporary art, which augmented her own long-standing collection. During this period, her talent at accumulating wealth became a byword among the old Hollywood élite. During the 1980s, she became a fairly well known (and highly visible) socialite in New York City, appearing covered with jewels at many high-profile cultural functions with several well-known men, including Andy Warhol, with whom she sustained a friendship for many years until his death in 1987.

With Chaplin in The Great Dictator

The Final Footprint

She is buried in Ronco Village Cemetery, next to Remarque and her mother.

#RIP #OTD in 1993 labor leader and civil rights activist, César Chavez died in San Luis, Arizona aged 66. Cesar E. Chavez National Monument, Keene, California

#RIP #OTD in 1995 lawyer, sports journalist, broadcaster, author, Howard Cosell died at the Hospital for Joint Diseases in Manhattan of a cardiac embolism at the age of 77. Westhampton Cemetery, Westhampton, New York.

#RIP #OTD in 1996 author (the Mary Poppins series), P. L. Travers died in London at the age of 96. St Mary the Virgin’s Church, Twickenham, London

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Posted in Day in History, Film Footprints, Literary Footprints | Tagged Buried, cesar chavez, epitaph, Ground Burial, Hamlet, Harold arlen, History, Holy Trinity Church, howard cossell, Inscription, lake district, MacBeth, otto preminger, P l travers, paulette goddard, riptff, romantic poets, Romeo and Juliet, ronco village cemetery, Rupert brooke, samuel taylor coleridge, St Mary the Virgin's Church, st oswalds church, tff, the final footprint, the prelude, westhampton cemetery, William shakespeare, William Wordsworth, Woodlawn Cemetery | 2 Comments

On this day 22 April death of Miguel de Cervantes – Earl Hines – Ansel Adams – Richard Nixon – Jane Kenyon – Felice Bryant – Pat Tillman – Alida Valli

Posted on 29 ApramMon, 22 Apr 2024 00:24:00 -05002024-04-22T00:24:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1616, soldier, novelist, poet and playwright, El Príncipe de los Ingenios (“The Prince of Wits”), Miguel de Cervantes died in Madrid at the age of 68. Born Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, presumably, in Alcalá de Henares, a Castilian city near Madrid, on 29 September (the feast day of Saint Michael the Archangel) 1547. His magnum opus, Don Quixote, in my opinion, the first modern European novel, is a classic of Western literature, and is amongst the best works of fiction ever written. His influence on the Spanish language has been so great that the language is often called la lengua de Cervantes (“the language of Cervantes”). In 1585, Cervantes published a pastoral novel named La Galatea. Because of financial problems, he worked as a purveyor for the Spanish Armada, and later as a tax collector. In 1597, discrepancies in his accounts of three years previous landed him in the Crown Jail of Seville. In 1605, he was in Valladolid when the immediate success of the first part of his Don Quixote, published in Madrid, signaled his return to the literary world. In 1607, he settled in Madrid, where he lived and worked until his death. During the last 9 years of his life, Cervantes solidified his reputation as a writer; he published the Novelas ejemplares (Exemplary Novels) in 1613, the Journey to Parnassus (Viaje al Parnaso) in 1614, and in 1615, the Ocho comedias y ocho entremeses and the 2nd part of Don Quixote.

The Final Footprint – In accordance with Cervantes’ will, he was buried in the neighboring convent of Trinitarian nuns, in central Madrid. According to the English newspaper The Guardian, his “bones went missing in 1673 when building work was done at the convent. They are known to have been taken to a different convent and were returned later.” Don Quixote has been the subject of a variety of works in other fields of art, including operas by the Italian composer Giovanni Paisiello, the French Jules Massenet, and the Spanish Manuel de Falla, a Russian ballet by the Russian-German composer Ludwig Minkus, a tone poem by the German composer Richard Strauss, a German film (1933) directed by G. W. Pabst, a Soviet film (1957) directed by Grigori Kozintsev, a 1965 ballet (no relation to the one by Minkus) with choreography by George Balanchine, an American musical – Man of La Mancha (1965) – by Dale Wasserman, Mitch Leigh, and Joe Darion, which was made into a film in 1972, directed by Arthur Hiller, and a song by Brazilian tropicalia-pioneers Os Mutantes.

Earl Hines
performing for Pvt. Charles Carpenter, songwriter and manager of the Hines Orchestra, at Camp Lee, during World War II

On this day in 1983 jazz pianist and band leader Earl “Fatha” Hines died in Oakland, California at the age of 79. Born Earl Kenneth Hines on December 28, 1903 in Duquesne, Pennsylvania. In my opinion, he is one of the most influential figures in the development of jazz piano

The trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie (a member of Hines’s big band, along with Charlie Parker) wrote, “The piano is the basis of modern harmony. This little guy came out of Chicago, Earl Hines. He changed the style of the piano. You can find the roots of Bud Powell, Herbie Hancock, all the guys who came after that. If it hadn’t been for Earl Hines blazing the path for the next generation to come, it’s no telling where or how they would be playing now. There were individual variations but the style of … the modern piano came from Earl Hines.”

Hines in 1947 (photograph by William P. Gottlieb)

The Final Footprint

Hines was buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Oakland, California.

Ansel Adams

On this day in 1984, photographer and environmentalist Ansel Adams died from cardiovascular disease in the Intensive-care unit at the Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula in Monterey, California, at age 82 with his wife, children, and grandchildren by his side. Born Ansel Easton Adams on February 20, 1902 in San Francsco. His black-and-white landscape photographs of the American West, especially Yosemite National Park, have been widely reproduced on calendars, posters, books, and the internet. He primarily used large-format cameras because the large film used with these cameras (primarily 5×4 and 8×10) contributed to the clarity of his prints.

Church, Taos Pueblo (1942)

Farm, farm workers, Mt. Williamson in background, Manzanar Relocation Center, California.

Evening, McDonald Lake, Glacier National Park (1942)

Baton practice at the Manzanar War Relocation Center, 1943.

The Tetons and the Snake River(1942)

The Final Footprint

Adams was cremated and his cremains were scattered on Mount Ansel Adams, Yosemite National Park. Publishing rights for most of Adams’s photographs are handled by the trustees of The Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust. An archive of Adams’s work is located at the Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona in Tucson.

On this day in 1994, U. S. Navy veteran, U. S. Senator from California, 36th Vice President of the U. S., 37th President of the U. S., author Richard Milhous Nixon died from a stroke at New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center in Manhattan at the age of 81. Born 9 January 1913 in Yorba Linda, California. He graduated from Whittier College in Whittier, California and received his law degree from Duke University. Nixon said “I always remember that whatever I have done in the past or may do in the future, Duke University is responsible in one way or another.” Nixon was married to Thelma Catherine “Pat” Ryan (1940-1993 her death). He served as Vice President during both of President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s terms in office. Nixon and his running mate, Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr. lost the 1960 presidential election to John F. Kennedy and his running mate Lyndon Baines Johnson. He lost the 1962 governor of California election to Pat Brown. Nixon again ran for president, with Spiro Agnew as his running mate, in 1968 this time defeating Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey. He and Agnew ran for reelection in 1972 winning in a landslide over George McGovern and Sargent Shriver (JFK‘s brother-in-law and father of Maria Owings Shriver Schwarzenegger). On 10 October 1973, Vice President Agnew resigned, amid charges of bribery, tax evasion and money laundering from his tenure as Maryland’s governor. Nixon chose Gerald Ford, Republican Minority Leader of the House of Representatives, to replace Agnew. Nixon resigned the office of the presidency on 9 August 1974 over the Nixon administration’s involvement and subsequent cover-up of the break-in to Democratic party headquarters at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C. on 17 June 1972. During the subsequent investigation, Nixon said during a 17 November 1973 televised question and answer session with the press; “People have got to know whether or not their President is a crook. Well, I’m not a crook. I’ve earned everything I’ve got.” Ford took the oath of office the day Nixon resigned becoming the 38th POTUS. Ford selected Nelson Rockefeller to fill the vice presidency. On 8 September 1974, Ford granted Nixon a “full, free, and absolute pardon”. This ended any possibility of an indictment. Nixon then released a statement: “I was wrong in not acting more decisively and forthrightly in dealing with Watergate… No words can describe the depths of my regret and pain at the anguish of my mistakes over Watergate have caused the nation and presidency, a nation I so deeply love and an institution I so greatly respect.” Nixon would spend the remaining 20 years of his life rebuilding his reputation as a world statesman and adviser on foreign affairs to his presidential successors.

The Final Footprint – Nixon is interred next to his wife Pat at the Richard Nixon Library and Birthplace in Yorba Linda. His grave is marked by an upright slant granite marker and features the inscription; “THE GREATEST HONOR HISTORY CAN BESTOW IS THE TITLE OF PEACEMAKER.” At his funeral, eulogies were delivered by President Bill Clinton, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole, California Governor Pete Wilson, and the Reverend Billy Graham. In attendance were former Presidents Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush and their respective first ladies. In keeping with his wishes, his funeral was not a full state funeral. Nixon has been portrayed in multiple films and has been the subject of several books. The films include; Oliver Stone’s Nixon (1995) starring Anthony Hopkins and Ron Howard’s Frost/Nixon (2008) starring Frank Langella which received five Oscar nominations; Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor.

#RIP #OTD in 1995 poet and translator, muse of Donald Hall, New Hampshire’s poet laureate, Jane Kenyon died from leukemia in Wilmot, New Hampshire, aged 47. Proctor Cemetery, Andover, New Hampshire.

#RIP #OTD in 2003 songwriter (“We Could”, with husband Boudleaux; “Rocky Top,” “Bye Bye Love”, “Wake Up Little Susie”) Felice Bryant died in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, aged 77. Woodlawn Memorial Park, Nashville

On this day in 2004, Arizona State Sun Devil, pro football player and United States Army Ranger, Pat Tillman died in the mountains of Afghanistan as a result of a friendly fire incident. Born Patrick Daniel Tillman on 6 November 1976, in Fremont, California. Tillman left his professional career and enlisted in the United States Army in June 2002 in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. His service in Iraq and Afghanistan, and subsequent death, were the subject of much media attention. Tillman served several tours in combat before he died. At first, the Army reported that Tillman had been killed by enemy fire. Controversy ensued when the Pentagon notified the Tillman family that he had died as a result of a friendly fire incident. Tillman’s family and other critics allege that the Department of Defense delayed the disclosure for weeks after Tillman’s memorial service out of a desire to protect the image of the U.S. armed forces.

The Final Footprint – Tillman was cremated and his cremains were scattered at sea. He received posthumous Silver Star and Purple Heart medals. After his death, the Pat Tillman Foundation was established to carry forward its view of Tillman’s legacy by inspiring and supporting those striving for positive change in themselves and the world. A highway bypass around the Hoover Dam has a bridge bearing Tillman’s name. Completed in October 2010, the Mike O’Callaghan – Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge spans the Colorado River between Nevada and Arizona. On Sunday 19 September 2004, all teams of the NFL wore a memorial decal on their helmets in honor of Pat Tillman. The Arizona Cardinals continued to wear this decal throughout the 2004 season. The Cardinals retired his number 40, and Arizona State did the same for the number 42 he wore with the Sun Devils. The Cardinals have named the plaza surrounding their University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale Pat Tillman Freedom Plaza. On 12 November 2006, during a Cardinals game versus the Cowboys, a bronze statue was revealed in his honor. ASU also named the football locker room entryway to Sun Devil Stadium the “Pat Tillman Memorial Tunnel” and made a “PT-42” patch that they place on the neck of their uniforms as a permanent feature. Before the 2013 season, the Tillman Tunnel was renovated with graphics, signage, double doors separate the locker room from the tunnel, and television replaying Tillman’s career highlights, sound system and a gate opens up to the field featuring an image of him looking as if he’s leading the team out. In 2004, the NFL donated $250,000 to the United Service Organizations to build a USO center in memory of Tillman. The Pat Tillman USO Center, the first USO center in Afghanistan, opened on Bagram Air Base on 1 April 2005. The Pacific-10 Conference renamed its annual defensive player-of-the-year award in football to the Pat Tillman Defensive Player of the Year. Forward Operating Base Tillman is close to the Pakistan border, near the village of Lwara in Paktika Province, Afghanistan. Tillman’s high school, Leland High School in San Jose, renamed its football field after him. In New Almaden, an unincorporated community adjacent to San Jose, CA where Tillman grew up, a memorial was constructed near the Almaden Quicksilver County Park. Jon Krakauer, author of Into Thin Air and Into the Wild, chronicles Tillman’s story in Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman, published by Doubleday on 15 September 2009. Tillman’s mother, Mary Tillman, wrote a book about her son, Boots on the Ground by Dusk, which was released in April 2008.

#RIP #OTD in 2006 actress (The Paradine Case, The Third Man, Senso, Il Grido, Eyes Without a Face, Oedipus Rex, Lisa and the Devil, La Luna, Suspiria) Alida Valli died at home in Rome aged 84. Cimitero Comunale Monumentale Campo Verano, Rome

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Posted in Artistic Footprints, Athletic Footprints, Day in History, Extravagant Footprints, Literary Footprints, Military Footprints, Political Footprints | Tagged 9/11, Alida Valli, ansel adams, arizona state, asu, Buried, cimitero comunale monumentale campo verano, Cremation, don quixote, earl hines, Felice bryant, Ground Burial, History, Inscription, jane kenyon, Marker, miguel de cervantes, pat tillman, rangers, Richard Nixon, riptff, september 11, sun devils, tff, the final footprint, Watergate | 1 Comment

On this day 21 April death of Peter Abelard – Jean Racine – Mark Twain – Eleonora Duse – Sandy Denny – Nina Simone – Prince

Posted on 29 ApramSun, 21 Apr 2024 00:21:00 -05002024-04-21T00:21:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1142, medieval French scholastic philosopher, theologian and preeminent logician, composer Peter Abelard died in the priory of St. Marcel, near Chalon-sur-Saone at the age of 62 or 63. Born Pierre le Pallet, c1079 in Le Pallet, near Nantes, in Brittany. Perhaps best known for his legendary affair with and love for Héloïse d’Argenteuil. The Chambers Biographical Dictionary describes him as “the keenest thinker and boldest theologian of the 12th Century.” Heloise lived within the precincts of Notre-Dame, under the care of her uncle, the secular canon Fulbert. She was remarkable for her knowledge of classical letters, which extended beyond Latin to Greek and Hebrew. Abélard sought a place in Fulbert’s house, and then in 1115 or 1116 began an affair with Héloïse. The affair interfered with his career, and Abélard himself boasted of his conquest. Once Fulbert found out, he separated them, but they continued to meet in secret. Héloïse became pregnant and was sent by Abélard to be looked after by his family in Brittany, where she gave birth to a son whom she named Astrolabe after the scientific instrument. Abélard proposed a secret marriage so as not to mar his career prospects. Héloïse initially opposed it, but the couple were married. When Fulbert publicly disclosed the marriage, and Héloïse denied it, Abelard sent Héloïse to the convent at Argenteuil, where she had been brought up, in order to protect her from her uncle. Heloise dressed as a nun and shared the nun’s life, though she was not veiled. Héloïse sent letters to Abélard, questioning why she must submit to a religious life for which she had no calling. Fulbert, most probably believing that Abélard wanted to be rid of Héloïse by forcing her to become a nun, arranged for a band of men to break into Abelard’s room one night and castrate him, effectively ending his romantic career. In reaction, Abelard decided to become a monk at the monastery of St Denis, near Paris. As if the story could not get weirder…

The Final Footprint – Abelard was first buried at St. Marcel, but his remains were soon carried off secretly to the Paraclete, and given over to the loving care of Héloïse, who in time came herself to rest beside him in 1163. The bones of the pair were moved more than once afterwards, but they were preserved even through the vicissitudes of the French Revolution, and now are presumed to lie in the well-known tomb in Père Lachaise Cemetery in eastern Paris. The transfer of their remains there in 1817 is considered to have considerably contributed to the popularity of that cemetery, at the time still far outside the built-up area of Paris. By tradition, lovers or lovelorn singles leave letters at the crypt, in tribute to the couple or in hope of finding true love. However, this chain of events is disputed. The Oratory of the Paraclete claims Abélard and Héloïse are buried there and that what exists in Père-Lachaise is merely a monument, or cenotaph. Others believe that while Abelard is buried in the tomb at Père-Lachaise, Heloïse’s remains are elsewhere. Other notable Final Footprints at Père Lachaise include; Guillaume Apollinaire, Honoré de Balzac, Jean-Dominique Bauby, Georges Bizet, Maria Callas, Chopin, Colette, Auguste Comte, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Max Ernst, Molière, Jim Morrison, Édith Piaf, Camille Pissarro, Marcel Proust, Sully Prudhomme, Gioachino Rossini, Georges-Pierre Seurat, Simone Signoret, Gertrude Stein, Dorothea Tanning, Alice B. Toklas, Oscar Wilde, and Richard Wright.

#RIP #OTD in 1699 dramatist (Phèdre, Andromaque, Athalie), one of the three great playwrights of 17th-century France, (Molière & Corneille), Jean Racine died from liver cancer, aged 59. Saint-Étienne-du-Mont church in Paris

On this day in 1910, author and humorist, Mark Twain died of a heart attack in Redding, Connecticut at the age of 74. Born Samuel Langhorne Clemens on 30 November 1835 in Florida, Missouri. Perhaps most noted for his novels, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876), and its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885). Ernest Hemingway said “All modern American literature comes from” Huckleberry Finn. William Faulkner called Twain “the father of American literature.” Jimmy Buffett included Twain’s Following the Equator (1869) on his “baker’s dozen of books I would have to take to a desert island.” Twain was a steamboat pilot on the Mississippi and took his pen name from the riverboat measurement term “mark twain” or two fathoms (12 feet). Two fathoms, a depth indicating safe water for passage of boat, was measured on the sounding line. The term twain is an archaic term for “two.” The riverboatman’s cry was by the mark twain, meaning according to the mark on the line, the depth is two fathoms and it is safe to pass. Twain married Olivia Langdon (1870-1904 her death). In 1909, Twain was quoted as saying: “I came in with Halley’s Comet in 1835. It is coming again next year, and I expect to go out with it. It will be the greatest disappointment of my life if I don’t go out with Halley’s Comet. The Almighty has said, no doubt: ‘Now here are these two unaccountable freaks; they came in together, they must go out together.” His prediction was accurate and he got his wish passing away one day after the comet’s closest approach to earth. Both Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn were a part of my childhood.

The Final Footprint – Twain is interred in the Langdon family plot next to his wife and three of his four children, who preceded him in death, in Woodlawn Cemetery in Elmira, New York. Their plot is marked by a 12-foot (i.e., two fathoms, or “mark twain”) monument. His grave is marked by an upright granite headstone. Twain’s legacy lives on and his namesakes continue to grow; schools, structures, people and awards.

#RIP #OTD in 1924 Italian actress, one of the greatest of her time, notably in the plays of Gabriele d’Annunzio and Henrik Ibsen, Eleonora Duse died of pneumonia in Pittsburgh in Suite 524 of the Hotel Schenley, aged 65. Sant’ Anna, Asalo, Italy.

On this day in 1978, singer-songwriter Sandy Denny died at Atkinson Morley Hospital, Wimbledon, England, from traumatic mid-brain haemorrhage and blunt force trauma after a fall at a friends home, at the age of 31. Born Alexandra Elene MacLean Denny on 6 January 1947 in . Denny was the lead singer of the British folk rock band Fairport Convention. She has been described as “the pre-eminent British folk rock singer”. After briefly working with the Strawbs, Denny joined Fairport Convention in 1968, remaining with them until 1969. She formed the short-lived band Fotheringay in 1970, before focusing on a solo career. Between 1971 and 1977, Denny released four solo albums: The North Star Grassman and the Ravens, Sandy, Like an Old Fashioned Waltz and Rendezvous. She also duetted with Robert Plant on “The Battle of Evermore” for Led Zeppelin’s album Led Zeppelin IV in 1971. Music publications Uncut and Mojo have called Denny Britain’s finest female singer-songwriter. Her composition “Who Knows Where the Time Goes?” has been recorded by several other artists. Her recorded work has been the subject of numerous reissues, along with a wealth of previously unreleased material which has appeared over the more than 40 years since her death, most notably including a 19-CD box set which was released in November 2010.

The Final Footprint

The funeral took place on 27 April 1978 at Putney Vale Cemetery, London. After the vicar had read Denny’s favourite psalm, Psalm 23, a piper played “Flowers of the Forest”, a traditional song commemorating the fallen of Flodden Field and one which had appeared on the 1970 Fairport album Full House. The inscription on her headstone reads:

The Lady
Alexandra Elene
MacLean Lucas
(Sandy Denny)
6·1·47 – 21·4·78

Other notable final footprints at Putney Vale include; J. Bruce Ismay chairman of White Star Line and a passenger of its ship RMS Titanic, and Eugen Sandow the father of modern bodybuilding.

On this day in 2003, singer, songwriter, pianist, arranger, and civil rights activist, Nina Simone died in her sleep at her home in Carry-le-Rouet, Bouches-du-Rhône from breast cancer at the age of 70. Born Eunice Kathleen Waymon in Tryon, North Carolina on 21 February 1933. Simone worked in a broad range of musical styles including classical, jazz, blues, folk, R&B, gospel, and pop. Her recording Gershwin and Gershwin’s, “I Loves You, Porgy” was a hit in the United States in 1958. Over the length of her career Simone recorded more than 40 albums, mostly between 1958, when she made her debut with Little Girl Blue, and 1974. Her musical style arose from a fusion of gospel and pop songs with classical music, in particular with influences from her first inspiration, Johann Sebastian Bach, and accompanied with her expressive jazz-like singing in her characteristic contralto voice. She injected her classical background into her music as much as possible to give it more depth and quality, as she felt that pop music was inferior to classical. Her intuitive grasp on the audience–performer relationship was gained from a unique background of playing piano accompaniment for church revivals and sermons regularly from the early age of six years old.

The Final Footprint – Her funeral service was attended by singers Miriam Makeba and Patti LaBelle, poet Sonia Sanchez, actor Ossie Davis, among others. Simone’s ashes were scattered in several African countries.

Prince
performing at the 2008 Coachella Festival

And on this day in 2016, singer-songwriter, actor, multi-instrumentalist, philanthropist, dancer and record producer, Camille, (Love Symbol), The Artist Formerly Known as Prince (TAFKAP), The Artist, Prince died from an accidental fentanyl opioid overdose at his Paisley Park home in Chanhassen, Minnesota at the age of 57. Born Prince Rogers Nelson on June 7, 1958 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Prince was a musical innovator who was known for his eclectic work, flamboyant stage presence, extravagant dress and makeup, and wide vocal range. His music integrates a wide variety of styles, including funk, rock, R&B, new wave, soul, psychedelia, and pop. He has sold over 100 million records worldwide, making him one of the best-selling artists of all time. He won seven Grammy Awards, an American Music Award, a Golden Globe Award, and an Academy Award for the film Purple Rain. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2004, his first year of eligibility.

He signed a recording contract with Warner Bros. at the age of 18, and released his debut album For You in 1978. His 1979 album Prince went platinum, and his next three records—Dirty Mind (1980), Controversy (1981), and 1999 (1982. In 1984, he began referring to his backup band as the Revolution and released Purple Rain, the soundtrack album to his eponymous 1984 film debut. It quickly became his most critically and commercially successful release, spending 24 consecutive weeks atop the Billboard 200 and selling over 20 million units worldwide. After releasing the albums Around the World in a Day (1985) and Parade (1986), The Revolution disbanded, and Prince released the double album Sign o’ the Times (1987) as a solo artist. He released three more solo albums before debuting the New Power Generation band in 1991.

In 1993, while in a contractual dispute with Warner Bros., he changed his stage name to , an unpronounceable symbol also known as the “Love Symbol”, and began releasing new albums at a faster pace to remove himself from contractual obligations. He released five records between 1994 and 1996 before signing with Arista Records in 1998. In 2000, he began referring to himself as “Prince” again. He released 16 albums after that, including the platinum-selling Musicology (2004). His final album, Hit n Run Phase Two, was first released on the Tidal streaming service on December 12, 2015.

The Final Footprint – Prince was cremated and his cremains were placed into a custom, 3D printed urn shaped like the Paisley Park estate. The urn is on display in the atrium of the Paisley Park complex.

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Posted in Day in History, Extravagant Footprints, Literary Footprints | Tagged Buried, Cemetery, Eleonora Duse, Ground Burial, History, Huckleberry Finn, Jean racine, Mark Twain, Marker, Monument, nina simone, peter abelard, prince, putney vale cemetery, riptff, Samuel Clemens, sandy denny, tff, the final footprint, Tom Sawyer, Woodlawn Cemetery | Leave a comment

On this day 20 April death of Bram Stoker – Steve Marriott – Don Siegel – Benny Hill – Columbine

Posted on 29 ApramSat, 20 Apr 2024 00:18:00 -05002024-04-20T00:18:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1912, novelist and short story writer, Bram Stoker died at No. 26 St. George’s Square in Pimlico, London at the age of 64. Born Abraham Stoker on 8 November 1847 in Clontarf, Dublin, Ireland. Best known today for his novel Dracula (1897). Stoker spent several years researching European folklore and mythological stories of vampires. Dracula is an epistolary novel, written as a collection of fictional diary entries, telegrams, letters, ship’s logs, and newspaper clippings, which added a level of detailed realism to his story; a skill he developed as a newspaper writer. Stoker married Florence Balcombe (1878-1912 his death), a celebrated beauty whose former suitor was Oscar Wilde.

The Final Footprint – Stoker was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium and his cremated remains were placed in a urn at Golders Green. To pay respects to him, visitors must be escorted to the room where the urn is kept. The cremated remains of his son, Irving Noel Stoker, were placed in the same urn following his death in 1961.

Other notable Final Footprints at Golders Green include; Kingsley Amis, Marc Bolan, Sigmund Freud, Johnny Kidd, Keith Moon, Anna Pavlova, and Peter Sellers. In addition, among those who were cremated here, but whose cremated remains are elsewhere; Neville Chamberlain, T. S. Eliot, Henry James, Rudyard Kipling, Vivien Leigh, Peter O’Toole, Ralph Vaughan Williams, H. G. Wells, and Amy Winehouse.

Stoker did not invent the vampire, but his novel’s influence on the popularity of vampires has been singularly responsible for many theatrical, film and television interpretations since its publication. Dracula was not an immediate bestseller, although reviewers were unstinting in their praise. It only reached its broad iconic legendary classic status later when the movie versions appeared. The first film adaptation was Nosferatu (1922), directed by Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau and starred Max Schreck as Count Orlock. The first authorized film version was Tod Browning’s Dracula (1931) starring Bela Lugosi as Count Dracula. My favorite version is Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992), starring Gary Oldman as Count Dracula and Winona Ryder as Mina Harker, and featuring Anthony Hopkins as Professor Abraham Van Helsing, Keanu Reeves as Jonathan Harker, and Sadie Frost as Lucy Westenra. In 2009, Dracula: The Un-Dead, a sequel novel was released, written by Dacre Stoker, his great-grandnephew, and Ian Holt.

#RIP #OTD in 1991 singer/songwriter (“Itchycoo Park”, “Lazy Sunday”, “All or Nothing”, “Tin Soldier”, “30 Days in the Hole”) and frontman guitarist of Small Faces and Humble Pie, Steve Marriott died in a fire at his home in Arkesden, Essex at the age of 44. Cremation

#RIP #OTD in 1991 film and television director (Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Dirty Harry, Escape from Alcatraz, The Shootist), producer, Don Siegel died from cancer in Nipomo, California, aged 78. Cayucos-Morro Bay District Cemetery, Cayucos, California

#RIP #OTD in 1992 actor, comedian, singer, writer, remembered for his television programme The Benny Hill Show, Benny Hill died at his home, Teddington, Greater London, in his armchair in front of the TV from a heart attack, aged 68. Hollybrook Cemetery, Bassett, Southampton

And on this day in 1999, the Columbine High School massacre shooting occurred at Columbine High School in Columbine, Colorado. The perpetrators, twelfth grade (senior) students Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, murdered 12 students and one teacher. Ten students were killed in the library, where the pair subsequently committed suicide. At the time, it was the deadliest shooting at a high school in United States history. The crime has inspired several copycats, and “Columbine” has become a byword for a school shooting.

The two perpetrators injured 21 additional people with gunshots and also exchanged gunfire with the police. Another three people were injured trying to escape the school. In addition to the shootings, the attack involved several homemade bombs. The largest of these were placed in the cafeteria; car bombs were also placed in the parking lot and at another location that was intended to divert first responders.

The motive remains unclear, but the pair planned the crime for about a year and wished for the massacre to rival the Oklahoma City bombing and cause the most deaths in United States history.

The incident resulted in the introduction of the Immediate Action Rapid Deployment tactic, which is used in situations where an active shooter is trying to kill people rather than take hostages. Columbine also resulted in an increased emphasis on school security with zero tolerance policies. Debates were sparked over gun control laws and gun culture, high school cliques, subcultures, and bullying. Also discussed were the moral panic over goths, social outcasts, the use of pharmaceutical antidepressants by teenagers, teenage Internet use and violence in video games.

The Final Footprint

HOPE Columbine Memorial Library

The Columbine memorial in Clement Park

In 2000, youth advocate Melissa Helmbrecht organized a remembrance event in Denver featuring two surviving students, called “A Call to Hope.” The library where most of the massacre took place was removed and replaced with an atrium. In 2001, a new library, the HOPE memorial library, was built next to the west entrance.

On February 26, 2004, thousands of pieces of evidence from the massacre were put on display at the Jeffco fairgrounds in Golden.

A permanent memorial “to honor and remember the victims of the April 20, 1999 shootings at Columbine High School” was dedicated on September 21, 2007, in Clement Park.

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Posted in Day in History, Literary Footprints | Tagged Bram Stoker, columbine, cremains, Cremation, Dracula, Golders Green Crematorium, History, riptff, tff, the final footprint, urn, vampires | Leave a comment

On this day 19 April death of Lord Byron – Daphne du Maurier – Oklahoma City National Memorial – Octavio Paz – Levon Helm – Jim Steinman

Posted on 29 ApramFri, 19 Apr 2024 00:03:00 -05002024-04-19T00:03:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

lordbyron250px-George_Gordon_Byron,_6th_Baron_Byron_by_Richard_Westall_(2)

Portrait by Richard Westall

On this day in 1824, poet and eading figure in the Romantic movement, Lord Byron died at the age of 36 in Missolonghi, Aetolia-Acarnania,Ottoman Empire (Greece). Born George Gordon Byron on 22 January 1788 in a house on 24 Holles Street in London. In my opinion, Byron is one of the greatest British poets, and remains widely read and influential. He travelled widely across Europe, especially in Italy where he lived for seven years. Later in life, Byron joined the Greek War of Independence fighting the Ottoman Empire, for which many Greeks revere him as a national hero. Often described as the most flamboyant and notorious of the major Romantics, Byron was both celebrated and castigated in life for his aristocratic excesses, including huge debts, numerous love affairs, rumours of a scandalous liaison with his half-sister, and self-imposed exile. He also fathered the Countess Ada Lovelace, whose work on Charles Babbage’s Analytical Engine is considered a founding document in the field of computer science. Perhaps his best known works are the lengthy narrative poems Don Juan and Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage and the short lyric She Walks in Beauty.

Lord Byron On His Deathbed by Joseph Denis Odevaere

The Final Footprint – Alfred, Lord Tennyson would later recall the shocked reaction in Britain when word was received of Byron’s death. The Greeks mourned Lord Byron deeply. The national poet of Greece, Dionysios Solomos, wrote a poem about the unexpected loss, named To the Death of Lord Byron. Βύρων (“Vyron”), the Greek form of “Byron”, continues in popularity as a masculine name in Greece, and a town near Athens is called Vyronas in his honour. Byron’s body was embalmed, but the Greeks wanted some part of their hero to stay with them. According to some sources, his heart remained at Missolonghi. His other remains were sent to England (accompanied by his faithful manservant, “Tita”) for burial in Westminster Abbey, but the Abbey refused for reason of “questionable morality”. Huge crowds viewed his body as he lay in state for two days in London. He is buried at the Church of St. Mary Magdalene in Hucknall, Nottinghamshire. A marble slab given by the King of Greece is laid directly above Byron’s grave. A duplicate of the slab was later placed in Westminster Abbey. His daughter, Ada Lovelace, was later buried beside him. Byron’s friends raised the sum of 1,000 pounds to commission a statue of the writer; Thorvaldsen offered to sculpt it for that amount. However, for ten years after the statue was completed in 1834, most British institutions turned it down, and it remained in storage. The statue was refused by the British Museum, St. Paul’s Cathedral, Westminster Abbey and the National Gallery before Trinity College, Cambridge, finally placed the statue of Byron in its library. In 1969, 145 years after Byron’s death, a memorial to him was finally placed in Westminster Abbey. The memorial had been lobbied for since 1907: The New York Times wrote, “People are beginning to ask whether this ignoring of Byron is not a thing of which England should be ashamed … a bust or a tablet might be put in the Poets’ Corner and England be relieved of ingratitude toward one of her really great sons.”. Robert Ripley had drawn a picture of Boatswain’s grave with the caption “Lord Byron’s dog has a magnificent tomb while Lord Byron himself has none”. This came as a shock to the English, particularly schoolchildren, who, Ripley said, raised funds of their own accord to provide the poet with a suitable memorial. Close to the centre of Athens, Greece, outside the National Garden, is a statue depicting Greece in the form of a woman crowning Byron. The statue is by the French sculptors Henri-Michel Chapu and Alexandre Falguière.

Dame Daphne du Maurier DBE
(about 1930)

On this day in 1989 author and playwright Daphne du Maurier died, aged 81, at her home in Cornwall. Born on May 1907 in London.

Although she is classed as a romantic novelist, her stories seldom feature a conventional happy ending and have been described as “moody and resonant” with overtones of the paranormal. These bestselling works were not at first taken seriously by critics, but have since earned an enduring reputation for storytelling craft. Many have been successfully adapted into films, including the novels Rebecca, My Cousin Rachel, and Jamaica Inn, and the short stories “The Birds” and “Don’t Look Now/Not After Midnight”.

Du Maurier spent much of her life in Cornwall, where most of her works are set. As her fame increased, she became more reclusive.

Du Maurier married Major (later Lieutenant-General) Frederick “Boy” Browning in 1932. Biographers have noted that du Maurier’s marriage was at times somewhat chilly and that she could be aloof and distant to her children, especially the girls, when immersed in her writing. Her husband died in 1965 and soon after Daphne moved to Kilmarth, near Par, Cornwall, which became the setting for The House on the Strand.

After her death in 1989, references were made to her reputed bisexuality; an alleged affair with Gertrude Lawrence, as well as her attraction to Ellen Doubleday, the wife of her U.S. publisher Nelson Doubleday, were cited. The Daphne du Maurier Companion, edited by Helen Taylor, includes Taylor’s claims that du Maurier confessed to her in 1965 that she had had an incestuous relationship with her father and that he had been a violent alcoholic.

In correspondence that her family released to biographer Margaret Forster, du Maurier explained to a trusted few people her own unique slant on her sexuality: her personality comprised two distinct people – the loving wife and mother (the side she showed to the world); and the lover (a decidedly male energy) hidden from virtually everyone and the power behind her artistic creativity. According to Forster’s biography, du Maurier believed the male energy propelled her writing. Forster wrote that du Maurier’s denial of her bisexuality unveiled a “homophobic” fear of her true nature.

The Final Footprint

Her body was cremated and her ashes scattered off the cliffs at Fowey, Kilmarth, Cornwall.

On this day in 1995, Timothy McVeigh parked a rental truck filled with explosives in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. The resulting explosion killed 168 people and destroyed the entire north face of the building. The Oklahoma City National Memorial is a memorial that honors the victims, survivors, rescuers, and all who were changed by the Oklahoma City bombing. The memorial is located in downtown Oklahoma City on the former site of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building.

The Final Footprint – The 3.3 acre memorial can be visited 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and includes;

The Gates of Time: Monumental twin bronze gates frame the moment of destruction – 9:02 – and mark the formal entrances to the Outdoor Memorial. 9:01, found on the eastern gate, represents the last moments of peace, while its opposite on the western gate, 9:03, represents the first moments of recovery. Both time stamps are inscribed on the interior of the monument, facing each other and the Reflecting Pool. The outside of each gate bears this inscription: We come here to remember Those who were killed, those who survived and those changed forever. May all who leave here know the impact of violence. May this memorial offer comfort, strength, peace, hope and serenity.
Reflecting Pool: A thin layer of water flows over polished black granite to form the pool.
Field of Empty Chairs: 168 empty chairs hand-crafted from glass, bronze, and stone represent those who lost their lives, with a name etched in the glass base of each. The chairs represent the empty chairs at the dinner tables of the victims’ families. Three unborn children died along with their mothers, and they are listed on their mothers’ chairs beneath their mothers’ names.
Survivors’ Wall: The only remaining original portions of the Murrah Building are the southeast corner, known as the Survivors’ Wall, and a portion of the south wall. The Survivors’ Wall includes several panels of granite salvaged from the Murrah Building itself, inscribed with the names of more than 600 survivors from the building and the surrounding area, many of whom were injured in the blast.
The Survivor Tree: An American elm on the north side of the Memorial, this was the only shade tree in the parking lot across the street from the Murrah Building. The force of the blast ripped most of the branches from the Survivor Tree. Glass and debris were embedded in its trunk and fire from the cars parked beneath it blackened what was left. Most thought the tree could not survive. Almost a year after the bombing, family members, survivors and rescue workers gathered for a memorial ceremony by the tree noticed it was beginning to bloom again. The inscription around the inside of the deck wall around the Survivor Tree reads: The spirit of this city and this nation will not be defeated; our deeply rooted faith sustains us. Hundreds of seeds from the Survivor Tree are planted annually and the resulting saplings are distributed each year on the anniversary of the bombing. Thousands of Survivor Trees are growing in public and private places all over the United States.
The Memorial Fence: A 10-foot-tall chain link fence was installed around the area that is now the Reflecting Pool and the Field of Empty Chairs to protect the site from damage and visitors from injury. The Fence stood for more than four years, becoming notable as the place where visitors left tributes. Visitors may still leave small items along and in the Fence; the mementos are periodically collected, cataloged, and stored.
Rescuers’ Orchard: A grove of Oklahoma redbuds (Oklahoma’s state tree), Amur Maple, Chinese Pistache, and Bosque Elm trees are planted on the lawn around the Survivor Tree.
Children’s Area: More than 5,000 hand-painted tiles, from all over the United States and Canada, were made by children and sent to Oklahoma City after the bombing in 1995. Most are stored in the Memorial’s Archives, and a sampling of tiles is on the wall in the Children’s Area. Chalkboards provide a place where children can draw and share their feelings. The Children’s Area is north of the 9:03 gate, on the west side of the Museum.
And Jesus Wept: On a corner adjacent to the memorial is a sculpture of Jesus weeping, erected by St. Joseph’s Catholic Church. St. Joseph’s, one of the first brick-and-mortar churches built in the city, was almost destroyed by the blast. Not officially part of the memorial, the statue is regularly visited.
Journal Record Building: North of the memorial is the Journal Record Building, which formerly housed the offices of the The Journal Record. It now houses the Oklahoma City National Memorial Museum, which features numerous exhibits and artifacts related to the Oklahoma City bombing. Staff of the National Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism, a non-partisan think tank created shortly after the bombing by family members and survivors, also work here to spread knowledge of terrorism and its prevention.
Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building Plaza: Located just south of the Field of Empty Chairs, above the underground parking garage, is the raised Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building Plaza. An original part of the federal building, the plaza had a garden and seating areas, as well as a playground for the daycare center. Visitors to the Memorial can walk across the plaza, where the original flagpole is used for the American flag.

#RIP #OTD in 1998 poet (Piedra de Sol, essay El laberinto de la soledad), diplomat Octavio Paz died of cancer in Mexico City, aged 84. Antiguo Colegio de San Ildefonso, Centro, Cuauhtémoc Borough, Distrito Federal, Mexico.

Levon Helm
performing in 2004 on the Village Green in Woodstock, New York

On this day in 2012, musician, drummer, actor Levon Helm died from throat cancer at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City at the age of 71. Born Mark Lavon Helm on May 26, 1940 in Elaine, Arkansas. Perhaps best known as the drummer and one of the vocalists for The Band. Helm was known for his soulful, country-accented voice, multi-instrumental ability, and creative drumming style, highlighted on many of the Band’s recordings, such as “The Weight”, “Up on Cripple Creek”, and “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down”.

Helm also had a successful career as a film actor, appearing as Loretta Lynn’s father in Coal Miner’s Daughter, as Chuck Yeager’s friend and colleague Captain Jack Ridley in The Right Stuff, and as a Tennessee firearms expert in Shooter.

In 1998, Helm was diagnosed with throat cancer, which caused him to lose his singing voice. After treatment, his cancer eventually went into remission, and he gradually regained the use of his voice. His 2007 comeback album Dirt Farmer earned the Grammy Award for Best Traditional Folk Album in February 2008. In 2010, Electric Dirt, his 2009 follow-up to Dirt Farmer, won the first Grammy Award for Best Americana Album, a category inaugurated in 2010. In 2011, his live album Ramble at the Ryman won the Grammy in the same category. On April 17, 2012, his wife and daughter announced on Helm’s website that he was “in the final stages of his battle with cancer” and thanked fans while requesting prayers. Two days later, Helm died from throat cancer at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City at the age of 72.

Helm met singer-songwriter Libby Titus in April 1969, while the Band was recording its second album.

Helm met his future wife, Sandra Dodd, in 1975 in California, while he was still involved with Titus. Helm and Dodd were married on September 7, 1981.

The Final Footprint

On April 17, 2012, Helm’s wife Sandy and daughter Amy revealed that he had end-stage throat cancer. They posted the following message on Helm’s website:

“Dear Friends,

Levon is in the final stages of his battle with cancer. Please send your prayers and love to him as he makes his way through this part of his journey.

Thank you fans and music lovers who have made his life so filled with joy and celebration… he has loved nothing more than to play, to fill the room up with music, lay down the back beat, and make the people dance! He did it every time he took the stage…

We appreciate all the love and support and concern.

From his daughter Amy, and wife Sandy”

Fans were invited to a public wake at Helm’s Barn studio complex on April 26. Approximately 2,000 fans came to pay their respects to the rock icon. The following day, after a private funeral service and a procession through the streets of Woodstock, Helm was interred in the Woodstock Cemetery, within sight of the grave of his longtime bandmate and friend Rick Danko.

On the day of Helm’s death, April 19, 2012, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, in a concert at the First Bank Center in Broomfield, Colorado, paid tribute to Levon by performing their song “The Best of Everything” and dedicating it to him.

At a concert on May 2, 2012, at the Prudential Center in Newark, NJ, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band performed “The Weight” as a tribute to Helm. Springsteen called Helm “one of the greatest, greatest voices in country, rockabilly and rock ‘n’ roll … staggering … while playing the drums. Both his voice and his drumming were so incredibly personal. He had a feel on the drums that comes out of certain place in the past and you can’t replicate it.”

On June 2, 2012, at Mountain Jam, Gov’t Mule, along with the Levon Helm Band (with Lukas Nelson coming on stage for the closing song) played a tribute set, including “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down,” “Up on Cripple Creek,””It Makes No Difference,” and closing with “The Weight.”

A tribute concert called Love for Levon took place at the Izod Center in East Rutherford, New Jersey, on October 3, 2012. The concert featured many special guests who had collaborated with and were inspired by Helm and the Band, including Roger Waters, Garth Hudson, Joe Walsh, Gregg Allman, Bruce Hornsby, Jorma Kaukonen, John Mayer, Mavis Staples, My Morning Jacket, Marc Cohn, John Hiatt, Allen Toussaint, Jakob Dylan, Mike Gordon and others. Proceeds from the concert were to “help support the lasting legacy of Levon Helm by helping his estate keep ownership of his home, barn and studio, and to continue the Midnight Ramble Sessions.”

At the 2013 Grammy Awards, the Zac Brown Band, Mumford & Sons, Elton John, Mavis Staples, T-Bone Burnett and Alabama Shakes singer Brittany Howard performed “The Weight” as a tribute to Levon and other recently deceased musicians. They also dedicated the song to the victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. In May 2013, the New York State Legislature approved a resolution to name State Route 375—the road which connects State Route 28 with the town of Woodstock—”Levon Helm Memorial Boulevard”. Governor Andrew Cuomo signed the bill on June 20, 2013. In July 2017, U.S. 49 from Marvell, Arkansas to Helena-West Helena was named The Levon Helm Memorial Highway by Act 810 of the Arkansas State Legislature. The Levon Helm Legacy Project is raising money to commission a bronze bust of Helm and to restore his boyhood home. The house, originally located in Turkey Scratch, Arkansas, was moved in 2015 to Marvell, where Helm attended school.

#RIP #OTD in 2021 composer, lyricist (Meat Loaf’s Bat Out of Hell album, “Total Eclipse of the Heart”, “It’s All Coming Back to Me Now”), record producer Jim Steinman died from kidney failure at a hospital in Danbury, Connecticut, aged 73. Final footprint details not known

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Posted in Day in History, Literary Footprints, Musical Footprints | Tagged Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, daphne du maurier, Jim steinman, levon helm, Lord Byron, Octavio paz, Oklahoma City bombing, Oklahoma City National Memorial, riptff, Survivor Tree, tff, the final footprint | Leave a comment

On this day 18 April death of Gustave Moreau – Ottorino Respighi – Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney – Albert Einstein – Dick Clark

Posted on 29 ApramThu, 18 Apr 2024 00:27:00 -05002024-04-18T00:27:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

Gustave Moreau
Self-portrait, 1850

On this day in 1898 Symbolist painter Gustave Moreau died of stomach cancer in Paris at the age of 72. Born in Paris on 18 April 1898. His main emphasis was the illustration of biblical and mythological figures. As a painter, Moreau appealed to the imaginations of some Symbolist writers and artists. He is recognized for his works that are influenced by the Italian Renaissance and exoticism. His art work was preserved in Paris at the Musée Gustave Moreau.

Moreau had a 25-year personal, possibly romantic relationship, with Adelaide-Alexandrine Dureux (b.Guise, 8 November 1835), a woman whom he drew several times. On 28 March 1890, Dureux died. Her death affected Moreau greatly, and his work after this point contained a more melancholic edge.

The Final Footprint

Moreau is entombed at the Cimetière de Montmartre in Paris in his parent’s tomb. Other notable final footprints at Montmartre include Hector Berlioz, Dalida, Edgar Degas, Léo Delibes, Alexandre Dumas, fils, Marie Duplessis, Théophile Gautier, Henri Murger, Jacques Offenbach, François Truffaut, and Alfred de Vigny.

Gallery

- Oedipus and the Sphinx(1864)

- Jason and Medea (1865)

- Orpheus (1865)

- Venus Rising from the Sea(1866)

- Europa and the Bull (1869)

- La chimère (1876)

- Salomé (1876)

- The Apparition (1876)

- Jacob and the Angel (1878)

- Galatée (1880)

- The Sacred Elephant (Péri)(1885)

- Eve by Gustave Moreau (1885)

- The Toilette (1885–90)

- Hesiod and the Muse (1891)

- Song of Songs (Cantique des Cantiques) (1893)

Jupiter and Semele (1894–95)

On this day in 1936 violinist and composer Ottorino Respighi died of endocarditis at the age of 56. Born in an apartment inside Palazzo Fantuzzi on Via Guido Reni in Bologna, Italy, into a musical family 0n 9 July 1879. Perhaps best known for his three orchestral tone poems Fountains of Rome (1916), Pines of Rome (1924), and Roman Festivals (1928). His musicological interest in 16th-, 17th- and 18th-century music led him to compose pieces based on the music of these periods. He also wrote several operas, the most famous being La fiamma.

In 1919, he married the composer and singer Elsa Olivieri-Sangiacomo who, at fourteen years his junior, had been his composition pupil. In 1921, the couple relocated to a flat in Rome.

Respighi’s operas fall broadly into three groups – the dramatic-tragic operas Semirama (1910), Marie Victoire (1912–14), La Campana Sommersa (1923–27), Maria Egiziaca (1928), La Fiamma (1931–34), and Lucrezia (completed Elsa Respighi, 1936), and the lighter works, Re Enzo (1905), Belfagor (1919–22), La Bella Dormente nel Bosco (Sleeping Beauty, 1916/1933). Respighi’s operas after Marie Victoire were all set to libretti by his close collaborator, Claudio Guastalla. Although La Fiamma is Respighi’s most frequently performed opera, La Campana Sommersa and Maria Egiziaca are his operatic masterpieces, written when he was at the height of his creative powers, and both Respighi and his wife Elsa considered La Campana Sommersa to be his finest work.

The Final Footprint

Respighi is entombed at the Certosa di Bologna. Inscribed on his tomb are his name and crosses; dates of birth and death are missing.

Respighi, 1935

#RIP #OTD in 1942 sculptor, art patron and collector, founder of the Whitney Museum of American Art, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney died from a heart condition in Manhattan aged 67. Woodlawn Cemetery, the Bronx. Portrait by Robert Henri

On this day in 1955, theoretical physicist, the father of modern physics, Albert Einstein died in Princeton Hospital in Princeton, New Jersey at the age of 76. Born on 14 March 1879 in Ulm, in the Kingdom of Württemberg in the German Empire. Einstein discovered the theory of general relativity, effecting a revolution in physics. He received the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics “for his services to theoretical physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect”. Einstein was visiting the United States when Hitler came to power in 1933. He did not go back to Germany, becoming a U. S. citizen in 1940. In the summer of 1939, Einstein wrote a letter, with Leo Szilard, to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, alerting him of the possibility that Nazi Germany might be developing an atomic bomb. The letter recommended that the U.S. government should become directly involved with uranium research and chain reaction research. Einstein and Szilard, along with other refugees such as Edward Teller and Eugene Wigner, “regarded it as their responsibility to alert Americans to the possibility that German scientists might win the race to build an atomic bomb, and to warn that Hitler would be more than willing to resort to such a weapon.” Einstein married twice; Mileva Marić (1903-1919 divorce) and Elsa Löwenthal (1919-1936 her death). On his religious belief, Einstein said; “I believe in Spinoza’s God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings.” The day before he died, Einstein experienced internal bleeding caused by the rupture of an abdominal aortic aneurysm. He refused surgery, saying: “I want to go when I want. It is tasteless to prolong life artificially. I have done my share, it is time to go. I will do it elegantly.” I have always thought physics was fascinating and had I been born a little smarter, actually a lot smarter, perhpaps I would have been a physicist. It is the study of the final frontier, or the next frontier.

The Final Footprint – Einstein was cremated and his cremains were possibly scattered around the grounds of The Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. Einstein has been the subject of, or inspiration for, many novels, films, plays, and works of music.

Dick Clark
in 1961

And on this day in 2012, radio and television personality, television producer and film actor, as well as a cultural icon Dick Clark died from a heart attack at the age of 82 in Santa Monica, California. Born Richard Wagstaff Clark on November 30, 1929 Perhaps best known for hosting American Bandstand from 1957 to 1987. He also hosted the game show Pyramid and Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve, which transmitted Times Square’s New Year’s Eve celebrations. Clark was well known for his trademark sign-off, “For now, Dick Clark — so long!”, accompanied by a facsimile of a military salute.

As host of American Bandstand, Clark introduced rock & roll to many Americans. The show gave many new music artists their first exposure to national audiences, including Iggy Pop, Ike and Tina Turner, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, Stevie Wonder, Prince, Talking Heads, Simon & Garfunkel and Madonna. Episodes he hosted were among the first in which blacks and whites performed on the same stage, and likewise among the first in which the live studio audience sat without racial segregation. Due to his perennial youthful appearance and his largely teenaged audience of American Bandstand, Clark was often referred to as “America’s oldest teenager” or “the world’s oldest teenager”.

as host of The $10,000 Pyramid

in 1963. His ABC radio show was called “Dick Clark Reports”.

Clark was married three times. His first marriage was to Barbara Mallery in 1952; the couple divorced in 1961. He married Loretta Martin in 1962 and divorced in 1971. His third marriage, to Kari Wigton, whom he married in 1977, lasted until his death.

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Clark’s family did not immediately decide on whether there would be a public memorial service, but stated “there will be no funeral”. He was cremated on April 20, and his ashes were scattered in the Pacific Ocean.

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Posted in American Icon, Day in History | Tagged Albert Einstein, Cremation, dick clark, gustave moreau, ottorino respighi, riptff, scattering, tff, the final footprint, Theory of Relativity | Leave a comment

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