On this day 15 November death of: Frank Weston Benson – Tyrone Power – The Clutter Family – Alydar – Roy Clark

Posted on 29 NovamFri, 15 Nov 2024 00:48:00 -06002024-11-15T00:48:00-06:0012 2011 by MacGregor

Frank_W_Benson_artist_headshot-crop-204x300On this day in 1951, impressionist painter, Frank Weston Benson, died in Salem, Massachusetts at the age of 89.  Born 24 March 1862 in Salem.

Perhaps best known for his Realistic portraits, American Impressionist paintings, watercolors and etchings. He began his career painting portraits of distinguished families and murals for the Library of Congress. Some of his best known paintings (Eleanor, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Summer, Rhode Island School of Design Museum) depict his daughters outdoors at Benson’s summer home, Wooster Farm, on the island of North Haven, Maine. He also produced numerous oil, wash and watercolor paintings and etchings of wildfowl and landscapes.

In 1883 he travelled to Paris to study at the Académie Julian. He enjoyed a distinguished career as an instructor and department head at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. He was a founding member of the Ten American Painters, American Academy of Arts and Letters and The Guild of Boston Artists.

The Final Footprint – Benson is interred in Harmony Grove Cemetery in Salem alongside his wife Ellen Perry Benson.  Their graves are marked by a large upright marble marker.

    • The Sisters, 1899, Terra Museum, Chicago

    • Eleanor Holding a Shell, 1902, Private collection

    • Calm Morning, 1904, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

    • Evening Light, 1908, Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio

    Red and Gold, 1915

On this day in 1958, US Marine Corp veteran, actor Tyrone Power died from a heart attack in Madrid, aged 44. Born Tyrone Edmund Power III in Cincinnati, Ohio on 5 May 1914.

From the 1930s to the 1950s, Power appeared in dozens of films, often in swashbuckler roles or romantic leads. Perhaps his best known films include The Mark of Zorro, Marie Antoinette, Blood and Sand, The Black Swan, Prince of Foxes, Witness for the Prosecution, The Black Rose, and Captain from Castile. Power’s own favorite film among those that he starred in was Nightmare Alley.

Though largely a matinee idol in the 1930s and early 1940s and known for his striking good looks, Power starred in films in a number of genres, from drama to light comedy. In the 1950s he began placing limits on the number of films he would make in order to devote more time to theater productions. He received his biggest accolades as a stage actor in John Brown’s Body and Mister Roberts.

Power was one of Hollywood’s most eligible bachelors until he married French actress Annabella (born Suzanne Georgette Charpentier) on July 14, 1939. They had met on the 20th Century Fox lot around the time they starred together in the movie Suez. Power adopted Annabella’s daughter, Anne, before leaving for service. In an A&E biography, Annabella said that Zanuck “could not stop Tyrone’s love for me, or my love for Tyrone.” J. Watson Webb, close friend and an editor at 20th Century Fox, maintained in the A&E Biography that one of the reasons the marriage fell apart was Annabella’s inability to give Power a son, yet, Webb said, there was no bitterness between the couple. In a March 1947 issue of Photoplay, Power was interviewed and said that he wanted a home and children, especially a son to carry on his acting legacy. Annabella shed some light on the situation in an interview published in Movieland magazine in 1948. She said, “Our troubles began because the war started earlier for me, a French-born woman, than it did for Americans.” She explained that the war clouds over Europe made her unhappy and irritable, and to get her mind off her troubles, she began accepting stage work, which often took her away from home. “It is always difficult to put one’s finger exactly on the place and time where a marriage starts to break up,” she said “but I think it began then. We were terribly sad about it, both of us, but we knew we were drifting apart. I didn’t think then—and I don’t think now—that it was his fault, or mine.” The couple tried to make their marriage work when Power returned from military service, but they were unable to do so.

Following his separation from Annabella, Power entered into a love affair with Lana Turner that lasted for a couple of years. In her 1982 autobiography, Turner claimed that she became pregnant with Power’s child in 1948, but chose to have an abortion.

In 1946, Power and lifelong friend Cesar Romero, accompanied by former flight instructor and war veteran John Jefferies as navigator, embarked on a goodwill tour throughout South America where they met, among others, Juan and Evita Peron in Argentina.  On September 1, 1947, Power set out on another goodwill trip around the world, piloting his own plane, “The Geek”.  He flew with Bob Buck, another experienced pilot and war veteran. Buck stated in his autobiography that Power had a photographic mind, was an excellent pilot, and genuinely liked people. They flew with a crew to various locations in Europe and South Africa, often mobbed by fans when they hit the ground. However, in 1948 when “The Geek” reached Rome, Power met and fell in love with Mexican actress Linda Christian. Turner claimed that the story of her dining out with Power’s friend Frank Sinatra was leaked to Power and that Power became very upset that she was “dating” another man in his absence. Turner also claimed that it could not have been a coincidence that Linda Christian was at the same hotel as Tyrone Power and implied that Christian had obtained Power’s itinerary from 20th Century Fox.

Power and Christian were married on January 27, 1949, in the Church of Santa Francesca Romana, with an estimated 8,000 to 10,000 screaming fans outside. Christian miscarried three times before giving birth to a baby girl, Romina Francesca Power, on October 2, 1951. A second daughter, Taryn Stephanie Power, was born on September 13, 1953. Around the time of Taryn’s birth, the marriage was becoming rocky. In her autobiography, Christian blamed the breakup of her marriage on her husband’s extramarital affairs, but acknowledged that she had had an affair with Edmund Purdom. They divorced in 1955.

After his divorce from Christian, Power had a long-lasting love affair with Mai Zetterling, whom he had met on the set of Abandon Ship.  At the time, he vowed that he would never marry again, because he had been twice burned financially by his previous marriages. He also entered into an affair with a British actress, Thelma Ruby.  However, in 1957, he met the former Deborah Jean Smith (sometimes incorrectly referred to as Deborah Ann Montgomery), who went by her former married name, Debbie Minardos.  They were married on May 7, 1958, and she became pregnant soon after with Tyrone Power Jr., the son he had always wanted.

The Final Footprint

In September 1958, Power and his wife Deborah traveled to Madrid and Valdespartera, Spain to film the epic Solomon and Sheba, directed by King Vidor and costarring Gina Lollobrigida. Probably affected by hereditary heart disease, and a chain smoker who smoked three to four packs a day, Power had filmed about 75% of his scenes when he was stricken by a massive heart attack while filming a dueling scene with his frequent costar and friend George Sanders. A doctor diagnosed the cause of Power’s death as “fulminant angina pectoris.”  Power died while being transported to the hospital in Madrid.

Power was interred at Hollywood Forever Cemetery (then known as Hollywood Cemetery) in a military service on November 21.  Henry King flew over the service; almost 20 years before, Power had flown in King’s plane to the set of Jesse James in Missouri, Power’s first experience with flying. Aviation became an important part of Power’s life, both in the U.S. Marines and as a civilian. In the foreword to Dennis Belafonte’s The Films of Tyrone Power, King wrote: “Knowing his love for flying and feeling that I had started it, I flew over his funeral procession and memorial park during his burial, and felt that he was with me.”

Power was interred beside a small lake. His grave is marked with a gravestone in the form of a marble bench containing the masks of comedy and tragedy with the inscription “Good night, sweet prince.” At Power’s grave, Laurence Olivier read the poem “High Flight.”

Power’s will, filed on December 8, 1958, contained a then-unusual provision that his eyes be donated to the Estelle Doheny Eye Foundation for corneal transplantation or retinal study.

Deborah Power gave birth to a son on January 22, 1959, two months after her husband’s death. She remarried within the year to producer Arthur Loew Jr.

On this day in 1959, farmer Herbert Clutter (48), his wife Bonnie (45), their daughter Nancy (16), and their son Kenyon (15), were found bound and shot to death in various rooms of their home, on the family’s River Valley Farm on the outskirts of Holcomb, Kansas.

The murders, arrests and convictions of Richard Eugene Hickock and Perry Edward Smith were the basis for author Truman Capote‘s acclaimed book, In Cold Blood, which was serialized in The New Yorker magazine in 1965 and first published in book form in 1966. Capote actually began work on the book several days after he read a news article in a New York paper in 1959 about the murders.  Capote was assisted in his research by his childhood friend, Harper Lee.

The Final Footprint – The Clutters are interred in Valley View Cemetery in Garden City, Kansas.

On this day in 1990, chesnut colt and American thoroughbred race horse, Alydar, died at the age of 15.  Foaled 23 March 1975 at Calumet Farms in Lexington, Kentucky; sire Raise a Native, dam Sweet Tooth, damsire On-And-On.  Trained by John M. Veitch and ridden by jockey Jorge Velasquez, Alydar finished second to archrival Affirmed in all three Triple Crown Races in 1978.  A feat never accomplished, before or since.   In my opinion, their matchup in the Belmont Stakes ranks as the most exciting race in the history of the sport.  Affirmed won by a head to claim racing’s 11th Triple Crown Winner.  I watched all three races on television.  Both horses were beautiful chestnuts and I was a fan of both, but I was hoping that Affirmed would win.  Alydar was a major success as a stallion.  His offspring include; Easy Goer, Alysheba and Strike the Gold.

The Final Footprint – On November 13, 1990, Alydar appeared to have shattered his right hind leg in his stall at Calumet Farm in Lexington, Kentucky. Emergency surgery was performed the next day in an attempt to repair the injury, but the leg broke again. On November 15, Alydar was euthanized.  At the time the owner of Calumet Farm was in dire trouble financially, but suspicions of foul play by the management were not raised until federal prosecutors investigated in the late 1990s. John Thomas (J.T.) Lundy was indicted and convicted in 2000 on separate but related fraud charges—bribing a bank executive for favorable loans—and served nearly four years in prison. The farm’s former attorney, Gary Matthews, was also convicted and received a 21-month prison sentence. The Texas Monthly described Alydar’s death as “a sweeping saga of greed, fraud, and almost unimaginable cruelty that could have been lifted straight from a best-selling Dick Francis horse-racing novel.”

In Houston federal court, MIT professor George Pratt testified that Alydar had to have been killed.  He speculated that someone had tied the end of a rope around Alydar’s leg and attached the other end of the rope to a truck that could easily have been driven into the stallion barn. The truck then took off, pulling Alydar’s leg from underneath him until it snapped; he testified that the force involved was at least three times that which a horse was able to exert. About five days before Alydar’s injury his original night watchman, Harold “Cowboy” Kipp, testified that he was at work on the farm when he was ordered to take Tuesday, November 13 off.

Alydar was given the rare honor of being buried whole (traditionally only the head, heart, and hooves of a winning race horse are buried) in the Calumet Farm Equine Cemetery in Lexington.

#RIP #OTD in 2018 singer (Yesterday, When I Was Young; Thank God and Greyhound), musician, Hee Haw host, Roy Clark died at his Tulsa, Oklahoma home from complications of pneumonia aged 85. Memorial Park Cemetery, Tulsa

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On this day 14 November death of: Giovanni della Casa – Flora Tristan – Booker T. Washington

Posted on 29 NovamThu, 14 Nov 2024 00:54:00 -06002024-11-14T00:54:00-06:0012 2011 by MacGregor

giovannidellacasaWenceslas_Hollar_-_Altoviti,_or_della_Casa_(State_3)_croppedOn this day in 1556, Florentine poet, writer on etiquette and society, diplomat, and inquisitor, Giovanni della Casa died probably in the Farnese palace in Rome at the age of 53.  Born 28 June 1503 in Florence or Borgo San Lorenzo.  He is celebrated for his famous treatise on polite behavior, Il Galateo overo de’ costumi (1558).  From the time of its publication, this courtesy book has enjoyed success and influence.  In the eighteenth century, critic Giuseppe Baretti wrote in The Italian Library (1757), “The little treatise is looked upon by many Italians as the most elegant thing, as to stile, that we have in our language.”

 The Final Footprint – Casa is entombed in the Church of Sant’Andrea della Valle, Rome. Sant’Andrea della Valle is a minor basilica in the rione of Sant’Eustachio. The basilica is the general seat for the religious order of the Theatines. It is located at Piazza Vidoni, 6 at the intersection of Corso Vittorio Emanuele (facing facade) and Corso Rinascimento.

#RIP #OTD in 1844 French-Peruvian writer and socialist activist who made important contributions to early feminist theory, Paul Gauguin’s grandmother, Flora Tristan died aged 41. Cimetière de la Chartreuse, Bordeaux, France

On this day in 1915, educator, author, orator, and advisor to presidents of the United States, Booker T. Washington died in Tuskegee,
Alabama at the age of 59. Born Booker Taliaferro Washington c. 1856 in Hale’s Ford, Virginia. Between 1890 and 1915, Washington was the dominant leader in the African-American community.

Washington was from the last generation of black American leaders born into slavery and became the leading voice of the former slaves and their descendants. They were newly oppressed in the South by disenfranchisement and the Jim Crow discriminatory laws enacted in the post-Reconstruction Southern states in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Washington was a key proponent of African-American businesses and one of the founders of the National Negro Business League. His base was the Tuskegee Institute, a historically black college in Alabama. As lynchings in the South reached a peak in 1895, Washington gave a speech, known as the “Atlanta compromise”, which brought him national fame. He called for black progress through education and entrepreneurship, rather than trying to challenge directly the Jim Crow segregation and the disenfranchisement of black voters in the South. Washington mobilized a nationwide coalition of middle-class blacks, church leaders, and white philanthropists and politicians, with a long-term goal of building the community’s economic strength and pride by a focus on self-help and schooling. But, secretly, he also supported court challenges to segregation and restrictions on voter registration, passing on funds to the NAACP for this purpose.  Black militants in the North, led by W. E. B. Du Bois, at first supported the Atlanta compromise but after 1909, they set up the NAACP to work for political change. They tried with limited success to challenge Washington’s political machine for leadership in the black community but also built wider networks among white allies in the North.[2]Decades after Washington’s death in 1915, the civil rights movement of the 1950s took a more active and militant approach, which was also based on new grassroots organizations based in the South, such as CORE, SNCC and SCLC.

Washington mastered the nuances of the political arena in the late 19th century, which enabled him to manipulate the media, raise money, develop strategy, network, push, reward friends, and distribute funds. His long-term goal was to end the disenfranchisement of the vast majority of African Americans, who then still lived in the South.

Washington was married three times. In his autobiography Up from Slavery, he gave all three of his wives credit for their contributions at Tuskegee. His first wife Fannie N. Smith was from Malden, West Virginia, the same Kanawha River Valley town where Washington had lived from age nine to sixteen. He maintained ties there all his life, and Smith was a student of his when he taught in Malden. He helped her gain entrance into the Hampton Institute. Washington and Smith were married in the summer of 1882. Fannie died in May 1884.

In 1885 the widower Washington married again, to Olivia A. Davidson (1854-1889). Born free in Virginia to a free woman of color and a father who had been freed from slavery, she moved with her family to the free state of Ohio, where she attended common schools. She later studied at Hampton Institute and the Massachusetts State Normal School at Framingham. She taught in Mississippi and Tennessee before going to Tuskegee to work as a teacher. Washington recruited Davidson to Tuskegee, and promoted her to vice-principal. She died in 1889.

In 1893 Washington married Margaret James Murray. She was from Mississippi and had graduated from Fisk University, a historically black college. Murray outlived Washington and died in 1925.

The Final Footprint

Washington’s coffin being carried to grave site.

He was interred on the campus of Tuskegee University near the University Chapel.

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On this day 13 November death of Gioachino Rossini – Camille Pissarro – Margaret Wise Brown – Karen Silkwood – Leon Russell

Posted on 29 NovamWed, 13 Nov 2024 00:54:00 -06002024-11-13T00:54:00-06:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1868, composer, The Italian Mozart,  Gioachino Rossini, died at his country house at Passy, France at the age of 76.  Born Gioachino Antonio Rossini on 29 February 1792 in Pesaro, Italy.  Best known for his 39 operas which inlcude Il barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville),  Guillaume Tell (William Tell) and La cenerentola (Cinderella).  A 30-year-old Rossini met Ludwig van Beethoven, then aged 51, in 1822.  Communicating in writing, Beethoven noted: “Ah, Rossini. So you’re the composer of The Barber of Seville. I congratulate you. It will be played as long as Italian opera exists. Never try to write anything else but opera buffa; any other style would do violence to your nature.”  That same year Rossini married the renowned opera singer Isabella Colbran.  She died in 1845 and on 16 August 1846, he married Olympe Pélissier.  During his life Rossini was photographed by Félix Nadar and Etienne Carjat and had his portrait painted by Giorces, Vincenzo Camuccini and Francesco Hayez.  I saw Houston Grand Opera’s production of La cenerentola in October of 1995 with Cecilia Bartoli in the role of Angelina (Cinderella).  I fell in love with opera, and Miss Bartoli, that night.

The Final Footprint – Rossini was entombed in the Rossini Private Mausoleum in Cimetière du Père Lachaise, Paris, Ile-de-France Region, France.  In 1887, his remains were moved and entombed in the Basilica di Santa Croce, in Florence, at the request of the Italian government.  The Basilica di Santa Croce (Basilica of the Holy Cross) is the principal Franciscan church in Florence, and a minor basilica of the Roman Catholic Church.  It is situated on the Piazza di Santa Croce.  It is the burial place of some of the most famous Italians; Michelangelo, Galileo, Machiavelli, and is known also as the Temple of the Italian Glories (Tempio dell’Itale Glorie).  His private mausoleum remains unoccupied at Père Lachaise.  Père Lachaise is the largest cemetery in Paris and one of the most visited cemeteries in the world.  Bravo Rossini!

camillePissarro-portraitOn this day in 1903, Danish-French Impressionist and Neo-Impressionist painter Camille Pissarro died in Paris at the age of 73.  Born Jacob Abraham Camille Pissarro on 10 July 1830 in Charlotte Amalie, Saint Thomas, Danish West Indies (now US Virgin Islands).  Pissarro’s importance resides in his contributions to both Impressionism and Post-Impressionism.  He studied with Gustave Courbet and Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, and later studied and worked alongside Georges Seurat and Paul Signac when he took on the Neo-Impressionist style at the age of 54.  In 1873 he helped establish a collective society of fifteen aspiring artists, perhaps becoming the leading figure in holding the group together and encouraging the other members.  Art historian John Rewald called Pissarro the “dean of the Impressionist painters”, not only because he was the oldest of the group, but also “by virtue of his wisdom and his balanced, kind, and warmhearted personality”.  Cézanne said “he was a father for me. A man to consult and a little like the good Lord,”.  Pissarro apparently was one of Gauguin’s masters.  Renoir referred to his work as “revolutionary”, through his artistic portrayals of the “common man”, as Pissarro insisted on painting individuals in natural settings without “artifice or grandeur”.  Pissarro is the only artist to have shown his work at all eight Paris Impressionist exhibitions, from 1874 to 1886.  In 1871 he married his mother’s maid, Julie Vellay, a vineyard grower’s daughter, with whom he would later have seven children.  They lived outside of Paris in Pontoise and later in Louveciennes, both of which places inspired many of his paintings including scenes of village life, along with rivers, woods, and people at work.

The Final Footprint – Pissarro was entombed in the  Cimetière du Père Lachaise, Paris, Ile-de-France Region, France, the largest cemetery in the city of Paris (44 hectares or 110 acres).  Père Lachaise is in the 20th arrondissement and is notable for being the first garden cemetery, as well as the first municipal cemetery.  It is the site of three World War I memorials.  The cemetery is on Boulevard de Ménilmontant.  The Paris Métro station Philippe Auguste on line 2 is next to the main entrance, while the station called Père Lachaise, on both lines 2 and 3, is 500 metres away near a side entrance.  Many tourists prefer the Gambetta station on line 3, as it allows them to enter near the tomb of Oscar Wilde and then walk downhill to visit the rest of the cemetery.  Other notable Final Footprints at Père Lachaise include; Guillaume Apollinaire, Honoré de Balzac, Georges Bizet, Jean-Dominique Bauby, Maria Callas, Chopin, Colette, Auguste Comte, Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Max Ernst, Molière, Jim Morrison, Édith Piaf, Marcel Proust, Sully Prudhomme, Gioachino Rossini (see above), Georges-Pierre Seurat, Simone Signoret, Gertrude Stein, Dorothea Tanning, Alice B. Toklas, Oscar Wilde, and Richard Wright.

Gallery

    • Le chemin, c. 1864

    • Châtaignier à Louveciennes, 1870, Musée d’Orsay, Paris

    • Old Chelsea Bridge, London 1871, Smith College Museum of Arts

    • Camille Pissarro, portrait of Paul Cézanne, National Gallery

    • Un Carrefour à l’Hermitage, Pontoise, 1876, Musée Malraux

    • Toits rouges, coin d’un village, hiver, Côte de Saint-Denis, Pontoise, 1877, Musée d’Orsay, Paris

    • The Artist’s Palette with a Landscape, c.1878, Clark Art Institute

    • Washerwoman, Study, 1880, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

    • Conversation, c. 1881, National Museum of Western Art

    • The Harvest, 1882, Bridgestone Museum of Art, Tokyo

    • The Church at Eragny, 1884, Walters Art Museum

    • Bergère rentrant des moutons (Shepherdess Bringing in Sheep) 1886, University of Oklahoma

    • Rouen, Rue de l’Épicerie, 1898, private collection

    • La Place due Théâtre Français, 1898, Los Angeles County Museum of Art

    • View of Rouen, 1898, Honolulu Museum of Art

    • Morning, Winter Sunshine, Frost, the Pont-Neuf, the Seine, the Louvre, Soleil D’hiver Gella Blanc, c. 1901, Honolulu Museum of Art

    • Hay Harvest at Éragny, 1901, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa

    • Le Jardin de Mirbeau aux Damps, Octave Mirbeau’s garden in Damps, 1891

  • Place du Havre, Paris, 1893, Art Institute of Chicago

    • ”Boulevard Montmartre” cityscape series

    • Boulevard Montmartre à Paris, 1897

    • Boulevard Montmartre, morning, cloudy weather, National Gallery of Victoria, 1897

      • The Boulevard Montmartre on a Winter Morning, 1897, Metropolitan Museum of Art

      • Le Boulevard de Montmartre, Matinée de Printemps, street view from hotel window, 1897

  • Boulevard Montmartre la nuit, 1898

On this day in 1952 writer of children’s books, including Goodnight Moon and The Runaway Bunny, both illustrated by Clement Hurd, Margaret Wise Brown died in Nice, France at 42 of an embolism. She has been called “the laureate of the nursery” for her achievements.  Born 23 May 1910 in Brooklyn.

Brown’s first published children’s book was When the Wind Blew, published in 1937 by Harper & Brothers. Impressed by Brown’s “here and now” style, W. R. Scott hired her as his first editor in 1938.  Through Scott, she published the Noisy Book series among others. As editor at Scott, one of Brown’s first projects was to recruit contemporary authors to write children’s books for the company. Ernest Hemingway and John Steinbeck neglected to respond, but Brown’s hero Gertrude Stein accepted the offer.  Stein’s book The World is Round was illustrated by Clement Hurd, who had previously teamed with Brown on W. R. Scott’s Bumble Bugs and Elephants, considered “perhaps the first modern board book for babies”.  Brown and Hurd later teamed on the children’s book classics The Runaway Bunny and Goodnight Moon, published by Harper. In addition to publishing a number of Brown’s books, under her editorship W. R. Scott published Edith Thacher Hurd’s first book, Hurry Hurry, and Esphyr Slobodkina’s classic Caps for Sale.

From 1944 to 1946, Doubleday published three picture books written by Brown under the pseudonym “Golden MacDonald” (coopted from her friend’s handyman) and illustrated by Leonard Weisgard. Weisgard was a runner-up for the Caldecott Medal in 1946, and he won the 1947 Medal for Little Lost Lamb and The Little Island. Two more of their collaborations appeared in 1953 and 1956, after Brown’s death. The Little Fisherman, illustrated by Dahlov Ipcar, was published in 1945. The Little Fur Family, illustrated by Garth Williams, was published in 1946. Early in the 1950s she wrote several books for the Little Golden Books series, including The Color Kittens, Mister Dog, and Scuppers The Sailor Dog.

The Final Footprint – While on a book tour in Nice, France, she died shortly after surgery for a ruptured appendix. Kicking up her leg to show her nurses how well she was feeling caused a blood clot that had formed in her leg to dislodge and travel to her heart.  Her cremated remains were scattered at her island home, “The Only House,” in Vinalhaven, Maine.

On this day in 1974 chemical technician and labor union activist Karen Silkwood died in a car crash under unclear circumstances near Crescent, Oklahoma at the age of 28. Born Karen Gay Silkwood on February 19, 1946 in Longview, Texas. Primarily known for raising concerns about corporate practices related to health and safety of workers in a nuclear facility. Following her mysterious death her estate filed a lawsuit against chemical company Kerr-McGee, which was eventually settled for $1.38 million. Her story was chronicled in Mike Nichols‘s 1983 Academy Award-nominated film Silkwood in which she was portrayed by Meryl Streep.

She worked at the Kerr-McGee Cimarron Fuel Fabrication Site plant near Crescent, Oklahoma, United States. Silkwood’s job was making plutonium pellets for nuclear reactor fuel rods. This plant experienced theft of plutonium by workers during this era. She joined the union and became an activist on behalf of issues of health and safety at the plant as a member of the union’s negotiating team, the first woman to have that position at Kerr-McGee. In the summer of 1974, she testified to the Atomic Energy Commission about her concerns.

The Final Footprint

Silkwood said she had assembled documentation for her claims, including company papers. She decided to go public with this evidence, and contacted David Burnham, a New York Times journalist, who was interested in her story. On November 13, 1974, Silkwood left a union meeting at the Hub cafe in Crescent. Another attendee of that meeting later testified that Silkwood had a binder and a packet of documents with her at the cafe. Silkwood got into her Honda Civic and headed alone for Oklahoma City, about 30 miles (48 km) away, to meet with Burnham, the New York Times reporter, and Steve Wodka, an official of her union’s national office.  Later that evening, Silkwood’s body was found in her car, which had run off the road and struck a culvert on the east side of State Highway 74, 0.11 miles (180 m) south of the intersection with West Industrial Road. The car contained none of the documents she had been holding in the union meeting at the Hub cafe. She was pronounced dead at the scene in what was believed to be an accident. The trooper at the scene remembers that he found one or two tablets of the sedative methaqualone (Quaalude) in the car, and he remembers finding cannabis. The police report indicated that she fell asleep at the wheel. The coroner found 0.35 milligrams of methaqualone per 100 milliliters of blood at the time of her death — an amount almost twice the recommended dosage for inducing drowsiness.

Some journalists have theorized that Silkwood’s car was rammed from behind by another vehicle, with the intent to cause an accident that would result in her death.  Skid marks from Silkwood’s car were present on the road, suggesting that she was trying to get back onto the road after being pushed from behind.

Investigators also noted damage on the rear of Silkwood’s vehicle that, according to Silkwood’s friends and family, had not been present before the accident. As the crash was entirely a front-end collision, it did not explain the damage to the rear of her vehicle. A microscopic examination of the rear of Silkwood’s car showed paint chips that could have come only from a rear impact by another vehicle. Silkwood’s family claimed to know of no accidents of any kind that Silkwood had had with the car, and that the 1974 Honda Civic she was driving was new when purchased and no insurance claims were filed on that vehicle.

Silkwood’s relatives, too, confirmed that she had taken the missing documents to the union meeting and placed them on the seat beside her. According to her family, she had received several threatening phone calls very shortly before her death. Speculation about foul play has never been substantiated.

Because of concerns about contamination, the Atomic Energy Commission and the State Medical Examiner requested analysis of Silkwood’s organs by the Los Alamos Tissue Analysis Program.

Public suspicions led to a federal investigation into plant security and safety. National Public Radio reported that this investigation had found that 20 to 30 kilograms (44–66 lb) of plutonium had been misplaced at the plant.

Kerr-McGee closed its nuclear fuel plants in 1975. The Department of Energy (DOE) reported the Cimarron plant as decontaminated and decommissioned in 1994.

PBS Frontline produced the program, Nuclear Reaction, which included aspects of the Silkwood story. Its website for the program includes a summary of details entitled “The Karen Silkwood Story”, as printed November 23, 1995 in Los Alamos Science. The PBS program covered the risks of nuclear energy and raised questions about corporate accountability and responsibility.

Silkwood is interred in Danville Cemetery in Kilgore, Texas.

On this day in 2016, musician and songwriter Leon Russell died in his sleep at his suburban Nashville home in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee while recovering from heart surgery, at the age of 74. Born Claude Russell Bridges on April 2, 1942 in Lawton, Oklahoma. He was involved with numerous bestselling pop music records during his 60-year career. His genres included pop, country, rock, folk, gospel, bluegrass, rhythm and blues, folk rock, blues rock, surf, standards, and Tulsa Sound.

His collaborations rank as some of the most successful in music history, and as a touring musician he performed with hundreds of notable artists. He recorded 33 albums and at least 430 songs. He wrote “Delta Lady”, recorded by Joe Cocker, and organized and performed with Cocker’s Mad Dogs and Englishmen tour in 1970. His “A Song for You”, added to the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2018, has been recorded by more than 200 artists, and his “This Masquerade” by more than 75.

As a pianist, he played in his early years on albums by The Beach Boys, Dick Dale and Jan and Dean. On his first album, Leon Russell, in 1970, the musicians included Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr, and George Harrison. One of his biggest early fans, Elton John, said Russell was a “mentor” and an “inspiration”. They recorded their album The Union in 2010, which earned them a Grammy nomination.

Russell produced and played in recording sessions for, among others Bob Dylan, Frank Sinatra, Ike & Tina Turner, and The Rolling Stones. He wrote and recorded the hits “Tight Rope” and “Lady Blue”. He performed at The Concert for Bangladesh in 1971 along with Harrison, Dylan, and Clapton, for which he earned a Grammy Award.

His recordings earned six gold records. He received two Grammy awards from seven nominations. In 2011, he was inducted into both the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

The Final Footprint

Russell’s funeral was on November 18 at Victory Baptist Church in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee, and a public memorial was held at The Oral Roberts University Mabee Center on November 20 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He is interred at the Memorial Park Cemetery in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

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On this day 12 November death of: Duncan II – William Holden – Eve Arden – Jonathan Brandis – Ira Levin – Lupita Tovar – Stan Lee

Posted on 29 NovamTue, 12 Nov 2024 00:06:00 -06002024-11-12T00:06:00-06:0012 2011 by MacGregor

Scottish Flag

On this day in 1094, King of Scots, Duncan II, died at the Battle of Mondoynes.  Born Donnchad mac Maíl Coluim before c. 1060.  Son of Malcolm III (Máel Coluim mac Donnchada) and his first wife Ingibiorg Finnsdottir, widow of Thorfinn Sigurdsson.  About 1093–1094 Duncan married Uchtreda of Northumbria, daughter of Gospatric, Earl of Dunbar and Northumbria.  Duncan deposed his uncle Donald III but reigned for only six months.  He was succeeded by Donald III.  I am very proud of my Scottish heritage.  In My Defens, God Me Defend!

The Final Footprint – There are two, contradictory accounts about the burial place of Duncan II. One reports him buried at Dunfermline Abbey, the other at the isle of Iona at Iona Abbey.  Dunfermline occupies the site of the ancient chancel and transepts of a large medieval Benedictine abbey, which was sacked in 1560 during the Scottish Reformation and permitted to fall into disrepair. Part of the old abbey church continued in use at that time and some parts of the abbey infrastructure still remain to this day.  Dunfermline Abbey is one of Scotland’s most important cultural sites. The ancient burial ground at Iona Abbey, called the Rèilig Odhrain (Eng: Oran’s “burial place” or “cemetery”), contains the 12th century chapel of St Odhrán, restored at the same time as the Abbey itself.  It contains a number of medieval grave monuments.  The abbey graveyard contains the graves of many early Scottish Kings, as well as kings from Ireland, Norway and France.  Iona became the burial site for the kings of Dál Riata and their successors.  Other notable final footprints at Dunfermline include; Saint Margaret of Scotland, Edgar, Alexander I, David I, Malcolm IV, Alexander III, and Robert The Bruce.

williamHolden-portraitOn this day in 1981 Academy Award winning actor William Holden bled to death from a head wound suffered in a fall in his apartment in Santa Monica, California at the age of 63.  Born William Franklin Beedle, Jr. in O’Fallon, Illinois on 17 April 1918.  In my opinion, one of the most popular movie stars of all time, Holden was one of the biggest box office draws of the 1950s.  Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1953 for his role in Stalag 17, and a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor for his role in the 1973 television film The Blue Knight.  Holden starred in some of Hollywood’s most popular and critically acclaimed films, including such blockbusters as Sunset Boulevard, The Bridge on the River Kwai, The Wild Bunch, Picnic, The Towering Inferno, and Network.  He was named one of the “Top 10 Stars of the Year” six times (1954–1958, 1961).  Holden married actress Ardis Ankerson (stage name Brenda Marshall) (1941 – 1971 divorce).  They served as best man and matron of honor as the only guests at the wedding of Ronald Reagan and Nancy Davis.  During the filming of Sabrina (1954), Audrey Hepburn and Holden became romantically involved.  Holden met French actress Capucine in the early 1960s.  The two starred in the films The Lion (1962) and The 7th Dawn (1964).  They began a two-year affair.  In 1972, Holden began a nine-year relationship with actress Stefanie Powers.  My favorite Holden movies; Sabrina (1954), The Horse Soldiers (1959) and The Wild Bunch (1969).

The Final Footprint – Holden had dictated in his will that the Neptune Society cremate him and scatter his ashes in the Pacific Ocean.  No funeral or memorial service was held, per his wishes.  For his contribution to the film industry, Holden has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame located at 1651 Vine Street.  He also has a star on the St. Louis Walk of Fame.

#RIP #OTD in 1990 actress (Mildred Pierce; The Unfaithful; The Arnelo Affair; Whiplash; Anatomy of a Murder; Stage Door; Our Miss Brooks; The Mothers-In-Law; Grease) Eve Arden died at home in Beverly Hills at age 82. Westwood Memorial Park, Westwood, California

On this day in 2003 actor Jonathan Brandis died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles from injuries sustained in a hanging, aged 27. Born Jonathan Gregory Brandis in Danbury, Connecticut on 13 April 1976.

Beginning his career as a child model, Brandis moved on to acting in commercials and subsequently won television and film roles. Brandis made his acting debut in 1982 as Kevin Buchanan on the soap opera One Life to Live. In 1990, he portrayed Bill Denbrough in the television miniseries It. Also in 1990, he starred as Bastian Bux in The NeverEnding Story II: The Next Chapter.  In 1993, at the age of 17, he was cast in the role of teen prodigy Lucas Wolenczak on the NBC series seaQuest DSV. The character was popular among teenage viewers, and Brandis regularly appeared in teen magazines.

The Final Footprint – Brandis was found hanging in the hallway of his Los Angeles apartment. He was transported to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and died the following day of injuries sustained from the hanging.

Brandis did not leave a suicide note.  After his death, friends reported that he had been depressed about his waning career and was reportedly disappointed when his appearance in the 2002 war drama Hart’s War, a role he hoped would revive his career, was significantly reduced in the film’s final cut. Brandis began drinking heavily and said that he intended to kill himself.

#RIP #OTD in 2007 novelist (A Kiss Before Dying, Rosemary’s Baby, The Stepford Wives, This Perfect Day, The Boys from Brazil, Sliver), playwright, songwriter Ira Levin died of a heart attack at his home in Manhattan aged 78. cremation

On this day in 2016, actress and centenarian Lupita Tovar died in Los Angeles at the age of 106. Born Guadalupe Natalia Tovar on 27 July 1910 Perhaps best known for her starring role in the 1931 Spanish language version of Drácula, filmed in Los Angeles by Universal Pictures at night using the same sets as the Bela Lugosi version, but with a different cast and director. She also starred in the 1932 film Santa, one of the first Mexican sound films, and one of the first commercial Spanish-language sound films.

Producer Paul Kohner proposed to Tovar over the phone—he had previously tried to give her a ring—and Tovar went to Czechoslovakia to meet him. They were married, by a rabbi, in Czechoslovakia on October 30, 1932, at Kohner’s parents’ home.

in film Santa

The Final Footprint

Tovar’s final resting place is at Hillside Memorial Park and Mortuary in Culver City, California. Other notable Final Footprints at Hillside Memorial include; Jack Benny, Milton Berle, Neil Bogart, Cyd Charisse, Mickey Cohen, Lorne Greene, Monty Hall, Moe Howard, David Janssen, Al Jolson, Michael Landon, Leonard Nimoy, Suzanne Pleshette, Dinah Shore, and Shelley Winters.

And on this day in 2018, United States Army veteran, comic book writer, editor, publisher, and producer Stan Lee died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, at the age of 95. Born Stanley Martin Lieber on December 28, 1922 in Manhattan. He rose through the ranks of a family-run business to become Marvel Comics’ primary creative leader for two decades, leading its expansion from a small division of a publishing house to a multimedia corporation that dominated the comics industry.

In collaboration with others at Marvel—particularly co-writer/artists Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko—he co-created popular fictional characters, including superheroes Spider-Man, the X-Men, Iron Man, Thor, the Hulk, Black Widow, the Fantastic Four, Black Panther, Daredevil, Doctor Strange, Scarlet Witch and Ant-Man. He pioneered a more naturalistic approach to writing superhero comics in the 1960s, and in the 1970s he challenged the restrictions of the Comics Code Authority, indirectly leading to changes in its policies. In the 1980s he pursued the development of Marvel properties in other media, with mixed results. Following his retirement from Marvel in the 1990s, he remained a public figurehead for the company, and frequently made cameo appearances in films and television shows based on Marvel characters, on which he received an executive producer credit. Meanwhile, he continued independent creative ventures into his 90s, until his death in 2018.

The Final Footprint

His body was cremated and his cremated remains were given to his daughter.

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On this day 11 November death of Nat Turner – Søren Kierkegaard – Lucretia Mott – Jerome Kern – Dimitri Tiomkin – Robert Vaughn

Posted on 29 NovamMon, 11 Nov 2024 00:24:00 -06002024-11-11T00:24:00-06:0012 2011 by MacGregor

Nat_Turner_capturedOn this day in 1831 African American slave Nat Turner was hanged after being convicted of leading a slave rebellion in Virginia.  Born 2 October 1800 in Southampton County, Virginia.  The rebellion resulted in 60 white deaths.  Local residents responded with at least 200 black deaths.  In the aftermath, the state executed 56 blacks accused of being part of Turner’s slave rebellion.  Across Virginia and other southern states, state legislators passed new laws prohibiting education of slaves and free blacks, restricting rights of assembly and other civil rights for free blacks, and requiring white ministers to be present at black worship services.

The Final Footprint – Turner’s body was flayed, beheaded and quartered.  The Confessions of Nat Turner (1967), a novel by William Styron, won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1968.  This book spurred cultural discussions about how different peoples can interpret the past and whether any one group has sole ownership of any portion of a historical event.

sorenKierkegaardOn this day in 1855, Danish philosopher, theologian, poet, social critic, and religious author, the “Father of Existentialism”,  Søren Kierkegaard died in Frederik’s Hospital in Copenhagen at the age of 42.  Born Søren Aabye Kierkegaard on 5 May 1813 in Copenhagen.  Kierkegaard  wrote critical texts on organized religion, Christendom, morality, ethics, psychology and philosophy of religion, displaying a fondness for metaphor, irony and parables.  Much of his philosophical work deals with the issues of how one lives as a “single individual”, giving priority to concrete human reality over abstract thinking, and highlighting the importance of personal choice and commitment.  He was a fierce critic of idealist intellectuals and philosophers of his time, such as Swedenborg, Hegel, Goethe, Fichte, Schelling, Schlegel, and Hans Christian Andersen.

His theological work focuses on Christian ethics, the institution of the Church, the differences between purely objective proofs of Christianity, the infinite qualitative distinction between man and God, and the individual’s subjective relationship to the God-Man Jesus Christ, which came through faith.  Much of his work deals with the art of Christian love.  He was extremely critical of the practice of Christianity as a state religion, primarily that of the Church of Denmark.  His psychological work explored the emotions and feelings of individuals when faced with life choices.

Kierkegaard’s early work was written under various pseudonyms which he used to present distinctive viewpoints and interact with each other in complex dialogue.  He assigned pseudonyms to explore particular viewpoints in-depth, which required several books in some instances, while Kierkegaard, openly or under another pseudonym, critiqued that position.  He wrote many Upbuilding Discourses under his own name and dedicated them to the “single individual” who might want to discover the meaning of his works.  Notably, he wrote: “Science and scholarship want to teach that becoming objective is the way. Christianity teaches that the way is to become subjective, to become a subject.”  While scientists can learn about the world by observation, Kierkegaard emphatically denied that observation could reveal the inner workings of the spiritual world.

Some of Kierkegaard’s key ideas include the concept of “Truth as Subjectivity”, the knight of faith, the recollection and repetition dichotomy, angst, the infinite qualitative distinction, faith as a passion, and the three stages on life’s way.  Kierkegaard’s writings were written in Danish and were initially limited to Scandinavia, but by the turn of the 20th century, his writings were translated into major European languages, such as French and German.  In my opinion, by the mid-20th century, his writings exerted a substantial influence on philosophy, theology, and Western culture.

sorenKierkegaardGraveThe Final Footprint – Kierkegaard is interred in the Assistens Kirkegård in the Nørrebro section of Copenhagen.  At Kierkegaard’s funeral, his nephew Henrik Lund caused a disturbance by protesting Kierkegaard’s burial by the official church.  Lund maintained that Kierkegaard would never have approved, had he been alive, as he had broken from and denounced the institution. Hans Christian Andersen is also interred at Assistens Kirkegård.

On this day in 1880 American Quaker, abolitionist, women’s rights activist, social reformer, Lucretia Mott died of pneumonia at her home, Roadside, in the district now known as La Mott, Cheltenham, Pennsylvania, aged 87.  Born Lucretia Coffin on January 3, 1793 in Nantucket, Massachusetts.

She had formed the idea of reforming the position of women in society when she was amongst the women excluded from the World Anti-Slavery Convention held in London in 1840. In 1848, she was invited by Jane Hunt to a meeting that led to the first public gathering about women’s rights, the Seneca Falls Convention, during which the Declaration of Sentiments was written.

On April 10, 1811, Lucretia Coffin married James Mott at Pine Street Meeting in Philadelphia.  James was a Quaker businessman who shared her anti-slavery interests, supported women’s rights, and helped found Swarthmore College.  They raised six children, five of whom made it to adulthood.

The Final Footprint

She was interred near to the highest point of Fair Hill Burial Ground, a Quaker cemetery in North Philadelphia.

On this day in 1945, Academy Award-winning composer, Jerome Kern, died from a cerebral hemorrhage while walking at the corner of Park Avenue and 57th Street in New York City at the age of 60, with fellow composer Oscar Hammerstein II at his side.  Born Jerome David Kern on 27 January 1885 in New York City.  In my opinion, one of the most important American theatre composers.  He wrote over 700 songs including; “Ol’ Man River”, “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man”, “A Fine Romance”, “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes”, “All the Things You Are”, “The Way You Look Tonight”, “Long Ago (and Far Away), “The Last Time I Saw Paris” and “Lovely to Look At”.  Kern wrote the musical stage version of Edna Ferber’s Show Boat.  Arguably his greatest score, it was a huge success.  American musical theatre would never be the same.  Kern named his yacht Show Boat.

The Final Footprint

Kern is entombed in a Private Memorial Niche in Ferncliff Mausoleum, Ferncliff Cemetery and Mausoleum, Hartsdale, New York.  Other notable Final Footprints at Ferncliff include:  Aaliyah, James Baldwin, Cab Calloway, Joan Crawford, Thelonious Monk, Oscar Hammerstein II, and Ed Sullivan.

On this day in 1979 film composer and conductor Dimitri Tiomkin died in London two weeks after fracturing his pelvis in a fall, aged 85.  Born Dimitri Zinovievich Tiomkin on May 10, 1894 in Kremenchug, Poltava Governorate, Russian Empire.

Classically trained in Saint Petersburg before the Bolshevik Revolution, he moved to Berlin and then New York City after the Russian Revolution. In 1929, after the stock market crash, he moved to Hollywood, where he perhaps became best known for his film scores, including; dramas: Shadow of a Doubt, Strangers on a Train, The Alamo, Dial M for Murder, The High and the Mighty, The Old Man and the Sea, Duel in the Sun, Red River, High Noon, The Big Sky, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, Rio Bravo, and Last Train from Gun Hill.  Tiomkin received 22 Academy Award nominations and won four Oscars, three for Best Original Score for High Noon, The High and the Mighty, and The Old Man and the Sea, and one for Best Original Song for “The Ballad of High Noon” from the film High Noon.

Tiomkin married twice; Carolina Perfetto and Albertina Rasch in 1927.  They remained married until her death on October 2, 1967, at age 76 in Woodland Hills, California, following a prolonged illness.

The Final Footprint

Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California

And on this day in 2016 stage, film and television actor, author, political activist and advertising spokesperson whose career spanned nearly six decades, Robert Vaughn died in a hospice in Danbury, Connecticut from leukemia, aged 83.  Born Robert Francis Vaughn on November 22, 1932 at Charity Hospital in Manhattan.

Appearing as a lead or character actor in scores of films, Vaughn portrayed the disabled, drunken war veteran Chester A. Gwynn in The Young Philadelphians, earning him a 1959 nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Vaughn then portrayed the gunman Lee in The Magnificent Seven (1960).

Vaughn was the lead or guest star in over 200 television shows, including playing the spy Napoleon Solo in the 1960s international hit series The Man from U.N.C.L.E.. Vaughn won an Emmy in 1978 for his portrayal of the White House Chief of Staff in the miniseries Washington: Behind Closed Doors.

In his 2008 autobiography, A Fortunate Life, Vaughn summed up his life, saying “With a modest amount of looks and talent and more than a modicum of serendipity, I’ve managed to stretch my 15 minutes of fame into more than half a century of good fortune.  The breaks all fell my way”.

Vaughn married actress Linda Staab in 1974. They appeared together in a 1973 episode of The Protectors, called “It Could Be Practically Anywhere on the Island”.  They resided in Ridgefield, Connecticut.

During the late 1960s Joyce Jameson was a girlfriend of Vaughn’s. She acted opposite Vaughn as a guest star on a 1966 U.N.C.L.E. episode “The Dippy Blond Affair”.

The Final Footprint – Cremation

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On this day 10 November death of Arthur Rimbaud – Anita Berber – Chuck Connors – Carmen McRae – Ken Kesey – Jack Palance

Posted on 29 NovamSun, 10 Nov 2024 00:39:00 -06002024-11-10T00:39:00-06:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1891, poet, Arthur Rimbaud, died in Marseille, France at the age of 37 from bone cancer.  Born Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud on 20 October 1854 in Charleville, Ardennes, France.  He produced his best known poems in his late teens.  Victor Hugo called him the “enfant Shakespeare”.  As part of the decadent movement, Rimbaud influenced modern literature, music and art.  He had a short and torrid affair with fellow poet Paul Verlaine.  Rimbaud never married.  He traveled extensively over three continents.  His poetry, as well as his life, are said to have influenced writers, musicians and artists including; Pablo Picasso, Dylan Thomas, Vladimir Nabokov, Bob Dylan, Patti Smith and Jim Morrison.  My favorite poem of his is Une Saison en Enfer (A Season in Hell) (1873).  The French painter Henri Fantin-Latour depicted Rimbaud and Verlaine in his 1872 painting Around the Table (Writers).

 The Final Footprint – Rimbaud is entombed in Charleville-Mezieres Cimetière in Charleville-Mezieres, Champagne-Ardenne Region, France.  His tomb is marked by a large upright marble marker.  His inscription reads; Priez pour lui (Pray for him).

On this day in 1928 dancer, actress, writer, libertine, subject of Otto Dix paintings, Anita Berber died in a Kreuzberg, Berlin hospital, from tuberculosis, aged 29.  Born 10 June 1899 in Leipzig.

Scandalously androgynous, she quickly made a name for herself. She wore heavy dancer’s make-up, which on the black-and-white photos and films of the time came across as jet black lipstick painted across the heart-shaped part of her skinny lips, and charcoaled eyes.[3] Berber’s hair was fashionably cut into a short bob and was frequently bright red, as in 1925 when the German painter Otto Dix painted a portrait of her, titled Portrait of the Dancer Anita Berber.

Her dancer, friend and sometime lover Sebastian Droste, who performed in the film Algol (1920), was thin and had black hair with gelled up curls much like sideburns. Neither of them wore much more than lowslung loincloths and Anita occasionally a corsage, placed well below her breasts.

Berber and Droste collaborated on a book titled Dances of Vice, Horror, and Ecstasy in 1923. Around 1,000 copies were published and even prominent artist Hannah Höch owned a copy.

Berber’s dances – which had names such as “Cocaine” and “Morphium” – broke boundaries with their androgyny and total nudity, but it was her public appearances that really challenged social taboos. Berber’s overt drug addiction and bisexuality were matters of public gossip.  In addition to her addiction to cocaine, opium and morphine, one of Berber’s favourite forms of inebriation was chloroform and ether mixed in a bowl.  This would be stirred with a white rose, the petals of which she would then eat.

Karl Toepfer contends that no one of this era was “more closely associated with nude dancing than Anita Berber”.  A contemporary of Berber, choreographer Joe Jencik, described how “The public never appreciated Anita’s artistic expression, only her public transgressions in which she trespassed the untouchable line between the stage and the audience. . . . She sacrificed her person to a self-vivisection of her life.”

Aside from her addiction to narcotic drugs, Berber was also an alcoholic. In 1928, at the age of 29, she suddenly gave up alcohol completely, but died later the same year. According to Mel Gordon, in The Seven Addictions and Five Professions of Anita Berber: Weimar Berlin’s Priestess of Debauchery, she had been diagnosed with severe tuberculosis while performing abroad.

The Final Footprint – After collapsing in Damascus, she returned to Germany and died in a Kreuzberg, Berlin hospital, although rumour had it that she died surrounded by empty morphine syringes.  Berber was buried in a pauper’s grave in St. Thomas Cemetery in Neukölln, Berlin

#RIP #OTD in 1994 pianist,  jazz singer (Take Five, When I Fall in Love, How Long Has this Been Going On?) Carmen McRae died from a stroke at her home in Beverly Hills, California, at the age of 74. Cremation

On this day in 2001, novelist, essayist, and countercultural figure Ken Kesey died from complications of liver cancer in Eugene, Oregon, at age 66. Born Kenneth Elton Kesey on September 17, 1935 in La Junta, Colorado. He considered himself a link between the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s.

Kesey grew up in Springfield, Oregon, graduating from the University of Oregon in 1957. He began writing One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest in 1960 following the completion of a graduate fellowship in creative writing at Stanford University; the novel was an immediate commercial and critical success when published two years later. During this period, Kesey participated in government studies involving hallucinogenic drugs (including mescaline and LSD) to supplement his income.

Following the publication of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, he moved to nearby La Honda, California, and began hosting happenings with former colleagues from Stanford, miscellaneous bohemian and literary figures (most notably Neal Cassady), and other friends collectively known as the Merry Pranksters. These parties, known as Acid Tests, integrated the consumption of LSD with multimedia performances. He mentored the Grateful Dead (the de facto “house band” of the Acid Tests) throughout their incipience and continued to exert an influence upon the group throughout their career. Sometimes a Great Notion was a commercial success that polarized critics and readers upon its release in 1964. Kesey regarded the novel as his magnum opus.

In 1965, following an arrest for marijuana possession and subsequent faked suicide, Kesey was imprisoned for five months. Shortly thereafter, he returned home to the Willamette Valley and settled in Pleasant Hill, Oregon, where he maintained a secluded, family-oriented lifestyle for the rest of his life. In addition to teaching at the University of Oregon—an experience that culminated in Caverns (1989), a collaborative novel written by Kesey and his graduate workshop students under the pseudonym of “O.U. Levon”—he continued to regularly contribute fiction and reportage to such publications as Esquire, Rolling Stone, Oui, Running, and The Whole Earth Catalog. Various iterations of these pieces were collected in Kesey’s Garage Sale (1973) and Demon Box (1986).

Between 1974 and 1980, Kesey published six issues of Spit in the Ocean, a literary magazine that featured excerpts from an unfinished novel (Seven Prayers by Grandma Whittier, an account of Kesey’s grandmother’s struggle with Alzheimer’s disease). After a third novel (Sailor Song) was released to lukewarm reviews in 1992, he reunited with the Merry Pranksters and began publishing works on the Internet until ill health (including a stroke) curtailed his activities.

  The Final Footprint

Kesey is interred in the Kesey Family Farm Cemetery near Eugene.

#RIP #OTD in 2006 actor (Sudden Fear, Shane, Young Guns, City Slickers, Tango and Cash) Jack Palance died at the home of his daughter in Montecito, California, aged 87. Cremation

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On this day 9 November death of Elizabeth Hamilton – Guillaume Apollinaire – Dylan Thomas – Art Carney – Stieg Larsson

Posted on 29 NovamSat, 09 Nov 2024 00:06:00 -06002024-11-09T00:06:00-06:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1854, socialite and philanthropist, wife of American Founding Father Alexander Hamilton, Elizabeth Hamilton died in Washington, D.C., at age 97.  She was a defender of her husband’s works and co-founder and deputy director of Graham Windham, the first private orphanage in New York City.  Hamilton is recognized as an early American philanthropist for her work with the Orphan Asylum Society.

The Final Footprint

Hamilton was buried near her husband in the graveyard of Trinity Church, a historic parish church in the Episcopal Diocese of New York, at the intersection of Wall Street and Broadway in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan.  I have visited her grave and my love and fabulous cemetery walkin’ companion, Anna took this photograph of her grave.

On this day in 1918, poet, playwright, short story writer, and novelist, Guillaume Apollinaire died in Paris during the Spanish flu pandemic at the age of 38. Born on 26 August 1880 in Rome.

In my opinion, Apollinaire is one of the foremost poets of the early 20th century, as well as one of the most impassioned defenders of Cubism and a forefather of Surrealism. He is credited with coining the term “cubism” in 1911 to describe the emerging art movement and the term “surrealism” in 1917 to describe the works of Erik Satie. The term Orphism (1912) is also his. Apollinaire wrote one of the earliest Surrealist literary works, the play The Breasts of Tiresias (1917), which became the basis for the 1947 opera Les mamelles de Tirésias.

Apollinaire was active as a journalist and art critic for Le Matin, L’Intransigeant, L’Esprit nouveau, Mercure de France, and Paris Journal. In 1912 Apollinaire co-founded Les Soirées de Paris (fr), an artistic and literary magazine.

The Final Footprint

He was interred in the Père Lachaise Cemetery, Paris. Other notable Final Footprints at Père Lachaise include; Honoré de Balzac, Georges Bizet, Jean-Dominique Bauby, Maria Callas, Frédéric 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.

Me voici devant tous un homme plein de sens
Connaissant la vie et de la mort ce qu’un vivant peut connaître
Ayant éprouvé les douleurs et les joies de l’amour

On this day in 1953, poet and writer, Dylan Thomas, died in St. Vincent’s Hospital in Greenwich Village from pneumonia at the age of 39.  Born Dylan Marlais Thomas on 27 October 1914 in Swansea, South Wales.  One of my favorite poets.  I particularly like the villanelle for his dying father, “Do not go gentle into that good night” and the poem “And death shall have no dominion”.  Thomas met the dancer Caitlin MacNamara in the Wheatsheaf pub in London’s West End.  They were married on 11 July 1937 in Cornwall.  Their marriage was a stormy affair, fuelled by alcohol and infidelity, though the couple remained together until Dylan’s death.  I am certainly proud of my own Welsh heritage.  Cymru am byth!  Wales forever!

The Final Footprint – Following his death, Thomas’ body was brought back to Wales for burial.  Thomas’ funeral took place at St Martin’s Church in Laugharne on 24 November. Thomas’ coffin was carried by six friends from the village.  The procession to the church was filmed and the wake took place at Brown’s Hotel.  Thomas is interred in Saint Martin’s Churchyard.  His grave is marked by a white cross.  There is a statue of Thomas in Swansea and a memorial.  The memorial is a small rock in an enclosed garden in Cwmdonkin Park.  The rock is inscribed with the closing lines from his poem Fern Hill;  

Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means
Time held me green and dying
Though I sang in my chains like the sea.

Thomas’s home in Laugharne, the Boat House, has been made a memorial.  A plaque was placed in Westminster Abbey’s Poets Corner in honour of Thomas.  His image appears on the pub sign of Brown’s Hotel in Laugharne.  From “And death shall have no dominion”:

And death shall have no dominion.
Dead men naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion.

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

  • “Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night” (1952)

#RIP #OTD in 2003 actor (The Honeymooners, Harry and Tonto, The Late Show, House Calls, Going in Style, Firestarter, Last Action Hero) Art Carney died at a care home in Chester, Connecticut, aged 85. Riverside Cemetery in Old Saybrook, Connecticut

On this day in 2004, journalist and writer Stieg Larsson died from a heart attack after climbing the stairs to work in Stockholm, at the age of 50. Born Karl Stig-Erland Larsson on 15 August 1954 in Skelleftehamn, Västerbottens län, Sweden. Perhaps best known for writing the Millennium trilogy of crime novels, which were published posthumously, starting in 2005, after his sudden death. The trilogy was adapted as three motion pictures in Sweden, and one in the U.S. (for the first book only). The publisher commissioned David Lagercrantz to expand the trilogy into a longer series. For much of his life, Larsson lived and worked in Stockholm. His journalistic work covered socialist politics and he acted as an independent researcher of right-wing extremism.

He was the second-best-selling fiction author in the world for 2008, owing to the success of the English translation of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. The third and final novel in the Millennium trilogy, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest, became the bestselling book in the United States in 2010, according to Publishers Weekly. By March 2015, his series had sold 80 million copies worldwide.

The Final Footprint

He is entombed at the Högalid Church cemetery in the district of Södermalm in Stockholm.

In May 2008, it was announced that a 1977 will, found soon after Larsson’s death, declared his wish to leave his assets to the Umeå branch of the Communist Workers League (now the Socialist Party). As the will was unwitnessed, it was not valid under Swedish law, with the result that all of Larsson’s estate, including future royalties from book sales, went to his father and brother, leaving nothing to his long-term partner Eva Gabrielsson.

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On this day 8 November death of John Milton – Doc Holliday – César Franck – Victorien Sardou – Norman Rockwell – Jean Marais – Rumer Godden – Alex Trebek

Posted on 29 NovamFri, 08 Nov 2024 00:15:00 -06002024-11-08T00:15:00-06:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1674, poet John Milton, died in Bunhill, London, England at the age of 65 from kidney failure.  Born on 9 December 1608 in Bread Street, London, England.  Best known for his epic poem in blank verse, Paradise Lost (1667).  The poem concerns the Christian story of the Fall of Man; the temptation of Adam and Eve by the fallen angel Satan and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden.  Milton incorporates Paganism, classical Greek references, and Christianity within the poem.  It deals with diverse topics from marriage, politics to monarchy and grapples with many difficult theological issues, including; fate, predestination, the Trinity, the introduction of sin and death into the world, angels, fallen angels, Satan, and the war in heaven. Milton draws on his knowledge of languages and diverse sources – primarily Genesis, much of the New Testament, the deuterocanonical Book of Enoch, and other parts of the Old Testament. Milton’s epic is generally considered one of the greatest literary works in the English language.  He remains generally regarded as one of the most significant writer’s in the English language.  

In 1643, he published a pamphlet called Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce.  He wrote: “Marriage is a cov’nant the very beeing wherof consists, not in a forc’t cohabitation, and counterfet performance of duties, but in unfained love and peace. […] It is a lesse breach of wedlock to part with wise and quiet consent betimes, then still to soile and profane that mystery of joy and union with a polluting sadnes and perpetuall distemper; for it is not the outward continuing of mariage that keeps whole that cov’nant, but whosoever does most according to peace and love, whether in mariage, or in divorce, he it is that breaks mariage least; it being so often written, that Love only is the fulfilling of every Commandment.”  A toast to unfained love and peace.  Milton married three times; Mary Powell (ended in 1652 her death), Katherine Woodcock (1656 – 1658 her death) and Elizabeth Mynshull (1662 – 1674 his death).

The Final Footprint– Milton is interred in St. Giles Cripplegate Churchyard in London.  There is a plaque and a statue of Milton inside the church.  There is cenotaph of Milton in Poet’s Corner in Westminster Abbey.  There is a plaque commemorating his birth place in Bread Street.  There is a statue of Milton in Temple of British Worthies in Stowe.  The French Romantic painter Eugène Delacroix portrayed Milton in his painting Milton Dictates the Lost Paradise to His Three Daughters, c. 1826.

Doc_HollidayatAge20On this day in 1887, dentist, gambler, gunfighter of the American Old West, usually remembered for his friendship with Wyatt Earp and his involvement in the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, Doc Holliday died from tuberculosis in the Hotel Glenwood in Glenwood Springs, Colorado at the age of 36.  Born John Henry Holliday on 14 August 1851 in Griffin, Georgia.  The legend and mystique of his life is so great that he has been mentioned in countless books, and portrayed by various actors in numerous movies and television series.  Debate continues about the exploits of his life.  Earp said, “Doc was a dentist, not a lawman or an assassin, whom necessity had made a gambler; a gentleman whom disease had made a frontier vagabond; a philosopher whom life had made a caustic wit; a long lean ash-blond fellow nearly dead with consumption, and at the same time the most skillful gambler and the nerviest, speediest, deadliest man with a six-gun that I ever knew.”

 The Final Footprint – Holliday is buried in Linwood Cemetery overlooking Glenwood Springs.  The exact location of his grave was lost.  Among the more notable portrayals of Holliday on film include; Kirk Douglas, Jason Robards, Stacy Keach, Dennis Hopper, Val Kilmer, and Dennis Quaid.

On this day in 1890, composer, pianist, organist, and music teacher César Franck died in Paris at the age of 67. Born César-Auguste-Jean-Guillaume-Hubert Franck on 10 December 1822 in Liège, in what is now Belgium (though at the time of his birth it was part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands). He studied privately in Paris from 1835. After a brief return to Belgium, and an unfavorable reception to an early oratorio Ruth, he moved to Paris, where he married and embarked on a career as teacher and organist. He gained a reputation as a formidable improviser, and travelled widely in France to demonstrate new instruments built by Aristide Cavaillé-Coll.

In 1858 he became organist at Sainte-Clotilde, a position he retained for the rest of his life. He became professor at the Paris Conservatoire in 1872; he took French nationality, a requirement of the appointment. After acquiring the professorship Franck wrote several pieces that have entered the standard classical repertoire, including symphonic, chamber, and keyboard works.

The Final Footprint

Tomb at Cimetiere du Montparnasse

Monument to Franck at the Square Samuel-Rousseau, 7th arrondissement.

The funeral mass for Franck was held at Sainte-Clotilde, attended by a large congregation including Léo Delibes (officially representing the Conservatoire), Camille Saint-Saëns, Eugène Gigout, Gabriel Fauré, Alexandre Guilmant, Charles-Marie Widor (who succeeded Franck as professor of organ at the Conservatoire), and Édouard Lalo. Emmanuel Chabrier spoke at the original gravesite at Montrouge. Later, Franck’s body was moved to its current location at Montparnasse Cemetery in Paris, into a tomb designed by his friend, architect Gaston Redon. A number of Franck’s students, led by Augusta Holmès, commissioned a bronze medallion from Auguste Rodin, a three-quarter bust of Franck, which in 1893 was placed on the side of the tomb. In 1904, a monument to Franck by sculptor Alfred Lenoir, César Franck at the Organ, was placed in the Square Samuel-Rousseau across the street from Sainte-Clotilde. Other notable Final Footprints at Montparnasse include; Charles Baudelaire, Samuel Beckett, Simone de Beauvoir, Emmanuel Chabrier, Guy de Maupassant, Adah Isaacs Menken, Man Ray, Camille Saint-Saëns, Jean-Paul Sartre,  Jean Seberg, and Susan Sontag.

#RIP #OTD in 1908 French dramatist (La Tosca, Fédora, Madame Sans-Gêne, Gismonda), Victorien Sardou died in Paris aged 77. Cimetière Bouilhet, Marly-le-Roi, France

#RIP #OTD in 1978 painter (The Saturday Evening Post, Willie Gillis series, Rosie the Riveter, The Problem We All Live With, Saying Grace, Four Freedoms) Norman Rockwell died of emphysema at age 84 in his Stockbridge, Massachusetts, home. Stockbridge Cemetery

On this day in 1998 actor, writer, director, sculptor, Jean Cocteau’s muse and lover, Jean Marais died from cardiovascular disease in Cannes, aged 84.  Born Jean-Alfred Villain-Marais in Cherbourg, France on 11 December 1913.

He performed in over 100 films and was the lover, muse and friend of acclaimed director Jean Cocteau.  In 1996, he was awarded the French Legion of Honor for his contributions to French cinema.

Marais was Cocteau’s lover from 1937 to 1947, his muse and longtime friend.  After Cocteau’s death, Marais wrote a memoir of Cocteau, L’Inconcevable Jean Cocteau, attributing authorship to “Cocteau-Marais”. He also wrote an autobiography, Histoires de ma vie, published in 1975. From 1948 until 1959, his companion was the American dancer George Reich.  He is rumored to have been among the lovers of Umberto II of Italy.

The Final Footprint

Village cemetery at Vallauris, near Antibes

#RIP #OTD in 1998 author (Black Narcissus, The River, The Greengage Summer) Rumer Godden died from a stroke in Moniaive, Scotland aged 90. Rye Cemetery, Rye, Rother District, East Sussex, England

And on this day in 2020 game show host and television personality Alex Trebek died at his home in Los Angeles from pancreatic cancer, aged 80.  Born George Alexander Trebek on July 22, 1940, in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada.

He hosted the syndicated general knowledge quiz game show Jeopardy! for 37 seasons from its revival in 1984 until his death in 2020. Trebek also hosted a number of other game shows, including The Wizard of Odds, Double Dare, High Rollers, Battlestars, Classic Concentration, and To Tell the Truth. He also made appearances, usually as himself, in numerous films and television series.  Trebek became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1998.  He received the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Game Show Host eight times for his work on Jeopardy!

The Final Footprint – What is cremation?

After each posthumous episode in season 37, the title card read, “Dedicated to Alex Trebek. Forever in our hearts. Always our inspiration.”

On the one year anniversary of his death, which was also the day that the first episode Ken Jennings hosted in season 38 was aired, a different title card read, “Alex Trebek, July 22, 1940 – November 8, 2020. You are missed every day.”

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On this day 7 November death of Eleanor Roosevelt – Steve McQueen – Adelaide Hall – Darrell Royal – Leonard Cohen

Posted on 29 NovamThu, 07 Nov 2024 00:27:00 -06002024-11-07T00:27:00-06:0012 2011 by MacGregor

#RIP #OTD in 1962 political figure, diplomat, activist, first lady of the United States (1933 to 1945) Eleanor Roosevelt died of cardiac failure at her Manhattan home, 55 East 74th Street, aged 78. Franklin D. Roosevelt National Historic Site, Hyde Park, New York

On this day in 1980, United States Marine Corp veteran, Academy Award-nominated actor, The King of Cool, Steve McQueen, died in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico at the age of 50 from complications related to pleural mesothelioma.  Born Terence Steven McQueen on 24 March 1930 in Beech Grove, Indiana.

On November 2, 1956, he married Filipino actress and dancer Neile Adams.  Mamie Van Doren claimed to have had an affair with McQueen and tried hallucinogens with him around 1959.  Actress-model Lauren Hutton said that she also had an affair with McQueen in the early 1960s.  In 1971–1972, while separated from Adams, McQueen had a relationship with Junior Bonner co-star Barbara Leigh.

In Cheyenne, Wyoming, in 1973, McQueen married actress Ali MacGraw (his co-star in The Getaway), but their marriage ended in a divorce in 1978.  Some claimed that MacGraw was the one true love of McQueen’s life: “He was madly in love with her until the day he died.”  On January 16, 1980, less than a year before his death, McQueen married model Barbara Minty.

In 1973, McQueen was one of the pallbearers at Bruce Lee’s funeral, along with James Coburn, Bruce’s brother Robert Lee, Peter Chin, Dan Inosanto and Taky Kimura.

My favorite movies in which McQueen appears are; The Magnificent Seven (1960), Nevada Smith (1966), Bullit (1968), Junior Bonner (1972), The Getaway (1972), Papillon (1973), and Tom Horn (1980).  I saw Papillon as a young teenager and enjoyed it so much I bought the book written by Henri Charrière.  One of my favorite books.  I still own that book.

The Final Footprint – McQueen was cremated and his cremated remains were scattered in the Pacific Ocean.

On this day in November 1993; jazz singer and entertainer Adelaide Hall died at London’s Charing Cross Hospital aged 92.  Born Adelaide Louise Hall on 20 October 1901 in Brooklyn.  Her long career spanned more than 70 years from 1921 until her death and she was a major figure in the Harlem Renaissance.  Hall entered the Guinness Book of World Records in 2003 as the world’s most enduring recording artist, having released material over eight consecutive decades.  She performed with major artists such as Art Tatum, Ethel Waters, Josephine Baker, Louis Armstrong, Lena Horne, Cab Calloway, Fela Sowande,  Rudy Vallee and Jools Holland, and recorded as a jazz singer with Duke Ellington (with whom she made her most famous recording, “Creole Love Call” in 1927) and with Fats Waller.

The Final Footprint – Honouring her wish, her funeral took place in New York at the Cathedral of the Incarnation (Garden City, New York) and she was laid to rest beside her mother at the Cemetery of the Evergreens in Brooklyn.

In London, a memorial service was held for her at St Paul’s, Covent Garden (known as the “actors’ church”), which was attended by many stars including Elaine Paige, Elisabeth Welch, Lon Satton and Elaine Delmar. One of the participants, TV presenter and broadcaster Michael Parkinson, remarked during his eulogy: “Adelaide lived to be ninety-two and never grew old.”  Another notable final footprint at Evergreens; Bill “Bojangles” Robinson.

darrell royalOn this day in 2012, United States Army Air Corp veteran, football player at the University of Oklahoma, head coach of the Texas Longhorns (1957-1976), 3x National Champion, 11x Southwest Conference champion, Darrell Royal died due to complications of Alzheimer’s disease in Austin at the age of 88.  Born Darrell K Royal on 6 July 1924 in Hollis, Oklahoma.  Royal also served as the head coach at Mississippi State University (1954–1955), the University of Washington (1956), compiling a career college football record of 184–60–5.  He won more games than any other coach in Texas Longhorns football history.  Royal also coached the Edmonton Eskimos of the Canadian Football League for one season in 1953.  He never had a losing season as a head coach for his entire career.  Royal was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach in 1983.  Darrell K Royal – Texas Memorial Stadium in Austin, Texas, where the Longhorns play their home games, was renamed in his honor in 1996.

The Final Footprint – Royal is interred at the Texas State Cemetery in Austin.  Other notable final footprints at TSC include: Stephen F. Austin, John B. Connally, Nellie Connally, J. Frank Dobie, Barbara Jordan, Tom Landry (cenotaph), Ann Richards, Edwin “Bud” Shrake, William A. A. “Bigfoot” Wallace, and Walter Prescott Webb.

On this day in 2016, singer, songwriter, musician, poet, novelist, and painter Leonard Cohen died at the age of 82 at his home in Los Angeles. Reportedly, his death was the result of a fall at his home on the night of November 7, and he subsequently died in his sleep. Cancer was a contributing cause. Born Leonard Norman Cohen on September 21, 1934 in Montreal.

His work explored religion, politics, isolation, sexuality, and personal relationships. Cohen was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He was a Companion of the Order of Canada, the nation’s highest civilian honour. In 2011, Cohen received one of the Prince of Asturias Awards for literature and the ninth Glenn Gould Prize.

Cohen pursued a career as a poet and novelist during the 1950s and early 1960s.  He did not launch a music career until 1967, at the age of 33. His first album, Songs of Leonard Cohen (1967), was followed by three more albums of folk music: Songs from a Room (1969), Songs of Love and Hate (1971) and New Skin for the Old Ceremony (1974). His 1977 record Death of a Ladies’ Man was co-written and produced by Phil Spector, which was a move away from Cohen’s previous minimalist sound. In 1979, Cohen returned with the more traditional Recent Songs, which blended his acoustic style with jazz and Oriental and Mediterranean influences. Perhaps Cohen’s most famous song, “Hallelujah” was first released on his studio album Various Positions in 1984. I’m Your Man in 1988 marked Cohen’s turn to synthesized productions and remains his most popular album. In 1992, Cohen released its follow-up, The Future, which had dark lyrics and references to political and social unrest.

Cohen returned to music in 2001 with the release of Ten New Songs, which was a major hit in Canada and Europe. His eleventh album, Dear Heather, followed in 2004. After a successful string of tours between 2008 and 2010, Cohen released three albums in the final four years of his life: Old Ideas (2012), Popular Problems(2014) and You Want It Darker (2016), the last of which was released three weeks before his death.

Cohen’s writing process, as he told an interviewer in 1998, was “like a bear stumbling into a beehive or a honey cache: I’m stumbling right into it and getting stuck, and it’s delicious and it’s horrible and I’m in it and it’s not very graceful and it’s very awkward and it’s very painful and yet there’s something inevitable about it.”

in 1988

2008

In 1960, Cohen lived in rural Hydra, Greece with Marianne Ihlen, with whom he was in a relationship for most of the 1960s. The song “So Long, Marianne” was written to and about her. Ihlen died of leukemia three months before Cohen. His farewell letter to her was read at her funeral, stating that “… our bodies are falling apart and I think I will follow you very soon. Know that I am so close behind you that if you stretch out your hand, I think you can reach mine.”

In the 1970s, Cohen was in a relationship with artist Suzanne Elrod. She took the cover photograph for Live Songs and is pictured on the cover of the Death of a Ladies’ Man. She also inspired the “Dark Lady” of Cohen’s book Death of a Lady’s Man (1978), but is not the subject of one of his best-known songs, “Suzanne”, which refers to Suzanne Verdal, the former wife of a friend, the Québécois sculptor Armand Vaillancourt. Cohen and Elrod separated in 1979, with him later stating that “cowardice” and “fear” prevented him from marrying her.

Cohen was in a relationship with French photographer Dominique Issermann in the 1980s. They worked together on several occasions: she shot his first two music videos for the songs “Dance Me to the End of Love” and “First We Take Manhattan” and her photographs were used for the covers of his 1993 book Stranger Music and his album More Best of Leonard Cohen and for the inside booklet of I’m Your Man(1988), which he also dedicated to her. In 2010, she was also the official photographer of his world tour.

In the 1990s, Cohen was romantically linked to actress Rebecca De Mornay. De Mornay co-produced Cohen’s 1992 album The Future, which is also dedicated to her with an inscription that quotes Rebecca’s coming to the well from the Book of Genesis chapter 24 and giving drink to Eliezer’s camels, after he prayed for the help; Eliezer (“God is my help” in Hebrew) is part of Cohen’s Hebrew name (Eliezer ben Nisan ha’Cohen), and Cohen sometimes referred to himself as “Eliezer Cohen” or even “Jikan Eliezer”.

The Final Footprint – 

His funeral was held on November 10, 2016, in Montreal, at a cemetery on Mount Royal. As was his wish, Cohen was laid to rest with a Jewish rite, in a simple pine casket, in a family plot in Shaar Hashomayim Cemetery in Montreal . The city of Montreal held a tribute concert to Cohen in December 2016, entitled “God is Alive, Magic Is Afoot” after a prose poem in his novel Beautiful Losers. It featured a number of musical performances and readings of Cohen’s poetry.

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On this day 6 November deathTchaikovsky – Annette Kellermann – Gene Tierney – Hank Thompson

Posted on 29 NovamWed, 06 Nov 2024 00:39:00 -06002024-11-06T00:39:00-06:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1893, composer of the romantic period, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky died in Saint Petersburg at the age of 53. Born on 7 May 1840 [O.S. 25 April] in Votkinsk, a small town in Vyatka Governorate (present-day Udmurtia) in the Russian Empire.  His works are among the most popular music in the classical repertoire. He was the first Russian composer whose music made a lasting impression internationally, bolstered by his appearances as a guest conductor in Europe and the United States.

Although musically precocious, Tchaikovsky was educated for a career as a civil servant. There was scant opportunity for a musical career in Russia at that time and no system of public music education. When an opportunity for such an education arose, he entered the nascent Saint Petersburg Conservatory, from which he graduated in 1865. The formal Western-oriented teaching he received there set him apart from composers of the contemporary nationalist movement embodied by the Russian composers of The Five, with whom his professional relationship was mixed. Tchaikovsky’s training set him on a path to reconcile what he had learned with the native musical practices to which he had been exposed from childhood. From this reconciliation he forged a personal but unmistakably Russian style.

Despite his many popular successes, Tchaikovsky’s life was punctuated by personal crises and depression. Contributory factors included his early separation from his mother for boarding school followed by his mother’s early death, the death of his close friend and colleague Nikolai Rubinstein, and the collapse of the one enduring relationship of his adult life, which was his 13-year association with the wealthy widow Nadezhda von Meck who was his patron even though they never actually met each other. His homosexuality, which he kept private, has traditionally also been considered a major factor, though some musicologists now downplay its importance. Tchaikovsky’s sudden death at the age of 53 is generally ascribed to cholera; there is an ongoing debate as to whether cholera was indeed the cause of death, and whether his death was accidental or self-inflicted.

While his music has remained popular among audiences, critical opinions were initially mixed. Some Russians did not feel it was sufficiently representative of native musical values and expressed suspicion that Europeans accepted the music for its Western elements. In an apparent reinforcement of the latter claim, some Europeans lauded Tchaikovsky for offering music more substantive than base exoticism and said he transcended stereotypes of Russian classical music.

Tchaikovsky’s sudden death is generally ascribed to cholera, but there is an ongoing debate as to whether cholera was the cause, or whether his death was accidental or self-inflicted.

The Final Footprint

From 16/28 October 1893, Tchaikovsky conducted the premiere of his Sixth Symphony, the Pathétique, in Saint Petersburg.  Nine days later, Tchaikovsky died.  While Tchaikovsky’s death has traditionally been attributed to cholera from drinking unboiled water at a local restaurant, there has been much speculation that his death was suicide.  He was interred in Tikhvin Cemetery at the Alexander Nevsky Monastery. Other notable final footprints at Tikhvin include; Alexander Borodin, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Modest Mussorgsky, and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.

#RIP #OTD in 1975 Australian professional swimmer, vaudeville star, film actress (A Daughter of the Gods), and writer, Annette Kellerman died in the hospital at Southport, Queensland, Australia, aged 89. Cremated remains scattered in the Great Barrier Reef

On this day in 1991, Academy Award-nominated actress, Gene Tierney, died of emphysema in Houston, Texas at the age of 70.  Born Gene Eliza Tierney on 19 November 1920 in Brooklyn, New York.  “Undeniably the most beautiful woman in movie history” – Darryl F. Zanuck, former chief of production and founder of 20th Century Fox.  She met Howard Hughes, who reportedly tried to seduce her but she was not impressed by his wealth.  They did become lifelong friends, and ironically, are interred in the same cemetery (see below).  She married twice; fashion designer Oleg Cassini (1941 – 1952 divorce) and Texas oil baron W. Howard Lee (1960 – 1981 his death).  During her separation from Cassini, Tierney allegedly had an affair with John F. Kennedy.

The Final Footprint – Tierney is interred in the Lee Family Private Estate in Glenwood Cemetery in Houston.  One of the offices I worked in when I worked in Houston had a great view of Glenwood Cemetery.  Other notable Final Footprints at Glenwood include; Maria Franklin Prentiss Langham Gable, Oveta Culp Hobby, William P. Hobby, Howard Hughes, Anson Jones, and Glenn McCarthy.

And on this day in 2007, singer songwriter Hank Thompson died from lung cancer in Keller, Texas at the age of 82.  Born Henry William Thompson on 3 September 1925 in Waco, Texas.  Perhaps his best known hit was his version of the Arlie Carter and William Warren song “The Wild Side of Life”.  The 1987 novel Crazy Heart by Thomas Cobb was apparently inspired by Thompson’s life.  In 2009 Cobb’s novel was turned into a successful film directed by Scott Cooper and starring Academy Award winner Jeff Bridges.

The Final Footprint – Thompson requested that no funeral be held.  On November 14, a “celebration of life,” open to both fans and friends, took place at Billy Bob’s Texas, a Fort Worth, Texas nightclub that bills itself as The World’s Largest Honky Tonk.  Thompson is interred in Waco Memorial Park in Waco.

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