#RIP #OTD in 1852 novelist (Dead Souls), short story writer (“The Overcoat”, “Viy”, “The Nose”, “Diary of a Madman”, “The Portrait”, “The Carriage”), playwright (Marriage) Nikolai Gogol died in Moscow, aged 42. Novodevichy Cemetery, Moscow
On this day in 1868, Native American Indian trader, guide, and interpreter, Jesse Chisholm, died at Left Hand Spring, near the site of present Geary, Oklahoma from food poisoning. Born in the Hiwassee region of Tennessee, probably in 1805 or 1806. His father, Ignatius, was Scottish and his mother was Cherokee. Primarily known for being the namesake of the Chisholm Trail, which ranchers used to drive their cattle to eastern markets. Chisholm had built a number of trading posts in what is now western Oklahoma. The trail had several variations but
seemed to start at the Rio Grande in Texas and ran though San Antonio and ended in Abilene, Kansas.
The Final Footprint – Chisholm is interred at the Jesse Chisholm Gravesite near Geary, Oklahoma.
#RIP #OTD in 1963 poet, writer, and physician William Carlos Williams died at his home in Rutherford, New Jersey, aged 79. Hillside Cemetery in Lyndhurst, New Jersey
#RIP #OTD in 1986 Canadian poet and novelist (By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept) Elizabeth Smart died in London of a heart attack, aged 72. St George’s churchyard, Saint Cross South Elmham, Suffolk
On this day in 1994, comedian and actor John Candy died of a heart attack in Durango, Mexico, aged 43. Born John Franklin Candy on October 31, 1950 in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada. Candy rose to fame as a member of the Toronto branch of the Second City and its related Second City Television series, and through his appearances in such comedy films as Stripes, Splash, Cool Runnings, Summer Rental, Home Alone, The Great Outdoors, Spaceballs, and Uncle Buck, as well as more dramatic roles in Only the Lonely and JFK. One of his most renowned onscreen performances was as Del Griffith, the talkative shower-curtain ring salesman in the John Hughes comedy Planes, Trains and Automobiles.
The Final Footprint
Candy is entombed at Holy Cross Cemetery, Culver City, California. Other notable final footprints at Holy Cross include; Bing Crosby, Jimmy Durante, John Ford, Rita Hayworth, Chick Hearn, Conrad Hilton, Jr., Bela Lugosi, Al Martino, Audrey Meadows, Ricardo Montalban, Chris Penn, Jo Stafford, and Sharon Tate.
#RIP #OTD in 1996, comedienne who appeared at the Grand Ole Opry for more than 50 years (from 1940 to 1991) and on the television show Hee Haw from 1969 to 1991, Minnie Pearl died from a stroke in Nashville, aged 83. Mount Hope Cemetery in Franklin, Tennessee.
On this day in 2009 playwright and screenwriter Horton Foote died in Hartford, Connecticut at the age of 92. Born Albert Horton Foote Jr. on March 14, 1916 in Wharton, Texas. Perhaps best known for his screenplays for the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird and the 1983 film Tender Mercies, and his notable live television dramas during the Golden Age of Television. He received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1995 for his play The Young Man From Atlanta and two Academy Awards, one for an original screenplay, Tender Mercies, and one for adapted screenplay, To Kill a Mockingbird. In 1995, Foote was the inaugural recipient of the Austin Film Festival’s Distinguished Screenwriter Award. In 2000, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts.
Foote was married to Lillian Vallish Foote (1923–1992) from June 4, 1945 until her death in 1992.
The Final Footprint
Foote is interred in the Wharton City Cemetery. The Fine Arts Building at the college located in Wharton, Texas, Wharton County Junior College, is named the Horton Foote Theatre.
On this day in 2016, author Pat Conroy died in Beaufort, South Carolina from pancreatic cancer at the age of 70. Born Donald Patrick Conroy in Atlanta, Georgia on October 26, 1945. He wrote several acclaimed novels and memoirs. Two of his novels, The Prince of Tides (one of my personal favorites) and The Great Santini, were made into Oscar-nominated films. In my opinion, he is a leading figure of late-20th century Southern literature.
In 1976, Conroy published his first novel, The Great Santini. The main character of the novel is Marine fighter pilot Colonel “Bull” Meecham, who dominates and terrorizes his family. Bull Meecham also psychologically abuses his teenage son Ben. The character is based on Conroy’s father Donald.
In 1986, Conroy published The Prince of Tides about Tom Wingo, an unemployed South Carolina teacher who goes to New York City to help his sister, Savannah, a poet who has attempted suicide, to come to terms with their past.
In 1995, Conroy published Beach Music, a novel about an American ex-patriate living in Rome who returns to South Carolina upon news of his mother’s terminal illness. The story reveals his attempt to confront personal demons, including the suicide of his wife, the subsequent custody battle with his in-laws over their daughter, and the attempt by a film-making friend to rekindle old friendships which were compromised during the days of the Vietnam War.
In 2009, Conroy published South of Broad, which again uses the familiar backdrop of Charleston following the suicide of newspaperman Leo King’s brother, and alternates narratives of a diverse group of friends between 1969 and 1989.
Conroy was married three times. His first marriage was to Barbara (née Bolling) Jones on October 10, 1969, while he was teaching on Daufuskie Island. Jones, who had been Conroy’s next door neighbor in Beaufort, South Carolina, had been widowed when her first husband, Joseph Wester Jones III, a fighter pilot stationed in Vietnam, had been shot down and killed. They divorced in 1977.
Conroy then married Lenore (née Gurewitz) Fleischer in 1981. Conroy and Fleischer divorced on 26 October 1995, Conroy’s 50th birthday. Conroy married his third wife, writer Cassandra King, author of four novels, in May 1998.
Conroy lived in Beaufort with wife Cassandra until his death. In 2007, he commented that she was a much happier writer than he was: “I’ll hear her cackle with laughter at some funny line she’s written. I’ve never cackled with laughter at a single line I’ve ever written. None of it has given me pleasure. She writes with pleasure and joy, and I sit there in gloom and darkness.”
The Final Footprint
On February 15, 2016, Conroy stated on his Facebook page that he was being treated for pancreatic cancer. Conroy’s funeral was held on March 8, 2016 at St. Peter’s Catholic Church in Beaufort, South Carolina. Conroy was interred at St. Helena Memorial Garden on Ernest Road on St. Helena Island, South Carolina. His epitaph reads; MY WOUND IS GEOGRAPHY, IT IS ALSO MY ANCHORAGE, MY PORT OF CALL.
#RIP #OTD on this day in 2019, actor (8 Seconds (1994), The Fifth Element (1997), Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019)) Luke Perry died from a stroke in Burbank, California at the age of 52. His interment site is at the Perry Family Farm in Vanleer, Tennessee
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