On this day in 1936, Native American author, Mourning Dove died at the state hospital in Medical Lake, Washington at the approximate age of 48. Perhaps best known for her novel Cogewea the Half-Blood: A Depiction of the Great Montana Cattle Range (1927). Born Hum-isha-ma “in the Moon of Leaves” (April) 1888 in a canoe on the Kootenai River near Bonners Ferry, Idaho , her name was later changed to Christal Quintasket.
Cogewea was one of the first novels to be written by a Native American woman and to feature a female protagonist. It explores the lives of Cogewea, a mixed-blood heroine whose ranching skills, riding prowess, and bravery are noted and greatly respected by the primarily mixed-racecowboys on the ranch on the Flathead Indian Reservation. The eponymous main character hires a greenhorn easterner, Alfred Densmore, who has designs on Cogewea’s land, which she had received as head of household in an allotment under the Dawes Act.
Coyote Stories (1933) is a collection of what Mourning Dove called Native American folklore.
Quintasket married Hector McLeod, a member of the Flathead people. While married to McLeod she attended Calgary College in Alberta where she studied business and composition. When McLeod proved to be an abusive husband; they separated. In 1919, she married again, to Fred Galler of the Wenatchi.
The Final Footprint – She is interred in Omak Memorial Cemetery in Omak, Washington.
On this day in 1965, writer, novelist, Shirley Jackson died of heart failure in her sleep at her home in North Bennington, Vermont at the age of 48. Born Shirley Hardie Jackson on 14 December 1916 in San Francisco. Perhaps best known for the short story “The Lottery” (1948), which suggests a secret, sinister underside to bucolic small-town America. She is also well known for the 1959 novel The Haunting of Hill House.
The Final Footprint – Jackson was cremated.
#RIP #OTD in 1985 actress (Beggars of Life, Pandora’s Box, Diary of a Lost Girl, Miss Europe), dancer, Jazz Age and flapper icon, Louise Brooks died of a heart attack in her apartment in Rochester, New York, aged 78. Holy Sepulchre Cemetery, Rochester
On this day in 2004, actress Fay Wray died in her Manhattan apartment at the age of 96. Born Vina Fay Wray on 15 September 1907 on a ranch near Cardston, Alberta, Canada. Perhaps best remembered for her role as Ann Darrow in the film King Kong (1933). Wray married three times; John Monk Saunders (1928-1939 divorce), Robert Riskin (1942-1955 his death) and Sanford Rothenberg (1971-1991 his death).
The Final Footprint – Wray is interred in Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood. Her grave is marked by an individual engraved flat granite marker near a memorial bench. The marker is engraved with her name and her birth and death years. Two days after her death, the lights of the Empire State Building were extinguished for 15 minutes in her memory. For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Wray was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6349 Hollywood Blvd. She received a star posthumously on Canada’s Walk of Fame in Toronto on June 5, 2005. A park near Lee’s Creek on Main Street in Cardston was named “Fay Wray Park” in her honor. The sign at the edge of the park on Main Street has a silhouette of King Kong on it. A large oil portrait of Wray by Alberta artist Neil Boyle is on display in the Empress Theatre in Fort Macleod, Alberta. Other notable Final Footprints at Hollywood Forever include; Mel Blanc, Lana Clarkson, Iron Eyes Cody, Chris Cornell, Cecil B. DeMille, Victor Fleming, Judy Garland, Joan Hackett, John Huston, Hattie McDaniel’s cenotaph, Jayne Mansfield’s cenotaph, Tyrone Power, Dee Dee Ramone, Johnny Ramone, Virginia Rappe, Nelson Riddle, Mickey Rooney, Ann Sheridan, Bugsy Siegel, Rudolph Valentino, and Anton Yelchin.
#RIP #OTD in 2005 stage and screen actress (Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, I Remember Mama, Vertigo, Dallas), artist, children’s author, Barbara Bel Geddes died of lung cancer at her estate in Northeast Harbor, Maine, aged 82. Cremated remains scattered into the harbor bordering her home
#RIP #OTD in 2010 stage and screen actress (The Day the Earth Stood Still, A Face in the Crowd, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Hud) Patricia Neal died at her home in Edgartown, Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, from lung cancer, aged 84. Abbey of Regina Laudis Cemetery, Bethlehem Conn.
On this day in 2013 actress, screenwriter, singer, and songwriter Karen Black died from ampullary cancer in Los Angeles at the age of 74. Born Karen Blanche Ziegler on July 1, 1939 in Park Ridge, Illinois. Black studied acting in New York City and performed on Broadway before making her major film debut in Francis Ford Coppola’s You’re a Big Boy Now (1966).
She followed this with roles in Easy Rider (1969), Five Easy Pieces (1970), and The Great Gatsby (1974), for the latter two of which she won Golden Globe awards for Best Supporting Actress; her performance in Five Easy Pieces also garnered her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress.
In 1975, she appeared in Dan Curtis’s cult horror films Trilogy of Terror and Burnt Offerings; Robert Altman’s Nashville, and The Day of the Locust, which earned her a third Golden Globe nomination. Other roles include Airport 1975 (1974), Alfred Hitchcock‘s Family Plot (1976), Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean (1982), and Tobe Hooper’s Invaders from Mars (1986).
In the 1990s, Black starred in a variety of arthouse and horror films, as well as writing her own screenplays before appearing in Rob Zombie’s House of 1000 Corpses (2003), which cemented her status as a cult horror icon.
Black continued to star in low-profile films throughout the early 2000s, as well as working as a playwright. Black’s career spanned over 50 years, and includes nearly 200 film credits.
Black married four times:
- Charles Black, married in 1960
- Robert Burton, an actor (who appeared alongside Black in Trilogy of Terror), married on April 18, 1973 and separated in October 1974
- L. M. Kit Carson, an actor/screenwriter, married on July 4, 1975 and separated in 1980.
- Stephen Eckelberry, from September 27, 1987.
The Final Footprint
Black is interred in Eternal Hills Memorial Park in Oceanside, California.
On this day in 2017 singer, guitarist, songwriter, and actor Glen Camplbell died from Alzheimer’s complications in Nashville at the age of 81. Born Glen Travis Campbell on April 22, 1936 in Billstown, Arkansas. Perhaps best known for a series of hit songs in the 1960s and 1970s, and for hosting a music and comedy variety show called The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour from January 1969 through June 1972. He released over 70 albums in a career that spanned five decades, accumulating over 45 million record sales worldwide, including 12 gold albums, four platinum albums, and one double-platinum album.
Campbell began his professional career as a studio musician in Los Angeles, spending several years playing with the group of instrumentalists later known as “the Wrecking Crew”. After becoming a solo artist, he placed a total of 80 different songs on either the Billboard Country Chart, Billboard Hot 100, or Adult Contemporary Chart, of which 29 made the top 10 and of which nine reached number one on at least one of those charts. Among Campbell’s hits are “Universal Soldier”, his first hit from 1965, along with “Gentle on My Mind” (1967), “By the Time I Get to Phoenix” (1967), “Wichita Lineman” (1968), “Dreams of the Everyday Housewife” (1968), “Galveston” (1969), “Rhinestone Cowboy” (1975) and “Southern Nights” (1977).
In 1967 Campbell won four Grammys in the country and pop categories. For “Gentle on My Mind”, he received two awards in country and western; “By the Time I Get to Phoenix” did the same in pop. Three of his early hits later won Grammy Hall of Fame Awards (2000, 2004, 2008), while Campbell himself won the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2012. He owned trophies for Male Vocalist of the Year from both the Country Music Association (CMA) and the Academy of Country Music (ACM), and took the CMA’s top award as 1968 Entertainer of the Year. Campbell played a supporting role in the film True Grit (1969), which earned him a Golden Globe nomination for Most Promising Newcomer. He also sang the title song, which was nominated for an Academy Award.
Campbell was married four times. Campbell was first married from 1955–1959 to Diane Kirk. After divorcing Kirk, Campbell married Billie Jean Nunley, an Albuquerque beautician. Billie Campbell filed for divorce in 1975, and their divorce was final in 1976. He married singer Mac Davis’s second wife, Sarah Barg, in September 1976.
After his divorce from Barg, Campbell began a relationship with fellow country artist Tanya Tucker. The couple recorded a number of songs together, including the single “Dream Lover”.
Campbell married Kimberly “Kim” Woollen in 1982. The couple met on a blind date in 1981 when Woollen was a Radio City Music Hall “Rockette”.
The Final Footprint
Campbell was buried in the Campbell family cemetery at Billstown, Arkansas.
#RIP #OTD in 2022 singer (“If You Love Me (Let Me Know)”, “Please Mr. Please”, “Have You Never Been Mellow”), actress (Grease) Olivia Newton-John died; breast cancer at her home in the Santa Ynez Valley of California, aged 73. Cremated remains scattered in Byron Bay, Australia/her Santa Ynez ranch
#RIP #OTD in 2023 musician, singer, songwriter, subject of the documentary film Searching for Sugar Man, Sixto Rodriguez died in Detroit from stroke complications aged 81. Holy Cross Cemetery, Detroit
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