On this day 30 April death of Lucan – Édouard Manet – Bessie Coleman – Inger Stevens – Agnes Moorehead – George Balanchine – Muddy Waters – Sergio Leone – Peter Mayhew – Naomi Judd

Posted on 29 ApramTue, 30 Apr 2024 00:48:00 -05002024-04-30T00:48:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

Modern bust of Lucan in Córdoba. There are no ancient likenesses.

On this day in 65 AD, Roman poet Lucan died by suicide by opening a vein at the age of 25, but not before incriminating his mother, among others, in the conspiracy of Gaius Calpurnius Piso against Nero, in the hopes of a pardon. According to Tacitus, as Lucan bled to death, “(he) recalled some poetry he had composed in which he had told the story of a wounded soldier dying a similar kind of death and he recited the very lines. These were his last words.”  An alternative interpretation of events is that his death was not by suicide, but was an execution carried out at Nero’s command.  Born Marcus Annaeus Lucanus on 3 November 39 AD in Corduba (modern-day Córdoba), in Hispania Baetica. He is regarded as one of the outstanding figures of the Imperial Latin period, known in particular for his epic Pharsalia. His youth and speed of composition set him apart from other poets.

Pharsalia

Aut nihil est sensus animis a morte relictum
aut mors ipsa nihil.

  • Either no feeling remains to the soul after death, or death itself matters not at all.
  • Book III, line 39

Vita brevis nulli superest qui tempus in illa
quaerendae sibi mortis habet.

  • No life is short that gives a man time to slay himself.
  • Book IV, line 478

Libera fortunae mors est; capit omnia tellus
quae genuit; caelo tegitur qui non habet urnam.

  • The dead are free from Fortune; Mother Earth has room for all her children, and he who lacks an urn has the sky to cover him.
  • Book VII, line 818

Scire mori sors prima viris, sed proxima cogi.

  • Best gift of all
    The knowledge how to die; next, death compelled.
  • Book IX, line 211

On this day in 1883, painter Édouard Manet died from complications of syphilis in Paris at the age of 51.  Born in Paris on 23 January 1832, in his families ancestral hôtel particulier on the rue Bonaparte.  Manet was one of the first 19th-century artists to paint modern life, and, in my opinion, a pivotal figure in the transition from Realism to Impressionism.  His early masterworks, The Luncheon on the Grass (Le déjeuner sur l’herbe) (see below right) and Olympia, (see below left) both 1863, caused great controversy and served as rallying points for the young painters who would create Impressionism.  Today, these are considered watershed paintings that mark the genesis of modern art.  After the death of his father in 1862, Manet married Suzanne Edouard_Manet_-_Luncheon_on_the_Grass_-_Google_Art_ProjectLeenhoff in 1863.  Leenhoff was a Dutch-born piano teacher of Manet’s age with whom he had been romantically involved for approximately ten years.  Leenhoff initially had been employed by Manet’s father, Auguste, to teach Manet and his younger brother piano.  She also may have been Auguste’s mistress.  In 1852, Leenhoff gave birth, out of wedlock, to a son, Leon Koella Leenhoff.  Eleven-year-old Leon Leenhoff, Edouard_Manet_-_Olympia_-_Google_Art_Project_3whose father may have been either of the Manets, posed often for Manet, most famously, as the subject of the Boy Carrying a Sword of 1861 (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York).  He also appears as the boy carrying a tray in the background of The Balcony.  Manet painted his wife in The Reading, among other paintings.

edouardManet-graveThe Final Footprint – Manet is buried in Passy Cemetery in the 16th arrondissement of Paris.  Opened in 1820 in the expensive residential and commercial districts of the Right Bank near the Champs-Élysées, by 1874 the small Passy Cemetery had become the aristocratic necropolis of Paris.  Sheltered by a bower of chestnut trees, the cemetery is in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower.  The retaining wall of the cemetery is adorned with a bas relief (by Louis Janthial) commemorating the soldiers who fell in the Great War.  Other notable final footprints as Passy include; Claude Debussy, Gabriel Fauré, Hubert de Givenchy, Octave Mirbeau, and Berthe Morisot.

Gallery

    • The Spanish Singer, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1860


  • The Old Musician, National Gallery of Art, 1862

  • Mlle. Victorine in the Costume of a Matador, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1862

  • The Dead Christ with Angels, 1864

  • Battle of the Kearsarge and the Alabama, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1864. Inspired by the Battle of Cherbourg (1864)

  • Dead Matador, National Gallery of Art, 1864–1865

  • The Philosopher, (Beggar with Oysters), Art Institute of Chicago, 1864–1867

  • The Ragpicker, Norton Simon Museum, 1865-1870

  • Young Flautist, or The Fifer, Musée d’Orsay, 1866

  • Still Life with Melon and Peaches, National Gallery of Art, 1866

  • The Tragic Actor (Rouvière as Hamlet), National Gallery of Art, 1866

  • Woman with Parrot, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1866

  • Portrait of Madame Brunet, J. Paul Getty Museum, 1867

  • Execution of Emperor Maximilian, 1868

  • Portrait of Émile Zola, Musée d’Orsay, 1868

  • Breakfast in the Studio (the Black Jacket), New Pinakothek, Munich, Germany, 1868

  • The Balcony, Musée d’Orsay, 1868–1869

  • Boating, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1874

  • The grand canal of Venice (Blue Venice), Shelburne Museum, 1875

  • Madame Manet, Norton Simon Museum, 1874-1876

  • Portrait of Stéphane Mallarmé, Musée d’Orsay, 1876

  • Nana, 1877

  • The Rue Mosnier with Flags, J. Paul Getty Museum, 1878

  • In the Conservatory, National Gallery, Berlin, Germany, 1879

  • Chez le père Lathuille, 1879, Musée des Beaux-Arts Tournai

  • The Bugler, 1882, Dallas Museum of Art

  • House in Rueil, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia 1882

  • Garden Path in Rueil, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon, 1882

  • Flowers in a Crystal Vase, National Gallery of Art, 1882

#RIP #OTD in 1926 civil aviator, the first African-American woman and first Native American to hold a pilot license, Queen Bess, Brave Bessie, Bessie Coleman died in a plane crash in Jacksonville, Florida, aged 34. Lincoln Cemetery, Cook County, Illinois

On this day in 1970 actress Inger Stevens died from a drug related overdose in Hollywood at the age of 35. Born Ingrid Stensland on October 18, 1934 in Stockholm.  

When she was nine, her mother abandoned the family and her father moved to the United States, leaving Inger and her sister in the custody first of the family maid and then with an aunt in Lidingö, near Stockholm. In 1944, the girls moved with their father and his new wife to New York City, where he had found work teaching at Columbia University. At age 13, she and her father moved to Manhattan, Kansas, where she attended Manhattan High School. At 16, she ran away from home to Kansas City, Missouri, and worked in burlesque shows. At 18, she left Kansas to return to New York City, where she worked as a chorus girl and in the Garment District while taking classes at the Actors Studio.

Stevens appeared in several films: A Guide for the Married Man (1967), with Walter Matthau; Hang ‘Em High, with Clint Eastwood; 5 Card Stud, with Dean Martin and Robert Mitchum; and Madigan with Henry Fonda and Richard Widmark.

Her first husband was her agent, Anthony Soglio, to whom she was married from 1955 to 1957. 

After her death, actor Ike Jones claimed that he had been secretly married to Stevens since 1961. Some doubted this due to the lack of a marriage license, the maintaining of separate homes and the filing of tax documents as single people. However, at the time Stevens’ estate was being settled, the actress’s brother, Carl O. Stensland, confirmed in court that his sister had hidden her marriage to Jones “out of fear for her career”, because Jones was black. Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner A. Edward Nichols ruled in Ike Jones’s favor and made him administrator of her estate. A photo exists of the two attending a banquet together in 1968. Her website also states that the marriage to Jones took place in Tijuana, Mexico.

The Final Footprint

Stevens cremated remains were scattered in the Pacific. 

#RIP #OTD in 1974, actress (The Magnificent Ambersons, Mrs. Parkington, Johnny Belinda, Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte, Bewitched) Agnes Moorehead died of uterine cancer in Rochester, Minnesota, aged 73. Dayton Memorial Park in Dayton, Ohio

On this day in 1983, ballet choreographer George Balanchine died, aged 79, in Manhattan from Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease. Born Georgiy Melitonovich Balanchivadze on January 22, 1904 in Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire. In my opinion, one of the most influential 20th century choreographers. Styled as the father of American ballet, he co-founded the New York City Ballet and remained its Artistic Director for more than 35 years.

Balanchine took the standards and technique from his time at the Imperial Ballet School and fused it with other schools of movement that he had adopted during his tenure on Broadway and in Hollywood, creating his signature “neoclassical style”.

He was a choreographer known for his musicality; he expressed music with dance and worked extensively with leading composers of his time like Igor Stravinsky. Balanchine was invited to America in 1933 by a young arts patron named Lincoln Kirstein, and together they founded the School of American Ballet. Along with Kirstein, Balanchine also co-founded the New York City Ballet (NYCB).

In 1923, Balanchine married Tamara Geva, a sixteen-year-old dancer. After his divorce from Geva, Balanchine was partnered with Alexandra Danilova from 1926 through 1933. He married and divorced three more times, all to women who were his dancers: Vera Zorina (1938–1946), Maria Tallchief (1946–1952), and Tanaquil LeClercq (1952–1969). He had no children by any of his marriages and no known offspring from any extramarital unions or other liaisons.


The Final Footprint

The night of his death, the company went on with its scheduled performance, which included Divertimento No. 15 and Symphony in C at Lincoln Center.

He had a Russian Orthodox funeral, and was interred at the Oakland Cemetery at Sag Harbor, Suffolk County, New York at the same cemetery where Danilova was later interred.

On this day in 1983, blues musician, The Father of Chicago Blues, Muddy Waters died in his sleep from heart failure at his home in Westmont, Illinois at the age of 70. Born McKinley Morganfield on April 4, 1913 in Issaquena County, Mississippi. 

Muddy Waters grew up on Stovall Plantation near Clarksdale, Mississippi, and by age 17 was playing the guitar and the harmonica, emulating the local blues artists Son House and Robert Johnson. He was recorded in Mississippi by Alan Lomax for the Library of Congress in 1941. In 1943, he moved to Chicago to become a full-time professional musician. In 1946, he recorded his first records for Columbia Records and then for Aristocrat Records, a newly formed label run by the brothers Leonard and Phil Chess.

In the early 1950s, Muddy Waters and his band—Little Walter Jacobs on harmonica, Jimmy Rogers on guitar, Elgin Evans on drums and Otis Spann on piano—recorded several blues classics, some with the bassist and songwriter Willie Dixon. These songs included “Hoochie Coochie Man”, “I Just Want to Make Love to You” and “I’m Ready”. In 1958, he traveled to England, laying the foundations of the resurgence of interest in the blues there. His performance at the Newport Jazz Festival in 1960 was recorded and released as his first live album, At Newport 1960.

Muddy Waters’ influence was tremendous, not just on blues and rhythm and blues but on rock and roll, hard rock, folk music, jazz, and country music. His use of amplification is often cited as the link between Delta blues and rock and roll. 

Waters’s longtime wife, Geneva (a first cousin of R. L. Burnside), died of cancer on March 15, 1973. Gaining custody of some of his children, he moved them into his home, eventually buying a new house in Westmont, Illinois. Years later, he travelled to Florida and met his future wife, 19-year-old Marva Jean Brooks, whom he nicknamed “Sunshine”. Eric Clapton served as best man at their wedding in 1979.


The Final Footprint

Throngs of blues musicians and fans attended his funeral at Restvale Cemetery in Alsip, Illinois, to pay tribute.

SergioLeone2On this day in 1989, director, producer and screenwriter, Sergio Leone died from a heart attack in Rome at the age of 60.  Born on 3 January 1929 in Rome.  Best known as the director of three legendary, iconic westerns, often referred to as Spaghetti Westerns: A Fistful of Dollars (Per un pugno di dollari) (1964) with Clint Eastwood; For a Few Dollars More (Per qualche dollaro in più) (1965) with Eastwood and Lee Van Cleef; and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (Il buono, il brutto, il cattivo) (1966) with Eastwood, Van Cleef and Eli Wallach.  The film score for all three movies was composed by Ennio Morricone.  Leone also directed Once Upon a Time in the West (C’era una volta il West) (1968) with Henry Fonda, Charles Bronson, Jason Robards and Claudia Cardinale; and Once Upon a Time in America (C’era una volta il America) (1984) with Robert De Niro.  All five of these movies are among my very favorites and I will stop what I am doing to watch them.

The Final Footprint – Leone is interred in a private estate in Cimitero di Pratica di Mare in Pratica di Mare, Lazio, Italy.

On this day in 2019, actor Peter Mayhew died of a heart attack at his home in Boyd, Texas, age 74. Born Peter William Mayhew on May 19, 1944 in Barnes, Surrey, England. Perhaps best known for portraying Chewbacca in the Star Wars film series. He played the character from the 1977 original to 2015’s The Force Awakens before his retirement from the role. His height 7′ 2″, was a product of Marfan syndrome.

Mayhew married Mary Angelique “Angie” Luker (née Cigainero; born October 12, 1954), a native of Texas, on August 7, 1999. The two lived in Boyd, Texas.

He became a naturalised citizen of the United States in 2005 at a ceremony in Arlington, Texas. In an interview with the Fort Worth Star-Telegram he joked that he did not get a medal at this ceremony either, a reference to the closing scene in Star Wars during which Luke Skywalker and Han Solo get medals, but Chewbacca does not. Mayhew noted in an MTV interview that although Chewbacca does not get a medal in the film, he does have the last line of dialogue, when he roars.

The Final Footprint

He was buried in Reno, Parker County, Texas, in Azleland Memorial Park and Mausoleum.

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is dedicated to his memory.

#RIP #OTD in 2022, singer, with her daughter Wynonna The Judds (“Mama He’s Crazy”, “Why Not Me”, “Girls Night Out”, “Love Is Alive”) mother of Ashley, Naomi Judd died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound at her home in Leiper’s Fork, Tennessee, aged 76.

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On this day 29 April death of Alice Prin -J. B. Lenoir – Alfred Hitchcock – Mae Clarke – Mick Ronson – Joanna Russ

Posted on 29 ApramMon, 29 Apr 2024 00:39:00 -05002024-04-29T00:39:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

On this day in 1967, blues guitarist and singer-songwriter J. B. Lenoir died in Urbana, Illinois, at the age 38, of internal bleeding related to injuries he had suffered in a car crash three weeks earlier, which had not been properly treated in a hospital in Illinois. Born on March 5, 1929 in Monticello, Mississippi. He was active in the Chicago blues scene in the 1950s and 1960s.

The Final Footprint

Salem Church Cemetery, Monticello, Lawrence County, Mississippi. 

His death was lamented by John Mayall in the songs “I’m Gonna Fight for You, J.B.” and “Death of J. B. Lenoir”.

The 2003 documentary film The Soul of a Man, directed by Wim Wenders as the second installment of Martin Scorsese’s series The Blues, explored Lenoir’s career, together with those of Skip James and Blind Willie Johnson.

In 2011, Lenoir was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame.

On this day in 1980, director and producer, Alfred Hitchcock died of renal failure in his Bel Air, Los Angeles, California home at the age of 80.  Born Alfred Joseph Hitchcock on 13 August 1899 in Leytonstone, London, England.  One of the most influential filmmakers of all time.  Hitchcock took suspense and psychological thrills to a whole new level in his films.  His stories frequently feature fugitives on the run and beautiful blonde female characters.  My favorite Hitchcock movies include: Suspicion (1941) with Cary Grant and Joan Fontaine; Spellbound (1945) with Gregory Peck and Ingrid Bergman; Notorious (1946) with Grant and Bergman; Dial M for Murder (1954) with Ray Milland and Grace Kelly; Rear Window (1954) with Jimmy Stewart and Kelly; To Catch a Thief (1955) with Grant and Kelly; Vertigo (1958) with Stewart and Kim Novak; North by Northwest (1959) with Grant and Eva Marie Saint; and Psycho (1960) with Anthony Perkins and Janet Leigh.

On 2 December 1926, Hitchcock married the English-American screenwriter Alma Reville (1899–1982) at the Brompton Oratory in South Kensington. The couple honeymooned in Paris, Lake Como and St. Moritz, before returning to London to live in a leased flat on the top two floors of 153 Cromwell Road, Kensington. Reville, who was born just hours after Hitchcock, converted from Protestantism to Catholicism, apparently at the insistence of Hitchcock’s mother.

Reville became her husband’s closest collaborator; Charles Champlin wrote in 1982: “The Hitchcock touch had four hands, and two were Alma’s.” When Hitchcock accepted the AFI Life Achievement Award in 1979, he said he wanted to mention “four people who have given me the most affection, appreciation and encouragement, and constant collaboration. The first of the four is a film editor, the second is a scriptwriter, the third is the mother of my daughter, Pat, and the fourth is as fine a cook as ever performed miracles in a domestic kitchen. And their names are Alma Reville.” Reville wrote or co-wrote on many of Hitchcock’s films, including Shadow of a Doubt, Suspicion and The 39 Steps.

The Final Footprint – Hitchcock was cremated and his cremains were scattered in the Pacific Ocean.

#RIP #OTD in 1992 actress (Henry Frankenstein’s bride Elizabeth in Frankenstein, The Public Enemy), Mae Clarke died of cancer at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, California aged 81. Valhalla Memorial Park Cemetery

#RIP #OTD in 1993 session musician (David Bowie, Ian Hunter), songwriter, arranger, producer, guitarist of the Spiders from Mars, Mick Ronson died from liver cancer in London, aged 46. Eastern Cemetery, Kingston upon Hull, England

#RIP #OTD in 2011 writer of science fiction, fantasy and feminist literary criticism (The Female Man, “When It Changed”), academic, feminist, Joanna Russ died after a series of strokes in Tucson, Arizona, aged 74.

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On this day 28 April death of Mary Read – Ken Curtis – Francis Bacon – Ann Petry – John Singleton

Posted on 29 ApramSun, 28 Apr 2024 00:54:00 -05002024-04-28T00:54:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor

#RIP #OTD in 1721 English pirate (along with Anne Bonny famous female pirates from the 18th century), among the few women known to have been convicted of piracy at the height of the “Golden Age of Piracy”, Mary Read died from a fever in prison in Port Royal, Colony of Jamaica aged 26-41. Spanish Town Cathedral Cemetery, Jamaica

On this day in 1991, actor Ken Curtis died in his sleep in Fresno, California at the age of 74.  Born Curtis Wain Gates on 2 July 1916 in Lamar, Colorado.  Best known for his role as Festus Haggen on the long-running CBS western television series, Gunsmoke.  Through his first marriage, Curtis was a son-in-law of director John Ford.  Curtis teamed with Ford and John Wayne in Rio Grande, The Quiet Man, The Wings of Eagles, The Searchers, The Horse Soldiers, The Alamo and How The West Was Won.  I remember him best for his role as Charlie McCorry in The Searchers, perhaps my favorite western movie.  Curtis was married three times; Lorraine Page, Barbara Ford (1952-1964 divorce) and Torrie Ahern Connelly (1966-1991 his death).

The Final Footprint – Curtis was cremated and his cremains were scattered in the Colorado flatlands.

Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon by John Dekin.jpg

photographed in the early 1950s
   

On this day in 1992, artist Francis Bacon died of a heart attack in Madrid at the age of 82. Born on 28 October 1909 in Dublin. Bacon was a figurative painter known for his bold, grotesque, emotionally charged, raw imagery. Perhaps best known for his depictions of popes, crucifixions and portraits of close friends. His abstracted figures are typically isolated in geometrical cage like spaces, set against flat, nondescript backgrounds. Bacon said that he saw images “in series”, and his work typically focuses on a single subject for sustained periods, often in triptych or diptych formats. His output can be broadly described as sequences or variations on a single motif; beginning with the 1930s Picasso-informed Furies, moving on to the 1940s male heads isolated in rooms or geometric structures, the 1950s screaming popes, and the mid-to-late 1950s animals and lone figures, the 1960s portraits of friends, the nihilistic 1970s self-portraits, and the cooler more technical 1980s late works.

Bacon took up painting late in life, having drifted in the late 1920s and 1930s as an interior decorator, bon vivant and gambler. He said that his artistic career was delayed because he spent too long looking for subject matter that could sustain his interest. His breakthrough came with the 1944 triptych Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, which sealed his reputation as a uniquely bleak chronicler of the human condition. From the mid-1960s he mainly produced portraits of friends and drinking companions, either as single or triptych panels. Following the suicide of his lover George Dyer in the 1971 his art became more sombre, inward-looking and preoccupied with the passage of time and death. The climax of this later period is marked by masterpieces, including his 1982’s “Study for Self-Portrait” and Study for a Self-Portrait—Triptych, 1985–86.

Despite his bleak existentialist outlook Bacon in person was highly engaging and charismatic, articulate, well-read and openly gay. He was a prolific artist, but nonetheless spent many of the evenings of his middle age eating, drinking and gambling in London’s Soho with like-minded friends.

After Dyer’s suicide he largely distanced himself from this circle, and while his social life was still active and his passion for gambling and drinking continued, he settled into a platonic and somewhat fatherly relationship with his eventual heir, John Edwards. Robert Hughes described Bacon as “the most implacable, lyric artist in late 20th-century England, perhaps in all the world” and along with Willem de Kooning as “the most important painter of the disquieting human figure in the 50’s of the 20th century.” Francis Bacon was the subject of two Tate retrospectives and a major showing in 1971 at the Grand Palais. Since his death his reputation and market value have grown steadily, and his work is among the most acclaimed, expensive and sought-after.

Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion, 1944. Oil and pastel on Sundeala board. Tate Britain, London

 

Head VI, 1949

 

Three Studies for a Portrait of Henrietta Moraes, 1963

 

Triptych, May–June 1973, oil on canvas, 198 × 147 cm. Collection of Esther Grether

 

Dyer photographed by John Deakin, retouched by Bacon, who often folded or creased, or spattered with paint, photographs of friends to find distortions he could exploit in his paintings. Although Dyer was handsome and charming in his own raw way, he was out of his depth when dealing with both Bacon’s wasp-tongued Soho set and intellectual art world friends

Study for a Self-Portrait—Triptych, 1985–86, Marlborough Fine Art, London

 

While holidaying in Madrid in 1992, Bacon was admitted to the Handmaids of Maria, a private clinic, where he was cared for by Sister Mercedes. His chronic asthma, which had plagued him all his life, had developed into a respiratory condition and he could not talk or breathe very well.

The Final Footprint

He had bequeathed his estate to John Edwards and Brian Clark, executors. In 1998 the director of the Hugh Lane Gallery in Dublin secured the donation of the contents of Bacon’s chaotic studio at 7 Reece Mews, South Kensington. The contents of his studio were moved and reconstructed in the gallery. 

Bacon was cremated.

#RIP #OTD in 1997 writer of novels (The Street, The Narrows), short stories, children’s books, Ann Petry died in Old Saybrook, Connecticut at the age of 88. Cypress Cemetery, Old Saybrook

On this day in 2019 film director, screenwriter, producer, and actor John Singleton died from a stroke at the age of 51. Born John Daniel Singleton on January 6, 1968 in Los Angeles. Perhaps best known for directing Boyz n the Hood (1991), for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director, becoming at age 24, the first African American and youngest person to have ever been nominated for that award. Many of his films, such as Poetic Justice (1993), Higher Learning (1995), and Baby Boy (2001), had themes which resonated with contemporary urban population. He also directed the drama Rosewood (1997) and the action films Shaft (2000), 2 Fast 2 Furious (2003), and Four Brothers (2005). He co-created the television crime drama Snowfall. He was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing for a Limited Series, Movie, or Dramatic Special for “The Race Card”, the fifth episode of The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story.

The Final Footprint

A private funeral was held on May 6, 2019 in Los Angeles, and Singleton was interred at Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Hollywood Hills. Other notable final footprints at Hollywood Hills include; Gene Autry, Albert “Cubby” Broccoli, David Carradine, Scatman Crothers, Bette Davis, Sandra Dee, Ronnie James Dio, Michael Clarke Duncan, Carrie Fisher, Bobby Fuller, Andy Gibb, Michael Hutchence, Jill Ireland, Al Jarreau, Buster Keaton, Lemmy Kilmister, Rodney King, Jack LaLanne, Nicolette Larson, Liberace, Strother Martin, Jayne Meadows, Brittany Murphy, Ricky Nelson, Bill Paxton, Brock Peters, Freddie Prinze, Lou Rawls, Debbie Reynolds, Telly Savalas, Lee Van Cleef, and Paul Walker.

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

Posted on 29 ApramSat, 27 Apr 2024 00:24:00 -05002024-04-27T00:24:00-05:0012 2011 by MacGregor
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson ca1857 retouched.jpg

in 1857
   

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

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

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

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

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

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

The Final Footprint

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

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

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Al Hirt
Al Hirt 1966-2.jpg

in 1966
 

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

 

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

 

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

The Final Footprint

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

#RIP #OTD in 2002 the inventor of the Barbie doll, co-founder of Mattel with husband Elliot, the company’s first president from 1945 to 1975, Ruth Handler died from complications during surgery for colon cancer in Century City, Los Angeles aged 85. Hillside Memorial Park, Culver City CA

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The Final Footprint

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

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

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

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


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

The Final Footprint

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

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

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

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

Leon_Battista_Alberti2-150x150On this day in 1472, Italian author, artist, architect, poet, priest, linguist, philosopher, cryptographer, polymath, Renaissance man, Leon Battista Alberti died in Rome at the age of 68.  Born in Genoa on 14 February 1404.  Although he is often characterized as an “architect” exclusively, as art historian James Beck has observed, “to single out one of Leon Battista’s ‘fields’ over others as somehow functionally independent and self-sufficient is of no help at all to any effort to characterize Alberti’s extensive explorations in the fine arts.”  Alberti’s life was described in Giorgio Vasari‘s Vite de’ più eccellenti pittori, scultori, e architettori or ‘Lives of the most excellent painters, sculptors and architects’.

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

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

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

Ainsi
Amour inconstamment me mène
Et, quand je pense avoir plus de douleur,
Sans y penser je me trouve hors de peine.
Puis, quand je crois ma joie être certaine,
Et être en haut de mon désiré heur,
Il me remet en mon premier malheur.

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

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

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

Ginger_Rogers_Argentinean_Magazine_AD_2On this day in 1995, Academy Award-winning actress, singer and dancer, Ginger Rogers died in Rancho Mirage, California of congestive heart failure at the age of 83.  Born Virginia Catherine McMath on 16 July 1911 in Independence, Missouri.  This year, 2011, will mark the 100th anniversary of her birth.  Best known for her role as Fred Astaire’s romantic interest and dancing partner in a series of ten Hollywood musical films that revolutionized the genre.  She won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in Kitty Foyle (1940).    When Rogers was nine years old, her mother Lela married John Logan Rogers.  They lived in Fort Worth, Texas.  Rogers reportedly dated Howard Hughes and even turned down his proposal.  Rogers was married five times; Jack Pepper (1929-1931 divorce), Lew Ayres (1934-1941 divorce), Jack Briggs (1943-1949 divorce), Jacques Bergerac (1953-1957 divorce), and William Marshall (1961-1969 divorce).

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The Final Footprint

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

All the world’s a stage,
and all the men and women merely players:
they have their exits and entrances;
and one man in his time plays many parts…
As You Like It, Act II, Scene 7
 
 
But soft, what light through yonder window breaks?
It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.
Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,
Who is already sick and pale with grief
That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.
Romeo And Juliet Act 2, scene 2
 
And Caesar’s spirit, raging for revenge,
With Ate by his side come hot from hell,
Shall in these confines with a monarch’s voice
Cry “Havoc!” and let slip the dogs of war,
That this foul deed shall smell above the earth
With carrion men, groaning for burial.
Julius Caesar Act 3, scene 1
 
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.
In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility;
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger. . . .
Henry The Fifth Act 3, scene 1

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

The Final Footprint – Shakespeare was entombed in the chancel of the Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon.  Reportedly, Shakespeare’s body is buried 20 feet deep to prevent its theft.  Above the grave a stone slab displays his epitaph:  GOOD FREND FOR IESUS SAKE FORBEARE, TO DIGG THE DVST ENCLOASED HEARE.  BLESTE BE YE MAN YT SPARES THES STONES, AND CVRST BE HE YT MOVES MY BONES.  Perhaps a warning to those who might want to have him moved to Westminster Abbey or exhumed for examination?  Sometime before 1623, a funerary monument was erected in his memory on the north wall, with a half-effigy of him in the act of writing.  The plaque compares him to Nestor, Socrates, and Virgil.  Shakespeare has been commemorated in many statues and memorials around the world, including funeral monuments in Southwark Cathedral and Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey.

William_Wordsworth_001On this day in 1850, Romantic poet, William Wordsworth died by aggravating a case of pleurisy at the age of 80 in Cumberland.  Born on 7 April 1770 in Wordsworth House in Cockermouth, Cumberland, part of the scenic region in northwest England, the Lake District.  With his friend, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Wordsworth helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their 1798 joint publication Lyrical Ballads.  Wordsworth’s magnum opus is generally considered to be The Prelude, a semiautobiographical poem of his early years which he revised and expanded a number of times.  It was posthumously titled and published, prior to which it was generally known as “the poem to Coleridge”.  Wordsworth was Britain’s Poet Laureate from 1843 until his death in 1850.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

The Final Footprint

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

Paulette Goddard

Paulette Goddard-publicity-2.JPG

Studio publicity portrait from the 1940s

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

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

publicity shot for A Stranger Came Home (1954)

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

With Phillip Reed in 1957

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

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

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

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

With Chaplin in The Great Dictator

The Final Footprint

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Earl Hines
"Earl `Father' (Fatha) Hines, a great swing musician, is shown with Pvt. Charles Carpenter, former manager of the Hines - NARA - 535834.tif

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

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

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

Hines in 1947 (photograph by William P. Gottlieb) 

 

The Final Footprint

Hines was buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Oakland, California.

Ansel Adams
A photo of a bearded Ansel Adams with a camera on a tripod and a light meter in his hand. Adams is wearing a dark jacket and a white shirt, and the open shirt collar is spread over the lapel of his jacket. He is holding a cable release for the camera, and there is a rocky hillside behind him. The photo was taken by J. Malcolm Greany, probably in 1947.
   

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

A black-and-white vertical photograph shows an adobe wall in the foreground, rising in the middle with a stairstep pattern and a white wooden cross at the pinnacle, with an open doorway beneath. Through the doorway and above the wall, an adobe church with white double doors and a similar stair-stepped roof and cross stands, slightly larger than the wall in front of it. The midday sun casts harsh shadows on the dirt ground.

Church, Taos Pueblo (1942)

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

A black-and-white photograph shows a large, still lake extending horizontally off the frame and halfway up vertically, reflecting the rest of the scene. In the distance, a mountain range can be seen, with a gap in the center and one faint smaller mountain in between. The sky is cloudy and large dark clouds rest at the very top of the frame.

Evening, McDonald Lake, Glacier National Park (1942)

Baton practice at the Manzanar War Relocation Center, 1943. 

A dramatically-lit black-and-white photograph depicts a large river, which snakes from the bottom right to the center left of the picture. Dark evergreen trees cover the steep left bank of the river, and lighter deciduous trees cover the right. In the top half of the frame, there is a tall mountain range, dark but clearly covered in snow. The sky is overcast in parts, but only partly cloudy in others, and the sun shines through to illuminate the scene and reflect off the river in these places.

The Tetons and the Snake River(1942)

The Final Footprint

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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Posted in Artistic Footprints, Athletic Footprints, Day in History, Extravagant Footprints, Literary Footprints, Military Footprints, Political Footprints | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

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

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

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

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

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

Mark_Twain_Brady-Handy_photo_portrait_Feb_7_1871_cropped-191x300On this day in 1910, author and humorist, Mark Twain died of a heart attack in Redding, Connecticut at the age of 74.  Born Samuel Langhorne Clemens on 30 November 1835 in Florida, Missouri.  Perhaps most noted for his novels, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876), and its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885).  Ernest Hemingway said  “All modern American literature comes from” Huckleberry Finn.  William Faulkner called Twain “the father of American literature.”  Jimmy Buffett included Twain’s Following the Equator (1869) on his “baker’s dozen of books I would have to take to a desert island.”  Twain was a steamboat pilot on the Mississippi and took his pen name from the riverboat measurement term “mark twain” or two fathoms (12 feet).  Two fathoms, a depth indicating safe water for passage of boat, was measured on the sounding line.  The term twain is an archaic term for “two.”  The riverboatman’s cry was by the mark twain, meaning according to the mark on the line, the depth is two fathoms and it is safe to pass.  Twain married Olivia Langdon (1870-1904 her death).  In 1909, Twain was quoted as saying:  “I came in with Halley’s Comet in 1835.  It is coming again next year, and I expect to go out with it.  It will be the greatest disappointment of my life if I don’t go out with Halley’s Comet.  The Almighty has said, no doubt: ‘Now here are these two unaccountable freaks; they came in together, they must go out together.”  His prediction was accurate and he got his wish passing away one day after the comet’s closest approach to earth.  Both Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn were a part of my childhood.


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

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

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

The Final Footprint

A grave covered with emerald-like gravel, with a granite headstone, surrounded by other graves
 

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

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

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

Nina_Simone_1969On this day in 2003,  singer, songwriter, pianist, arranger, and civil rights activist, Nina Simone died in her sleep at her home in Carry-le-Rouet, Bouches-du-Rhône from breast cancer at the age of 70.  Born Eunice Kathleen Waymon in Tryon, North Carolina on 21 February 1933.  Simone worked in a broad range of musical styles including classical, jazz, blues, folk, R&B, gospel, and pop.  Her recording Gershwin and Gershwin’s, “I Loves You, Porgy” was a hit in the United States in 1958.  Over the length of her career Simone recorded more than 40 albums, mostly between 1958, when she made her debut with Little Girl Blue, and 1974.  Her musical style arose from a fusion of gospel and pop songs with classical music, in particular with influences from her first inspiration, Johann Sebastian Bach, and accompanied with her expressive jazz-like singing in her characteristic contralto voice.  She injected her classical background into her music as much as possible to give it more depth and quality, as she felt that pop music was inferior to classical.  Her intuitive grasp on the audience–performer relationship was gained from a unique background of playing piano accompaniment for church revivals and sermons regularly from the early age of six years old.

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

Prince
Prince at Coachella 001.jpg

performing at the 2008 Coachella Festival
   

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

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

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

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

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