Archive for the ‘1970s’ Category

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Obit watch: October 5, 2026.

Monday, October 5th, 2026

Marjoe Gortner, who had one of the oddest career arcs in entertainment history.

He spoke eloquently as a child, so his parents, Vernon, a Christian evangelical minister, and mother, Marge, had him ordained as a preacher at age 4, when he performed a marriage ceremony for a Paramount newsreel.
Now a celebrity, the long-haired Gortner delivered gyrating, dramatic sermons at revival meetings across the U.S. as his family amassed a fortune estimated to be worth $3 million, but he said his father took off with the money shortly before Gortner turned 16.
He rejoined the ministry as a way to earn a living and in 1971 granted a film crew access to him during his final revival tour. The resulting 1972 documentary, Marjoe, produced and directed by Howard Smith and Sarah Kernochan, debuted at Cannes and won the Oscar for best feature documentary. (The poster called it “a real story millions of people refuse to believe.”)

He went on to become an actor. Other credits include “Starcrash”, “Acapulco Gold“, and “American Ninja 3: Blood Hunt”.

Burning in Hell watch: Dennis Hastert (R-pedo).

Posted in 1970s, Movies, Obits, Politics, TV | No Comments »

Obit watch: August 28, 2026.

Friday, August 28th, 2026

I am reliably informed by a reliable source who sent me a private message (that I don’t have permission to share here) that “Rocky Horror Picture Show” is actually still a thing, in Austin and in Washington, DC. (“The wash dc monthly showings still draw hundreds of people.”)

It is nice to leave a legacy behind you.

NYT obit for Jaye P. Morgan, for the record. (May require registration or an email address or something.)

King Harald V of Norway (NYT share link, yadda yadda.)

This is an interesting obit. The king’s daughter-in-law was close to Jeffrey Epstein. Her son is serving time for rape. And his daughter married “a self-proclaimed shaman who counted Gwyneth Paltrow among his celebrity clients and friends.”

Their relationship brought hostile attention to some of Mr. Verrett’s past utterances, including his claim that he had used an amulet — which he sold for $222 on his website — to combat Covid-19, and his assertion that cancer is a choice. The princess had also been criticized for many years for claiming to be clairvoyant and for urging others to contact “the angels and the divine universe.”

Several people sent me obits for voice actor Peter Cullen: NYT (you know the drill). The Internet Movie Voice Actor Database.

And a burning in Hell watch: Ratko Mladic, the “Butcher of Bosnia”.

On the eve of the Srebrenica massacre, he promised to avenge the conquest of Serbia centuries before by the Ottoman Muslim Turks. Over 10 days, his soldiers hunted down, captured and summarily executed thousands of Bosnian Muslims, lining them up with hands tied behind their backs and shooting them. Women were raped. International pleas for restraint were ignored.
Serb forces buried the remains, dug them up again and scattered them in distant mass graves in an organized effort to hide damning evidence of war crimes.

Posted in 1970s, Horses, Movies, Obits, TV | No Comments »

Obit watch: August 26, 2026.

Wednesday, August 26th, 2026

Dolly Parton. NYT share link (may require registration or an email address or something).

Everyone was on this yesterday: I held off, per the policy of this blog, and I think pretty much everything that can be said has been, or will be. I only have two thoughts:

1. I know this isn’t original to Ms. Parton (it’s actually a cover of a Neil Young song, with a slightly modified lyric) but I find this to be incredibly haunting.

2. She was a zealous advocate of literacy. She wanted to put books in kid’s hands. I swear I read somewhere (but can’t find it now) that she believed books were the best way for kids to broaden their horizons and lift themselves up from poverty.

Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library. You know, just in case you feel like tossing a few bucks in.

Dolly Parton’s letter to Eminem.

In other news: Jaye P. Morgan. Yes, from “The Gong Show”. (Kids, ask your parents about “The Gong Show”.)

Posted in 1970s, Books, Music, Obits, TV | 3 Comments »

Obit watch: August 24, 2026.

Monday, August 24th, 2026

Shelley Fabares, actress. THR.

Previously on WCD. Credits other than those in the headline and “Hello, Larry” include “The Incredible Hulk”, “The Rockford Files”, and “Longstreet”.

Her “Mannix” was “A Step in Time“, season 5, episode 3. She was “Gwen Townsend”.

(Edited to add 8/25: NYT share link, may require registration or an email address or something.)

Dave Marsh, cantankerous music critic. (NYT share link, may require registration or an email address or something.)

Another one of the publications that I used to read when I holed up in the UT library was “Rock & Roll Confidential”. I liked Marsh’s prose style, even if I would probably have disagreed with him on a lot of things. Then again…

In the same record guide, Mr. Marsh called the Grateful Dead, with their interminable space jams and druggy aura, an “assertedly major oeuvre that’s virtually worthless except for documentary purposes.”

Posted in 1970s, Mannix, Movies, Obits, TV | No Comments »

Obit watch: August 11, 2026.

Monday, August 10th, 2026

Former Representative Ben Jones (D-Georgia). THR.

Most people would know him as “Cooter Davenport” on “The Dukes of Hazzard”. Other credits include “Movin’ On”, “Smokey and the Bandit”, and “The Lincoln Conspiracy”.

Tedde Moore, actress. Other credits include “Police Surgeon”, “Torso: The Evelyn Dick Story”, and “Odyssey 5”.

It has been a bad few days for people of the gun. One of my book buddies in the Association has been sending me obits.

Tom Marx passed away in February, but his death was announced only recently.

Tom was one of the true “industry insiders.” He began as a Chicago cop and then focused on the gun world, working at various times for Smith & Wesson, Ruger, and Blackhawk among others. His consulting encompassed design, engineering, and marketing. Marx specialized in handguns and particularly defensive handguns.

From the same obit (by Massad Ayoob in Backwoods Home), Greg Moats.

Greg had been at the legendary Columbia Conference held at world combat pistol champion Ray Chapman’s Chapman Academy in Columbia, Missouri in 1976 at which the International Practical Shooting Confederation was founded under the leadership of the legendary Jeff Cooper.

And Steven Dodd Hughes, gunsmith, author, and photographer.

I think I actually bought a gun from him about 14 years ago. I remember him being a pretty darn good guy and a pleasure to do business with.

Posted in 1970s, Guns, Movies, Obits, Politics, Smith and Wesson, TV | 2 Comments »

Obit watch: July 27, 2026.

Monday, July 27th, 2026

Lawrence sent me this a few days ago, but I didn’t have a link I felt like using until now: John C. Dvorak, prominent computer columnist.

I almost want to make an argument that Dvorak was a “troll” in the Internet sense of the word before there was an Internet. I’m not sure I can or want to defend that argument, but people who were around at the height of Mr. Dvorak’s career might remember some of his more trollish moments.

E.J. Peaker, actress. No “Mannix”, but she had a lot of other cop and cop-related credits: “Quincy, M.E.”, “Get Christie Love!”, and “The Streets of San Francisco”, among others.

Zale Parry. She didn’t have a lot of credits beyond “Sea Hunt”, but she was an early scuba pioneer:

In 1953, the couple helped launch Scientific Underwater Research Enterprises, which tested underwater equipment that would be sold to consumers. Two years later, she became the third woman certified as an underwater instructor in Los Angeles County.
Parry said she attempted her record-setting dive in August 1954 “to prepare a technical paper on the subject of nitrogen narcosis since we could not find enough subject matter. We wanted to give a good, true picture of what happens. The event changed my life.
“All it took was three miles off the shores of Avalon, Santa Catalina Island with a slight afternoon chop and a dive to 209 feet to a sandy rippled bottom with a strand of bull kelp and one discarded Schlitz beer can … From there on, the radio, television, newspapers and magazines had agents calling for interviews and fun game shows.”

Posted in 1970s, Media, Obits, TV | 3 Comments »

Obit watch: July 22, 2026.

Wednesday, July 22nd, 2026

Hal Williams, actor. Other credits include “Quincy, M.E.”, “Harry O”, and “Sanford”.

(Did you know they tried to make a sequel to “Sanford and Son” without Lamont? I did not.)

He was 91.

I saw this story earlier today, but didn’t make the connection until Lawrence sent me an obit: Kaylee Hottle. She was 18, and died in a car accident.

I usually try to stay away from the credits in the headline, but her only other credit in IMDB is an episode of the “Magnum, P.I.” remake. (Something called “What Doesn’t Kill Us” is listed in pre-production.)

Posted in 1970s, Obits, TV | No Comments »

Obit watch: July 11, 2026.

Saturday, July 11th, 2026

Antoinette Bower, actress. Other credits include “The Starlost”, “The F.B.I.”, “Mission: Impossible”…

…and three episodes of “Mannix”. (“Deadfall“, parts 1 and 2, season 1, episodes 17 and 18. She was “Gail Mason”. “Shadow of a Man“, season 2, episode 16. She was “Barbara Sanderson”.)

Randolph Mantooth. NYT

The pair took paramedic classes, where they learned how to insert an IV, and trained with the fire department. Cinader wanted the show to be funny but told his actors that “when the [station alarm sounds], funny is left at the door. You are now a professional,” Mantooth noted. “We never got away from that.”
He added: “We never went home with Johnny Gage, we never went home with Roy DeSoto, we didn’t hear about Johnny Gage’s drunk father beating his mother. Who cared about that? [The show] was about the job.”

While that may be technically correct, there was certainly a lot of discussion of Roy DeSoto’s home life and Johnny Gage’s dating life. Their personal lives were not complete ciphers.

After “Emergency!,” Mr. Mantooth was an advocate for emergency medical workers, speaking at firefighter and paramedic symposiums across the country. He was given an award by the International Association of Fire Chiefs in 2022 honoring his work to promote the profession.

…

He and Tighe had the same agent, shared a motor home during the entire run of their show and became great friends. The series ended, Mantooth said, because his and Tighe’s original seven-year contracts had expired, Tighe didn’t want to continue and Mantooth didn’t want to go on without him.
When Mantooth raced home in 1978 to find his ranch in the Lobo Canyon area of Agoura Hills engulfed in flames, Tighe was already there, trying to get the animals safely off the property. Tighe later served as the best man at Mantooth’s 2002 wedding to actress Kristen Connors.

…

In his TV Academy Foundation interview, Mantooth got emotional talking about how in the ’70s he was saved by paramedics who figured out he had carbon monoxide poisoning caused by a malfunctioning house furnace and how other emergency personnel brought his sister back from the dead after she was injured in a car accident in the ’80s.
“Do I respect paramedics? Do I respect firefighters?” he asked. “There’s a debt I owe them that I probably can’t ever pay back. But I’m gonna try.”

Other credits include “Walker, Texas Ranger”, “Battlestar Galactica” (1979), and “The Bold Ones: The Senator” (the two-part episode “A Continual Roar of Musketry”: as I’ve noted before, Harlan Ellison praised this episode highly in one of the “Glass Teat” essays).

Peter Van Norden, actor. Other credits include “The New Odd Couple”, “Hardcastle and McCormick”, and “Madman of the People”.

Posted in 1970s, Obits, TV | Comments Closed

Obit watch: July 8, 2026.

Wednesday, July 8th, 2026

Louise Lasser.

Other credits include “McCloud”, “Medical Center”, and “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation”.

Joby Baker.

When Pearl Harbor was bombed on Dec. 7, 1941, Baker escaped injury in the immediate aftermath when the house he was living in was hit by friendly fire. He and his stepmother quickly left the islands, taking the RMS Aquitania with thousands of other evacuees to San Francisco, he recalled in 2022.

Other credits include “12 O’Clock High” (the series), OG “Dragnet”, “Run, Joe, Run”…

…and “Mannix”. (“The Sound of Darkness“, season 3, episode 10. He was “Rudy Marin”.)

Posted in 1970s, Mannix, Obits, TV | 1 Comment »

Obit watch: June 16, 2026.

Tuesday, June 16th, 2026

NYT obit for Jane Yolen. (Previously.)

Anne Schedeen, actress. Credits other than one of the worst shows ever to air on television include “Ironside”, “Lanigan’s Rabbi”, and “The Six Million Dollar Man”.

William Smithers, actor. Other credits include “Quincy, M.E.”, “The Bold Ones: The New Doctors”, the good “Hawaii Five-0”, “The F.B.I.”, a minor SF TV series from the 1960s…

…and “Mannix”. (“Eight to Five, It’s a Miracle”, season 1, episode 21. He was “Salvatore Pucci”.)

Posted in 1970s, Books, Mannix, Movies, Obits, TV | Comments Closed

Obit watch: June 13, 2026.

Saturday, June 13th, 2026

Gene Shalit. THR. I realize that there’s a “don’t speak ill of the dead” factor here, but the THR story reads like a hastily and slightly re-written press release from the family.

I do remember liking the guy when I was a young person watching the “Today” show, and I’m impressed he lived to 100.

Posted in 1970s, Movies, Obits, TV | Comments Closed

Obit watch: June 5, 2026.

Friday, June 5th, 2026

James Handy, actor. Other credits include “Crossing Jordan” (the “Quincy” of the 2000s except it sucked), “Gideon’s Crossing”, and “Walker, Texas Ranger”.

Max Kleven. Man, he had one heck of a career. Stunt work on “Cotton Comes to Harlem” and “Come Back Charleston Blue”, second unit director on “Rollerball” and “Silver Streak”, and acting credits on “The F.B.I.”, a minor SF TV series from the 1960s…

…and he was a “Mannix” five-timer, too.

This just in: Anthony Head. Other credits include “Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance”, “NYPD Blue”, and “Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place”.

Posted in 1970s, Mannix, Movies, Obits, TV | Comments Closed

Obit watch: May 22, 2026.

Friday, May 22nd, 2026

The archiving service I use has been having problems for the past few days, and I’m running low on NYT share links.

Kyle Busch. ESPN. Oddly, I don’t see any coverage of this in the NYT: it looks like they’ve shuffled off the coverage to their sports vertical, “The Athletic”, which they make you pay extra to read.

41 seems awfully young these days.

Edited to add: Shortly after this went up, the NYT posted an actual obit in the obituary section. I apologize that this is paywalled, but, as I said earlier, archive.is is having problems and I only have three share links left until June 1. (No, they don’t roll over from month to month. I wish.)

Kirk Foyle. He was a local man: Tuesday night, he was eating on the patio at Green Mesquite (one of our local barbecue restaurants), when a tree fell on him. He died from his injuries the next day.

Tomorrow is promised to nobody, whether you’re a NASCAR driver or a barbecue eater. Be prepared.

Sam Sianis. He owned and ran the Billy Goat Tavern in Chicago, also known as the “Cheezborger cheezborger cheezborger cheeps cheeps Pepsi!” place from SNL. (Though my understanding is that sketch was also heavily influenced by the Belushi family, who were in the restaurant business as well.)

The Billy Goat Tavern is also famous for triggering Cubs fans.

Mr. Sianis’s uncle Billy bought the bar — which was originally across from Chicago Stadium (now United Center) and called the Lincoln Tavern — in 1934. After a goat wandered in the door, he renamed the bar the Billy Goat and adopted the animal as a pet.
The goat, called Murphy, became something of a celebrity himself. In 1945, the elder Mr. Sianis brought him to Game 4 of the World Series, between the Cubs and the Detroit Tigers, at Wrigley Field.
It began to rain. Murphy began to stink. The Cubs’ owner, Philip K. Wrigley, kicked them out.
As he was leaving, Billy Sianis put a curse on the team, vowing that it would never win a championship. When the Cubs lost the Series that year, he sent a note to Mr. Wrigley: “Now who stinks!”

…

In 1984, when the Cubs were contesting the National League championship, the team relented and allowed Mr. Sianis bring a goat onto the field.
But the Cubs did not win a World Series until 2016.
Watching the tiebreaking seventh game that year from the tavern, Mr. Sianis banished the curse by ringing the bell that had been worn by Murphy in 1945. The current goat stood beside him, looking as nervous as the rest of the crowd. Then it urinated on the floor. Mr. Sianis led it away.
“Don’t touch the goat,” one fan said, according to The Financial Times. “It’s bad luck.”

“Then it urinated on the floor.” I cannot tell a lie: one of the reasons I enjoy NYT obits so much is the telling details.

Posted in 1970s, Food, Goats, Mammals, Obits, Sports, TV, Urine | Comments Closed

Obit watch: April 14, 2026.

Tuesday, April 14th, 2026

Sid Krofft. THR.

The shows could feel hallucinogenic, and many older viewers read drug references into them that the Kroffts maintained were not intentional. (Titles like “Pufnstuf” did not make that argument more believable.)
“If we did the drugs that we’ve been accused of doing all these years, we wouldn’t be here answering your questions,” Mr. Krofft said in an interview with The Washington Post in 2009.

Lawrence sent over an obit for noted SF writer Ian Watson. I don’t have much to add to this, as I have not seen this reported elsewhere.

Valerie Lee. She was one of the children who played Munchkins in “The Wizard of Oz”. It gets a little confusing, at least for me, but as best as I understand it: they recruited some child actors to play adult Munchkins alongside the actual little people in “Oz”.

About a dozen children of average height were hired so they could be used for background fill. Sources differ on the number of children used for these roles ranging anywhere from 10 to 12. The names used for the women are maiden names with known aliases present in italics and quotation marks.

According to Cox, Priscilla Montgomery Clark, 96, another child Munchkin, is the last surviving person to have appeared in The Wizard of Oz.

John Nolan, actor. Other credits include “The Sweeney”, “The Prisoner”, and “Return of the Saint”.

Posted in 1970s, Books, Movies, Obits, Theatre, TV | Comments Closed

Obit watch: March 20, 2026.

Friday, March 20th, 2026

Chuck Norris. THR. “The World Bows: Remembering Chuck Norris 1940-2026” from Black Belt.

Other credits include the bad “Hawaii Five-0”, “Sons of Thunder”, and “Firewalker“.

Ed Bernard, actor. Other credits include “Hardcastle and McCormick”, “Shaft” (the movie), “Cool Million”…

…and “Mannix”. (“A Question of Murder”, season 7, episode 22. He was “Bull Evans”.)

Jane Lapotaire, British actress.

For the historical record: NYT obit for Alvin Greene. (Previously on WCD.)

Posted in 1970s, Mannix, Movies, Obits, Sports, Theatre, TV | Comments Closed

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