Very brief catch up here:
Martin Mull. NYT. IMDB.
I was involved in the Great Folk Music scare back in the sixties, when it almost caught on.
Archive for the ‘1970s’ Category
Obit watch: July 1, 2024.
Monday, July 1st, 2024Obit watch: June 9, 2024.
Sunday, June 9th, 2024Major General William A. Anders (USAF – ret.), Apollo 8 astronaut.
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On Christmas Eve, during their 10 orbits of the moon, the three astronauts, whose movements were telecast to millions around the world, took photos of Earth as it rose over the lunar horizon, appearing as a blue marble amid the blackness of the heavens. But only Major Anders, who oversaw their spacecraft’s electronic and communications systems, shot color film.
His photo shook the world. Known as “Earthrise,” it was reproduced in a 1969 postage stamp bearing the words “In the beginning God …” It was an inspiration for the first Earth Day, in 1970, and appeared on the cover of Life magazine’s 2003 book “100 Photographs That Changed the World.”
Betty Anne Rees, actress. Other credits include “Lou Grant”, “The F.B.I.”, “Bearcats!”…
…and “Mannix”. (“With Intent to Kill”, season 4, epsiode 17. She was “Cora Hayden”.)
Obit watch: June 6, 2024.
Thursday, June 6th, 2024Robert Persichitti (US Navy – ret.) has passed away at the age of 102.
Persichitti, meanwhile, had served in Iwo Jima, Okinawa and Guam as a radioman second class on the command ship USS Eldorado during WWII.
He was among the US troops who witnessed the raising of the American flag atop Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima on Feb. 19, 1945 — a moment that would go on to become one of the most famous photos captured during the war.
“I was on the deck,” Persichitti told Stars and Stripes in a 2019 interview when he returned to the region. “When I got on the island today, I just broke down.”
He was part of a group of veterans traveling to Normandy when he fell ill, was airlifted off the ship, and passed away in a hospital.
Bob Kelley. You might not know the name, but if you’re into cars, you know the book.
The Kelley Blue Book started in 1926 at the Kelley Kar Co., a Los Angeles dealership founded by Mr. Kelley’s father, Sidney, and an uncle, Leslie Kelley. As one of the biggest used-car dealerships in the region — and eventually the country — they had a constant need for new inventory, and the book originated as a simple list of prices that they were willing to pay for certain cars in certain conditions.
Mr. Kelley joined the company after the end of World War II, a prime time to get into the used-car business. The war had put an end to new-car production, and it would be several years before automakers could meet the demand.
He was initially in charge of both valuations on new inventory and compiling the book, and he brought a jeweler’s eye to the job. He studied all the factors that go into deciding a car’s road-worthiness and visual appeal — mileage, sound system, paint color — then developed a long list of data points that, combined, would produce a price.
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The Kelleys closed their dealership in 1962 and sold the Kelley Blue Book to a fellow dealer in Los Angeles. By then Sidney and Leslie Kelley had largely left the business, but the new owners kept Bob Kelley and the rest of the team as employees.Mr. Kelley worried at first that without the dealership, confidence in the book would diminish. Instead its popularity continued to grow, largely because of Mr. Kelley’s reputation for evaluating cars.
As he deepened the data underlying his valuations, the Kelley Blue Book became increasingly valuable beyond used-car dealerships. Courts, insurance companies and banks all used it to evaluate what for most people constituted one of the biggest assets they would ever own.
He also expanded the scope of the book to encompass new cars as well as used, and to include motorcycles, boats, RVs and trucks as well as luxury vehicles and imports. Eventually, an updated edition of the book appeared every other month, selling a total of a million copies a year.
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Tom Bower, actor. Other credits include “Hill Street Blues”, “Hardcastle and McCormick”, and “The Rockford Files”.
Obit watch: June 4, 2024.
Tuesday, June 4th, 2024Janis Page, actress. She was 101. NYT (archived).
Other credits include “The Rockford Files”, “Lanigan’s Rabbi”, “Banacek”…
…and “Mannix”. (“A Way to Dusty Death”, season 7, episode 2. She was “Georgia Durian”.)
Brother Marquis, rapper with 2 Live Crew.
Larry Allen, of the Dallas Cowboys.
Allen was a second-round pick out of Sonoma State in 1994 and quickly became one of the most dominant offensive linemen in the NFL.
He was named to the Pro Bowl 11 times and was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2013. He played for the Cowboys from 1994 to 2005, winning a Super Bowl in 1995. He spent his final two seasons with the San Francisco 49ers.
He was 52.
Obit watch: May 29, 2024.
Wednesday, May 29th, 2024Elizabeth MacRae, actress.
Other credits include “Eddie and the Cruisers II: Eddie Lives!”, “The Fugitive” (the original), “77 Sunset Strip”, “Hawaiian Eye”…
…and “Mannix”. (“A Puzzle for One”, season 6, episode 11. She played “Diane Glover”.)
Obit watch: May 17, 2024.
Friday, May 17th, 2024The great Dabney Coleman, who was also a good Texas boy.
IMDB. I’m riding shotgun on the way to dinner right now, so I’ll just note: he was, among all his other credits, a “Mannix” three-timer.
I always liked him.
Obit watch: May 6, 2024.
Monday, May 6th, 2024Bernard Hill. NYT. IMDB.
Frank Stella, artist.
Mr. Stella was a dominant figure in postwar American art, a restless, relentless innovator whose explorations of color and form made him an outsize presence, endlessly discussed and constantly on exhibit.
Few American artists of the 20th century arrived with quite his éclat. He was in his early 20s when his large-scale black paintings — precisely delineated black stripes separated by thin lines of blank canvas — took the art world by storm. Austere, self-referential, opaque, they cast a chilling spell.
Jeannie Epper, stuntwoman. 161 stunt credits in IMDB (and another 39 actress credits). Seems like she was working pretty steadily from 1964 all the way to 2021, including “Play Misty For Me”, “Soylent Green”, “Blazing Saddles”, “The Blues Brothers”, and “Road House” (the good one).
Lawrence sent over an obit for Edgar Lansbury. I had seen this elsewhere and didn’t think he was noteworthy enough, but Lawrence pointed out that he produced “Squirm“.
Lawrence also sent over an obit for Dick Rutan, legendary pilot. He’s the guy who, with Jeana Yeager, flew non-stop around the world in nine days, three minutes, and 44 seconds in “Voyager”. Unfortunately, the obit Lawrence sent me came from a blog by way of a blog, and I’d rather have something more substantial to link to: none of the flying news publications I know of have this story yet. I’ll link to a better obit when I find one.
Obit watch: April 23, 2024.
Tuesday, April 23rd, 2024Playing catch-up from the past few days:
Terry Anderson, journalist who was kidnapped and held for six years by Shia Hezbollah militants of the Islamic Jihad Organization in Lebanon.
While he had not been tortured during his captivity, he said, he was beaten and chained. He spent a year or so, on and off, in solitary confinement, he said.
“There is nothing to hold on to, no way to anchor my mind,” he said after the ordeal. “I try praying, every day, sometimes for hours. But there’s nothing there, just a blankness. I’m talking to myself, not God.”
He found some consolation in the Bible, though, and added: “The only real defense was to remember that no one could take away my self-respect and dignity — only I could do that.”
Roman Gabriel, quarterback for the Rams and Eagles.
He was voted the N.F.L.’s Most Valuable Player when he led the league in touchdown passes, with 24, in a 14-game season with the 1969 Rams.
He was also named the comeback player of the year by pro football writers in 1973, his first season with the Eagles. Coming off knee problems and a sore arm, he led the N.F.L. in touchdown passes (23), completions (270) and passing yardage (3,219) that season.
He played in four Pro Bowl games, three with the Rams in the late 1960s and another with the Eagles in 1973. But he reached the postseason only twice, and his Rams were eliminated in the first round both times.
Terry Carter, actor. This is buried a bit in the article, but he was McCloud’s partner and played “Colonel Tigh” on the original “Battlestar Galactica”.
Other credits include “The Bold Ones: The New Doctors”, “Search”…
…and “Mannix” (“Medal For a Hero”, season 3, episode 14).
And in a wayfaring six-decade career, he was a merchant seaman, a jazz pianist, a law student, a television news anchor, a familiar character on network sitcoms, an Emmy-winning documentarian, a good will ambassador to China, a longtime expatriate in Europe — and a reported dead man; in 2015, rumors that he had been killed were mistaken. It was not him but a much younger Terry Carter who had died in a hit-and-run accident in Los Angeles by a pickup truck driven by the rap mogul Marion “Suge” Knight.
Slightly misquoting Mark Twain, Mr. Carter posted on social media: “Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”
Frederick Celani, serial con man. He conned people into thinking he was going to build a package delivery hub in Springfield (Illinois), conned inmates into giving him money to have their convictions overturned (he wasn’t a lawyer), and ran various real estate cons.
Fred Neulander. You may recall that name, as his trial was a brief sensation back in the 1990s.
The rabbi and his wife, Carol Neulander, 52, were well-known in the community through both the shul and Classic Cakes, the popular bakery Carol co-founded, CNN reported.
The mother of 3 had just returned from the bakery when she bludgeoned to death with a lead pipe in the couple’s Cherry Hill home on the evening of Nov. 1, 1994, the outlet said.
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Neulander was indicted for the murder in 1999, but the case did not come together until the following year, when private investigator Len Jenoff told police that the rabbi paid him and another man, Paul Daniels, $30,000 to kill his wife.
At trial in 2001, prosecutors argued that the rabbi wanted to get rid of Carol to continue his two-year affair with Philadelphia radio host Elaine Soncini.
Soncini, who was Catholic, had even supposedly converted to Judaism to be with the rabbi, whom she met when he performed funeral rites for her late husband.
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When the first trial ended in a hung jury, the 2002 retrial was moved from Camden County to Monmouth County to downplay the local scrutiny.
Following the retrial, Neulander was convicted of Carol’s murder. He narrowly avoided the death penalty and was sentenced to 30 years to life in prison.
Soncini testified against Neulander at both trials, as did two of his three children.
Obit watch: April 17, 2024.
Wednesday, April 17th, 2024Man, it has been a rough few days for baseball.
Signed by the Yankees in 1949, he never made it out of their minor league system, though he picked up a lifetime of baseball knowledge from Manager Casey Stengel at spring training camps. He played the outfield for four American League teams over eight seasons with only modest success.
But Herzog found his niche as a manager with what came to be called Whiteyball, molding teams with speed, defense and pitching to take advantage of ballparks with fast artificial turf and spacious outfields, first at Royals Stadium in Kansas City and then at Busch Stadium in St. Louis.
Herzog managed the Kansas City Royals to three consecutive American League division championships in the 1970s, then took the Cardinals to the 1982 World Series title with a team he had built while general manager as well. And he managed the Cardinals to pennants in 1985 and 1987.
He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee in 2009.
He was 92, and the second oldest member of the Hall of Fame (behind Willie Mays). Baseball Reference.
Carl Erskine, pitcher.
Erskine was the last survivor of the 13 Dodger players of his time who were profiled by Roger Kahn in his 1972 book, “The Boys of Summer,” telling of their exploits on the field and the lives they led when their baseball years had ended.
Although struggling with a sore pitching shoulder throughout his career, Erskine, an unimposing presence on the mound at 5 feet 10 inches and 165 pounds, employed a superb overhand curveball to help the Dodgers capture five pennants (the first in 1949 and the rest in the 1950s) and the 1955 World Series championship, the only one in their history before they moved to Los Angeles in 1958.
His 14 strikeouts in Game 3 of the 1953 World Series against the Yankees, a complete-game 3-2 victory, has been eclipsed only by the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Sandy Koufax, who had 15 strikeouts against the Yankees in 1963, and the St. Louis Cardinals’ Bob Gibson, who struck out 17 Detroit Tigers in 1968.
In the 1952 World Series, also against the Yankees, Erskine pitched an 11-inning complete game, retiring the last 19 batters in the Dodgers’ 6-5 victory.
He pitched no-hitters against the Chicago Cubs in 1952 and the New York Giants in 1956, both at Ebbets Field. His best season was 1953, when he was 20-6 and led the National League in winning percentage at .769.
Ken Holtzman, the “winningest Jewish pitcher in Major League Baseball”. He played for the Cubs and the Oakland A’s.
Holtzman won 174 games, the most for a Jewish pitcher in Major League Baseball — nine more than the Hall of Famer Sandy Koufax, who is considered one of the best pitchers ever and who had a shorter career.
In addition to his win total, Holtzman, who at 6 feet 2 inches and 175 pounds cut a lanky figure, had a career earned run average of 3.49 and was chosen for the 1972 and 1973 All-Star teams.
Holtzman, at 23, threw his first no-hitter on Aug. 19, 1969, a 3-0 victory over the Atlanta Braves — a performance distinguished by the fact that he didn’t strike out any Braves. It was the first time since 1923 that a no-hitter had been pitched without a strikeout.
“I didn’t have my good curve, and I must have thrown 90 percent fastballs,” Holtzman told The Atlanta Constitution afterward. “When I saw my curve wasn’t breaking early in the game, I thought it might be a long day.”
His second no-hitter came on June 3, 1971, against the Cincinnati Reds at their ballpark, Riverfront Stadium, where he struck out six and walked four.
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Bob Graham, former Florida governor and US Senator.
Ron Thompson, actor. He did a lot of theater work, and some movies and TV. Other credits include “Quincy, M.E.”, “The Streets of San Francisco”, “Baretta”…
…and “Mannix”. (“Death Has No Face”, season 8, episode 6.)
Obit watch: April 11, 2024.
Thursday, April 11th, 2024He was a native Hawaiian who moved to Japan and began training in sumo.
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I’m a little late on this one, but everyone was on it: Peter Higgs, of Higgs boson fame.
Lawrence sent over an obit for Bruce Kessler, TV director. Before that, he raced cars:
His credits as a director include “The Hat Squad”, “Renegade”, “Enos”, “The Misadventures Of Sheriff Lobo”, “Hardcastle and McCormick”…
…and the episode “Chopper” of “Kolchak: The Night Stalker”, which is my own personal favorite episode. One of these days, I’m going to write that Top Five “Kolchak” episodes list. (“Chopper”, “Firefall”, “The Sentry”…)
Finally: O.J. Simpson. THR. LAT (archived). ESPN. (Edited to add: Lawrence.)
I don’t have a lot to say about this. Whatever he did or didn’t do, he’s facing judgement for it now, and I don’t feel like making jokes.
Obit watch: April 1, 2024.
Monday, April 1st, 2024Barbara Rush, actress. (Edited to add: NYT obit (archived).)
“Bigger Than Life” is available from Criterion, and I kind of want to see it: unfortunately, none of the B&N stores I’ve gone to has had it in stock during the last few sales. (I know, I can order it online, but I just hate paying shipping.) Also, that may be a hard sell to the Saturday Movie Group.
Other credits include “Fantasy Island”, “Murder She Wrote”, “Death Car on the Freeway”, and quite a few cop shows…
…including “Mannix”. (“A Copy of Murder”, season 2, episode 6. “Design For Dying”, season 8, episode 22.)
Obit watch: March 29, 2024.
Friday, March 29th, 2024Harvey Elwood Gann (US Army – ret.). He was 103.
Mr. Gann was a flight engineer and top turret gunner with the 449th Bomb Group, 718th Squadron, on B24s. His plane was shot down during a bombing raid and he had to bail out. He was the only member of his crew to survive, but was imprisoned in a German POW camp. He escaped and was recaptured three times: his fourth escape attempt was successful.
He served as a Austin police officer for 38 years, mostly in vice and narcotics according to the online obit. He also wrote a book about his wartime experiences, Escape I Must (affiliate link).
(Hattip on this one to a source who I will leave anonymous for now. While Mr. Gann has an online obituary, my source was informed of this through other non-public channels, and I’m not sure they want to be named right now.)
200 acting credits in IMDB, with 12 more upcoming. They include five episodes of “Hap and Leonard”, “The Rockford Files”, “The Bold Ones: The New Doctors”, and “Longstreet”.
NYT obit for Vernor Vinge (archived).
Jennifer Leak, actress. Other credits include the good “Hawaii Five-O”, “The Delphi Bureau”, and “Nero Wolfe” (the 1981 series with William Conrad in the title role).
Obit watch: February 26, 2024.
Monday, February 26th, 2024I was running pretty much flat out from mid-Friday afternoon until late Sunday night, so this is the first chance I’ve had to post anything. But: the NYT finally ran an obit for Chuck Mawhinney. (Previously.)
After graduating from high school in 1967, Chuck wanted to become a Navy pilot. But a Marine Corps recruiter won him over by promising that he could delay his enlistment by four months, until the end of deer season.
The Marines had not had dedicated snipers since World War II, but by 1967 the corps had changed its mind. Mr. Mawhinney was among the first to complete the new Scout Sniper School at Camp Pendleton, a Marine Corps installation in Southern California. He graduated at the top of his class.
Lawrence sent over an obit for Golden Richards, former Dallas Cowboy receiver.
José DeLeón, pitcher.
Jackie Loughery, actress (and Jack Webb’s third wife). Other credits include OG “Perry Mason”, “Surfside 6”, and “Marcus Welby, M.D.”.
Charles Dierkop, actor.
Other credits include “Matt Houston”, “Bearcats!” and…two episodes of “Mannix” (“A Penny for the Peep Show”, season 3, episode 6. “Desert Run”, season 7, episode 6).
Eddie Driscoll, actor. IMDB.
Chris Gauthier, actor. Fair number of genre credits, including “Supernatural”, “Watchmen”, and the “Earthsea” mini series.
Kenneth Mitchell, actor. Other credits include “NCIS”, “CSI: Cyber”, and “Detroit 1-8-7”.
Obit watch: January 6, 2024.
Saturday, January 6th, 2024Shoutout for his work in “Magnum Force”. Other credits include “Jerry Springer: The Opera” (the TV movie: he played Jerry Springer), “Murder, She Wrote”, “Jake and the Fatman”, “Unsub” (an interesting failed series from the late 1980s), “Casablanca” (the short-lived TV series: he played “Rick Blane”), “In the Line of Duty: The F.B.I. Murders” (he played “Michael Lee Platt”, one of the killers), and a minor SF TV series from the 1960s.
Christian Oliver. Other credits include “Alarm für Cobra 11 – Die Autobahnpolizei”, “Ninja Apocalypse”, and “Christmas in Vienna”.
Joseph Lelyveld, former executive editor of the NYT.
Obit watch: December 6, 2023.
Wednesday, December 6th, 2023Dr. William P. Murphy Jr., another one of those unsung big damn heroes.
His most famous invention was probably the plastic blood bag:
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No matter what I may have thought of Lear’s politics, he served honorably in WWII (52 combat missions in B-17s).
John Nichols, author. (The Milagro Beanfield War)
Denny Laine, of the Moody Blues and Wings.