Loved The Streets Of SF when I was a kid.

Loved him in this...

Since Harve Presnell played George S Marshall in 'Saving Private Ryan', one can conclude that it's not a good day for actos who played WW2 era generals.

We learned the news this morning of the unexpected death earlier today of Norm Pellegrini, the man who created the unique and superlative sound and taste and programming of WFMT Radio in Chicago as program director from 1953 to 1996. Norman would have been 80 on Saturday July 18, a day that will now be that of his memorial service. He was just 23 or 24 when he began his classical music radio career.

Karl Malden's nose was so big it had it's own zip code!

I found out about this show while watching Milwaukee Public Television, I'm not sure if it ever aired on WTTW. Are You Being Served was known for using a lot of sexual innuendo, like when Mrs. Slocombe refers to her pussy.

I sure did air on WTTW.

But it's all about "the young man and the river" speech that he did in "On the Waterfront" and muche later revisited on an episode of The West Wing. I tel children that story all the time.

Budapest - Bela Kiraly, a key figure in Hungary's ill-fated anti-Soviet revolution in 1956, died at the age of 97, the Ministry of Defence told MTI on Saturday.

Inaugurated as an officer in 1935, Kadar graduated from the Budapest Military Academy in 1942, then took part in the Second World War. Promoted to general in 1950, he became commander of the Military Academy. A year later, however, he was sentenced to death, later mitigated to life imprisonment, under the trumped-up charge of conspiracy against the state.

A key phase of his life was the 1956 revolution and freedom fight when Kiraly served as commander-in-chief of the National Guard and the military commander of Budapest.

After the uprising he fled to Austria and later emigrated to the United States, where he lectured at universities. He worked as a military historian and wrote several volumes during the decades of emigration.

In 1989 Kiraly returned to Hungary to become one of the speakers at the reburial ceremony of Imre Nagy, prime minister in 1956, and his associates executed in 1958.

From 1990 to 1994 Kiraly was an independent member of Hungary's first freely elected post-communist Parliament.

Record label mogul Allen Klein, who handled the affairs of both the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, died in New York on Saturday after a battle with Alzheimer's disease, a spokesman said. He was 77.

During a career spanning more than 50 years, the former New Jersey accountant secured a fortune as one of the savviest and most infamous players in the music business.

He played a key role during the bitter demise of the Beatles, coming on board in 1969 at the behest of John Lennon, Ringo Starr and George Harrison. Paul McCartney was fiercely opposed to Klein, preferring the legal expertise of his high-powered father-in-law Lee Eastman. The feud set the scene for the court battle that led to the group's dissolution.

Klein later reunited with Harrison to organize the all-star Concert for Bangladesh show in 1971 concert. It took a decade for the funds to reach the refugees because of complex tax problems. He also continued to work with Lennon and Yoko Ono.

Klein also managed the Rolling Stones during the 1960s and ended up owning the rights to their recordings and copyrights from that decade -- to the eternal regret of Mick Jagger.

He first made his mark in the music industry by auditing record labels on behalf of clients such as Bobby Darin and Connie Francis. When he invariably found that they were owed royalties, he took a percentage of the difference as a fee. he also managed Sam Cooke, helping the R&B star set up his own label and publishing company.

Klein's family-owned ABKCO Music & Records also handled the recordings of such artists as the Animals, Herman's Hermits, Bobby Womack, Marianne Faithfull, the Kinks, Chubby Checker, Bobby Rydell and many others.

He is survived by his wife and three adult children. His funeral will take place in New York on Tuesday.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. - Former Titans quarterback Steve McNair has been killed. Police said McNair suffered a fatal gunshot wound to the head in downtown Nashville.

The incident happened near 2nd South & Lea Ave. Police said it looked like a double homicide. A female victim was also found dead.

Stay with NewsChannel5.com for more information as it becomes available.

http://www.chicagobreakingnews.com/2009/06...laway-dies.html

Missed this one: John Callaway, former host of Chicago Tonight.

WASHINGTON — Former Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara died Monday, according to his wife. He was 93.

McNamara died at 5:30 a.m. at his home, his wife Diana told The Associated Press. She said he had been in failing health for some time.

McNamara served as secretary of defense during the Vietnam war under presidents Kennedy and Johnson.

Known as a policymaker with a fixation for statistical analysis, McNamara was recruited to run the Pentagon by President John F. Kennedy in 1961 from the presidency of the Ford Motor Co. He stayed seven years, longer than anyone since the job's creation in 1947.

John Keel has died. Author of The Mothman Prophecies.

BLABBERMOUTH.NET has learned that former CRIMSON GLORY frontman Midnight (real name: John Patrick Jr. McDonald) passed away earlier today (Wednesday, July 8) from "total kidney and liver failure." He was 47 years old.

According to JON OLIVA'S PAIN guitarist Matt LaPorte, who played on some of Midnight's recent solo recordings, the singer spent his final hours surrounded by his mother, brother, daughter as well as members of CRIMSON GLORY, SAVATAGE, and JON OLIVA'S PAIN. His death occurred at 3:45 a.m EST at St. Anthony's Hospital in St. Petersburg, Florida.

"I will miss my partner Midnight — the greatest voice and friend I've ever known," LaPorte told BLABBERMOUTH.NET. He added, "In spite of his demons, [Midnight] was a beautiful soul who constantly changed the lives of those he met and came into contact with."

Midnight sang on CRIMSON GLORY's first three albums — "Crimson Glory" (1986), "Transcendence" (1988) and "Strange and Beautiful" (1991) — before going into self-imposed exile for almost a decade. He eventually rejoined CRIMSON GLORY in 2005 but was dismissed in January 2007 following the revelation that he was arrested in Sarasota, Florida and charged with "DUI [driving under the influence] with .20 [blood-alcohol level] or higher or having a passenger under 18" years of age. Midnight, who gave his occupation as "painter" to the authorities at the time of the arrest, was also cited for driving with a suspended/ cancelled/ revoked license.

Last fall, Midnight announced plans to release a new solo CD called "All Souls Midnight" which was to feature the "Acoustic Crimson" EP (four songs) along with the lost "Midnight Mass" recordings from the late '80s/early '90s plus some other "cool rarities."

Just had a dream that Michael Richards died, it was so vivid and real.

Hey Tony, did you get Oscar Mayer yet?

Nope. I feel like a weiner...


MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- Oscar G. Mayer, retired chairman of the Wisconsin-based meat processing company that bears his name, has died at the age of 95.

Mayer's wife, Geraldine, said he died of old age Monday age at Hospice Care in Fitchburg.

He was the third Oscar Mayer in the family that founded Oscar Mayer Foods, which was once the largest private employer in Madison. His grandfather, Oscar F. Mayer, died in 1955 and his father, Oscar G. Mayer Sr., died in 1965.

Mayer retired as chairman of the board in 1977 at age 62 soon after the company recorded its first $1 billion year. The company was later sold to General Foods and is now a business unit of Kraft.

Mayer's first wife, Rosalie, died in 1998. He married Geraldine Fitzpatrick in 1999

Walter Cronkite has died.

...and that's the way it is. -30-

One of the last the icons of journalism.

Maybe the last....?

First World War veteran Henry Allingham – who last month officially became the world's oldest man – has died at the age of 113.

Mr Allingham died in his sleep at 3.10am on Saturday at his care home near Brighton, after a life that saw him marked out as a national treasure. He was one of the last three surviving British veterans of the First World War. He was also the last surviving founder member of the RAF, the last man to have witnessed the Battle of Jutland and the last surviving member of the Royal Naval Air Service.

On June 20 Guinness World Records had announced that Mr Allingham, who celebrated his 113th birthday on June 6, became the world's oldest man after the previous incumbent, Tomoji Tanabe, died in his sleep at his home in Japan, also at the age of 113.
He jokingly attributed his longevity to "cigarettes, whisky and wild, wild women".
Mr Allingham, who became a familiar face at Remembrance ceremonies, was born in Clapton, East London, in 1896.
After his father's death he was brought up by his mother, who persuaded him not to join up as soon as war broke out. When she died in 1915 he enlisted, serving first as a seaplane mechanic and then as a spotter, or bomber.
He later confessed that he did not realise what war meant when he signed up, but his experiences at the Third Battle of Ypres, widely known as Passchendaele, resulted in his naïve enthusiasm for battle and glory that gave way to a passion for peace.
He once told the BBC: "War's stupid. Nobody wins. You might as well talk first, you have to talk last anyway."
The scenes he witnessed of soldiers waiting to go over the top at Ypres have stayed with him ever since.
"They would just stand there in 2ft of water in mud-filled trenches, waiting to go forward," he said. "They knew what was coming. It was pathetic to see those men like that. I don't think they have ever got the admiration and respect they deserved."
Mr Allingham and his wife Dorothy were together for more than 50 years, living to see his first great-great-great-grandchild. After the war he went into the motor industry, eventually joining the design department at Ford before retiring in 1961.
When asked how he had lived so long, Mr Allingham, who held the Legion d'Honneur, said: "I don't know if there is a secret, but keeping within your capacity is vital.
"I've had two major breakdowns, one during the war and one after but both when I was trying to do the work of three men.
"The trick is to look after yourself and always know your limitations."

Will be a big funeral for that man, imagine living for over 90 years after your parents have died. I think I read he survived a couple of his grandchildren somewhere before.

Photographer Julius Schulman has died aged 98



Obit http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-...0,1393680.story
Appreciation http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/...0,7744877.story

NEW YORK – Irish author Frank McCourt has died in New York City at age 78. He was best known for the million-selling "Angela's Ashes," a memoir about his childhood. The memoir was published in 1996 and won a Pulitzer Prize.

Brother Malachy (MAL'-uh-kee) McCourt says Frank McCourt died Sunday afternoon at a Manhattan hospice.

Frank McCourt had been gravely ill with meningitis and recently was treated for melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer.

Actor Les (Leslie) Earnest Lye, best known for the 1979 hit children's program You Can't Do That on Television, died Tuesday in Ottawa. He was 84.

Lye's career as an actor and broadcaster on television and radio has spanned half a century.

The show You Can't Do That on Television, which featured teenage actors performing comedic skits, was a Canadian success. It went international a year later and earned a large following. The program went on for 10 seasons and was later syndicated on Nickelodeon.

Lye was born in Toronto, Ont., on Nov. 18, 1924.

He served briefly in the armed forces before enrolling at the University of Toronto. Lye earned a Bachelor of Arts degree and went on to study at Lorne Greene's Academy of Radio Arts.

In 1948, Lye moved to Ottawa to join CFRA, a talk radio station founded by Frank Ryan. It was there that he became a popular radio announcer and emcee.

After briefly returning to Toronto to work at radio station CKEY, Lye went back to CFRA with a new on-air personality he created named Abercrombie and became one of the station's most popular voices.

In 1958, Lye decided to venture into television. His first job was co-hosting a talk show program called Contact.

In 1961, Lye began creating comic characters for Bill Luxton's TV morning show in Ottawa. The two later teamed up and created the hit TV show Uncle Willy and Floyd. The half-hour program featured slapstick humour, puppets and gags and was eventually syndicated across Canada. The show featured many guest stars, including Margaret Trudeau, Alanis Morissette and Rich Little. It ran for 22 years.

In 2003, Lye and Luxton were honoured with a lifetime achievement award from the Alliance of Canadian Cinema for their work on Uncle Willy and Floyd.

Lye continued to work for several TV networks, including the CBC, CTV and Global.

Lye is survived by his wife, Johnni, and three children.

May he rest in a barf-filled peace.

http://intensities.wordpress.com/2009/07/2...bell-chihuahua/

The last British survivor of the World War I trenches, Harry Patch, has died at the age of 111.

Mr Patch was conscripted into the Army aged 18 and fought in the Battle of Passchendaele at Ypres in 1917 in which more than 70,000 British soldiers died.

He was raised in Coombe Down, near Bath, and had been living at a care home in Wells, Somerset.

The oldest WWI veteran Henry Allingham, who served in the Royal Navy and the RAF, died at the age of 113 a week ago.

Ellie Frazetta

Merce Cunningham, the American choreographer who was among a handful of 20th-century figures to make dance a major art and a major form of theater, died Sunday night. He was 90 and lived in Manhattan...

http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/...ref=global-home

Philadelphia Eagles defensive coordinator Jim Johnson passed away on Tuesday at the age of 68 after a battle with melanoma skin cancer.

I figured something must be up after he ceded the Defensive Coordinator job a few days ago to the linebackers coach, or something like that.

Budd Schulberg, the legendary screenwriter and novelist who won an
Oscar in 1954 for his classic film “On the Waterfront,” has died. He
was 95.


Mr. Schulberg, the son of a movie executive born in New York, rose to
fame in the 40’s and 50’s with a succession of award-winning books and
screenplays, most notably his novels “What Makes Sammy Run” (1941) and
“The Harder They Fall” (1947), and the film “A Face in the
Crowd” (1957). But it was “On the Waterfront” that Mr. Schulberg was
best known for. The film, starring a young Marlon Brando and Eva Marie
Saint, nearly swept the 1954 Academy Awards, earning eight Oscars,
including one for Best Picture and another for Best Actor, which went
to Mr. Brando. The film was so influential that it was selected for
preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the
Library of Congress.


Mr. Schulberg lived in Westhampton Beach on Long Island and is
survived by his wife, Betsy, and five children.

RIP John Hughes

Typical Englishman getting out on 111.

John Hughes has died of a heart attack.

Hughes suffered the heart attack while taking a morning walk during a trip to NYC to visit family.

He directed such '80s hit films as "The Breakfast Club," "Pretty in Pink," "Sixteen Candles" and "Ferris Bueller's Day Off."

He was 59.

Willy Deville has died.

Mink DeVille's Mixed Up, Shook Up Girl made my top 100 of all time.

So, in tribute.

Yeah, that first Mink DeVille LP is classic.

CNN reporting that Duncan Sheik is on life-support.

This ain't on their site or any other news source. Did you see it on TV?

Wow, 59 for hughes? That sucks.

I think Undo's just boarding hard.

http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-...0,6424973.story

One we all missed, I guess: Billy Lee Riley, original Sun Records artist, sideman for Jerry Lee Lewis, author of "Red Hot" and "Flying Saucer Rock'n'Roll" (among others) - dead of colon cancer at 75.

BARNSTABLE, Massachusetts - Former President John F. Kennedy's sister Eunice Kennedy Shriver died early Tuesday, her family said.

The 88-year-old Shriver had been hospitalized in Massachusetts since last week. Members of her extended family had gathered at her bedside at Cape Cod Hospital in Barnstable.

In a statement, her family described Shriver as the "light of our lives ... who taught us by example and with passion what it means to live a faith-driven life of love and service to others."

Shriver organized the first Special Olympics in 1968. She was inspired in part by the struggles of her mentally disabled sister, Rosemary Kennedy.

"She was a living prayer, a living advocate, a living center of power," her family's statement added. "She set out to change the world and to change us, and she did that and more.

"She founded the movement that became Special Olympics, the largest movement for acceptance and inclusion for people with intellectual disabilities in the history of the world. Her work transformed the lives of hundreds of millions of people across the globe, and they in turn are her living legacy."

Shriver is the fifth of nine Kennedy children. Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., and Jean Kennedy Smith are her sole surviving siblings.

Tom Jameson, who wrote the perennial doo-wop favorite, "Summertime Summertime" and recorded it with his group, the Jamies, died of cancer Sunday July 19, 2009 at age 72, according to his sister, Serena McKenney, who sang with him in the 1950s quartet.

Born in Boston on April 24, 1937, Thomas Earl Jameson was singing tenor in the Boy’s Choir at Boston’s Trinity Church, when he came up with an idea for a song. “We lived in my grandmother’s house, and I remember being upstairs and my poor grandmother laying down for her rest on the couch in the dining room, and Tom was in the living room where the piano was, playing that over and over as he wrote it, because he was a perfectionist,” Serena laughed in a 2008 interview. “I thought, ‘Is it ever going to end?’ When he finished it, he asked Jeannie (Roy, who sang with Serena in Dorchester's First Baptist Church Choir) and me if we would sing it.”

“It’s Summertime”, a classic ode to school vacation, featured four distinct harmony parts, from soprano to bass, painstakingly written and arranged by Jameson. Arthur Blair, a bass in the Baptist Church choir rounded out the quartet. “The harmony, everything was totally and completely his,” Serena adds. “He was a tough taskmaster. Everything had to be perfect.”

For months, the unnamed group would gather- often three times a week- to rehearse the song. On May 24, 1958, a demo of “It’s Summertime” was recorded at the Roy Nelson Studio on Boylston Street in Boston. “Tom paid,” Jeannie remembers. “He had a couple of copies made, and he and Arthur took them around to several disc jockeys in the Boston area.”

Two local DJs showed interest. Jameson decided to go with Sherman Feller (1918-1994), a popular fixture on WEEI and WEZE who had been in the medium for some 17 years, and had rubbed shoulders with everyone from Nat “King” Cole to Frank Sinatra. “Tom chose Sherm because he had contacts,” Serena explained. "Tom also signed something which gave Sherm half the writer’s compensation and allowed Sherm’s name to be printed on each record as co-writer. Sherm also got manager’s percentage and the publishing.”

Feller interested Cadence Records' Archie Bleyer in his protégés and brought them to New York to record the song on July 2 and subsequently suggested naming them the Jamies, from Tom and Serena’s last name.

The group’s bouncing lyrics and tight harmonies were augmented nicely by a harpsichord, which stood out among the sparse accompaniment. Blair’s bass intro was followed by a cascade of voices, from Tom’s tenor and Serena’s alto, to Jeannie’s clear soprano. “When we went to record, they said ‘Stop and let us know if you want any changes,” Serena recounted, “and Tom did stop it several times because it wasn’t the way he had it in his mind. It had to be exactly the way we had practiced.”

When Bleyer passed on the finished master, Feller brought it across the street to Epic Records which released the record on July 18. “Summertime, Summertime” cracked the pop chart on August 11, peaking at #26 in an 11-week stint. A winter follow-up, “Snow Train” never caught on. In 1959, Feller arranged a deal with United Artists by which time Rosalind Dever and Robert Paolucci (1935-2004) had replaced Serena and Arthur. The bouncing “Don’t Darken My Door” was issued in November, 1959 but failed to draw a national audience. In early 1960, the Jamies quietly dissolved.

Tom Jameson, who also composed the group’s B sides, “Searching For You”, “When The Sun Goes Down”, and “The Evening Star”, worked as a computer programmer and as an analyst in the banking and insurance industries, making his home in the Boston suburb of Braintree.

Through the years, “Summertime, Summertime” has taken on a life of its own. In 1960, it sold another quarter of a million copies, and when it was released for the third time in 1962, it spent eight weeks on Billboard’s Hot 100 and hit #38. Jameson’s composition was also recorded by the Fortunes, the Doodletown Pipers, Hobby Horse, Jan & Dean, Mongo Jerry, and Sha Na Na. Buick, Applebee’s Restaurants, and Coca-Cola have used re-recordings in commercials.

As opposed to dying in the winter.

WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. – Les Paul, the guitarist and inventor who changed the course of music with the electric guitar and multitrack recording and had a string of hits, many with wife Mary Ford, died on Thursday. He was 94.

According to Gibson Guitar, Paul died of complications from pneumonia at White Plains Hospital. His family and friends were by his side.

As an inventor, Paul helped bring about the rise of rock 'n' roll and multitrack recording, which enables artists to record different instruments at different times, sing harmony with themselves, and then carefully balance the "tracks" in the finished recording.