by The Grim ~V~eeper
Greetings,
everyone...and welcome to this edition of
Celebrity Cemetary, the Grim ~V~eeper's Obituary Page.
Death Poll 2001 has now begun. We have 20
players this year,
who have picked 139 different celebs. Everyone's picks
can be found at the Death Poll page. Hopefully,
we'll get more than two hits this time around.
The final point totals in DEATH POLL
2000:
1.
Twins, Flying V: 23 points (for Charles Schultz)
2. Tarqness: 21 points (for Walter Matthau)
3. All other players: zip
Evil regards to Twins, that Viking fan (masochist) and to that Flying
V guy whose being I inhabit when the mood strikes. They
both shall be first to have their names inscribed into
the imaginary yet coveted Esther Rolle Memorial Trophy.
That is the only prize to Death Poll 2000, other than
bragging rights (s evillaff).
Death Poll 2001, however, actually HAS prizes based in
reality. Yes, I said prizes. Not only will the winner
receive a full roll of Mentos (www.Mentos.com) the "Chewy
Mint", there is an additionial "mystery"
prize that will be announced at a later date, so keep
your bleary eyes on this column...
 Before we review the lastest bunch
of stiffs, yours ghouly would like to give a
bony-fingered salute to the state of Texas, who has
broken its own record for executions in a year. The Lone
Star state had 40 in 2000, eclipsing its own record of
37. Texas leads the nation in captial punishment with 235
since the Supreme Court lifted the national death penalty
in 1976. Of those, 148 have been performed since
President-elect George W. "Kill'em a lot!" Bush
took office in January 1995. He wasn't fooling me with
that "Pro-Life" nonsense {s evillaff}.
Well, the final month of the Millenium was an active one,
and January has started off with a "Judge Bone"
bang...
(The
lead stories...)
Jason
Robards, the veteran stage and screen actor who won
back-to-back Oscars for All the President's Men
and Julia, died Dec. 26 after battling cancer.
He was 78. (Not to mention his memorable roles as Drunken
Writer in Bright Lights, Big City, and
Grouchy-Ass Dad in House Without a Christmas Tree)
Werner
Klemperer, the German-born actor best known as the
bumbling  Nazi Col. Klink in
the 1960s television sitcom Hogan's Heroes, died
on Dec. 7 at the age of 80. Born in Cologne to a Jewish
family who fled the Nazis in the 1930, Klemperer came to
the United States in 1933 with his father, famed
conductor Otto Klemperer. He was often typecast as
fumbling, ridiculous Nazis of the sort that eventually
led to his long-running role as Klink in Hogan's
Heroes, which ran on CBS from 1965 to 1971.
Klemperer, who received Emmy nominations in each of the
show's six seasons, won his supporting actor awards in
1968 and 1969. (and whoever said "Ho-o-o-o-gan!"
to themselves when hearing about this raise their hands)
Veteran actor Billy Barty, shown at his
"Billy Barty Foundation" in Studio City,
Calif., in this May 22, 1986 photo, died Dec. 24. Barty,
a 3-foot-10 actor whose career spanned seven decades,
died of heart failure. He was 76. (The famous midget
death streak is now at two months in a row)
Ray
Walston, who played the lovable extraterrestrial
Uncle Martin on the 1960s TV sitcom My Favorite
Martian and the devil in Damn Yankees, died
Monday, Jan. 1, 2001 of apparent natural causes at his
home in Beverly Hills, Calif. He was 86. (Aloha, Mr. Hand)
(A few
old jock straps bought it, and some young ones as
well...)
Chris Antley, who rode Charismatic to victory
in the 1999 Kentucky Derby and just missed winning the
Triple Crown, was found dead at his home in Pasadena, CA
on Dec. 2 with a blow to the head. Chris Antley won 3,480
career races in his career. He was 34.
Lou Groza, the Cleveland Browns' Hall of Fame kicker
and lineman affectionately known as "The Toe",
died Nov. 29 of an apparent heart attack in Cleveland. He
was 76 (Oddly,
76 was his jersey number).
Joe Gilliam Jr., who was one of the first black
quarterbacks to start an NFL game but fell into drug
addiction and spent two years living under a bridge in a
cardboard box, dead at 49, on Dec. 26 in Nashville.
Kazakstan's Bekzat Sattarkhanov, shown exchanging
blows with USA's Ricardo Juarez during their 57 kg boxing
final at the XXVII Summer Games in Sydney on Oct. 1,
2000, was killed in a New Year's Eve car accident. He was
20 years old.
(Family
members of more famous, or infamous, people had a hard
month...)
John
Hadley Nicanor "Jack" Hemingway, eldest son of
Ernest Hemingway, died Dec. 8. He was 77. As a toddler he
accompanied his father to Paris cafes and bookstores,
meeting the likes of James Joyce and Ezra Pound. His
godmother was Gertrude Stein. Family members decided
Friday to remove Hemingway from life support systems
after complications from heart surgery in New York City.
As a father himself he saw two of his daughters become
well-known actresses. And he experienced great loss when
one died of a drug overdose (otherwise known as extreme
stupidity).
John
Jay, the great-great-great-grandson of the man
who became the fifth president of the Continental
Congress and George Washington's first Supreme Court
Chief Justice, died Dec 7. But this John Jay plowed a
very different path. Jay made 34 feature-length ski
movies, starting in 1939, when skiing was in its infancy.
Named one of the 100 most influential skiers of all time
by Ski magazine, Jay died of cancer in
Encinitas, CA. He was 84.
Mickey
Mantle Jr. died of cancer Dec. 22, five years after
the disease killed his father. He was 47. Mantle Jr. was
the oldest of the Hall of Famer's four sons and the
second to be stricken with cancer. The youngest Mantle
son, Billy, had Hodgkin's disease before he died of a
heart attack in 1994 at 36.
Randolph
Apperson Hearst, the newspaper heir whose daughter
Patricia was kidnapped by the revolutionary Symbionese
Liberation Army in 1974, died Dec. 18 at a New York
hospital after suffering a stroke. He was 85.
Joyce
"Rocky" Flint, 64, the mother of
serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer who worked in the field of
HIV and AIDS treatment in the Fresno area. One of
Dahmer's lawyers, Gerald Boyle, said his client told him
repeatedly that Flint was a great mother. "It was
clear she bore no responsibility...She had to live with
the idea that she was the mother of a monster, and it
drove her crazy." Flint died of breast cancer, on
Nov. 27th, in Fresno. (And my mom thought *I* was bad...)
(Let's
play a death march for the musicians...Dec. 19th took its
toll)
Pianist and humorist Victor Borge, posing in his
dressing room in this June 8, 1989 photo, died in his
sleep Dec. 23, at the age of 91. (and the onslaught
of "Victor Borge Live" CD commericals ensues on
late-night TV.)
Roebuck "Pops" Staples, who led his
family vocal group, the Staple Singers, from
gospel music into the forefront of socially conscious
rhythm & blues and to the top of the pop music
charts, died Dec. 19th in Chicago. He was 84.
Rob Buck, 42, lead guitarist for the rock band 10,000
Maniacs died on Dec. 19th in Pittsburgh of
complications from liver failure.
British singer and songwriter Kirsty
MacColl died after being struck by a speedboat
while swimming in Mexico, Dec. 19th. She was 41. She may
be best remembered for accompanying Shane MacGowan on the
Pogues' 1987 hit "A Fairytale of New
York."
Nick Massi, 73, an original member of the vocal group
the Four Seasons who handled bass vocals and
vocal arrangements throughout the band's glory days, died
on Dec.24th of cancer in West Orange, N.J. The Four
Seasons were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of
Fame in 1990. (Um...he's one of these non-Frankie Valli
guys shown on the album, my guess is the tall one)
Milt
Hinton, a jazz bassist known for a big, rich tone
and an unerring sense of rhythmic timing, and who also
utilized a flair for photography to capture his
colleagues at work throughout his 70-year career, died
Dec. 19th at a hospital in New York's Queens after a long
illness. He may have appeared on more records that anyone
else in history.
(And
if you were a female activist, well, it sucked to be you
last month)
Gwendolyn Brooks, who won a Pulitzer Prize for
writing candid and compassionate poetry that delved into
poverty, racism and drugs among black people, died Dec. 3
in Chicago. She was 83.
Writer Marvel
Cooke, a pioneering black journalist who crusaded
for racial reform as a reporter and as a political
activist, died of leukemia on Nov. 29 in New York. She
was 97.
Florynce
Rae Kennedy, a flamboyant lawyer who fought for civil
rights and feminism with trademark flair, died on Dec.
26th. She was 84.
Juliet
Garretson Hollister, 84, housewife who started an
international educational group called Temple of
Understanding, died on Nov. 26 at her home in
Greenwich, Conn.
(and
the miscellaneous)
Jose Greco, the famed flamenco dancer and
choreographer who founded the Jose Greco Spanish
Dance Company, died Dec. 31 of heart failure. He was
82. (No
relation to Tennessee Titan kicker Al Del Greco)
U.S. Sen. Alan Cranston of California, who
ended a 24-year Senate career in 1993 under the cloud of
the savings and loan industry scandal, died Dec. 31 at
age 86, at his home in Los Altos.
Flintstones, meet the Flintstones
They're the modern Stone Age fa-mi-ly
From the town of Bedrock
They're a page right out of his-tor-y...
Hoyt
Curtin, music composer for Hanna-Barbera, whose
credits cover a who's who of cartoon history, died Dec. 3
at a Thousand Oaks, CA hospital. He was 78.
Peggy
McMartin Buckey, acquitted in the nation's most
protracted criminal molestation case targeting her
family's Manhattan Beach preschool, died Dec. 15, in
Torrance, Calif. She was 74.
Stan
Fox, whose racing career ended five years ago
in a horrific crash at the Indianapolis 500, was killed
in an auto accident in New Zealand on Dec. 18th. He was
48.
Ray
Bell, the game officer who cared for Smokey Bear
after the cub was rescued from a forest fire 50 years
ago, died Dec. 21 of cancer at his home in Truth or
Consequences, N.M. He was 89.
 Thomas G. Yohe, 63, who helped
give the post-baby boom generation jazzy mantras about
multiplication and grammar as co-creator of television's
Emmy-winning "Schoolhouse Rock" cartoons, had
pancreatic cancer and died Dec. 26 in Norwalk, Conn.
(Interjections!
Show excitement!
Or emotion!
Hallelujah!
Hallelujah!
Hallelujah... yea!!
Darn, that's the end.)
(and
perhaps the most disturbing of all...)
William
"Waving Willie" Spranger, a fixture on
Route 206 who gained a measure of regional New Jersey
fame by greeting motorists from a lawn chair for 60 years
as they passed his home, died of a heart attack Dec. 10
after collapsing in his driveway. He was 80. Several
flowers and a funeral wreath had been placed near the
chair as a tribute. (and SHOCKING that no one had him in Death
Poll 2000)
So, farewell until next month,
DG~V~
Celebrity
Death Poll 2001 player's picks
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