The Rest In Peace & Remembrance Thread #2

Charles Napier, 1936-2011

StarTrek.com is saddened to learn of the passing of actor Charles Napier, who died on October 5 after collapsing in his house. The veteran character actor, best known for playing tough guys in dozens of movies and TV shows -- including Supervixens, The Blues Brothers, Silence of the Lambs and two Austin Powers films -- made his mark on two Star Trek series... decades apart. Napier memorably played Adam in the third-season TOS episode "The Way to Eden" and General Rex Denning in the popular fourth-season Deep Space Nine episode "Little Green Men." Napier was 75. Our condolences to his family, friends and fans.
 
"Just Win, Baby"


OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) -- Al Davis, the renegade owner of the Oakland Raiders who bucked NFL authority while exhorting his silver-and-black team to "Just win, baby!," died Saturday. He was 82.

The Hall of Famer died at his home in Oakland, the team said. The cause of death was not immediately disclosed.

Davis was one of the most important figures in NFL history - a rebel with a subpoena. That was most evident during the 1980s when he went to court - and won - for the right to move his team from Oakland to Los Angeles. Even after he moved the Raiders back to the Bay Area in 1995, he sued for $1.2 billion to establish that he still owned the rights to the L.A. market.

Before that, though, he was a pivotal figure in hastening the merger between the AFL - where he served as commissioner - and the more established NFL. Davis was not initially in favor of a merger, but his aggressive pursuit of NFL players for his fledgling league and team helped bring about the eventual 1970 combination of the two leagues into what is now the most popular sport in the country.

"Al Davis's passion for football and his influence on the game were extraordinary," Commissioner Roger Goodell said. "He defined the Raiders and contributed to pro football at every level. The respect he commanded was evident in the way that people listened carefully every time he spoke. He is a true legend of the game whose impact and legacy will forever be part of the NFL."
 
Longtime Motorola CEO Robert Galvin dies at 89
By Peter Svensson, Associated Press
October 13, 2011

NEW YORK – Robert Galvin, who over nearly three decades as Motorola's CEO transformed the maker of police radios and TVs into one of the world's leading electronics companies, has died. He was 89.

Galvin died Tuesday night in Chicago of natural causes, his family said.

Galvin oversaw Motorola's pioneering efforts in the cellular industry, including the creation of the first commercial cellphone in 1973 and the construction of the first cellphone network in the early 80s.

"He probably single-handedly provided this firm with more leadership and guided it through more innovation than any other single person in our 83-year history," said Greg Brown, CEO of Motorola Solutions, the half of the old Motorola that sells communications equipment to government and corporate customers.

Galvin was named CEO in 1959 at the death his father, Paul Galvin, who had founded the company in 1928. Robert Galvin, known as "Bob," remained in the post until 1986 and stayed on as chairman until 1990. He retired from the board of directors in 2001.

Galvin led the company into China with a $100 million investment in 1987. The country is still a major market for its phones. He helped create the Six Sigma quality system at Motorola, since adopted by many other companies.

"Bob saw around corners. He anticipated," Brown said.

Motorola Inc. split into two companies in January. Motorola Solutions makes police radios, bar code scanners and other products for corporate and government customers. Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. makes cellphones, and has agreed to be acquired by Google Inc.

In retirement, Galvin founded an investment firm with his sons and established two think tanks focused on energy and transportation issues.

He wrote two books on the influence of the Scottish Enlightment on the founders of the United States and published a compilation of the business philosophies that shaped Motorola.

Galvin was born in 1922 in Marshfield, Wis. He attended high school in Evanston, Ill., and attended the University of Notre Dame. He started working full time at Motorola in 1944, when it was still called Galvin Manufacturing.

Galvin is survived by his wife, Mary Barnes Galvin, four children — Gail Galvin Ellis, Dawn Galvin Meiners, and Christopher and Michael Galvin — 13 grandchildren and ten great grandchildren.

A wake is scheduled for Monday in Skokie, Ill., followed by a funeral mass the next day in Winnetka, Ill.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that gifts be directed to the Robert W. Galvin Center for Electricity Innovation at Illinois Institute of Technology, 10 W. 35th St. Suite 1700, Chicago, IL 60616, attention of Betsy Hughes.
 
'The Devil Went Down to Georgia' co-writer killed

Oct 13, 9:08 PM (ET)

By Joe Edwards

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) - Country star Charlie Daniels says his longtime keyboardist and co-writer of "The Devil Went Down to Georgia" had his own musical personality. Joel "Taz" DiGregorio, 67, was killed Wednesday night in a single-car accident on Interstate 40 west of Nashville while en route to Georgia for a Charlie Daniels Band concert that has since been canceled. He was alone when his car flipped going around a curve, Daniels said.


"He was an intricate part of our sound for 40 years," Daniels said Thursday in a telephone interview. "If you listened to our records, you could hear Taz all over them. He had a riff in 'The Devil Went Down to Georgia' which was his idea."


Wearing an ever present cowboy hat and always to Daniels' right on stage, DiGregorio was a fixture of the band's rocking persona.

"He just fit in with our music for 40 years. It won't be easy without him," Daniels said.


The Charlie Daniels Band has canceled the concert Thursday in Cumming, Ga., and a show in Waterbury, Conn., on Saturday. Daniels said he will resume performing next Friday and Saturday in Oklahoma with just five members.


"I won't replace him now," Daniels said. "I can't come to grips with replacing him right now, but I will."


DiGregorio is survived by his wife, two sons and two daughters. Funeral arrangements were incomplete.


"He just had a unique way," Daniels said. "We'll live with this and deal with it."
 
Crash in Las Vegas

Two-time Indy 500 champion Dan Wheldon dies.

Wheldon, who moved to the United States from his native England with hopes of winning the Indianapolis 500 and went on to prevail at his sport's most famed race twice, died Sunday after a massive, fiery 15-car wreck at the Las Vegas Indy 300.

He was 33. :(

http://msn.foxsports.com/motor/stor...killed-in-crash-at-Las-Vegas-101611?gt1=39002

Such a tragedy.
RIP Dan Wheldon
 
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Longtime CBS correspondent Robert Pierpoint dies
Oct 23, 2:43 AM (ET)
By ANDREW DALTON

LOS ANGELES (AP) - CBS News correspondent Robert C. Pierpoint - who covered six presidents, the Korean War, the Kennedy assassination and the Iranian hostage crisis in a career that spanned more than four decades - died Saturday in California, his daughter said. He was 86.

Pierpoint, who retired in 1990, died of complications from surgery at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital, Marta Pierpoint told The Associated Press. He had broken his hip Oct. 12 at the Santa Barbara Retirement Community where he lived with his wife Patricia.

After making his name covering the Korean War - a role he reprised when he provided his radio voice for the widely watched final episode of "MASH" in 1983 - Pierpoint became a White House correspondent during the Dwight D. Eisenhower administration, a position he would hold through the Jimmy Carter administration.

Full story at Iwon/AP News.
 
Guitarist for Metal Band GWAR Found Dead on Tour Bus.

The lead guitarist and co-producer for a veteran heavy metal band was found dead Thursday on the group’s tour bus, The Washington Post reports.

Cory Smoot’s body was found shortly before the GWAR bus was to cross the border from North Dakota into Manitoba, Canada, the story reports. Smoot had performed with the band since 2002, using the stage name Flattus Maximus.

The Richmond, Va.-based speed metal band, formed in 1984, is known for its science-fiction-oriented stage performances, vulgar lyrics and grotesque costumes. Smoot reportedly produced GWAR’s two most recent albums.

No additional details were released about Smoot’s death, and it was unclear whether the band would continue its tour.

GWAR lead singer Dave Brockie, who performs as Oderus Urungus, released a statement calling Smoot “one of the most talented guitar players in metal today” and asking for privacy. “At this point we are just dealing with the loss of our dear friend and brother,” he said in the statement.


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'Porky's' actor Knight commits suicide in Hawaii
Nov 4, 6:23 PM (ET)

KULA, Hawaii (AP) - Wyatt Knight, who starred in the 1980s "Porky's" films, has been found dead in Hawaii with a self-inflicted gunshot wound. He was 56.

A family statement Friday said the actor chose to end his life after a painful bout with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, which was in stage 4. He underwent radiation treatments that left him in "physical and emotional pain," and had a bone marrow transplant in 2003.

"He was tired of the pain and after much contemplation, chose to end his life in a beautiful and a serene place," the statement said. "His family and friends are devastated. He was deeply loved by all who knew him and will be missed every day."

Maui police Lt. Wayne Ibarra said Knight's body was found Oct. 26 in the upcountry region. An autopsy determined Knight died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Knight's most well-known role was playing Tommy Turner in the "Porky's" comedy trilogy.

"Wyatt was an incredibly talented, intelligent and loving person with an amazing spirit. He is free and at peace," the family's statement said.

Knight lived in Los Angeles and had been staying in Kula for several months. He is survived by his wife, Silvina, and two children from a previous marriage.

The family didn't provide any information about memorial services.
 
'Willy Wonka' actor Leonard Stone dies at 87
Nov. 3, 2011, 6:29 PM EST

Actor Leonard Stone has died at the age of 87.

He passed away on Wednesday after a long battle with cancer, according to TMZ and People.

Stone is perhaps best known for his role as Violet Beauregarde's father in the 1971 classic "Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory."

Stone was born in Oregon in 1923 and went on to guest star in a number of TV shows, including "General Hospital," "L.A. Law," "The Waltons," "The Outer Limits" and "The Partridge Family."

He also received a Tony Award nomination in 1959 for Best Supporting Actor in the Broadway show "Redhead."
 
Former 60 Minutes commentator Andy Rooney dies

NEW YORK (AP) — Andy Rooney, the curmudgeonly commentator who spent more than 30 years wryly talking about the oddities of life for "60 Minutes," died Friday night, CBS said. He was 92.

Just a month ago, Rooney delivered his last regular essay on the CBS newsmagazine.

CBS said he died Friday night in New York from complications from a recent surgery.
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Susan
 
Family Circus creator Bil Keane dies at 89.

Bil Keane's "Family Circus" comics entertained readers with a simple but sublime mix of humor and traditional family values for more than a half century. The appeal endured, the author thought, because the American public needed the consistency.

Keane, who started drawing the one-panel cartoon featuring Billy, Jeffy, Dolly, P.J. and their parents in February 1960, died Tuesday at age 89 at his longtime home in Paradise Valley, near Phoenix. His comic strip is featured in nearly 1,500 newspapers across the country.

Jeff Keane, Keane's son who lives in Laguna Hills, Calif., said that his father died of congestive heart failure with one of his other sons by his side after his conditioned worsened during the last month. All of Keane's five children, nine grandchildren and great-granddaughter were able to visit him last week, Jeff Keane said.
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Susan
 
Norman Ramsey
From ThisisTrue.com
6 November 2011

An atomic physicist, Ramsey studied matter and energy at an atomic level. He learned he could precisely control the flow of atoms through a magnetic field. He called it "the separated oscillatory fields method". Everyone else in the field calls it the "Ramsey Method". So what? So this: the Method is what enables MRIs -- Magnetic Resonance Imaging medical scanners -- to work. In addition, the Ramsey Method made it possible to build the most accurate timepiece ever created: "atomic" clocks, which are so accurate that current versions are not expected to gain or lose even one second over 138 million years. "I didn't even know there was a problem about clocks initially," Ramsey said in 1995. But atomic clocks aren't just a curiosity: they enable technologies such as the Global Positioning System to be accurate. And he spent 39 years teaching physics at Harvard, passing on his knowledge. "If you made a list of the most outstanding physicists of the 20th century, he'd be among the leaders," said Leon M. Lederman, emeritus director of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory -- which Ramsey co-founded. Dr. Ramsey was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1989 for his Method. He died in Massachusetts on November 4. He was 96.
 
Evelyn Lauder Dead: Breast Cancer Ribbon Creator And Estee Lauder Doyenne Dies At 75
AP/The Huffington Post First Posted: 11/13/11 10:19 AM ET Updated: 11/13/11 12:06 PM ET
Text by Christian Salazar and Samantha Critichell, AP

NEW YORK -- Pink was Evelyn Lauder's color.

In her long career as an executive at cosmetics giant Estee Lauder Cos., the company founded by her mother-in-law, Lauder worked with many shades of red, peach, bronze and even blues, but pink was the one hue that changed her life.

In 1992, Lauder worked with her friend Alexandra Penney, the former editor-in-chief of Self magazine, to create the pink ribbon campaign for breast cancer awareness. It started small with Lauder and her husband, Leonard, largely financing the little bows given to women at department store makeup counters to remind them about breast exams.

That grew into fundraising products, congressional designation of October as Breast Cancer Awareness Month and $330 million in donations – $50 million from Estee Lauder and its partners – to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation, which Lauder also started.

That money helped establish the Evelyn H. Lauder Breast Center at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, which opened in 2009.

Lauder died Saturday at her Manhattan home from complications of nongenetic ovarian cancer. She was 75.

Just last month, she reminisced about the early days of the breast cancer campaign. When it launched, it was so little known that some people thought it symbolized AIDS awareness.

"There had been no publicity about breast cancer, but a confluence of events – the pink ribbon, the color, the press, partnering with Elizabeth Hurley, having Estee Lauder as an advertiser in so magazines and persuading so many of my friends who are health and beauty editors to do stories about breast health -- got people talking," she said. Then, three years after distributing the first pink ribbon, a flight attendant noted it on Lauder's lapel and said, "I know that's for breast cancer."

"From there, it became ubiquitous," she remembered.

Lauder had been diagnosed with her cancer in 2007, but it didn't slow her down much. Come each October, she appeared at cancer awareness events around the world.

The rest of the time, she went to work at Estee Lauder's Fifth Avenue headquarters, which, despite its annual revenue of $2.48 billion, was run much like a family business. Over the years, Evelyn Lauder would hold many positions there and she helped develop its lines of skin care, makeup and fragrance.

She came up with the name of its popular Clinique brand during the 1960s. Most recently, she held the title of senior corporate vice president.

Her other passion was photography, and she was the author of the book "In Great Taste: Fresh, Simple Recipes for Eating and Living Well."

Born Evelyn Hausner in 1936 in Vienna, Austria, she fled Nazi-occupied Europe with her parents, and they settled in the U.S. She attended public schools in New York City and Hunter College, part of the City University of New York.

As a college freshman, she met her husband, the elder son of Estee Lauder and whose family owned what was then a small cosmetics company.

"We had five products in the line, we only had two or three colors in our lipsticks," she told cable news channel NY1 in 2005. "It was a baby company."

The young couple married in 1959. Leonard Lauder is now chairman emeritus of the company. Estee Lauder died in 2004 at 97.

Leonard and Evelyn Lauder's son William is executive chairman of Estee Lauder Cos. Another son, Gary, is managing director of Lauder Partners LLC, a technology investment firm.
 
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