In Remembrance:2007

[Mark]

Washoe the chimpanzee, the first non-human to learn sign language, died Tuesday. She was 42.

In attendance at her funeral was Manis the Orangutan, famous as Clyde from the Every Which Way But Loose (1978) Clint Eastwood movie, making the one sign he knows as a shocking tribute.

 

[GrayLinnorm]

Pulitzer Prize winning writer Norman Mailer died today. He was 84.

Mailer was known as much for his eccentric behavior as well as for novels like The Naked and the Dead and The Executioner's Son g. Earlier this year he had just released a novel about Hitler.

Mailer said more than once that authors like himself had become anachronisms as people focused on television and young writiers aspired to screenwriting and journalism. So I guess it's ironic that he died during the writers' strike.

 

[GrayLinnorm]

Ira Levin, who wrote Rosemary's Baby, The Boys of Brazil, and The Stepford Wives, has died. He was 78.

Levin also wrote for television and Broadway (his play Deathtrap was also adapted into a movie).

 

[GrayLinnorm]

Dick Wilson, best known for playing Mr. Whipple in commercials for Charmin toilet paper ("Don't squeeze the Charmin!), died today. He was 91.

 

[GrayLinnorm]

John Hughey, a steel guitar player who toured with Conway Twitty and recorded with Elvis Presley, Loretta Lynn, Willie Nelson, Vince Gill, the Allman Brothers, and others, died Sunday. He was 73.

Hughey was credited for developing a unique "crying sound" based on the guitar's high tones.

 

[GrayLinnorm]

Sigrid Valdis, who played Hilda on Hogan's Heroes, and who later married the show's star, Bob Crane, died October 14 of lung cancer. She was 72.

 

[GrayLinnorm]

French choreographer Maurice Bejart, considered one of the giants of contemporary dance, died today. He was 80.

 

[GrayLinnorm]

Kevin Dubrow, lead singer of Quiet Riot, was found dead in Las Vegas. He was 52.

 

[GeorgeFields]

Kevin Dubrow, lead singer of Quiet Riot, was found dead in Las Vegas. He was 52.

a sad day for us metal heads

 

[freyar]

Well, I didn't think to post it here b/c it's a scientist, but what the hey! (Seems like there are all kinds of celebs here, so please let me know if there are restrictions.)

Sidney Coleman, a somewhat famous particle physics theorist and author of a remarkably witty set of lectures on the usually dry subject of quantum field theory, passed away 18 Nov. His small corner of the physics world is saddened. obit