Posts tagged as And Now He's Dead
Gary Carter, 1954-2012
"The Red Sox were leading, 5-3, in the 10th inning of Game 6 at Shea and were one out from winning a World Series for the first time since 1918. The Mets had nobody on base. Carter kept the Mets alive with a single off reliever Calvin Schiraldi, and a pair of singles brought him home. A wild pitch allowed the tying run to score. Then Mookie Wilson hit a grounder that went between the legs of Red Sox first baseman Bill Buckner, bringing Ray Knight home with the winning run. The Mets won the World Series two nights later." READ MORE
Candyman Bites It
Nello Ferrara, creator of the Atomic FireBall and the Lemonhead, has died. Atomic FireBalls were the consensus favorite candy at the New England summer camp I went to as a boy, and being able to eat one without panting was a badge of honor. So it's a little disturbing to learn this: "Mr. Ferrara came up with the idea of spicy-hot Atomic FireBalls in 1954, after serving in Occupied Japan in the post-atom bomb era, according to his son, company CEO Salvatore Ferrara II." Ferrara was 93.
Angelo Dundee, 1921-2012
I used to love boxing, before I finally, inevitably came around to the idea that it is pretty much barbaric. I basically have a year or two before I finally accept the same thing about football, so I'm hoping the Saints win one more in that time. But, yeah, there comes a point where you can no longer watch something that is essentially damaging its participants for your entertainment. But thank God there was a time before we realized that, and could celebrate men like Angelo Dundee, one of the sport's greatest trainers, who passed away yesterday at the age of 90.
Don Cornelius, 1936-2012
Mellifluent Soul Train creator Don Cornelius shot himself to death early this morning at his home in Los Angeles. "Before MTV there was Soul Train, that will be the great legacy of Don Cornelius," said Quincy Jones in a statement to press. "His contributions to television, music and our culture as a whole will never be matched." Above, the first (and reportedly only) episode in which Cornelius himself danced down the famous Soul Train Line.
Jimmy Castor, 1947-2012
New York singer, saxophonist and band leader Jimmy Castor died yesterday of as-yet-unknown causes. The very funky Castor took Frankie Lymon's place in the doo-wop group The Teenagers in 1957 (when he was not yet a teenager). And he went on to solo success with "Hey, Leroy, Your Mama's Callin' You," which has been sampled a lot, notably on the Beastie Boys' "Hold It Now, Hit It," and which also seems, pretty clearly, to have been source material for Paul Simon's "Me and Julio Down By the Schoolyard." Castor had his biggest success in the early '70s, with his group The Jimmy Castor Bunch. Samples of the above "Troglodyte (Caveman)" and the title track from the 1972 album It's Only Just Begun have been used in too many rap songs to count.
Ronald Searle, 1920-2011
Ronald Searle, "Britain's greatest graphic artist," and, with Geoffrey Willans, creator of what may be the most embarrassing book one can read in public because it is impossible to refrain from laughing aloud, has died at the age of 91.
Ralph MacDonald, 1944-2011
"I don't want to be a superstar. Above all, I'm a musician first." READ MORE
Václav Havel, 1936-2011
"The original and most important sphere of activity, one that predetermines all the others, is simply an attempt to create and support the independent life of society as an articulated expression of living within the truth." —Václav Havel, 1978.
Russell Hoban, 1925-2011
"I think death will be a good career move for me. People will say, 'Yes, Hoban, he seems an interesting writer, let's look at him again.'" READ MORE
