Loretta Lynn

 

Loretta Lynn (née Webb; born April 14, 1932)^[2] is an American singer-songwriter. In a career which spans six decades in country music, Lynn has released multiple gold albums. She is famous for hits such as "You Ain't Woman Enough (To Take My Man)", "Don't Come Home A-Drinkin' (With Lovin' on Your Mind)", "One's on the Way", "Fist City" and "Coal Miner's Daughter" along with the 1980 biographical film of the same name.

Lynn has received numerous awards and other accolades for her groundbreaking role in country music, including awards from both the Country Music Association and Academy of Country Music as a duet partner and an individual artist. She has been nominated 18 times for a GRAMMY Award, and has won 3 times.^[3] Lynn is the most awarded female country recording artist and the only female ACM Artist of the Decade (1970s). Lynn has scored 24 No. 1 hit singles and 11 number one albums. She ended nearly 50 years of touring on the road after she suffered a stroke in 2017 and then broke her hip in 2018. 

Lynn was born Loretta Webb in Butcher Hollow, Kentucky. She is the eldest daughter and second child born to Clara Marie "Clary" (née Ramey; May 5, 1912 – November 24, 1981) and Melvin Theodore "Ted" Webb (June 6, 1906 – February 22, 1959). Ted was a coal miner and subsistence farmer.^[4] Lynn and her siblings are of Irish and Cherokee descent,^[5] although she is not enrolled with any Native tribe. She was named after the film star Loretta Young.^[6] The other Webb children:

• Melvin "Junior" Webb (December 4, 1929 – July 1, 1993)
• Herman Webb (September 3, 1934 – July 28, 2018)
• Willie "Jay" Lee Webb (February 12, 1937 – July 31, 1996)
• Donald Ray Webb (April 2, 1941 – October 13, 2017)
• Peggy Sue Wright (née Webb; born March 25, 1943)
• Betty Ruth Hopkins (née Webb; born January 5, 1946)
• Crystal Gayle (born Brenda Gail Webb; January 9, 1951)

Loretta's father died at the age of 52 of black lung disease a few years after he relocated to Wabash, Indiana, with his wife and younger children.

Through her matriline, Lynn is first cousins with country singer Patty Loveless (née Ramey). The former Miss America, Venus Ramey, who died in 2017, was also her cousin.

On January 10, 1948, 15-year-old Loretta Webb married Oliver Vanetta "Doolittle" Lynn (August 27, 1926 – August 22, 1996), better known as "Doolittle", "Doo", or "Mooney".^[2] They had met only a month earlier.^[2] The Lynns left Kentucky and moved to the logging community of Custer, Washington, when Loretta was seven months pregnant with the first of their six children.^[4] The happiness and heartache of her early years of marriage would help to inspire Lynn's songwriting.^[7] In 1953, Doolittle bought her a $17 Harmony guitar.^[8] She taught herself to play the instrument, and over the following three years, she worked to improve her guitar playing. With Doolittle's encouragement, she started her own band, Loretta and the Trailblazers, with her brother Jay Lee playing lead guitar. She often appeared at Bill's Tavern in Blaine, Washington, and the Delta Grange Hall in Custer, Washington, with the Pen Brothers' band and the Westerneers. She cut her first record, "I'm a Honky Tonk Girl", in February 1960.^[9]

Lynn became a part of the country music scene in Nashville in the 1960s. In 1967, she had the first of 16 No. 1 hits, out of 70 charted songs as a solo artist and a duet partner.^[10] Her later hits include "Don't Come Home A-Drinkin' (With Lovin' on Your Mind)", "You Ain't Woman Enough (To Take My Man)", "Fist City", and "Coal Miner's Daughter".^[11]

Lynn focused on women's issues with themes about philandering husbands and persistent mistresses. Her music was inspired by issues she faced in her marriage. She increased the boundaries in the conservative genre of country music by singing about birth control ("The Pill"), repeated childbirth ("One's on the Way"), double standards for men and women ("Rated 'X'"), and being widowed by the draft during the Vietnam War ("Dear Uncle Sam").^[12]

Country music radio stations often refused to play her music, banning nine of her songs, but Lynn pushed on to become one of country music's legendary artists.

Her bestselling 1976 autobiography, Coal Miner's Daughter, was made into an Academy Award–winning film of the same title in 1980, starring Sissy Spacek and Tommy Lee Jones. Spacek won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her role as Lynn. Her album Van Lear Rose, released in 2004, was produced by the alternative rock musician Jack White. Lynn and White were nominated for five Grammys and won two.^[13][14]

Lynn has received numerous awards in country and American music. She was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1983, the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1988, and the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2008, and she was honored in 2010 at the Country Music Awards. She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama in 2013.^[15] Lynn has been a member of the Grand Ole Opry since joining on September 25, 1962. Her debut appearance on the Grand Ole Opry was on October 15, 1960. Lynn has recorded 70 albums including 54 studio albums, 15 compilation albums, and one tribute album,^{[16][unreliable source?][17]}

1960–1966: Early country success

Lynn began singing in local clubs in the late 1950s. She later formed her own band, the Trailblazers, which included her brother Jay Lee Webb. Lynn won a wristwatch in a televised talent contest in Tacoma, Washington, hosted by Buck Owens. Lynn's performance was seen by Canadian Norm Burley of Zero Records, who co-founded the record company after hearing Loretta sing.^[18]

Zero Records president, Canadian Don Grashey, arranged a recording session in Hollywood, where four of Lynn's compositions were recorded, including "I'm A Honky Tonk Girl", "Whispering Sea", "Heartache Meet Mister Blues", and "New Rainbow". Her first release featured "Whispering Sea" and "I'm a Honky Tonk Girl". Lynn signed her first contract on February 2, 1960, with Zero. Her album was recorded at United Western Recorders in Hollywood, engineered by Don Blake and produced by Grashey.^[19][20] Musicians who played on the songs were steel guitar player Speedy West,^[21] fiddler Harold Hensely, guitarist Roy Lanham, Al Williams on bass, and Muddy Berry on drums.^[22] Lynn commented on the different sound of her first record: "Well, there is a West Coast sound that is definitely not the same as the Nashville sound ... It was a shuffle with a West Coast beat".^[21]

The Lynns toured the country to promote the release to country stations,^[18] while Grashey and Del Roy took the music to KFOX in Long Beach, California.^[20] When the Lynns reached Nashville, the song was a hit, climbing to No. 14 on Billboard's Country and Western chart, and Lynn began cutting demo records for the Wilburn Brothers Publishing Company. Through the Wilburns, she secured a contract with Decca Records.^[18] The first Loretta Lynn Fan Club formed in November 1960. By the end of the year, Billboard magazine listed Lynn as the No. 4 Most Promising Country Female Artist.^[23]

Lynn's relationship with the Wilburn Brothers and her appearances on the Grand Ole Opry, beginning in 1960,^[24] helped Lynn become the No. 1 female recording artist in country music. Her contract with the Wilburn Brothers gave them the publishing rights to her material. She unsuccessfully fought the Wilburn Brothers for 30 years to regain the publishing rights to her songs after ending her business relationship with them. Lynn stopped writing music in the 1970s because of the contracts. Lynn joined the Grand Ole Opry on September 25, 1962.^[4]

Lynn has credited Patsy Cline as her mentor and best friend during her early years in music. In 2010, when interviewed for Jimmy McDonough's biography of Tammy Wynette, Tammy Wynette: Tragic Country Queen, Lynn said of having best friends in Patsy and Tammy during different times: "Best friends are like husbands. You only need one at a time."^{[citation needed]}

Lynn released her first Decca single, "Success", in 1962, and it went straight to No. 6, beginning a string of top 10 singles that would run throughout the 1970s. Lynn's music began to regularly hit the Top 10 after 1964 with songs such as "Before I'm Over You", which peaked at No. 4, followed by "Wine, Women and Song", which peaked at No. 3. In late 1964, she recorded a duet album with Ernest Tubb. Their lead single, "Mr. and Mrs. Used to Be", peaked within the Top 15. The pair recorded two more albums, Singin' Again (1967) and If We Put Our Heads Together (1969). In 1965, her solo career continued with three major hits, "Happy Birthday", "Blue Kentucky Girl" (later recorded and made a Top 10 hit in the 1970s by Emmylou Harris), and "The Home You're Tearing Down". Lynn's label issued two albums that year, Songs from My Heart and Blue Kentucky Girl.^[25]

Lynn's first self-penned song to crack the Top 10, 1966's "Dear Uncle Sam", was among the first recordings to recount the human costs of the Vietnam War.^[4] Her 1966 hit "You Ain't Woman Enough (To Take My Man)" made Lynn the first country female recording artist to write a No. 1 hit.^[26]

1967–1980: Breakthrough success

In 1967, Lynn reached No. 1 with "Don't Come Home A-Drinkin' (With Lovin' on Your Mind)",^[27] which became one of the first albums by a female country artist to reach sales of 500,000 copies.^[28]

Lynn's next album, Fist City, was released in 1968. The title track became Lynn's second No. 1 hit, as a single earlier that year, and the other single from the album, "What Kind of a Girl (Do You Think I Am)", peaked within the top 10. In 1968, her next studio album, Your Squaw Is on the Warpath, spawned two Top 5 Country hits, including the title track and "You've Just Stepped In (From Stepping Out on Me)". In 1969, her next single, "Woman of the World (Leave My World Alone)", was Lynn's third chart-topper, followed by a subsequent Top 10, "To Make a Man (Feel Like a Man)". Her song "You Ain't Woman Enough (To Take My Man)", was an instant hit and became one of Lynn's all-time most popular. Her career continued to be successful into the 1970s, especially following the success of her autobiographical hit "Coal Miner's Daughter", which peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard Country Chart in 1970. The song became her first single to chart on the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at No. 83. She had a series of singles that charted low on the Hot 100 between 1970 and 1975. The song "Coal Miner's Daughter" later served as the impetus for the bestselling autobiography (1976) and the Oscar-winning biopic, both of which share the song's title.^[29]

In 1973, "Rated "X"" peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard Country Chart and was considered one of Lynn's most controversial hits. The following year, her next single, "Love Is the Foundation", also became a No. 1 country hit from her album of the same name. The second and last single from that album, "Hey Loretta", became a Top 5 hit. Lynn continued to reach the Top 10 until the end of the decade, including 1975's "The Pill", one of the first songs to discuss birth control. Many of Lynn's songs were autobiographical, and as a songwriter, Lynn felt no topic was off limits, as long as it was relatable to women.^[30] In 1976, she released her autobiography, Coal Miner's Daughter, with the help of writer George Vecsey. It became a No. 1 bestseller, making Lynn the first country music artist to make The New York Times Best Seller list.

Professional partnership with Conway Twitty

In 1971, Lynn began a professional partnership with Conway Twitty. As a duo, Lynn and Twitty had five consecutive No. 1 hits between 1971 and 1975, including "After the Fire Is Gone" (1971), which won them a Grammy award, "Lead Me On" (1971), "Louisiana Woman, Mississippi Man" (1973), "As Soon as I Hang Up the Phone" (1974), and "Feelins'" (1974). For four consecutive years, 1972–1975, Lynn and Twitty were named the "Vocal Duo of the Year" by the Country Music Association. The Academy of Country Music named them the "Best Vocal Duet" in 1971, 1974, 1975 and 1976. The American Music awards selected them as the "Favorite Country Duo" in 1975, 1976 and 1977. The fan-voted Music City News readers voted them the No. 1 duet every year between 1971 and 1981, inclusive. In addition to their five No. 1 singles, they had seven other Top 10 hits between 1976 and 1981.^[10]

As a solo artist, Lynn continued her success in 1971, achieving her fifth No. 1 solo hit, "One's on the Way", written by poet and songwriter Shel Silverstein. She also charted with "I Wanna Be Free", "You're Lookin' at Country" and 1972's "Here I Am Again", all released on separate albums. The next year, she became the first country star on the cover of Newsweek.^[31] In 1972, Lynn was the first woman to be nominated and win Entertainer of the Year at the CMA awards. She won the Female Vocalist of the Year and Duo of the Year with Conway Twitty, beating out George Jones and Tammy Wynette and Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton. Wikipedia

 

Crystal Gayle

 

Crystal Gayle (born Brenda Gail Webb; January 9, 1951)^[1] is an American country music singer best known for her 1977 hit "Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue". Initially, Gayle's management and record label were the same as that of her oldest sister, Loretta Lynn. Not finding success with the arrangement after several years, and with Lynn's encouragement, Gayle decided to try a different approach. She signed a new record contract and began recording with Nashville producer Allen Reynolds. Gayle's new sound was sometimes referred to as middle-of-the-road (MOR) or country pop, and was part of a bigger musical trend by many country artists of the 1970s to appeal to a wider audience. Subsequently, Gayle became one of the most successful crossover artists of the 1970s and 80s.^[2][3] Her floor-length hair has become synonymous with her name.^[4]

Gayle began her career in the 1960s performing as a background singer in Lynn's band. Lynn helped her sign a recording contract with Decca Records in 1970. Having minor success, she was encouraged to develop her own musical identity. Under the direction of producer Reynolds at United Artists Records, Gayle shifted towards a country pop style that was more successful. In 1975, "Wrong Road Again" became Gayle's first major hit. However, it was in 1977 when Gayle achieved her biggest success with "Don't It Make My Brown Eyes Blue." The single topped the Billboard country chart, crossed over to the top five of the Billboard Hot 100 and became a major international hit.

Gayle continued having success from the late 1970s and through late 1980s. Her biggest hits included "Ready for the Times to Get Better" (1977), "Talking in Your Sleep" (1978), "Half the Way" (1979) and "You and I" (1982). In the 1990s, Gayle shifted artistic directions by recording various genres of music. This included an album of inspirational music titled Someday (1995) and an album of standards called Crystal Gayle Sings the Heart and Soul of Hoagy Carmichael (1999). During the decade she also owned and operated a fine arts shop called "Crystal's Fine Gifts and Jewelry". Her most recent studio release was in 2019 and Gayle has since continued to tour throughout the world.

Gayle has won one Grammy Award and has been nominated for several others since the 1970s. She has also won five Academy of Country Music awards; those awards include receiving the Cliffie Stone Pioneer Award in 2016. In addition, she has won two Country Music Association awards and three American Music Awards. Rolling Stone ranked her among the 100 greatest country artists of all time and CMT ranked her within their list of the 40 greatest women of country music. Gayle has her own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and was inducted as a member of the Grand Ole Opry in 2017.Wikipedia

 

Lana Turner

 

Lana Turner (/ˈlɑːnə/ LAH-nə;^[a] born Julia Jean Turner; February 8, 1921 – June 29, 1995) was an American actress. Over the course of her nearly 50-year career, she achieved fame as both a pin-up model and a film actress, as well as for her highly publicized personal life. In the mid-1940s, she was one of the highest-paid actresses in the United States, and one of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's (MGM) biggest stars, with her films earning more than $50 million for the studio during her 18-year contract with them. Turner is frequently cited as a popular culture icon of Hollywood glamour and a screen legend of classical Hollywood cinema.^[4]

Born to working-class parents in northern Idaho, Turner spent her childhood there before her family relocated to San Francisco. In 1936, when Turner was 15, she was discovered while purchasing a soda at the Top Hat Malt Shop in Hollywood. At 16, she was signed to a personal contract by Warner Bros. director Mervyn LeRoy, who took her with him when he transferred to MGM in 1938. She soon attracted attention by playing the role of a murder victim in her film debut, LeRoy's They Won't Forget (1937), and she later moved into supporting roles, often appearing as an ingénue.

During the early 1940s, Turner established herself as a leading lady and one of MGM's top stars, appearing in such films as the film noir Johnny Eager (1941); the musical Ziegfeld Girl (1941); the horror film Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941); and the romantic war drama Somewhere I'll Find You (1942), one of several films in which she starred opposite Clark Gable. Turner's reputation as a glamorous femme fatale was enhanced by her critically acclaimed performance in the noir The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946), a role which established her as a serious dramatic actress. Her popularity continued through the 1950s in dramas such as The Bad and the Beautiful (1952) and Peyton Place (1957), the latter for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress.

Intense media scrutiny surrounded the actress in 1958 when her teenage daughter Cheryl Crane stabbed Turner's lover at the time Johnny Stompanato to death in their home during a domestic struggle. Her next film, Imitation of Life (1959), proved to be one of the greatest commercial successes of her career, and her starring role in Madame X (1966) earned her a David di Donatello Award for Best Foreign Actress. Turner spent most of the 1970s in semi-retirement, making her final film appearance in 1980. In 1982, she accepted a much-publicized and lucrative recurring guest role in the television series Falcon Crest, which afforded the series notably high ratings. In 1992, Turner was diagnosed with throat cancer and died of the disease three years later at age 74.Wikipedia

 

Dashiell Hammett

 

Samuel Dashiell Hammett (/ˌdæʃiːl ˈhæmɪt/;^[2] May 27, 1894 – January 10, 1961) was an American author of hard-boiled detective novels and short stories. He was also a screenwriter and political activist. Among the enduring characters he created are Sam Spade (The Maltese Falcon), Nick and Nora Charles (The Thin Man), the Continental Op (Red Harvest and The Dain Curse) and the comic strip character Secret Agent X-9.

Hammett "is now widely regarded as one of the finest mystery writers of all time".^[3] In his obituary in The New York Times, he was described as "the dean of the ... 'hard-boiled' school of detective fiction."^[4] Time included Hammett's 1929 novel Red Harvest on its list of the 100 best English-language novels published between 1923 and 2005.^[5] In 1990, the Crime Writers' Association picked three out of five of his novels for their list of The Top 100 Crime Novels of All Time.^[6] Five years later, four out of five of his novels made The Top 100 Mystery Novels of All Time as selected by the Mystery Writers of America.^[7] His novels and stories also had a significant influence on films, including the genres of private eye/detective fiction, mystery thrillers, and film noir.Wikipedia

 

 

Buddy Holly

 

Charles Hardin Holley (September 7, 1936 – February 3, 1959), known as Buddy Holly, was an American singer-songwriter who was a central and pioneering figure of mid-1950s rock and roll. He was born in Lubbock, Texas, to a musical family during the Great Depression, and learned to play guitar and sing alongside his siblings. His style was influenced by gospel music, country music, and rhythm and blues acts, which he performed in Lubbock with his friends from high school.

He made his first appearance on local television in 1952, and the following year he formed the group "Buddy and Bob" with his friend Bob Montgomery. In 1955, after opening for Elvis Presley, he decided to pursue a career in music. He opened for Presley three times that year; his band's style shifted from country and western to entirely rock and roll. In October that year, when he opened for Bill Haley & His Comets, he was spotted by Nashville scout Eddie Crandall, who helped him get a contract with Decca Records.

Holly's recording sessions at Decca were produced by Owen Bradley, who had become famous for producing orchestrated country hits for stars like Patsy Cline. Unhappy with Bradley's musical style and control in the studio, Holly went to producer Norman Petty in Clovis, New Mexico, and recorded a demo of "That'll Be the Day", among other songs. Petty became the band's manager and sent the demo to Brunswick Records, which released it as a single credited to "The Crickets", which became the name of Holly's band. In September 1957, as the band toured, "That'll Be the Day" topped the US and UK singles charts. Its success was followed in October by another major hit, "Peggy Sue".

The album The "Chirping" Crickets, released in November 1957, reached number five on the UK Albums Chart. Holly made his second appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show in January 1958 and soon after toured Australia and then the UK. In early 1959, he assembled a new band, consisting of future country music star Waylon Jennings (bass), famed session musician Tommy Allsup (guitar), and Carl Bunch (drums), and embarked on a tour of the midwestern U.S. After a show in Clear Lake, Iowa, he chartered an airplane to travel to his next show, in Moorhead, Minnesota. Soon after takeoff, the plane crashed, killing Holly, Ritchie Valens, The Big Bopper, and pilot Roger Peterson in a tragedy later referred to by Don McLean as "The Day the Music Died" in his song "American Pie".

During his short career, Holly wrote and recorded many songs. He is often regarded as the artist who defined the traditional rock-and-roll lineup of two guitars, bass, and drums.^{[citation needed]} He was a major influence on later popular music artists, including Bob Dylan, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, The Hollies (who named themselves in his honor), Elvis Costello, Dave Edmunds, Marshall Crenshaw (who later played Holly), and Elton John. He was among the first artists inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, in 1986. Rolling Stone magazine ranked him number 13 in its list of "100 Greatest Artists". Wikipedia

 

Tennessee Williams

 

Thomas Lanier Williams III (March 26, 1911 – February 25, 1983), known by his pen name Tennessee Williams, was an American playwright and screenwriter. Along with contemporaries Eugene O'Neill and Arthur Miller, he is considered among the three foremost playwrights of 20th-century American drama.^[1]

At age 33, after years of obscurity, Williams suddenly became famous with the success of The Glass Menagerie (1944) in New York City. This play closely reflected his own unhappy family background. It was the first of a string of successes, including A Streetcar Named Desire (1947), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955), Sweet Bird of Youth (1959), and The Night of the Iguana (1961). With his later work, Williams attempted a new style that did not appeal as widely to audiences. His drama A Streetcar Named Desire is often numbered on short lists of the finest American plays of the 20th century alongside Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night and Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman.^[1]

Much of Williams's most acclaimed work has been adapted for the cinema. He also wrote short stories, poetry, essays and a volume of memoirs. In 1979, four years before his death, Williams was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame. Wikipedia

 

Norma Talmadge--Shining Star of the Silent Cinema

 

Norma Marie Talmadge^[1] (May 2, 1894 – December 24, 1957) was an American actress and film producer of the silent era. A major box-office draw for more than a decade, her career reached a peak in the early 1920s, when she ranked among the most popular idols of the American screen.^[2]

A specialist in melodrama, her most famous film was Smilin’ Through (1922),^[3] but she also scored artistic triumphs teamed with director Frank Borzage in Secrets (1924) and The Lady (1925). Her younger sister Constance Talmadge was also a movie star. Talmadge married millionaire film producer Joseph M. Schenck and they successfully created their own production company. After reaching fame in the film studios on the East Coast, she moved to Hollywood in 1922.

Talmadge was one of the most elegant and glamorous film stars of the Roaring '20s. However, by the end of the silent film era, her popularity with audiences had waned.^[4] After her two talkies proved disappointing at the box office, she retired a very wealthy woman.Wikipedia

 

 

John Denver

 

Henry John Deutschendorf Jr. (December 31, 1943 – October 12, 1997),^[3] known professionally as John Denver, was an American singer-songwriter, actor, activist, and humanitarian whose greatest commercial success was as a solo singer. After traveling and living in numerous locations while growing up in his military family, Denver began his music career with folk music groups during the late 1960s.^[4] Starting in the 1970s, he was one of the most popular acoustic artists of the decade and one of its best-selling artists.^[5] By 1974, he was one of America's best-selling performers; AllMusic has called Denver "among the most beloved entertainers of his era".^[6]

Denver recorded and released approximately 300 songs, about 200 of which he composed. He had 33 albums and singles that were certified Gold and Platinum in the U.S by the RIAA,^[7] with estimated sales of more than 33 million units.^[8] He recorded and performed primarily with an acoustic guitar and sang about his joy in nature, disdain for city life, enthusiasm for music, and relationship trials. Denver's music appeared on a variety of charts, including country music, the Billboard Hot 100, and adult contemporary, earning 12 gold and four platinum albums with his signature songs "Take Me Home, Country Roads", "Poems, Prayers & Promises", "Annie's Song", "Rocky Mountain High", "Calypso", "Thank God I'm a Country Boy", and "Sunshine on My Shoulders".

Denver appeared in several films and television specials during the 1970s and 1980s, including the 1977 hit Oh, God!, in which he starred alongside George Burns. He continued to record into the 1990s, also focusing on environmental issues as well as lending vocal support to space exploration and testifying in front of Congress to protest censorship in music. He lived in Aspen for much of his life, and he was known for his love of Colorado. In 1974, Denver was named poet laureate of the state. The Colorado state legislature also adopted "Rocky Mountain High" as one of its two state songs in 2007, and West Virginia did the same for "Take Me Home, Country Roads" in 2014.

An avid pilot, Denver died at age 53 in a single-fatality crash while piloting a recently purchased light plane. Wikipedia

 

 

Robin Williams

 

 

Robin McLaurin Williams (July 21, 1951 – August 11, 2014) was an American actor and comedian. Known for his improvisational skills^[1][2] and the wide variety of characters he created on the spur of the moment and portrayed on film, in dramas and comedies alike,^[3][4] he is regarded as one of the best comedians of all time.^[5][6][7]

Williams began performing stand-up comedy in San Francisco and Los Angeles during the mid-1970s,^[8] and rose to fame playing the alien Mork in the ABC sitcom Mork & Mindy (1978–1982).^[9] After his first starring film role in Popeye (1980), he starred in several critically and commercially successful films including The World According to Garp (1982), Moscow on the Hudson (1984), Good Morning, Vietnam (1987), Dead Poets Society (1989), Awakenings (1990), The Fisher King (1991), Patch Adams (1998), One Hour Photo (2002), and World's Greatest Dad (2009). He also starred in box office successes such as Hook (1991), Aladdin (1992), Mrs. Doubtfire (1993), Jumanji (1995), The Birdcage (1996), Good Will Hunting (1997), and the Night at the Museum trilogy (2006–2014). He was nominated for four Academy Awards, winning Best Supporting Actor for Good Will Hunting. He also received two Primetime Emmy Awards, six Golden Globe Awards, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, and five Grammy Awards.

On August 11, 2014, at age 63, Williams died by suicide at his home in Paradise Cay, California. His autopsy revealed undiagnosed Lewy body disease. Wikipedia

 

Glen Gray

 

Glenn Gray Knoblauch (June 7, 1900 – August 23, 1963),^[1] known professionally as Glen Gray, was an American jazz saxophonist and leader of the Casa Loma Orchestra.^[2]

Gray was born to Lurdie P. and Agnes (Gray) Knoblauch in Roanoke, Illinois, United States.^[1] His father was a saloon keeper and railroad worker who died when Glen was two years of age.^[3] He had an older sister. His widowed mother married George H. DeWilde, a coal miner, and moved her family to Roanoke. Gray graduated from Roanoke High School, in 1917 where he played basketball and acquired his nickname, "Gordo".^[4]

Gray attended the American Conservatory of Music in 1921 but left during his first year to go to Peoria, Illinois, to play with George Haschert's orchestra. From 1924 to 1929, he played with several orchestras in Detroit, Michigan.^[4]

Gray served as leader of the Casa Loma Orchestra though the orchestra itself had been formed as a collective group, with no designated leader.^[1] Their mid-1930s appearances on the long-run radio comedy-variety program, the Camel Caravan,^[1] (introduced with their theme, "Smoke Rings") increased their popularity. Gray chose not to conduct the band in the early years, playing in the saxophone section while violinist Mel Jenssen acted as conductor.^[1] In 1937, the band overwhelmingly voted in favor of Glen leading the orchestra, and Gray finally accepted the job.^[1] By the mid-1940s, Gray would come to own the band and the Casa Loma name. For a time, during this period, the band featured guitarist Herb Ellis, trumpeter Bobby Hackett, pianist Nick Denucci and cornetist Red Nichols.

By 1950, the Casa Loma band had ceased touring, and Gray retired to Massachusetts.^[1] The later recordings on Capitol Records (beginning with Casa Loma in Hi-Fi in 1956 and continuing through the Sounds of the Great Bands series) were done with Gray leading a group of studio musicians in Hollywood (though several of Gray's "alumni" occasionally featured.) In all, some 14 high-fidelity and stereo recordings were made for Capitol under the name of Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra before Gray's death in 1963. ^Wikipedia

Mark Harmon

 

Thomas Mark Harmon was born on September 2, 1951, in Burbank, California, to football player and broadcaster Tom Harmon and actress and artist Elyse Knox (née Kornbrath). Harmon played college football and found success as one of TV's hunkiest actors. While many of his roles have relied on good looks, Harmon was impressive on St. Elsewhere (1982) as the suave doctor who contracted AIDS.

His sisters are Kelly Harmon, the Tic Tac model; and Kristin Harmon, a painter and ex-wife of musician Ricky Nelson. He is the uncle of musicians Matthew Nelson and Gunnar Nelson of the band Nelson, and actress Tracy Nelson. In 1987, Harmon and his wife, actress Pam Dawber, sued his sister Kristin Harmon, for custody of her youngest son, Sam. IMDB 

 

Tom Harmon

 

Thomas Dudley Harmon (September 28, 1919 – March 15, 1990), sometimes known by the nickname "Old 98",^[1] was an American football player, military pilot, actor, and sports broadcaster.

Harmon grew up in Gary, Indiana, and played college football at the halfback position for the University of Michigan from 1938 to 1940. He led the nation in scoring and was a consensus All-American in both 1939 and 1940 and won the Heisman Trophy, the Maxwell Award, and the Associated Press Athlete of the Year award in 1940. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1954.

During World War II, Harmon served as a pilot in the U.S. Army Air Forces. In April 1943, he was the sole survivor of the crash of a bomber he piloted in South America en route to North Africa. Six months later, while flying a P-38 Lightning, he was shot down in a dogfight with Japanese Zeros near Kiukiang in China.

After the war, Harmon played two seasons of professional football for the Los Angeles Rams and had the longest run from scrimmage during the 1946 NFL season. He later pursued a career in sports broadcasting and was the play-by-play announcer for the first televised Rose Bowl in the late 1940s and worked for CBS from 1950 to 1962. He later hosted a 10-minute daily sports show on the ABC radio network in the 1960s and worked as the sports anchor on the KTLA nightly news from 1958 to 1964. He also handled play-by-play responsibility on broadcasts of UCLA football games in the 1960s and 1970s.Wikipedia