Günther Simon (1925 - 1972)

A bank clerk’s son, Günther Simon attended an acting school already in Gymnasium. At the age of 16, he was sent to a premilitary training camp of the Hitler Youth and then drafted to the Reich Labour Service. He volunteered to join the paratroopers in August 1943. He was captured by American troops near Normandy […]

Maurice White (1941 - 2016)

Maurice White Earth, Wind and Fire vocalist and co-founder Maurice White died in his sleep in Los Angeles on Wednesday evening. A rep for the band confirmed his passing toRolling Stone. He was 74. Savor the smoothest soul and most enlightened funk from the hitmaking legends The singer had been battling Parkinson’s disease since 1992, according […]

Hannjo Hasse (1921 - 1983)

Hannjo Hasse (31 August 1921 – 5 February 1983) was an East German actor. Hasse began studying acting in 1938, and attended Lily Ackermann’s Institute for Stage Artists’ Education in Berlin. At 1941, he was drafted for the Labour Service, and later to the Army. After the end of the Second World War and his release […]

Deborah Jin (1968 - 2016)

Deborah S. Jin (November 15, 1968 – September 15, 2016) was an American physicist and fellow with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST); Professor Adjunct, Department of Physics at the University of Colorado; and a fellow of the JILA, a NIST joint laboratory with the University of Colorado. She is considered a pioneer in […]

Evan Mecham (1924 - 2008)

Evan Mecham (/ˈmiːkəm/ mee-kəm; May 12, 1924 – February 21, 2008) was the 17th Governor of Arizona. A decorated veteran of World War II, Mecham earned his living as an automotive dealership owner and occasional newspaper publisher. Periodic runs for political office earned him a reputation as a perennial candidate along with the nickname of […]

Rose Mofford (1922 - 2016)

Rose Mofford was born Rose Perica in Globe, Arizona, on June 10, 1922, the youngest of six children. Her parents, Frances (Oberstar) and John Perica, had immigrated to the United States from Croatia, then part of Austria–Hungary. The first female class president in the history of Globe High School, she had great success in both […]

Edward Albee (1928 - 2016)

Edward Albee was born in 1928. He was placed for adoption two weeks later and taken to Larchmont in Westchester County, New York, where he grew up. Albee’s adoptive father, Reed A. Albee, the wealthy son of vaudeville magnate Edward Franklin Albee II, owned several theaters. His adoptive mother, Reed’s third wife, Frances (Cotter), was […]

Charmain Carr (1942 - 2016)

Charmain Carr was born Charmian Anne Farnon in Chicago, Illinois, the second child of vaudeville actress Rita Oehmen and musician Brian Farnon. The couple divorced in 1957. She has two sisters, both actresses (Shannon Farnon and Darleen Carr). Her family moved to Los Angeles when she was 10. While a student at San Fernando High […]

Joey Feek (1975 - 2016)

Joey Feek Country singer Joey Feek, whose final months battling cervical cancer were chronicled through a series of emotional posts on social media and her husband’s blog, died Friday. She was 40. “My wife’s greatest dream came true today,” her spouse and musical partner, Rory Feek, wrote in a blog post. “She is in Heaven. […]

Garry Shandling (1949 - 2016)

Garry Shandling Comedian, actor, writer and producer Garry Shandling, known for “It’s Garry Shandling’s Show” and “The Larry Sanders Show,” died Thursday, the Los Angeles Police Department confirmed. He was 66. A spokesman for the LAPD said they received a 911 call from Shandling’s home on Thursday, saying the comedian suffered from a “medical emergency.” […]

Theresa Saldana (1954 - 2016)

Theresa Saldana Theresa Saldana, who co-starred on The Commish and in Raging Bull but whose most lasting legacy might be the victims’ advocacy work she undertook following a near-fatal stalking incident in 1982, has died. She was 61. Two friends confirmed her death in Facebook posts Monday. She had been hospitalized in Los Angeles, but no cause of death was given. […]

Ann Morgan Guilbert (1928 - 2016)

Ann Morgan Guilbert Ann Morgan Guilbert, beloved as the next-door neighbor on “The Dick Van Dyke Show” and seen recently on CBS’ comedy “Life in Pieces,” has died. Guilbert died of cancer in Los Angeles on Tuesday, her daughter Nora Eckstein said. She was 87. Recent TV appearances included a starring role on the hospital comedy “Getting On” […]

Paul Fix (1901 - 1983)

Paul Fix was born in Dobbs Ferry, New York, to Wilhelm Fix, a brewmaster, and the former Louise C. Walz,[citation needed] though some sources say he was born Paul Fix Morrison His mother and father were German immigrants who had left their Black Forest home and arrived in New York City in the 1870s. A veteran […]

Joseph Schildkraut (1896 - 1964)

Joseph Schildkraut was born in Vienna, Austria, the son of Erna (née Weinstein) and stage (and later motion picture) actor Rudolph Schildkraut. His family was Jewish. The younger Schildkraut moved to the United States in the early 1900s. He appeared in many Broadway productions. Among the plays that he starred in was a notable production […]

Bob Steele (1907 - 1988)

Bob Steele’s career began to take off for good in 1927, when he was hired by production company Film Booking Offices of America (FBO) to star in a series of Westerns. Renamed Bob Steele at FBO, he soon made a name for himself, and in the late 1920s, 1930s and 1940s starred in B-Westerns for […]

Chill Wills (1902 - 1978)

Chill Wills was born in 1902 in Seagoville, Dallas County, Texas. He was a performer from early childhood, forming and leading the Avalon Boys singing group in the 1930s. After appearing in a few westerns, he disbanded the group in 1938 and struck out on a solo acting career. One of his more memorable roles was […]

Max Terhune (1891 - 1973)

Max Terhune’s father died when he was seven (1898). He worked as a tool maker and when he was 20 he played semi-pro baseball for teams in Minneapolis and Indianapolis; he also spent the 1913 season playing Class-D baseball for the Vincennes Alices of the Kitty League. During this time he became friends with Kermit […]

Forrest Tucker (1919 - 1986)

Forrest Tucker described himself as a farm boy. He was born in Plainfield, Indiana, a son of Forrest A. Tucker and his wife, Doris Heringlake. His mother has been described as an alcoholic. Tucker began his performing career at age 14 at the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair, pushing the big wicker tourist chairs by day […]

Joseph Kane (1894 - 1975)

Jasper Joseph Inman Kane (March 19, 1894, San Diego – August 25, 1975, Santa Monica, California) was an American film director, film producer, film editor and screenwriter. He is best known for his extensive directorship and focus on Western films. Joseph Kane began his career as a professional cellist. In 1934 he took an interest in […]

Norm Ferguson (1902 - 1957)

William Norman “Norm” Ferguson (September 2, 1902 – November 4, 1957) was an animator for Walt Disney Studios and a central contributor to the studio’s stylistic development in the 1930s. He is most frequently noted for his contribution to the creation of Pluto, one of the studio’s best-known and most enduring characters, and is the […]

Dickie Jones (1927 - 2014)

Richard Percy “Dickie” Jones was born on Friday, February 25, 1927 in Snyder, some ninety miles south of Lubbock, Texas. The son of a newspaper editor, Jones was a prodigious horseman from infancy, having been billed at the age of four as the “World’s Youngest Trick Rider and Trick Roper”. At the age of six, […]

Jock Mahoney (1919 - 1989)

Jock Mahoney was born in Chicago, Illinois, but reared in Davenport, Iowa. He entered the University of Iowa in Iowa City but dropped out to enlist in the United States Marine Corps when World War II began. He served as a pilot, flight instructor and war correspondent. After his discharge from the Marine Corps he moved to […]

Edward Robinson (1893 - 1973)

Edward G. Robinson (born Emanuel Goldenberg; December 12, 1893 – January 26, 1973) was a Romanian-born American actor. A popular star on stage and screen during Hollywood’s Golden Age, he appeared in 40 Broadway plays and more than 100 films during a 50-year career. He is best remembered for his tough-guy roles as a gangster, […]

Ritchie Valens (1941 - 1959)

Ritchie Valens Mexican-American musician Ritchie Valens is best known for his hit “La Bamba.” His successful career was cut short when he died in a plane crash at age 17. Ritchie Valens was a Mexican-American singer and songwriter influential in the Chicano rock movement. He recorded numerous hits during his short career, most notably the […]

Charles Addams (1912 - 1988)

Charles Samuel Addams was born in Westfield, New Jersey, the son of Grace M. and Charles Huey Addams, a piano-company executive who had studied to be an architect. He was known as “something of a rascal around the neighborhood” as childhood friends recalled. Charles Addams was distantly related to U.S. presidents John Adams and John […]

Ken Weatherwax (1955 - 2014)

Kenneth Patrick Weatherwax (September 29, 1955 – December 7, 2014) was an American child actor. Billed as Ken and nicknamed Kenny, Weatherwax was best known for having played Pugsley Addams on the original The Addams Family black-and-white television series and reprised the role in the television movie Halloween with the New Addams Family. Ken Weatherwax, who […]

George Kennedy (1925 - 2016)

George Kennedy was born on February 18, 1925, in New York City, into a show business family. His father, George Harris Kennedy, a musician and orchestra leader, died when Kennedy was four years old. He was raised by his mother, Helen A. (née Kieselbach), a ballet dancer. His maternal grandfather was a German immigrant; his […]

John Ogonowski (1951 - 2001)

John Ogonowski went to secondary school at Keith Academy, Lowell, Massachusetts. He attended Lowell Technological Institute (now the University of Massachusetts Lowell), where he was a member of the Pi Lambda Phi fraternity. He graduated in 1972 with a bachelor of science degree in Nuclear Engineering. Ogonowski was a pilot in the U. S. Air Force […]

John O’Neill (1952 - 2001)

John O’Neill was born in Atlantic City, New Jersey on February 6, 1952 and had a desire to become an FBI special agent from an early age. As a child, his favorite television show was The F.B.I., a crime drama based around true cases that the bureau had handled. After graduating from Holy Spirit High […]

Mark Bingham (1970 - 2001)

Mark Bingham was born in 1970, the only child of mother Alice Hoagland and father Gerald Bingham. He grew up in Miami, Florida, and Southern California before moving to the San Jose area in 1983. Bingham was an aspiring filmmaker growing up, and began using a video camera as a teenager as a personal diary […]