Boing Boing » obits

Divinyls singer Chrissy Amphlett dies of breast cancer, MS

Xeni Jardin — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 13:46:53 +0000

The charismatic lead singer of Australian new wave band The Divinyls, Chrissy Amphlett, has died in her New York home of cancer and multiple sclerosis. She was 53. Above, "I Touch Myself," the autoerotic anthem of '80s teen females that became the Divinyls' greatest hit.

Last month, on her Facebook page, she wrote about the experience of being a breast cancer patient since 2010:

"Unfortunately the last 18 months have been a real challenge for me having breast cancer and MS and all the new places that will take you. You become sadly a patient in a world of waiting rooms, waiting sometimes hours for a result or an appointment. You spend a lot time in cold machines... hospital beds, on your knees praying for miracles, operating rooms, tests after tests, looking at healthy people skip down the street like you once did and you took it all for granted and now wish you could do that. I have not stopped singing throughout all this in my dreams and to be once again performing and doing what I love to do."

I know how that feels.

More: Divinyls singer Chrissy Amphlett dies. (ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation, thanks Eliot)

More at Rolling Stone, and Reuters.

Once again, every single obit I just linked to there uses the trite phrase "battling cancer," "fighting cancer," or "lost her battle with cancer." Once again, I will take the opportunity to remind the world that cancer is a biological process involving cells that refuse to do what they're supposed to do inside our bodies, not a "fight" that the weaker souls among us "lose." Please stop using that phrase.

Great dad dies (also, he was a scientist)

Maggie Koerth-Baker — Mon, 01 Apr 2013 18:59:31 +0000

Handsome Dad of the Year (a former brunette) took out the garbage without fail, did the family shopping, and is remembered fondly by his step-daughters/first-cousins-once-removed. Also, outside the home, he discovered something called "relativity". Jennie Dusheck has a great follow up to a story that Xeni posted about earlier today.

Worlds longest cat dies

Rob Beschizza — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:19:06 +0000

"Stewie the Cat, the longest domestic cat in the world at more than 4 feet long from nose to tail, has died." [AP]

Bam Bam the car-ramming sheep dies of natural causes

Rob Beschizza — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 18:15:42 +0000

"A bighorn sheep named Bam Bam because of his habit of butting vehicles at a Wyoming park has died with his horns, likely of natural causes." [Standard Examiner]

Ravi Shankar, RIP: A performance on the Dick Cavett Show, and a reporter's recollections of a visit with Raviji

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 14:26:01 +0000

George Harrison of the Beatles, studying sitar with Pandit Ravi Shankar.

In the clip above, the late Indian music legend Pandit Ravi Shankar (web, Wikipedia, Amazon) performs on the Dick Cavett show, in an episode where his friend George Harrison of the Beatles introduces him to the viewing audience.

His family and his foundation have released a statement on the day of his death (PDF), with an obituary by Oliver Craske, a writer and editor who worked on Raviji's autobiography, ‘Raga Mala.’ Snip:

It is with heavy hearts we write to inform you that Pandit Ravi Shankar, husband, father, and musical soul, passed away today, December 11th, 2012. As you all know, his health has been fragile for the past several years and on Thursday he underwent a surgery that could have potentially given him a new lease of life. Unfortunately, despite the best efforts of the surgeons and doctors taking care of him, his body was not able to withstand the strain of the surgery. We were at his side when he passed away.

Read the rest here at the Shankar Foundation website. He had upper-respiratory and heart problems, and underwent heart-valve replacement surgery last week. The surgery was successful, but recovery was too much for the 92-year-old musician. His last performance was with his daughter, sitarist Anoushka Shankar, on November 4 in Long Beach, California. It was a celebration of his tenth decade of creating music.

I interviewed him in 2003 at his home north of San Diego for Grammy Magazine. The article is no longer online, but I'll try to dig it up from the old print copy. His home was set up a little like an Indian villa, and I remember feeling like I was back in India as I sat on the floor in the room where he received guests and visiting reporters. He was very patient and attentive; very sweet to this starstruck and stuttering reporter.

Asking him questions about his formative years as a young musician, his early life, his years with the Beatles—it was such an amazing experience for someone who'd grown up revering his work as I had.

He had an awesome sense of humor, and told me great tales about what it was like to be the most famous Indian musician in the world during the sixties, hordes of groupies and superstardom and all. The racier bits didn't make it in to the story, but man, they sure were some crazy tales.

He won eight Grammys that year, a few months after the piece ran.

Backstage at one of his performances with Anoushka (a totally amazing show!), his wife Sukanya told me he was grateful to me, because he thought the article I wrote had something to do with him being awarded all those Grammys.

It did not, but it was one of the great, great honors of my life to sit in the home of this legendary man, whose music transformed the lives of so many, and transformed the way we think about music itself.

What a sad day today is. What a great legacy this man leaves us.

In the New York Times, a roundup of observations on his passing, from within India and around the world.

Russell Means, Native American activist and actor, dead of cancer at 72

Xeni Jardin — Mon, 22 Oct 2012 17:17:29 +0000

Native American political activist and actor Russell Means, founding member of AIM, has died at 72 of esophageal cancer. A NYT obituary is here. More: russellmeans.com.

Iconic erotic film star Sylvia Kristel of ‘Emmanuelle’ dies of cancer at 60

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 19 Oct 2012 16:08:55 +0000

Actress Sylvia Kristel died this week at 60 years of age. “She died during the night during her sleep,” her agent, Marieke Verharen, told the AFP news agency. The cause of her death was cancer. In recent years, she received treatment for throat and liver cancer, and suffered a stroke.

She is most famous for her role in the 1970s cult-erotic hit "Emmanuelle." Dangerous Minds has an obit, and the New York Times. Her memoir is a sad and illuminating read.

Herbert Lom, who played stressed-out boss of Inspector Clouseau in "Pink Panther" films, has died

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 02:16:56 +0000

Czech-born actor Herbert Lom, best known as the weary boss of Inspector Clouseau in the Peter Sellers Pink Panther movies, died today at 95 years of age.

His son Alec Lom told the Associated Press that his dad "died peacefully in his sleep at home in London."

A two-part series of clips on YouTube:

Part 1, and Part 2.

Steve Jurvetson, on the recurring nightmare Neil Armstrong had for two years leading up to Apollo 11

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 29 Aug 2012 17:08:47 +0000

Venture capitalist, photographer, and master-level space fanatic Steve Jurvetson has been digging in to his archives for snapshots and relics related to the life and legacy of the late astronaut Neil Armstrong. For instance: above, a vintage 11”x 14” X-ray of Armstrong's lunar EVA spacesuit boots dated 7-7-69, only 9 days before the launch.

You can scroll through more photos here, on Steve's Facebook page.

Steve shared some amazing conversations with the "First Man," from what I can tell. Here's one:

Tang is a farce. That was the first thing Neil Armstrong told me last night. “We did not use it on the Apollo missions.”
I asked him, of all of the systems and stages of the mission, which did he worry about the most? (the frequently failing autopilot? the reliance on a global network of astronomers to spot solar flares in time to get the warning out? the onboard computers being less powerful than a Furby?....)
He gave a detailed answer about the hypergolic fuel mixing system for the lunar module. Rather than an ignition system, they had two substances that would ignite upon contact. Instead of an electric pump, he wished he had a big simple lever to mechanically initiate mixing.
That seemed a bit odd to me at first. So, I asked if he gave that answer because it really was the most likely point of failure, or because it symbolizes a vivid nightmare – having completed the moon mission, pushing the button... and the engines just wont start.
He responded that he had dreams about that for two years prior to the launch.

Reminds me of what Warren Ellis wrote on the day Armstrong died:

Neil Armstrong has died, aged 82. Manually flew a spaceship and landed it on the Moon. Relaunched it with a bit of a pen. Beat that.
— Warren Ellis (@warrenellis) August 25, 2012

“I am, and ever will be, a white-socks, pocket-protector, nerdy engineer,” Armstrong said at a millennial gathering honoring the greatest engineering achievements of the 20th century. A modest man. One who will inspire nerdy engineers for ages to come.

Coroner: "Top Gun" filmmaker Tony Scott did not have brain cancer

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 17:54:04 +0000

Filmmaker Tony Scott jumped to his death on Sunday, off a bridge in Southern California. Early reports from ABC News (which were copy-pasted by TMZ, HuffPo, and other outlets) that the "Top Gun" director killed himself after learning that he had an inoperable brain tumor were apparently false.

For Aileen.

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 01:27:12 +0000

My boyfriend Miles O'Brien lost his beloved little sister to breast cancer today. She was only 46 years old.

They both lost their mom to it a few weeks after I was diagnosed with the same disease.

There is so much to say about what a beautiful soul Aileen was, what a cruel and ugly and brutal disease breast cancer is, how torturous treatment is, how enraging it is that science and medicine have nothing better to offer us yet, how unjust the financial devastation a diagnosis brings to so many women is—and, most of all, what it means to those of us with cancer to have the kind of support in our lives that men like Miles provide, selflessly and heroically and with unconditional love.

But for now, I just want the world to see, respect, and remember this photograph Miles took of his sister this morning, shortly before her life ended. He brought her dog Jethro from her home to the hospice house so Jethro could also say goodbye.

Gone but still loved by all. RIP Aileen Crimmings O'Brien Graef - 10/30/64-8/21/2012

She is survived by two beautiful daughters, Katie and Aileen, whom she loved very much.

And, their dog Jethro.

Update: Miles and her daughters suggest that donations in honor of Aileen be sent to Visiting Nurses Association of the Treasure Coast (@vnatc), 1110 35th Lane. Vero Beach, FL 32960. This is the hospice center that cared for Aileen in her final days. Services at Strunk Funeral Home, 916 17th Street, Vero Beach, FL 32960. If you wish to send cards or flowers, this is the best address.

Image link (photo: Miles O'Brien).

No one should die this way (@46!) How many more must we lose before we get serious about curing #cancer? Photo: @xeni twitter.com/milesobrien/st…
— Miles O'Brien (@milesobrien) August 21, 2012

David Rakoff, 1964-2012

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 10 Aug 2012 15:07:09 +0000

David Rakoff, best known as a storyteller, author, and a regular contributor to the radio programs "This American Life" and "Fresh Air," has died of cancer. The news first appeared on the website Third Beat. Rakoff wrote beautifully about the experience of going through treatment here, in the New York Times.

Choire Sicha at the Awl:

David Rakoff—writer, aesthete, genius, New York devotee (the City was "the great love of my life," he wrote), exceptional reporter and observer, performer, director and incredibly kind person—died after a phenomenally unfair and incredibly prolonged series of medical travails, which rarely slowed his creative output or his deeply human black humor. In early 2009, a pinched nerve was discovered to be a malignant sarcoma, caused, he said, by the radiation treatments from the lymphoma he'd had two decades before. An incredibly complicated and ethical person, Rakoff channeled his anxieties both into crafts, making elaborate products in his incredibly organized home such as duct tape wallets, but also into a phenomenal amount of writing.

The New York Times Artbeat blog remembers him here. Writing in the Times about "the empathy broadcast," a thing that we who have cancer experience from some who mean well, Rakoff said:

We like to think that the empathy broadcast with the swooping, downward intonation of the “aaawwww” is an evolutionary comfort; something we are programmed to welcome and offer freely ourselves. As a comment on something that has already happened, it probably works. But as an anticipatory tool, it does not soften the blow, indeed it does the opposite. It leaves you exposed, like grabbing onto the trunk of a tree for support in a storm only to find the wood soaked through and punky and coming apart in your hands. The sweetest bedtime-story delivery is no help when the words it delivers are a version of “ . . . and behind this door is a tiger. Brace yourself.”

More at The Atlantic. * Photo by Don Denton.

Gore Vidal, 1925-2012

Xeni Jardin — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 04:18:49 +0000

Writer, analyst, and eloquent opinionator Gore Vidal died today. He was 86. The LA Times reports that he died Tuesday in his Hollywood Hills home, from complications related to pneumonia.

In his lifetime, Vidal received the National Book Award, wrote many novels, short stories, plays and essays. He was a political activist, and received the most votes of any Democrat in more than 50 years when he ran as a Democratic candidate for Congress in upstate New York. Vidal's The City and the Pillar was one of the first American novels to present homosexuality in a direct manner, and outraged many at the time.

Above, his epic 1968 debate with noted dirtbag William Buckley, in which he tells Buckley to "shut up," and calls him a "cryptonazi."

Vidal was a literary juggernaut who wrote 25 novels, including historical works such as “Lincoln” and “Burr” and satires such as “Myra Breckinridge” and “Duluth.” He was also a prolific essayist whose pieces on politics, sexuality, religion and literature -- once described as “elegantly sustained demolition derbies” -- both delighted and inflamed and in 1993 earned him a National Book Award for his massive “United States Essays, 1952-1992.”
Threaded throughout his pieces are anecdotes about his famous friends and foes, who included Anais Nin, Tennessee Williams, Christopher Isherwood, Orson Welles, Truman Capote, Frank Sinatra, Jack Kerouac, Marlon Brando, Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Eleanor Roosevelt and a variety of Kennedys. He counted Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and Al Gore among his relatives.
He also wrote Broadway hits, screenplays, television dramas and a trio of mysteries under a pseudonym that remain in print after 50 years.

Writer Gore Vidal, 86, has died (LAT)

Here's an Associated Press obit.

Here's an extensive fan-site with an index of his works.

Below, another classic television moment with Vidal, vs. Norman Mailer.

Amid PR crisis, top Chick-fil-A publicist dies

Xeni Jardin — Fri, 27 Jul 2012 19:33:33 +0000

The Midland, GA-based fast food chain Chick-fil-A has been in the middle of a public relations firestorm over homophobic comments by its CEO. Today, the company's chief spokesman Don Perry died unexpectedly. Various news outlets are reporting the cause of death as a heart attack, citing Ross Cathy, owner of the fast food chain and family member of company CEO, Dan Cathy, as a source. The company's CEO has long made his conservative, non-gay-friendly political positions known, but recent remarks against gay marriage sparked widespread protest. The company is now being sued by a former employee (PDF) over allegations of gender discrimination.

RIP, Donald J. Sobol, creator of Encyclopedia Brown

Cory Doctorow — Fri, 20 Jul 2012 01:31:40 +0000

Donald J. Sobol, the author who created the great Encyclopedia Brown series, died last week. Encyclopedia Brown were kids' mystery stories about a boy detective, whose solution required careful reading and imaginative reasoning. When I started working on Little Brother, I told people it would be "Encyclopedia Brown meets Wargames" -- and I've often noodled with the idea of a set of contemporary, Internet-based mystery stories called "Wikipedia Brown."

I'm always running into die-hard Encyclopedia Brown fans in the happy mutants set. GeekDad's Ethan Gilsdorf is another megafan, and he's written a very good, informative obit for Sobol:

I lived vicariously through Encyclopedia Brown. And I came up with a hundred schemes a summer to make money, trick the bully, or otherwise engineer a scenario to be the smart one who would sweep in to save the day.
But Encyclopedia’s success wasn’t only due to his problem-solving prowess. Credit his best pal (and girl Friday) Sally Kimball: older, stronger and sometimes smarter. She also could stand up to Bugs, and was Encyclopedia’s bodyguard. That was a novel premise, to give that role of “the muscle” to a girl.

Update: There's one more Encyclopedia Brown book coming out in the fall (Thanks, Craig Pittman!)

R.I.P. Donald J. Sobol, Encyclopedia Brown Author, 1924-2012

"Queen of Clown Porn" Hollie Stevens, 30, dies of breast cancer

Xeni Jardin — Tue, 10 Jul 2012 01:09:18 +0000

Image: Hollie Stevens, via Flickr.

The alt-adult performer known as Hollie Stevens (Twitter, Tumblr, Flickr, Wikipedia, MySpace) has died of breast cancer.

In addition to her work in indie pornography (including "clown porn", NSFW link), she was also a model for, and contributor to, the weirdo horror-rotica zine Girls and Corpses.

From an early account of Hollie's story by Vanessa Pinto at SF Weekly, it sounds like the lack of access to affordable health care (and health insurance) was a significant factor in the case of Hollie, a freelance creative based in San Francisco:

She was no different than a lot of us when we were young who believe we're invincible. So when this very young healthy woman noticed a lump on her breast, she let it go at first.
"I noticed it and paid attention to it, but going to the doctor is hard when you don't have insurance," says Stevens.
The lump didn't go away.

More from Vanessa Pinto, this time writing Hollie's obituary one year later:

Debuting in 2000 as feature dancer, "Holly Wood," she traveled across the U.S. performing to packed houses. She was nominated for an AVN in 2004 for Best Group Sex Scene, (The Bachleor) and won the AVN award in 2004 for Best All-Girl Scene (The Violation of Jessica Darlin). Hollie performed in over 170 titles as well as being featured on kink.com, DungeonCorp.com, hogtied.com, chantasbitches.com, The Howard Stern Show, performing at the Lusty Lady, and more.
An accomplished painter with works hanging in the Hyena Gallery in Burbank, Hollie was also a long-time writer and model for Girls and Corpses magazine, a DJ, live visual manipulator, performance artist, kickboxing champion, and an extraordinary wife and friend.

This woman was diagnosed at age 29 with stage 3 metastatic breast cancer just over a year ago. Now she is gone. Fuck you, cancer.

From the blog for Solace SF, an organization in San Francisco that helps provide health care resources to people who work in the adult industry:

in one of our last conversations, i asked her what she wanted to be known and remembered as. the following was her answer:
“I hope people know I’m always myself. I take pride in what others think may be weird about me! [she laughed for about 10 seconds and then said:] I’d also want people to know what I love most, what what makes me happy, is being a friend and a wife. That’s what I would want them to know and remember.” i love you, Hollie. and we will always remember.

Farewell, fellow happy mutant.

@holliestevens memorial has been planned for Monday, July 23rd, here in SF, with a private service, and a public party, more details soon.
— eric cash (@ericcash) July 8, 2012

(thanks, @gillyarcht)

Image: Cover of an edition of "Girls and Corpses," featuring Hollie Stevens.

"Lady Diabla," 11"x15" unframed watercolor on paper, Hollie Stevens. Via hyaenagallery.com.

Neil Gaiman on Maurice Sendak

Cory Doctorow — Wed, 09 May 2012 22:16:07 +0000

Wired's Geeta Dayal got a lovely remembrance of Maurice Sendak from Neil Gaiman. Sendak died yesterday.

As a parent, I read Where the Wild Things Are to my children. But [my daughter] Holly’s favorite was Outside, Over There, and I must have read it to her hundreds of times, perhaps thousands of times, marveling at Sendak’s economy of words, his cruelty, his art...
“What I loved, what I always responded to, was the feeling that Sendak owed nothing to anyone in the books that he made. His only obligation was to the book, to make it true. His lines could be cute, but there was an honesty that transcended the cuteness.
Too many parents and too many writers of children’s books don’t respect the fact that kids know a great deal and suffer a great deal.
I was 11 or 12, and had been given a small allowance by my parents to buy my littlest sister, who did not read, books, if I would read them to her. I loved books and reading aloud. It was liberating, transgressive and a dream come to life: I understood the nakedness, could not understand why all the chefs were Oliver Hardy but loved that all the chefs were Oliver Hardy. Years later I discovered Little Nemo in Slumberland, and In The Night Kitchen came into focus.

Remembering Maurice Sendak

Alan Turing's obituaries

Cory Doctorow — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 04:13:44 +0000

David Stutz has posted a small collection of obituaries for Alan Turing after he was hounded to suicide as a punishment for being gay. Here's my favorite:

“For those who knew him here [at Sherborne] the memory is of an even-tempered, lovable character with an impish sense of humour and a modesty proof against all achievement. You would not take him for a Wrangler, the youngest Fellow of King’s and the youngest F.R.S. [Fellow of the Royal Society], or as a Marathon runner, or that behind a negligé appearance he was intensely practical. Rather you recollected him as one who buttered his porridge, brewed scientific concoctions in his study, suspended a weighted string from the staircase wall and set it swinging before Chapel to demonstrate the rotation of the Earth by its change of direcction by noon, produced proofs of the postulates of Euclid, or brought bottles of imprisoned flies to study their “decadence” by inbreeding. On holidays in Cornwall or Sark he was a lively companion even to the extent of mixed bathing at midnight. During the war he was engaged in breaking down enemy codes, and had under him a regiment of girls, supervised to his amusement by a dragon of a female. His work was hush-hush, not to be divulged even to his mother. For it he was awarded the O.B.E. He also adopted a young Jewish refugee and saw him through his education. Besides long distance running, his hobbies were gardening and chess; and occasionally realistic water-colour painting.
In all his preoccupation with logic, mathematics, and science he never lost the common touch; in a short life he accomplished much, and to the roll of great names in the history of his particular studies added his own.” — The Sherbornian, Summer Term 1954

obituary quotations

RIP: Night of the Living Dead's #1 zombie

Cory Doctorow — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 14:13:59 +0000

Antinous sez, "RIP Bill Hinzman, the actor who played the first zombie in Night of the Living Dead." Mr Hinzman died of cancer at the age of 75.

Hinzman was working on the movie as an assistant cameraman when Romero spotted him and knew he'd found his zombie muse. "We'd like to tell the story that it was a hard audition session," said Russ Steiner, who co-produced the film and played Johnny. "But Bill was there and old enough and thin enough and he had an old suit." Hinzman (whose name is spelled "Heinzman" in the credits of Living Dead) remained in Romero's orbit for years, working in a variety of functions on There's Always Vanilla, Hungry Wives, and The Crazies, as well as the equally chilling 1974 TV sports documentary O. J. Simpson: Juice On The Loose.
He’d largely drifted out of the business by the time Romero's post-Living Dead career really began in earnest with Martin and Dawn Of The Dead, but by the late 1980s, his cult status was secure, and he found himself lured back to appear in a number of low-budget horror pictures where his presence served as an instant in-joke. (For example: In 2006’s Shadow: Dead Riot—starring Night Of The Living Dead remake lead—Hinzman’s character is billed as "Romero the Zombie".)

R.I.P. Bill Hinzman, Night Of The Living Dead's original zombie

Jack Goldman, 1921-2011

Rob Beschizza — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 14:45:15 +0000

Jacob "Jack" Goldman, the founder of Xerox PARC, died Tuesday at 90. In the New York Times's obit, John Markoff describes how Goldman's vision convinced a copier company to invest in the future, even if it had no idea what to do with the returns: "PARC researchers designed a remarkable array of computer technologies, including the Alto personal computer, the Ethernet office network, laser printing and the graphical user interface. ... Years later, Dr. Goldman explained Xerox’s failure ... as part of a large corporation’s unwillingness to take risks."