Deaths of the Rich and Famous - August, 2019

Arts and Letters

Don Banks (age 57) - Banks spent much of his professional life as a writer for Sports Illustrated, where he became a respected authority on the National Football League. After leaving SI, Banks wrote for Bleacher Report and various sports websites before being hired to cover the Las Vegas Raiders by the local newspaper. Banks died in Canton, Ohio, on August 4, 2019, while covering the Football Hall of Fame inductions.

Ernie Colón (age 88) - The Puerto Rican-born Colón had a long career as a comic book artist, first in children's comics such as Richie Rich and Casper the Friendly Ghost for Harvey Comics. Later, he worked for DC, where he created the character of Arak, Son of Thunder. He spent several years in the 1980s and '90s as an editor at DC; he later worked for Marvel. Colón died of cancer August 8, 2019.

Leslie Gelb (age 82) - Gelb was a correspondent and columnist for the New York Times, with strong ties to politics and the diplomatic service. He was an assistant Secretary of State during the Carter administration, and later served in the Council on Foreigh Relations. He shuttled between journalism and government throughout his career. Gelb died August 31, 2019.

Lee Bennett Hopkins (age 81) - Hopkins was an educator, poet, and author; especially of books and anthologies for children. In addition to several professional works on education, Bennett published several YA novels. His most prolific area, however, was anthologies of children's poetry. At one time, he held a Guinness record for the most anthologies of the genre, 113. Hopkins died August 8, 2019.

Toni Morrison (age 88) - Born Chloe Wofford, Toni Morrison had a career with Random House before publishing her first novel, The Bluest eye, at age 40. Over the next five decades, Morrison published a dozen novels and reaped awards like grapes. She received both the 1998 Pulitzer (for Beloved) and the 1993 Nobel Prize for Literature, always remaining true to her African-American roots. In 2012, President Obama awarded Morrison the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Morrison died August 5, 2019.

Gerard O'Neill (age 77) - O'Neill spent the bulk of his career as an investigative journalist for the Boston Globe, where he was part of the paper's first "Spotlight Team," which won multiple Pulitzer Prizes for reporting, beginning with a 1972 investigation of corruption in the 1970s. One prize came when his team revealed that mobster Whitey Bulger was an FBS informant. O'Neill died August 22, 2019.

Charles Santore (age 84) - Santore began his career as an illustrator in advertising in the 1950s, but in the 1980s shifted his focus to children's literature. He began by illustrating a new release of Beatrix Potter's The Classic Tale of Peter Rabbit, and also illustrated a version of The Wizard of Oz. Over the years he also contributed dozens of celebrity caricatures for the cover of TV Guide.  Santore passed away August 11, 2019.

Business

Jeffrey Epstein (age 66) - Epstein made his name as a banker and financial consultant with relationships with many of the "movers and shakers" of American society. Following a 2005 arrest for sex trafficking in Florida, Epstein was allowed to plead to a lesser charge. In 2019, however, he was arrested on multiple charges of sex crimes. He committed suicide by hanging while in jail awaiting trial on August 10, 2019.

Jeffrey Tarrant (age 63) - Tarrant founded or managed several hedge funds, including the Sequoia Fund; as was active in fields beyond finance. He was one of the backers of bitcoin development as well as instrumental in artificially-guided investment strategies. Tarrant also founded Candescent Films, a documentary film company that specializes in finance studies. Tarrant died August 5, 2019, of brain cancer.

David Koch (age 79) - An American billionaire with massive holdings in extractive industries, particularly "downstream" petroleum, David Koch and his brother Charles Koch were even better known as ultraconservative political activists. Koch died August 23, 2019.

Joe Tortorice (age 70) - Tortorice, a Texas native, was the founder of the regional Jason's Deli chain of restaurants. The chain has almost 250 locations in 28 states; after having started at a single Beaumont, Tex., location in 1976. Tortorice died of cancer August 10, 2019.

Miscellaneous

Alfred Haynes (age 87) - Haynes was piloting a United Airlines DC-10 bound for Chicago when the tail-mounted engine disintegrated and rendered the controls useless. Despite the lack of attitude control, Haynes and his crew brought the plane to a crash landing, saving more than half the passengers. Haynes died August 25, 2019.

Saoirse Kennedy Hill (age 22) - Hill was the granddaughter of the late Robert F. Kennedy and Ethel Kennedy and the daughter of Courtney Kennedy Hill. She was found unresponsive at the Kennedy family compound in Hyannisport, Mass., on August 1, 2019, allegedly of a drug overdose. Hill was a journalism graduate of Boston College who wrote of her depression in that school's student newspaper.

Jim Leavelle (age 99) - Leavelle had a long and distinguished career with the Dallas Police Department, however he will forever be remembered for an event that took place on November 24, 1963. Leavelle was one of the two officers handcuffed to alleged JFK assassin Lee Harvey Oswald when Oswald was shot and killed by Jack Ruby. Leavelle died August 29, 2019.

Rick Loomis (age 77) - Loomis created his first game, a play-by-mail game names Nuclear Destruction, back in the 1970s, while in the Army. He was one of the first, if not the first, gamers to utilize computers when he and his partner bought a computer in 1972 to manage the many ongoing games. His company, Flying Buffalo, sold or managed card and play-by-mail games. Loomis passed away from cancer on August 23, 2019.

Kary Mullis (age 74) - Mullis led a large and varied life, including writing fiction and managing a bakery, before accepting a position with a biotechnology company where he put his multiple biomedicine and biochemistry degrees to work. In 1993, Mullis shared the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for the invention of the revolutionary Polymerase Chain reaction technique. Mullis died of pneumonia August 7, 2019.

Movies, Television, and Stage

Jessi Combs (age 31) - Combs was an xtreme sports television host and race car driver. She hosted racing-related television shows as well as appearing on "Mythbusters." Combs held several women's land-speed records and was attempting to set another when she crashed a jet car on August 27, 2019, and was killed.

Peter Fonda (age 79)  Fonda, the son of actor Henry Fonda and brother of Jane Fonda, was an actor in his own right as well as a producer and director. He will be forever remembered by the boomer generation as Captain America astride a chopper with the American flag painted on the gas tank in "Easy Rider." He appeared in dozens of movies and television shows in a career that lasted from 1963 until his death. Fonda died of lung cancer August 16, 2019.

Valerie Harper (age 80) - Harper was originally cast as Mary Richards' neighbor on "The Mary Tyler Moore Show," but became so popular that she spun off the character of Rhoda Morganstern in her own sitcom, "Rhoda." She was also the title character of the comedy "Valerie." Harper was an actor in theater and film, appearing in Freebie and the Bean and Chapter Two. She won four Emmys and a Golden Globe as Rhoda, and was nominated for a Tony for the play Looped. Harper died August 30, 2019.

D. A. Pennebaker (age 94) - Donn Alan Pennebaker was a documentary filmmaker, especially well-known for his early rock-and-roll films that included such legends as Lennon, Hendrix, Bowie, Dylan, and Redding. In later life, he also filmed the 1992 campaign of Bill Clinton. Pennebaker was awarded a lifetime Academy Award in 2013. He died August 1, 2019.

Larry Siegel (age 93) - Siegel was a comic who wrote across several media, but he is perhaps best known for several years as head writer for television's "The Carol Burnett Show," when he won three Emmy awards in four years. He won several other Emmys for that show and "Laugh-In," and wrote for Playboy and spent 33 yers writing for Mad Magazine. Siegel died August 20, 2019.

Jack Whitaker (age 95) - Whitaker was a broadcast journalist for CBS and ABC during the 1960s, '70s, and '80s; beginning at CBS where he covered horse racing, including Secretariat's 1972 Triple Crown run, and golf. He moved to ABC in 1982, covering both news and sports, including the 1988 Winter Olympics. Whitaker was on the broadcast team for the first Super Bowl in 1967. He was inducted into the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame in 2012 and won  Emmys for his news reporting at ABC. He passed away August 18, 2019.

Music

Henri Belolo (age 88) - The Moroccan-born Belolo was a music promoter, DJ, and songwriter in France and briefly in the United States. He and a friend founded the group The Village People in the 1970s and co-wrote several of their most popular disco hits, including "Y.M.C.A." and "In the Navy." Belolo died August 3, 2019.

Claire Cloninger (age 77) - Cloninger wrote or co-wrote hundreds of songs for Christian artists, including such performers as Sandi Patti and B. J. Thomas. In all, Cloninger received six Dove Awards from the Gospel Music Association. She also wrote more than a dozen books. Cloninger died August 15, 2019.

Jim Cullum, Jr. (age 77) - Cullum was a Dixieland jazz cornet player and preservationist who assembled bands in and around San Antonio, Texas. His band played for thirty years at his club, The Landing, on that city's Riverwalk. He also broadcast the NPR show "Riverwalk Jazz" from his club beginning in 1989. Cullum passed away August 11, 2019.

Larry Taylor (age 77) - Taylor was a long-time session musician on bass and, occasionally, lead guitar. He was a touring member of Canned Heat and John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers, but the majority of his work was contributions to studio albums. He appears on albums ranging from the Monkees (1966) to Tom Waits to Kim Wilson (2017). Taylor passed away August 19, 2019.

Bob Wilber (age 91) - Wilber was a jazz band leader and instrumentalist on the saxophone and clarinet; with a specialty in  traditional jazz  (aka "heroin jazz"). Before starting his own group, Wilber played with such jazz greats as Benny Goodman and Jack Teagarden. His discography includes more than 50 recordings with multiple groups. Wilber died August 4, 2019.

Politics

Kathleen Blanco (age 76) - Blanco, a Democrat, was the first woman ever elected governor of Louisiana when she took office in 2004. She served one term (2004-8), choosing not to run for re-election in the wake of criticism over Louisiana's reaction to Hurricane Katrina. In the last years of her administration, Blanco severely criticized the Bush administration and FEMA for their disaster response. She died August 18, 2019, of cancer.

Princess Christina (age 72) - Christina, also known as Marijke, was the youngest of four daughters of Queen Juliana of the Netherlands and her consort. She was married to a Cuban exile, Jorge Pérez y Guillermo, for twenty years. She was an accomplished musician and patron of the music arts who taught music in a New York Montessori school for several years and sang for her parents' funerals. Christina died August 16, 2019.

Sports

Barry Bennett (age 61) - Bennett had an eleven-year career as an NFL defensive tackle and end, most of it with the Jets and Saints. He recorded 18.5 sacks and 4 fumble recoveries over his career before retiring to Minnesota in 1988. Bennett and his wife were murdered in their home on August 19, 2019, allegedly by their 22-year-old son.

Cedric Benson (age 36) - Benson was a star running back at the University of Texas, which led to the Bears picking him fourth in the 2005 NFL Draft. He spend three seasons witht he Bears followed by four with the Bengals before retiring during the 2012 season at Green Bay. His career netted nearly 7000 combined yards and 33 TDs, not to mention approximately one arrest per year. Benson was killed in a motorcycle accident August 17, 2019.

Jeff Blackshear (age 50) - Blackshear was a college all-american and an NFL player who spent nine seasons with four different teams. He appeared in over 140 games, starting 96 including all regular-season games at guard for the Ravens in 1997-1999. Blackshear died of pancreatic cancer on August 31, 2019.

Cliff Branch (age 71) - Branch was a favorite target of Oakland Raiders QB Ken Stabler for much of his fourteen-year career; including three Super Bowl seasons. The wide receiver finished his career with 501 receptions for almost 9700 yards and 67 TDs, resulting in four Pro Bowl appearances. Branch died August 3, 2019.

Colin Clark (age 35) - Clark spent seven seasons as a professional soccer player in the MSL, most of them in the Colorado Rapids organization. He  played for the Houston Dynamo for three seasons, 2010-12, and made five appearances for the LA Galaxy. He played on the 2009 United States team as well. Clark suffered a heart attack and died on August 26, 2019.

	Tex Clevenger (age 87) - Clevenger was a relief pitcher in the major leagues in an era when most pitchers completed their own games. He appeared in 307 games, starting only 40, and compiled a lifetime 36-37 record with 30 saves. In 1958 his 55 appearances for the Washington Senators led the American League. Clevenger died August 14, 2019.

Donnie Green (age 71) - Green played for eight years in the NFL, six of them as an offensive lineman for the Buffalo Bills. He was one of the linemen who blocked for O. J. Simpson in his record-setting 2000-yard 1973 season. Green finished his career with the Eagles in 1977-78. He died August 28, 2019.

Jim Hardy (age 96) - Hardy was a member of the first team fielded by the Los Angeles Rams, in 1946; that after playing both high school and college ball in LA. He played three seasons for the Rams (1946-8) and three for the Chicago Cardinals (now the Arizona Cardinals) and one for the Lions. Hardy, a quarterback, holds the NFL record for most interceptions thrown in a single game, an eight-pick game against the Eagles in 1950 (he still, however, made the Pro Bowl that year). Hardy died August 16, 2019.

Al Jackson (age 83) - Jackson labored for all or part of six seasons with the hapless Mets, including the team's major-league record 120-loss inaugural season in 1962. He managed to win 43 games, including 10 shutouts, over the interval; including setting a modern-day record for the longest time to complete a nine-inning game. He also pitched for the Cardinals, Pirates, and Reds; compiling a 66-99 record with a sub-4.00 ERA. Jackson died August 19, 2019.

Jim Langer (age 71) - Langer was an NFL Hall of Fame member, elected to the hall in his first year of eligibility. Although he played linebacker in college, Langer made the 1970 Dolphins as a free agent before switching to center in 1972. He played 141 consecutive games at the position including six consecutive years as a Pro Bowler. He finished his career with two seasons at Minnesota. Langer died August 29, 2019, of heart failure.

Vince Naimoli (age 81) - Naimoli was the first owner of the major league baseball franchise in Tampa, Fla., the Tampa Bay (Devil) Rays. He owned the team from its inception in 1998 until he sold a controlling interest in 2004, years in which the Rays never won more than 70 games. Naimoli was renowned for his thrift and what has been politely characterized as a short temper. He died August 25, 2019.

Tom Nissalke (age 87) - Nissalke coached basketball at all levels, from high school to the pros, in a career that spanned almost four decades. He peaked as coach of ABA and NBA teams in the '70s and '80s, including stints with the Jazz, Rockets, and Cavaliers. He was ABA coach of the year in 1972 and NBA coach of the year five years later. Nissalke died August 22, 2019.

Dave Parks (age 77) - Parks spent ten seasons as an NFL wide receiver with the 49ers, Saints, and Oilers. He was the number 1 pick in the 1964 draft by San Francisco, where he spent four seasons include three as a Pro Bowl pick. In 1965, he led the league in receptions, reception yardage, and receiving TDs. He finished his career with 360 receptions and more than 5600 yards. Parks died August 8, 2019.

Harley Race (age 76) - Race was a professional wrestler known in his prime as "Handsome Harley." He was a nine-time champion of the various wrestling world organizations, and is an inductee of four different wrestling halls of fame. After retiring from the ring, he became a promoter and trainer, operating Harley's Wrestling Academy. He died August 1, 2019, of lung cancer.

Randy Romero (age 61) - Romero, better known as The Ragin' Cajun, was a jockey in thoroughbred racing. In his 25-year career, Romero rode almost 4300 winners, a record that earned him Hall of Fame honors in 2010. The motion picture Casey's Shadow is based on the Romero family, as Randy's father was a breeder and trainer. Romero died August 29, 2019.

Deaths in July, 2109 --- Deaths in September, 2019