Archive: June 2009
The Daily Goodbye
Another day and another singer from the Motown era leaves us. Fayette Pinkney, one of the original members of the 3 Degrees, an all female singing group hailing from Philadelphia, died over the weekend. She was 61. Although she only performed with the group until the mid-1970s, she sang in...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 30, 2009; 8:10 AM ET | Comments (1)
Remembering Michael Jackson
In most cases, when a well known person dies, his or her obituary is written, perhaps accompanied by an appreciation, and then we move on to the next story. But as we have seen over the weekend, and will continue to see in the coming days and weeks, the Michael...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 29, 2009; 1:06 PM ET | Comments (0)
The Daily Goodbye
We saw some big name entertainers cross our obituary page last week and sadly, it seems to be a growing trend. Boisterous TV pitchman and infomercial king, Billy Mays, who became a pop cultural figure in appearances for cleaning products like Orange Glo and OxiClean, died yesterday at his home...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 29, 2009; 8:18 AM ET | Comments (2)
'Hi! Billy Mays here for . . .'
If you were to measure the significance of a person's life -- and death -- by the range of random comments in the newsroom when they die, then Billy Mays, the ubiquitous TV pitchman, ranks right up there with Farrah Fawcett and just a step down from the King of...
By Joe Holley | June 28, 2009; 5:14 PM ET | Comments (6)
Hating Farrah
"Growing up in Texas, I knew a lot of girls like Farrah Fawcett, and I hated them. They had everything I didn't: blond hair, blue eyes, the power, seemingly, to get anything and everything they wanted in my small public high school -- boys, head cheerleader, the ability to decide,...
By Joe Holley | June 28, 2009; 10:35 AM ET | Comments (0)
Betty Allen & Marian Anderson
In today's paper we have an obituary for Betty Allen, 82, one of the first African American opera singers to make it big on the international stage. She died Monday in Valhalla, N.Y., of complications from kidney disease. You can read more about Miss Allen's life here. As Emily Langer...
By Matt Schudel | June 27, 2009; 2:06 PM ET | Comments (0)
Michael Jackson Obit, the Backstory
About 7 p.m. Thursday evening, former Post managing editor Bob Kaiser wandered past the obits desk and asked, ever so innocently, "Any noteworthy deaths today?" Kaiser, who has been at the Post since 1963, knows the gallows humor of newsrooms better than anyone, and of course he knew we were...
By Matt Schudel | June 26, 2009; 10:44 AM ET | Comments (5)
The Daily Goodbye
Wow, the king of pop and Gen X's favorite pinup girl both died yesterday, on the heels of Ed McMahon's death a day earlier. Regarding the unexpected death of Michael Jackson, there are about a million sidebars, retrospectives, deconstructions of both, not to mention the fan gatherings. Let's see if...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 26, 2009; 7:59 AM ET | Comments (0)
Jackson's 'Victory' in D.C.: The Post Looks Back
In early 1984, when it looked like Michael Jackson's Victory tour might not make it to the Nation's Capitol, the star got a friendly suggestion from the man in the White House. Jackson was in town helping promote an anti-drunk-driving campaign he'd worked on; he visited the executive residence to...
By Washington Post Editors | June 25, 2009; 6:33 PM ET | Comments (19)
Michael Jackson Update
The Los Angeles Times reported at 3:15 p.m., Pacific time, that Michael Jackson is dead at age 50. The Times attributed the information to city and law enforcement sources. He had been rushed to a hospital earlier in the afternoon by Los Angeles Fire Department paramedics and was reportedly in...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 25, 2009; 5:48 PM ET | Comments (2)
Spotlight: Farrah Fawcett
The actress Farrah Fawcett has died in California after a two and a half year battle with cancer. She was 62. Earlier this morning, Barbara Walters told "Good Morning America" that Fawcett received last rites and her friends and family were saying their goodbyes. The death was expected, with...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 25, 2009; 12:26 PM ET | Comments (19)
The Daily Goodbye
Good morning, all. A particularly interesting set of obits awaits us this morning, starting with news broken yesterday of the death of Dr. Jerri Nielsen FitzGerald, the doctor who while posted to the South Pole, diagnosed and treated herself for breast cancer. Once again, we have multiple versions: the Boston...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 25, 2009; 8:15 AM ET | Comments (0)
South Pole Doctor Dies
One of the most compelling medical news stories of the last decade was the story of Jerri Nielsen, an emergency room doctor who accompanied dozens of National Science Foundation researchers to the South Pole in 1999. She later wrote of wanting to escape to the South Pole to forget an...
By Adam Bernstein | June 24, 2009; 11:32 AM ET | Comments (6)
The Daily Goodbye
We have more details on the victims of the Washington D.C. subway train crash of two days ago. News of Ed McMahon's death broke just as we were posting yesterday. Here are a few of his obits, from the Washington Post, New York Times and Los Angeles Times. Tell us...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 24, 2009; 8:23 AM ET | Comments (1)
Metro Crash Victims
This week's Metro Red Line crash killed nine people and was the deadliest Metrorail accident in the transit system's 33-year history. We've profiled some of the victims and would like to hear what you remember about them. You can also visit our remembrance page. Please click on the entries below...
By Adam Bernstein | June 23, 2009; 4:01 PM ET | Comments (0)
Gooooodbye Ed McMahon!
Venerable entertainer, Ed McMahon, best known as Johnny Carson's sidekick for 30 years on "The Tonight Show," died this morning in Los Angeles. He may be the most well known sidekick of all time and while other late-night variety shows copied the format none imitated the Carson/McMahon success. Carson's replacement...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 23, 2009; 10:14 AM ET | Comments (7)
The Daily Goodbye
This just in: TV's Tonight Show sidekick Ed McMahon has died of cancer. On a morning when all of Washington DC is mourning the people who died in a needless subway system crash, we turn to other deaths around the world. Neda Agha-Soltan, the Iranian woman who died on...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 23, 2009; 8:24 AM ET | Comments (0)
Spotlight: Larry Flynt and More
Hustler magazine owner and founder, Larry Flynt, was rushed to a Los Angeles-area hospital on Saturday, moaning in pain. His condition remains a mystery. The publishing mogul, whose media empire includes the magazine, novelty shops and a gentleman's club, is paralyzed from the waist down, the result of a...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 22, 2009; 12:30 PM ET | Comments (2)
The Daily Goodbye
Good morning, readers, and welcome to summer. Dorothy Waggoner worked for better inspections and enforcement of nursing home regulations in Milwaukee most of her life. When she opened a bed and breakfast in the small town of Menomonee Falls, Wis., suspicious residents "thought we were going to run a brothel,"...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 22, 2009; 8:22 AM ET | Comments (0)
Frowned on strip ping-pong
Scanning some of the British papers this morning, I noticed several interesting obituaries for World War II veterans, and I remembered writing a story a few years ago about how we're losing more than a thousand WWII vets a day. The numbers are mounting, of course. Their deaths are also...
By Joe Holley | June 21, 2009; 12:04 PM ET | Comments (0)
Magic Fingers
We've had two obituaries in the past two days, you could say, about magic fingers or "Magic Fingers." The first, on Saturday, was Robert Thomason's obituary of Ali Akbar Khan, a Bengali musicain who was a virtuoso of Indian music and, in particular, the 25-string lutelike instrument called the sarod....
By Matt Schudel | June 21, 2009; 5:58 AM ET | Comments (0)
Readers on Slain Officer Stephen T. Johns
Funeral services for slain U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum security officer Stephen T. Johns take place today at Ebenezer AME Church in Ft. Washington. A Smithsonian Institution honor guard moves the casket of Stephen T. Johns to the viewing and funeral. (Jonathan Newton -- Post) Johns was working at the museum...
By Washington Post Editors | June 19, 2009; 9:04 AM ET | Comments (12)
The Daily Goodbye
Hortensia Bussi, the widow of Chilean President Salvador Allende who helped lead opposition to the military dictatorship that ousted her socialist husband in a bloody 1973 coup, died Thursday. She was 94. Helen Boosalis, the first female president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, died in Lincoln, Neb. earlier this...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 19, 2009; 8:17 AM ET | Comments (0)
Spotlight: Ethan Zohn
Celebrities chronicling cancer seem all the rage. In May, NBC aired a documentary, Farrah's Story, which followed actress Farrah Fawcett's battle with anal cancer. And now 2002 Survivor: Africa winner, Ethan Zohn, is keeping a video dairy for People.com of his treatment for a rare form of Hodgkin's Lymphoma. Zohn,...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 18, 2009; 11:22 AM ET | Comments (2)
The Daily Goodbye
Playwriting is often a quick route to the poorhouse, but Dr. Mona Grey, a veteran nurse, actually raised funds that way. We suspect it had to do with her "enormous energy, a forceful character and great charm that made it impossible for people to refuse her. She would underline...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 18, 2009; 9:03 AM ET | Comments (0)
From D.C. to Antarctica
Edith "Jackie" Ronne grew up "scrubbing the steps" of her Baltimore home, her daughter said, and knew one thing -- she wanted a life different from what she saw. She spent a couple of years at a college in Ohio, then moved to Washington, living with her aunt and uncle...
By Christopher Dean Hopkins | June 18, 2009; 6:00 AM ET | Comments (1)
Metro Crash Victim: Cameron Williams
Cameron Williams was among the casualties in yesterday's Metro accident. If you knew Williams, we'd love to hear your anecdotes and memories in this space. The entry date of this post does not reflect when it was written. It was written Tuesday, June 23....
By Christopher Dean Hopkins | June 17, 2009; 7:02 PM ET | Comments (19)
Metro Crash Victim: Veronica DuBose
Veronica DuBose was among the casualties in yesterday's Metro accident. If you knew DuBose, we'd love to hear your anecdotes and memories in this space. The entry date of this post does not reflect when it was written. It was written Tuesday, June 23....
By Christopher Dean Hopkins | June 17, 2009; 6:55 PM ET | Comments (31)
Metro Crash Victim: Ana Fernandez
Ana Fernandez was among the casualties in yesterday's Metro accident. If you knew Fernandez, we'd love to hear your anecdotes and memories in this space. The entry date of this post does not reflect when it was written. It was written Tuesday, June 23....
By Adam Bernstein | June 17, 2009; 3:58 PM ET | Comments (10)
Metro Crash Victim: Mary Doolittle
Mary Doolittle was among the casualties in yesterday's Metro accident. If you knew Doolittle, we'd love to hear your anecdotes and memories in this space. The entry date of this post does not reflect when it was written. It was written Tuesday, June 23....
By Adam Bernstein | June 17, 2009; 3:57 PM ET | Comments (36)
Metro Crash Victim: Dennis Hawkins
Dennis Hawkins was among the casualties in yesterday's Metro accident. If you knew Hawkins, we'd love to hear your anecdotes and memories in this space. The entry date of this post does not reflect when it was written. It was written Tuesday, June 23....
By Adam Bernstein | June 17, 2009; 3:53 PM ET | Comments (19)
Metro Crash Victim: LaVonda "Nikki" King
LaVonda "Nikki" King was among the casualties in yesterday's Metro accident. If you knew King, we'd love to hear your anecdotes and memories in this space. The entry date of this post does not reflect when it was written. It was written Tuesday, June 23....
By Adam Bernstein | June 17, 2009; 3:46 PM ET | Comments (31)
Metro Crash Victim: Jeanice McMillan
Jeanice McMillan was confirmed among the casualties in yesterday's Metro accident. If you knew McMillan, who was the driver of the train that struck the other, we'd love to hear your anecdotes and memories. The entry date of this post does not reflect when it was written. It was written...
By Adam Bernstein | June 17, 2009; 3:43 PM ET | Comments (9)
Metro Crash Victims: David F. and Ann Wherley
D.C. National Guard Major Gen. David F. Wherley Jr. and his wife, Ann, were among the casualties in yesterday's Metro accident. If you knew the Wherleys, we'd love to hear your anecdotes and memories of the couple. The entry date of this post does not reflect when it was written....
By Adam Bernstein | June 17, 2009; 3:36 PM ET | Comments (23)
Controversial Afrocentric Scholar Dies
Ivan Van Sertima, a Guayana-born writer who died May 25 in New Jersey, created a stir for his 1977 book "They Came Before Columbus," which argued that blacks made a major contribution to civilization in the New World before Columbus sailed into the West Indies in the 15th century. Dr....
By Adam Bernstein | June 17, 2009; 2:40 PM ET | Comments (0)
More on the Ventures
I put up an earlier post about Bob Bogle, the guitarist and bass player who was one of the founders of the Ventures, the quintessential rock-and-roll guitar band. The obituary of Bogle appears today, and if you have a second, I want to point out one interesting sidelight concerning the...
By Matt Schudel | June 17, 2009; 11:28 AM ET | Comments (2)
The Daily Goodbye
Compare and contrast: the New York Times, Los Angeles Times and Washington Post versions of an obit for Ventures co-founder Bob Bogle. (We'll refrain from noting that we told you about this yesterday -- oops...) Which one do you prefer? There was a time when Motorola was a leader...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 17, 2009; 8:11 AM ET | Comments (2)
Bob Bogle of the Ventures
Who doesn't love the Ventures? They were the most successful rock-and-roll instrumental group of all time and had an instantly recognizable rumbling guitar sound that is infectious, thrilling and dangerous all at once. Bob Bogle, who founded the Ventures with Don Wilson, died this week, and he had more influence...
By Matt Schudel | June 17, 2009; 6:41 AM ET | Comments (0)
Funeral Funding
The state of the economy is finally affecting the dead. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, Illinois is suspending payments for funerals for the indigent because of state-wide budget cuts. According to the Illinois Health Department, the state was spending $15 million a year for about 10,000 funerals. The money would...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 16, 2009; 2:27 PM ET | Comments (0)
The Daily Goodbye
An advocate for the deaf, Marcella M. Meyer has died at age 84. She played a key role in establishing a California telephone service that relayed messages between the hearing and the hearing-impaired and led to the development of a nationwide system. If you've ever stayed at the great old...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 16, 2009; 9:00 AM ET | Comments (0)
Too Much Huey
I've often heard from obit fans something with which I completely agree: That it's not the predictable major obits that make the page exciting, but rather the utterly fascinating second or third-rung characters that provide fun and texture. You don't need to report on wastrels and third-tier actresses, but what...
By Adam Bernstein | June 16, 2009; 5:00 AM ET | Comments (1)
Tim Russert Reprise
This past Saturday marked the one year anniversary of the death of Tim Russert, former "Meet the Press" host. Within the past several days, the outpouring of appreciations across news platforms has been vast. Newsday.com published a list of the top seven things we have learned since Russert's passing, including...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 15, 2009; 4:17 PM ET | Comments (2)
Traffic Kills Walkers, Bikers
Nearly half of the 1.2 million people killed in traffic accidents around the world each year are not in cars. They are on motorcycles or bicycles or walking along the side of the road, according to a story by the Post's esteemed medical writer, David Brown. In the United States,...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 15, 2009; 12:23 PM ET | Comments (0)
The Daily Goodbye
Ron Richards discovered the Hollies, recorded the Beatles "Love Me Do" and recommended the replacement of Pete Best as their drummer. So why haven't we heard until now that he died April 30? A Tuskegee Airman who fought for equal treatment in the military, and whose reward was a fine...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 15, 2009; 8:33 AM ET | Comments (0)
Norse Who?
Emily Dickinson, arguably the greatest American poet of the 19th century, wrote hundreds and hundreds of poems, squirrelled them away in her dresser drawer and wasn't "discovered" until after her death. Harold Norse may have been one of the best 20th-century poets most people have never heard of. Norse, who...
By Joe Holley | June 14, 2009; 4:56 PM ET | Comments (0)
Preserving History
I have to confess I had never heard of Mary Ann Kephart before I began to work on her obituary this week. Mrs. Kephart never had a paying job outside the home, was never well known beyond Poolesville, the rural community in northwestern Montgomery County, Md., and never get caught...
By Matt Schudel | June 14, 2009; 7:17 AM ET | Comments (0)
Lucy in Sky with Diamonds muse ill
Lucy Vodden, the woman who was the inspiration for the Beatles "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" song is gravely ill, AP reports. She never dug the description of herself as the "girl with kaleidoscope eyes," but millions of LSD users did....
By Patricia Sullivan | June 12, 2009; 1:51 PM ET | Comments (0)
The Daily Goodbye
Good morning, obit fans. Don't forget to vote in our Best Obit of the Week user poll , and as always, we welcome comments and discussion. The last surviving member of the legendary Ink Spots, Huey Long, has died. He set up a museum which has a lot more information...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 12, 2009; 8:28 AM ET | Comments (0)
Best Obit of the Week
What did you like? Vote now! POLL Did we miss a good one? Tell us in the comments section below....
By Patricia Sullivan | June 12, 2009; 7:55 AM ET | Comments (0)
Shout Out From Washingtonian
Washingtonian magazine's June issue has a nice shout out to the Post obit desk, courtesy of Harry Jaffe. It starts: "Washington Post readers might mourn the loss of beloved sections: Among the dearly departed are Sunday Style (now combined with Arts), Book World, and Business. But obituaries are having a...
By Adam Bernstein | June 12, 2009; 6:00 AM ET | Comments (0)
A Grave Problem
Lexy Chubrich of Tempe, Ariz., is an obit fan and recently wrote to us posing a question about the funeral of her grandmother, Sophie Kolember Chubrich, who died May 30 at 91. Lexy Chubrich writes: I've just returned from attending my grandmother's funeral in Chicago and just wanted to share...
By Adam Bernstein | June 11, 2009; 11:59 AM ET | Comments (1)
The Daily Goodbye
After a long layoff, we're reviving the Daily Goodbye, a compendium of the best recent obits on the web. You can tell us what we missed in the comments section below, and you'll be able to vote on your favorites tomorrow. We're going to try to make this a much...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 11, 2009; 8:14 AM ET | Comments (0)
The Funeral Director's Art
Mostly we think about a person's life when writing or reading obituaries. But there's no denying that these stories are triggered by death, and in death, a funeral director and his or her staff directly handle issues that most of us never think about. One of those issues is make-up....
By Patricia Sullivan | June 10, 2009; 12:21 PM ET | Comments (0)
'Hi, my name is. . . '
Norman Brinker, a Dallas restaurant entrepreneur who died June 9 at age 78, made millions by offering casual dining choices at such places as Chili's, Bennigan's, Romano's Macaroni Grill, Maggiano's LIttle Italy and On the Border Mexican Grill and Cantina. Here's what Dave Simmons of the Dallas Business Journal said...
By Joe Holley | June 9, 2009; 5:40 PM ET | Comments (1)
Q&A: Italian Americans in Jazz
Chicago-based author and educator Bill Dal Cerro contacted the obituary desk last week after I wrote about Sam Butera, the hard-driving tenor saxophonist whose musical partnership with Louis Prima in the 1950s and 1960s made them a major national act. Their prominence as Italian Americans who played jazz attracted the...
By Adam Bernstein | June 9, 2009; 11:07 AM ET | Comments (0)
Calling Santa Claus
Joe Holley's fine piece about the White House phone engineer this morning immediately reminded me of an obit I'd written last year about the woman who had been in charge of the White House switchboard for years, Mary Burns. In it, I told the story about how she could get...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 8, 2009; 12:30 PM ET | Comments (1)
How Obits Have Changed
Nice piece in Obits magazine about how newspaper obituaries have changed over the years. It seems that the Civil War was a turning point; previously "writers were striving to convey the reality of death without having to state the unpleasant truth that somebody had actually died. So readers learned of...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 8, 2009; 11:19 AM ET | Comments (0)
No RIP for Carradine
So the actor who, in his most famous role, conveyed the inscrutable innner calm of a Chinese mystic is finding anything but now that he's gone. David Carradine, the old "Kung Fu" hero, is most assuredly not resting in peace since his body was found in a Bangkok hotel room...
By Joe Holley | June 7, 2009; 3:38 PM ET | Comments (1)
Weasel Words
Well, it's been a busy two days here on the obits desk. On Friday, I completed the Local Life of Paul Wasserman -- a librarian who founded the University of Maryland's College of Information Studies (as it's now called, to his chagrin). More about that in a moment. On Saturday,...
By Matt Schudel | June 7, 2009; 7:27 AM ET | Comments (0)
Carradine's Death: Accidental?
BANGKOK, June 5 -- Thai police officers investigating the death of David Carradine, the American actor who made his name in the "Kung Fu" television series in the 1970s, say he most likely died of asphyxiation, possibly when an autoerotic sex game went wrong....
By Patricia Sullivan | June 5, 2009; 12:24 PM ET | Comments (1)
Sam Butera, Sax Star, Dies
Sam Butera, who died June 3 at 81, was a hard-swinging tenor saxophonist who formed a rowdy and successful onstage partnership with entertainers Louis Prima and Keely Smith in the 1950s. Butera's not a household name. He's not a John Coltrane or a Coleman Hawkins. And frankly, when you listen...
By Adam Bernstein | June 5, 2009; 12:00 PM ET | Comments (0)
Best Obit of the Week Poll
Time for our first BOW (Best Obit of the Week) user poll. It's not scientific, just for entertainment value. Which obit is the most surprising, best-researched, and the most well-written article about a person who died? You can find most of these stories at the Washington Post obits web page;...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 5, 2009; 6:00 AM ET | Comments (1)
David Carradine's Best Work?
Early reports are that actor David Carradine was found dead today in Bangkok at age 72 and that suicide is the suspected cause of death. Barely a minute goes by without someone in the newsroom coming up and reciting something he did in the "Kill Bill" movies. Carradine may have...
By Adam Bernstein | June 4, 2009; 11:10 AM ET | Comments (4)
Actor David Carradine Dead
AP reports that actor David Carradine, best known for his 1970s "Kung Fu" television show and appearance in the "Kill Bill" movie, has been found dead in Bangkok, reportedly of a hanging....
By Patricia Sullivan | June 4, 2009; 10:35 AM ET | Comments (0)
Blues Queen Koko Taylor Dies
Grammy Award-winning blues wailer Koko Taylor died today of complications from gastro-intestinal surgery in Chicago. A shout-out to Greg Kot of the Chicago Tribune, who has a story up. Here's the queen herself, with Little Walter, on Wang Dang Doodle....
By Patricia Sullivan | June 3, 2009; 6:16 PM ET | Comments (4)
Poem for a Neighbor
An e-mail came to me the other day from Angela Scarlis, a poet who wanted to celebrate the life of her neighbor in Alexandria. Her friend was Louise Hurt, and she died May 19. Her death notice is here. "For me it is important that people can feel the pain...
By Adam Bernstein | June 3, 2009; 6:00 AM ET | Comments (1)
Robert Wone Murder Case
In case you haven't seen it, Paul Duggan has written a remarkable story for The Post about one of the most mystifying murders in Washington in recent years -- the killing of Robert Wone. Duggan's two-part story retelling the 2006 murder of a young lawyer in a townhouse near Dupont...
By Matt Schudel | June 2, 2009; 3:14 PM ET | Comments (0)
Beyond Crazy
A dozen years ago, I co-wrote a book -- along with my wife, Tara Elgin Holley -- called "My Mother's Keeper: A Daughter's Memoir of Growing Up in the Shadow of Schizophrenia" (William Morrow, 1997). It was about Tara's mother, Dawn Elgin, her lifelong battle with mental illness and Tara's...
By Joe Holley | June 2, 2009; 1:50 PM ET | Comments (0)
Peter Falk Family Battle
The LA Times reports an ugly family feud between Peter Falk's wife and daughter as the 81-year-old actor suffers from advanced dementia. Though Falk is mostly remembered for "Columbo," he was harrowingly good in a wide range of films. I think mostly of his portrait of a merciless thug in...
By Adam Bernstein | June 2, 2009; 11:27 AM ET | Comments (0)
Washington's Wolfman Jack
Don Dillard, who died May 28 at 74, operated a 250 watt station in Wheaton that was a force in bringing rock music to a local radio audience weary of Doris Day, Percy Faith and Eddie Fisher. Dillard's obit is here. Dillard was a powerhouse in the late 1950s and...
By Adam Bernstein | June 2, 2009; 6:00 AM ET | Comments (5)
Best Obit of the Week
What obits are you liking out there? Give us your thoughts throughout the week and on Friday, we'll run a little poll for Best Obit of the Week (BOW -- wow, what an acronym!) You don't have to limit yourself to the Washington Post obits, but if you want to...
By Patricia Sullivan | June 1, 2009; 4:00 PM ET | Comments (6)
"Bloke in a Frock"
Danny La Rue, a legendary British female impersonator known for his cabaret-style performances, extravagant costumes, impersonations of Hollywood A-listers and his signature bleach-blonde wig, died Sunday. He was 81. But beneath his feathered attire, elaborate headdresses and sequin gowns, La Rue thought of himself as just another performer. "I work...
By Lauren Wiseman | June 1, 2009; 1:40 PM ET | Comments (1)
