++++++++++++++++ Obituaries ++++++++++++++++

[KamiKaZee]

Actor Robert Earl Jones Dies at 96
 
By Associated Press

September 18, 2006, 5:36 PM EDT

ENGLEWOOD, N.J. -- Actor Robert Earl Jones, a fixture in Broadway shows and movies and the father of actor James Earl Jones, has died.

Jones, 96, died Sept. 7 at the Lillian Booth Actors' Home, according to the home and Dale Olson, his son's agent.

Jones was a third-grade dropout from Senotobia, Miss., who worked as a sharecropper, then became a boxer before arriving in New York City and taking up acting. The poet Langston Hughes cast him in an early role in the Harlem Suitcase Theatre.

Jones appeared as boxing champion Joe Louis in "Spirit of Youth" among other films and Broadway productions before his career was interrupted in the 1950s when he was blacklisted for refusing to testify before the House un-American Activities Committee.

His movie career resumed by the late 1950s. He had roles in films including "Odds Against Tomorrow," "Wild River," "The Sting" and "Witness" in a career that lasted into the 1990s. In all, he appeared in more than 20 films.

He also appeared in several stage productions with his son, James Earl Jones, the actor who gave voice to Darth Vader in the "Star Wars" movies, among dozens of other roles.

In addition to his acting, Jones ran marathons, including the New York City marathon in 1996.

Besides James Earl Jones, Robert Earl Jones is survived by son Matthew Earl Jones and a grandson. Funeral services were private.

[Cheirel]

I didn't know this, thanx! for the education. Sad as it may be.

[KamiKaZee]

Blues Icon, N.C. Native Etta Baker Dies

By David Menconi, Staff Writer
Sep 24, 2006 11:23 PM


Etta Baker, legendary Piedmont blues-woman and an inspiration to generations of guitar players, passed away on Saturday. She was 93 years old. No cause of death was given, but she had been in failing health for years.

"She embodied everything we love about the South," said Tim Duffy, who worked with Baker through his Music Maker Relief Foundation.

"She was strong, warm, witty, gentle; a gardener and also the world's premiere Piedmont-style blues guitarist. Like B.B. King and single-string blues, anybody who has picked up acoustic finger-style guitar has been influenced by Etta whether they know it or not."

Baker played Piedmont blues, a style that drew from the clattery rhythms of bluegrass as well as blues. In spite of her declining health, she kept right on making music until the end. She appears on million-selling blues-rock guitarist Kenny Wayne Shepherd's next album, due out in November, and she has an album of banjo tunes coming out next year.

Neither did Baker's ill health stop her from tending to family. She died in Fairfax, Va., while visiting one of her daughters who had suffered a stroke.

"She just had to go, she just had to see my sister," said Darlene Davis, another daughter who lives next door to Baker's house in Morganton. "She was a great mother and a tower of strength for the family. We always looked up to her."

Baker grew up in a musical family in Western North Carolina and first made her mark in 1956. That year, she appeared on a compilation album called "Instrumental Music of the Southern Appalachians," which would be enormously influential on the growing folk revival — especially Baker's versions of "Railroad bill" and "One-Dime Blues." If you could keep up with her rapid finger-picking on "One-Dime Blues," you were said to be "one-diming it."

But for years, no one knew anything about the woman playing that incredible guitar. Bluesman Taj Mahal, who recorded an album with Baker in 2004, was among those who found inspiration from Baker's rhythmic finger-picking.

"I came upon that record in the '60s," said Mahal. "It didn't have any pictures so I had no idea who she was until I got to meet her years later. But man, that chord in 'Railroad Bill,' that was just the chord. It just cut right through me. I can't even describe how deep that was for me, just beautiful stuff."

While her music inspired Mahal, Bob Dylan and other younger musicians, Baker was busy raising a family that eventually numbered nine children. She had to cope with a fair amount of tragedy in the 1960s. Her husband suffered a debilitating stroke in 1964, the same year Baker had a serious car accident that killed one of her grandsons. Then in the span of one month in 1967, her husband died and one of her sons was killed in the Vietnam War.

After working for 26 years at a textile mill in Morganton, Baker quit to pursue a career as a professional musician — at age 60. She was a hit on the international folk-festival circuit, earning awards including a 1991 Folk Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. And she made an impression on almost everyone she met.

"I remember being at this banjo [festival] one time, and I wanted to have my picture taken with her," recalls Mahal. "And she looked at me kinda sideways and asked, 'Now you ain't gonna get in no trouble with me, are ya?' And she was 80-some years old."

Baker stayed on the road well into her 80s, but she finally had to quit touring because of heart problems. By this year, she no longer had the strength to play guitar.

So she put most of her musical energy into playing banjo. Wayne Martin, who plays fiddle on her upcoming banjo collection, reports that Baker was still playing great a month ago when he saw her for the last time.

"I consider her to be one of the most important traditional artists of our lifetime," Martin said. "She meant a lot to me personally, and to North Carolina. She touched hundreds of thousands if not millions of people with her music. It's amazing that she raised nine kids, attending to their needs, then had a career that didn't even start until she was in her 60s, and it touched all these people. What she did resonated with many, many people."

http://www.newsobserver.com/102/story/490442.html

[KamiKaZee]

West Point Buries 'Class of 9-11' Cadet
By CARA ANNA
Associated Press Writer      
AP Photo/TIM ROSKE
Sep 26, 6:22 PM EDT



WEST POINT, N.Y. (AP) -- The first member of West Point's "Class of 9-11" to die in combat was buried at the military academy Tuesday, two weeks after she was killed by a bomb at the head of a convoy in Iraq.

2nd Lt. Emily Perez, 23, was leading a platoon when a roadside bomb exploded Sept. 12 south of Baghdad. She was the first female West Point graduate to die in Iraq and the highest-ranking black and Hispanic woman cadet in the school's history.

"She was like a little superwoman, so full of energy and life," said Meghan Venable-Thomas, a senior who was on the track team and in the gospel choir with Perez.

The academy's Class of 2005 is called the "Class of 9-11" because the 2001 terrorist attacks occurred just weeks into the students' freshman year.      

"I think we all hoped it wouldn't happen," said class President James Freeze of the first death among the graduates, who numbered exactly 911. Half of the class remains on duty in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Perez was a Medical Service Corps officer assigned to the 204th Support Battalion, 2nd Brigade, 4th Infantry Division in Fort Hood, Texas.

Dozens of cadets watched as she was buried in the West Point Cemetery.  After accepting the folded American flag from Perez's coffin, her mother leaned over, put her forehead on the casket and whispered.

Perez was fluent in German from growing up overseas. She also played the clarinet and helped start an AIDS ministry at her church. Before leaving for Iraq, she donated bone marrow to a stranger.   

"One of the things important to Emily was not the fear of death, but the fear of not living," the Rev. E. Faith Bell said after the service.

[KamiKaZee]

Rev. Run's Daughter Dies at Birth

By Associated Press

September 27, 2006, 3:59 PM EDT

RIDGEWOOD, N.J. -- A daughter born to rap pioneer Joseph "Rev. Run" Simmons and his wife, Justine, died shortly after delivery last week, an MTV spokesman said Wednesday.

Simmons issued a statement through the network, which airs his reality show, "Run's House," saying his wife "is doing fine." He thanked his supporters for their prayers and condolences.

"On Sept. 26, 2006, Victoria Anne Simmons for some unknown reason chose to come early and unfortunately did not survive," his statement said. "We must accept whatever is there and once you accept unconditionally, then everything is beautiful. Every pain has a purifying effect. So whatever comes your way, just be thankful. We see life in death and believe in the celebration of life in death."

The baby was delivered at Valley Hospital in Ridgewood, according to MTV spokesman Graham James.

Simmons, brother of hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons, has five children. He was a founding member of pioneering rap group Run-DMC.

[zulu801]

Girl in coma since dentist visit dies

September 28, 2006

BY F.N. D'ALESSIO Associated Press
A five-year-old Chicago girl who never awoke from her sedation during a isit to the dentist has died at Children's Memorial Hospital, a hospital official said.










Kindergartner Diamond Brownridge, who had been in a coma and on life support since the weekend dental treatment, died at around 2:30 p.m. surrounded by her family, said Julie Pesch, a hospital spokeswoman.

''She passed very peacefully and beautifully,'' said a family statement released by the hospital. It added that there had been no intervention by doctors and Diamond stopped breathing on her own.

Family members have said the girl received a triple dose of sedatives -- an oral agent, an intravenous drug and nitrous oxide gas -- during Saturday's exam at Little Angel Dental, a storefront clinic in the city's Little Village neighborhood.

She was having two cavities filled and caps placed on her lower front teeth.

Ommettress Travis, the girl's mother, has said she was asked to leave the room during the half-hour procedure. She said when she returned, her daughter was lying in the dental chair, not breathing.

State records show the girl's dentist, Hicham Riba, was licensed in the state in 1997.

A written statement from Riba on Wednesday night extended condolences to the girl's family. ''(My family and I) are so sad,'' he said. ''May God bless Diamond and her family.''

Susan Hofer, a spokeswoman for the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation, has said that Riba's license is current and he is certified to administer anesthesia to patients.

Dentists often sedate children having dental work, Indru Punwani, the head of the pediatric dentistry department at the University of Illinois Chicago, has said. But the combination of the three medications, he added, is unusual for children.

''The principal issue is what was the level of sedation and was the level of monitoring appropriate,'' he said.

A Chicago law firm, Clifford Law Offices, filed a petition for discovery for Diamond's family on Tuesday. Such a petition is the first step in obtaining medical records to assess whether a malpractice case has merit, explained Thomas K. Prindable, managing partner of the firm.

No lawsuit can be filed without a report from an expert saying the records have been reviewed and that they provide evidence the lawsuit has merit, he said.

Cook County Circuit Court Judge William D. Maddux granted an order that will preserve the anesthesia equipment used on Diamond, as well as all medical records pertaining to her case.

Speaking to The Chicago Sun-Times this week before Diamond died, the 40-year-old Riba said he is traumatized by what happened.

''Every time you have a tragedy like this, you pray more,'' he said. ''I don't think I will ever go back to a normal life after an experience like this.''

Riba also told the newspaper that he has voluntarily stopped administering intravenous sedation to his patients. He intended to continue in dentistry, but has not gone to his office this week, he said.


Follow up info:


[b]Diamond Brownridge's death ruled accidental[/b]

September 28, 2006

BY STNG WIRE REPORTS
The Cook County Medical Examiner's office has ruled the death of a 5-year-old girl who slipped into a coma following sedation at a dentist’s office accidental.

An autopsy Thursday showed that Diamond Brownridge died from anoxic encephalopathy caused by anesthesia during a dental procedure, according to a report from the medical examiner’s office, which ruled the death accidental.

Diamond, who was over-sedated in the dentist’s chair Saturday while having two cavities filled, according to attorneys for her family, had been clinging to life at Children's Memorial Hospital, where she was on life support. She died Wednesday.

Diamond was taken by her mother Saturday to Little Angel Dental Clinic at the 3900 block of West 26th Street in Little Village after complaining of tooth pain. She apparently was given a number of sedatives including intravenous and gas while her mother was asked to wait in the waiting room.

After about an hour, Ommettress Travis went in to check on her daughter and found the girl had no pulse. Paramedics eventually were called and Diamond was taken to the hospital.

Brownridge was pronounced dead at 2:20 p.m. Wednesday at Children's Memorial Hospital, according to a spokesman from the medical examiner’s office.

[KamiKaZee]

Star of Cleopatra Jones Films Dies
By Associated Press

October 5, 2006, 8:11 AM EDT                           



BALTIMORE -- Tamara Dobson, the tall, stunning model-turned-actress who portrayed a strong female role as Cleopatra Jones in two "blaxploitation" films, has died.

Dobson, 59, died Monday of complications from pneumonia and multiple sclerosis at the Keswick Multi-Care Center, where she had lived for the past two years, her publicist said.
 
At 6 feet, 2 inches tall, Dobson was striking as the kung-fu fighting government agent Cleopatra Jones in 1973. She reprised the role in 1975's "Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold."

"She was not afraid to start a trend," said her brother, Peter Dobson, of Houston. "She designed a lot of the clothing that so many women emulated."

Dobson also appeared in "Come Back, Charleston Blue," "Norman, Is That You?" "Murder at the World Series" and "Chained Heat."

She had TV roles in the early 1980s in "Jason of Star Command" and "Buck Rogers in the 25th Century."

Dobson lived most of her adult life in New York, her family said. She was diagnosed six years ago with multiple sclerosis.

[KamiKaZee]

1950s R&B Star Ruth Brown Dies, 78

By DAISY NGUYEN
Associated Press Writer

November 17, 2006, 9:42 PM EST




LOS ANGELES -- Singer Ruth Brown, whose recordings of "Teardrops in My Eyes," "5-10-15 Hours" and "(Mama) He Treats Your Daughter Mean" shot her to rhythm-and-blues stardom in the 1950s, has died. She was 78.

Brown, who later in life won a Grammy and a Tony, died Friday of complications from a stroke and heart attack at a Las Vegas-area hospital, said Lindajo Loftus, a publicist for the Rhythm & Blues Foundation, which Brown helped establish.

"Ruth was one of the most important and beloved figures in modern music," singer Bonnie Raitt said in a statement. "You can hear her influence in everyone from Little Richard to Etta (James), Aretha (Franklin), Janis (Joplin) and divas like Christina Aguilera today."

"She was my dear friend, and I will miss her terribly," Raitt said.

Brown's soulful voice produced dozens of hits for Atlantic Records, cementing the fledgling record label's reputation as an R&B powerhouse. Trained in a church choir in her hometown of Portsmouth, Va., Brown sang a range of style from jazz to gospel-blues in such hits as "So Long" and "Teardrops in My Eyes."

She later crossed over into rock 'n' roll with some success with "Lucky Lips" and "This Little Girl's Gone Rockin'," a song she co-wrote with Bobby Darin.

But as R&B and rock 'n' roll fell out of style in the late 1950s, Brown and her musical contemporaries were forced into retirement. She spent most of the 1960s raising her two sons alone and earning a living as a maid, school bus driver and teacher.

Brown enjoyed a career renaissance in the mid-70s when she began recording blues and jazz tunes for a variety of labels and found success on the stage and in movies.

She won acclaim in the R&B musical "Staggerlee" and won a Tony Award for best actress in the Broadway revue "Black and Blue."

She also played a feisty deejay in the 1988 cult movie "Hairspray." A year later, she won a Grammy for best jazz vocal performance for the album "Blues on Broadway."

Brown continued to perform and record in her later years, becoming a popular host of National Public Radio's "Harlem Hit Parade."

She also became a prominent advocate for the rights of aging R&B musicians during her long struggle to recoup her share of royalties from Atlantic. Her effort led to the formation of the Rhythm & Blues Foundation, a Philadelphia-based nonprofit dedicated to providing financial and medical assistance, as well as historical and cultural preservation of the musical genre.

[Yaw]

This is my grandfather.  I just got back from the funeral this weekend.  Considering the occasion it was pretty joyous for the family as we are so huge but rarely are able to get together.  It was great for us to be together and I'm sure my grandfather would be happy about that.  R.I.P.

http://www.newhopefh.com/ASIMAS/newhope/obituaryDescription.jsp?domain_id=5&deceased_id=77419

William Cornelious Lashley

LASHLEY, William C. of Balch Springs, born January 4, 1923,in the Republic of Panama, passed away November 12, 2006.

Survived by wife, Miriam Lashley; sons, Joseph Lashley & wife, Arlene, Franklin Lashley & wife, Darlene, Claude Lashley & wife, Carmen, Basilio Lashley & wife, Simonsea; daughters, Rosaline C. Tench & husband, Edwin E., Lesvia Price & husband, Gerald, Norma E.Hay & husband, Alfredo, Alicia Lewis & husband, Eugenio; 22 grandchildren; 8 great grandchildren; numerous nieces and nephews.

Grandson, Bobby Lashley is currently a WWE Professional Wrestler.

[Wise Son]

Sorry for your loss, Yaw.

[KamiKaZee]

Memphis Black Radio Pioneer Dies at 91
By Associated Press
November 24, 2006, 2:24 PM EST

MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- John R. Pepper II, co-founder of the first nationwide radio station with programming targeting a black audience, has died. He was 91.

Pepper died Monday at St. Francis Hospital after an extended illness, according to Forest Hill Midtown Funeral Home, where services were held Friday.

Still one of Memphis' top stations, WDIA-AM was the first in the South with an all-black on-air staff. Clear Channel Broadcasting Inc. now owns the station, which reaches five states.

WDIA, which Pepper founded with Bert Ferguson in the 1940s, helped launch the careers of B.B. King and Isaac Hayes, among others, and eased the way for blacks throughout the country to break into broadcasting.

Hayes was a member of the station's "teen-town singers," and King, whose real name is Riley King, picked up his stage name while working as a WDIA disc jockey from 1949 to 1955. He was known then as the "Beale Street Blues Boy" and later as simply "B.B."

Pepper also founded what later became Pepper Tanner Advertising Agency.

Pepper is survived by his daughter, Dianne Gilliland of Memphis; two sons, Sam Pepper of Anchorage, Alaska, and John R. Pepper III of Huntingdon, Tenn.; and a granddaughter.

[KamiKaZee]

Diehl, "Primal Fear" Author, Dead at 81
By Associated Press

November 26, 2006, 9:31 PM EST

ATLANTA -- William Diehl, best-selling author of "Primal Fear" and other novels, has died at Emory University Hospital. He was 81.

Diehl died Friday, said Sarah Carter of H.M. Patterson & Son funeral home in Atlanta. He died of aortic embolism, said his wife, Virginia Gunn.

He started on his first novel, "Sharky's Machine," while serving as a juror. Diehl, then 50, was bored by the trial and started writing fiction on a notepad. The book, published in 1978, became a best-seller and -- later -- a movie starring Burt Reynolds.

Diehl was unemployed when he got the news that the book was going to be published, his longtime friend Michael Parver said. When his agent first called to tell him, the phone line went dead. Diehl hadn't paid the bill, Parver told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Diehl's friends and relatives were turned into characters in his later works. Parver became a dirty cop in the novel "Hooligans."

The author's other novels included "Primal Fear," a 1993 thriller about a lawyer defending a young man accused of slaying an archbishop. It was turned into the 1996 film starring Richard Gere and Edward Norton.

Diehl was writing his 10th novel at the time of his death. It was expected to be published sometime next year, his friends said.

Diehl was formerly a writer for the Journal-Constitution, and had been a freelance photographer and magazine editor. Diehl was also a World War II veteran, serving as a ball turret gunner aboard a B-24 bomber.

[KamiKaZee]

LASHLEY, William C. of Balch Springs, born January 4, 1923, in the Republic of Panama, passed away November 12, 2006.

Survived by wife, Miriam Lashley; sons, Joseph Lashley & wife, Arlene, Franklin Lashley & wife, Darlene, Claude Lashley & wife, Carmen, Basilio Lashley & wife, Simonsea; daughters, Rosaline C. Tench & husband, Edwin E., Lesvia Price & husband, Gerald, Norma E.Hay & husband, Alfredo, Alicia Lewis & husband, Eugenio; 22 grandchildren; 8 great grandchildren; numerous nieces and nephews.

Grandson, Bobby Lashley is currently a WWE Professional Wrestler.



A lovely Family slideshow can be seen here:

http://www.newhopefh.com/ASIMAS/newhope/obituaryDescription.jsp?domain_id=5&deceased_id=77419

[KamiKaZee]

Opera Singer Robert McFerrin Dies
By JIM SALTER
Associated Press Writer

November 27, 2006, 4:32 PM EST
 
ST. LOUIS -- Robert McFerrin Sr., the first black man to sing solo at the New York Metropolitan Opera and the father of Grammy-winning conductor-vocalist Bobby McFerrin, has died. He was 85.

He died Friday of a heart attack at a suburban St. Louis hospital, the funeral home handling his services confirmed Monday.

In 1953, McFerrin won the Metropolitan Opera national auditions. His 1955 debut with the Metropolitan Opera as Amonasro in "Aida" made him the first black male member of the company. He performed in 10 operas over three seasons.

He appeared just three weeks after contralto Marian Anderson made her historic debut Jan. 7, 1955, as the first black to sing a principal role at the Met.

McFerrin is also known for providing the vocals for Sidney Poitier in the 1959 movie "Porgy and Bess."

Son Bobby McFerrin Jr. is best-known for the eclectic 1980s hit, "Don't Worry, Be Happy." McFerrin's daughter, Brenda McFerrin, is also a recording artist, and he sang with both children.

In 1993, father and son appeared with the St. Louis Symphony -- Robert McFerrin Sr. as soloist, his son as guest conductor.

"His work influenced everything I do musically," Bobby McFerrin told The Associated Press in 2003. "When I direct a choir, I go for his sound. His musical influence was absolutely profound. I cannot do anything without me hearing his voice."

McFerrin was born in Marianna, Ark., one of eight children of a strict Baptist minister who forbade his son to sing anything but gospel music. That changed when McFerrin moved to St. Louis in 1936, and a music teacher discovered and encouraged his talent.

In the late 1940s and early '50s, McFerrin sang on Broadway, performed with the National Negro Opera Company and the New York City Opera Company.

He moved back to St. Louis in 1973. He suffered a stroke in 1989, but his singing voice remained with him and he continued to perform for many years afterward. By the time he was honored in June 2003 by Opera America, doctors suspected he had Alzheimer's disease.

Opera Theatre of Saint Louis general director Charles MacKay called McFerrin's baritone voice "beautiful, virile, strong, and sensitive."

"He sang with such joy and commitment," MacKay said in 2003. "It reminds me of the profound pleasure of a beautifully trained singing voice."

McFerrin and his first wife divorced. He married his second wife, Athena, in 1994. Besides his wife and children, survivors include a sister and three grandchildren.

[Stringer]

WE REMEMBER NOVELIST BEBE MOORE CAMPBELL: Journalist-turned-writer died Monday at age 56.
(November 28, 2006)
 

      *Bebe Moore Campbell, a former journalist and writer of such books as “Your Blues Ain't Like Mine” and “Singing in the Comeback Choir,” has died from complications due to brain cancer, reports AP. She was 56.     

      "My wife was a phenomenal woman who did it her way," husband Ellis Gordon Jr. said in a statement. "She loved her family and her career as a writer.”


      As a journalist, Campbell has written pieces for the New York Times Magazine, the Washington Post and Los Angeles Times, as well as the magazines Essence, Ebony and Black Enterprise. She was also a regular contributor for National Public Radio's "Morning Edition."


      Much of her fiction work was based on real-life stories and explored racial and social issues through the perspective of various ethnic groups. Her first novel, “Your Blues Ain't Like Mine,” earned Campbell an NAACP Image Award for Literature. Her second novel, “Brothers and Sisters,” was the first of three Campbell novels to become New York Times bestsellers. The other two were “Singing in the Comeback Choir” and “What You Owe Me.”


      Born February 1950 in Philadelphia, Penn., Campbell received a Bachelor of Science (B.S.) degree in elementary education from the University of Pittsburgh. She is survived by her husband, her son and daughter, actress Maia Campbell (“In the House”).