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Robert Matsui (January 1, age 63, myelodysplastic syndrome)

Thirteen-term Democratic Congressman from California’s 5th District, Matsui was extremely popular in his hometown of Sacramento.  A third-generation American born a few months before Pearl Harbor, as an infant he was interned with his family to the Tule Lake relocation camp.  During his time in the House, he led the effort to pass the Japanese-American Redress Act in 1988.  After his sudden death, his widow Doris (herself born in an internment camp in Arizona) was overwhelmingly elected to fill her husband’s seat in Congress.

Shirley Chisholm (January 1, age 80)

A woman of political firsts – first African-American woman elected to the US Congress (1968), first woman and first African-American to undertake a serious campaign for the presidency (1972).  Chisholm served eight terms in the House, representing New York’s 12th District.  Though born in Brooklyn, Chisholm received much of her early education in the Barbados.  Shola Lynch’s 2004 documentary film Chisholm ‘72: Unbought & Unbossed, also shown last year on the PBS program P.O.V., chronicles the Chisholm campaign.

Kelly Freas (January 2, at 82)

Frank Kelly Freas painted the cover art for hundreds, if not thousands, of science fiction and fantasy books and magazines.  His work was taken seriously, as he also produced artwork for the Skylab I insignia and the cover of Queen’s 1977 album News of the World, illustrated medical texts, and much more.  Nominated for 20 Hugo Awards, he was the first person to win 10 of them.  Not being a connoisseur of sci-fi art or art rock, my favorite Freas work was the 30 covers he created for Mad magazine between 1958 and 1962.  My vision of Alfred E. Neuman is his doing.

Rosemary Kennedy (January 7, at 86)

Third child and first daughter in the Kennedy clan, Rosemary was “slow”.  Her condition may have been slight retardation, serious dyslexia, or perhaps a mental illness.  Through the age of 23, she was marginally able to function in the Kennedy social whirl, until Papa Joe decided that a prefrontal lobotomy could “cure” her.  He was wrong … for her remaining 63 years, she was severely handicapped, incontinent, unintelligible, and stashed away out of sight.  Her plight is said to have been an inspiration for the Special Olympics movement.  Rosemary is (thus far) the only Kennedy sibling to die of natural causes.

Spencer Dryden (January 10, 66 years old, colon cancer)

Replacing Skip Spence (soon to co-found Moby Grape) as drummer for the quintessential San Francisco rock band Jefferson Airplane in June 1966, Dryden played with the group during its peak years.  Fired after his liaison with Grace Slick fell apart, Dryden later joined and then managed the New Riders of the Purple Sage, played with the Dinosaurs, and eventually faded into musical obscurity.  One fact I wasn’t aware of before preparing this – Dryden’s father was Charlie Chaplin’s half-brother.

Thelma White (January 11, at 94, pneumonia)

A very minor actress of the 1930s and 1940s, mentioned here only because she co-starred in the 1936 anti-classic Reefer Madness.

Virginia Mayo (January 17, at 84, pneumonia)

Versatile blonde actress who played movie roles from the 1940s through 1990s, including two starring roles opposite Ronald Reagan (1949’s The Girl From Jones Beach and She’s Working Her Way Through College in 1952).  Among her more distinguished films were The Kid From Brooklyn (1946) and The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (1947), both opposite Danny Kaye, and the 1949 classic White Heat, in which she played James Cagney’s wife.  Mayo also played a major role in perhaps the finest PTSD movie ever, the multi-Oscar-winning The Best Years of Our Lives (1946).  Another star of that movie was

Theresa Wright (March 6, age 86, heart attack)

Wright arrived on screen with a huge splash, earning Oscar nominations for her first three roles.  After falling short for Best Supporting Actress in 1941’s The Little Foxes and Best Actress in The Pride of the Yankees (she played Gehrig’s wife), Wright won the Supporting Actress statuette for the 1942 film Mrs. Miniver.  She is one of only a few performers to be nominated for Lead and Supporting in the same year.

Albert Schatz (January 17, at 84, pancreatic cancer)

The saga of Charles Best, co-discoverer of insulin who was omitted from the Nobel Prize awarded for that breakthrough, is fairly well known.  Not nearly as familiar is the similar story of Albert Schatz.  As a very young post-doc in 1943, Schatz did much of the heavy lifting in the discovery of the antibiotic streptomycin, only to find that all of the accolades (including the Nobel Prize) went to his mentor Selman Waksman.  Schatz sued for recognition of his contribution in 1950, receiving a cash settlement, but attained no public recognition for another 40 years.  In his later years, Schatz moved away from scientific methodologies and research standards, publishing a long anti-fluoridation screed.

Rose Mary Woods (January 22, at 87)

Considering how reprehensible were the words on the Nixon tapes we did hear, what awful things might have been said during the infamous 18½-minute gap on the June 20, 1972 tape?  The ever-faithful Woods, who had been Tricky Dick’s secretary, gatekeeper, and friend since 1951, did her level best to try to take all the blame for the erasures, testifying to that effect before Sam Ervin’s Watergate Select Committee and even posing for a ludicrous AP photo demonstrating what would be immortalized as the “Rose Mary Stretch”.

Johnny Carson (January 23, age 79, emphysema)

What remains to be said about Johnny?  Truly, he defined both television and the nation’s funny bone during his thirty years at the helm of The Tonight Show.  During Carson’s first few years on the program, his bandleader was

Skitch Henderson (November 1, at 87, natural causes)

Pianist, composer, and conductor, Henderson’s various bios are fraught with inconsistencies.  Was he born in England or Minnesota?  Did he or did he not study with Arnold Schoenberg?  Was he an RAF fighter pilot or a US Army Air Corps bomber pilot during World War II, or did he remain a civilian?  In any case, he succeeded Arturo Toscanini as NBC’s musical director and then became the bandleader when Steve Allen invented The Tonight Show in 1954.  He remained in that position throughout Allen’s tenure, returned after a five-year absence (while Jack Paar hosted the show), and left the show for good in 1966.  Henderson was a collector and preservationist, leaving his country home in New Milford CT as the Hunt Hill Farm Trust.

Philip Johnson (January 25, age 98)

Renowned American modernist and post-modernist architect, perhaps better known for his administrative guidance and architectural criticism than for his buildings.  He was the first director of architecture at MoMA in New York.  Johnson built his well-known Glass House in 1949 and lived there until his death.  His firm also designed such landmark structures as Rev. Schuller’s Crystal Cathedral in Orange County CA and Pittsburgh’s PPG Place.  Johnson’s career was marred by his strong interest in fascism, both domestic (Huey Long, Father Coughlin) and foreign (Hitler’s 1938 Nuremberg rally, post-blitzkrieg Poland in 1939), in the 1930s.  He wrote anti-Semitic articles and even attempted to form a fascist political party.

Nick McDonald (January 27, age 76, diabetes)

A Dallas police officer in 1963, McDonald apprehended Lee Harvey Oswald in the Texas Theatre on November 22.  During the arrest, Oswald punched McDonald and attempted to shoot him with a pistol (probably the one with which he had earlier killed Officer J.D. Tippet), but McDonald was able to keep the gun from firing by getting his hand between the gun’s hammer and the bullet.  McDonald remained on the Dallas force until 1980.

Jim Capaldi (January 28, 60 years old, stomach cancer)

Drummer for the English band Traffic, which also featured Steve Winwood, Chris Wood, and (at first) Dave Mason.  Formed in 1967, Traffic soared on Winwood’s prodigious and precocious talent and the volcanic interrelationships between Mason and the rest of the group.  In addition to his drumming talent, Capaldi was also a splendid songwriter, collaborating with Winwood on such songs as Dear Mr. Fantasy, Coloured Rain, and Forty Thousand Headmen.  Post-Traffic, he continued to perform and write, releasing about a dozen albums of his own.  He wrote the Eagles hit Love Will Keep Us Alive.  Capaldi’s interests had turned to environmental issues in the last 20 years or so, and had developed programs to assist street kids in his wife’s native Brazil.

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