Celebrity Deaths in 2003...........and the list continues to grow (what's going on??)
Ang
Robert Palmer, musician best known for Addicted to Love, died September 26 at
the age of 54.
George Plimpton, author, died September 25 at the age of 76.
Edward Said, Columbia University professor and spokesman for the Palestinian
cause, died September 24 at the age of 67.
Gordon Jump, actor best known as the Maytag Repairman, died September 22 at the
age of 71.
Sheb Wooley, musician best known for Purple People Eater, died September 16 at
the age of 82.
Johnny Cash, musician, died September 12 at the age of 71.
John Ritter, actor best known for tv sitcom Three's Company, died September 11
at the age of 54.
Edward Teller, father of the hydrogen bomb, died September 9 at the age of 95.
Leni Riefenstahl, director best known for Triumph of the Will, died September 8
at the age of 101.
Charles Bronson, actor best known for the Death Wish series, died August 31 at
the age of 81.
Bobby Bonds, baseball star now best known as Barry Bonds father, died August 23
at the age of 57.
Idi Amin, former dictator, died August 16 at the age of 80.
Bob Hope, comedian, died July 27 at the age of 100.
John Schlesinger, director best known for Midnight Cowboy, died July 25 at the
age of 77.
Buddy Ebsen, actor best known as Jed on The Beverly Hillbillies, died July 6 at
the age of 95.
Barry White, singer known for his sexy songs, died July 4 at the age of 58.
Buddy Hackett, comedian, died June 30 at the age of 79.
Katharine Hepburn, actress, died June 29 at the age of 96.
Strom Thurmond, ultra conservative US politician, died June 26 at the age of
100.
Leon Uris, author best known for novels such as Exodus and Trinity, died June
21 at the age of 78.
Hume Cronyn, actor most recently known for Cocoon, died June 15 at the age of
91.
Gregory Peck, movie star best known as Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird,
died June 12 at the age of 87.
David Brinkley, news anchorman, died June 11 at the age of 82.
June Carter Cash, country music star, died May 15 at the age of 73.
Robert Stack, actor best known for starring in TV's The Untouchables, died May
14 at the age of 84.
Robert C. Atkins, diet doctor, died April 17 at the age of 72.
Cardinal Gerald Emmett Carter, archbishop emeritus of Toronto, died April 6 at
the age of 91.
Daniel Patrick Moynihan, one time US senator for New York, died March 26 at the
age of 76.
Joseph Coors, brewing giant, died March 16 at the age of 85.
Fred Rogers, of Mr. Rogers fame, died February 27 at the age of 74.
Nell Carter, known for her role in Gimme a Break, died January 23 at the age of
54.
Richard Crenna, actor known for such films as The Sand Pebbles and Wait Until
Dark, died January 17 at the age of 76.
Maurice Gibb, star of the Bee Gees, died January 11 at the age of 53.
Sydney Omarr, astrologer to the stars, died January 2 at the age of 76.
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Bud
>Celebrity Deaths in 2003
Here's another one:
'Whitey' from 'Leave It to Beaver' Dies
Fri September 26, 2003 03:48 PM ET
By Steve Gorman
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Former child actor Stanley Fafara, who played
Beaver's pal Whitey on the idyllic family sitcom "Leave It to Beaver"
but descended into a real-life adulthood of drugs, alcohol and petty
crime, has died at age 53, friends said on Friday.
Fafara died in a Portland, Oregon, hospital on Saturday, Sept. 20, of
complications from surgery he underwent last month to repair a
constricted intestine caused by a hernia, according to Tom Hallman
Jr., a reporter for the Portland Oregonian who knew him.
Hallman, who had kept in touch with Fafara since writing a profile of
him in December 2002, said the former actor already was weakened by a
hepatitis C infection contracted years ago from intravenous drug use.
Hallman said friends of Fafara told him the former actor ultimately
was removed from life support after slipping into a coma.
His death capped a tragic adult epilogue to the boyhood celebrity
Fafara enjoyed as a young actor portraying "Whitey" Whitney, the
tow-headed pal of the title character played by Jerry Mathers on
"Leave It to Beaver."
The show, set in the fictional suburban town of Mayfield, aired on CBS
and ABC from 1957 to 1963.
Fafara, who grew up in the Los Angeles suburbs of Studio City and was
pushed into acting by his mother, landed the part as Whitey after
doing a number of commercials. He also had appeared in an episode of
"The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin."
In a recent online interview, Fafara said it was Whitey who uttered
the first line spoken on the show, asking Mathers' character, "What
did she do to you, Beaver?" as the Beav emerged from his teacher's
classroom with a note to bring home to his parents.
But the innocent, sheltered suburbia depicted on "Leave It to Beaver"
was a far cry from the lifestyle Fafara assumed after the series ended
its run.
By his own account, he began drinking and doing drugs as a teenager
and briefly lived in a house with members of the rock band Paul Revere
and the Raiders. Sent off to live with his sister in Jamaica, he
returned to Los Angeles at age 22 and started dealing drugs.
By the early 1980s, he was breaking into pharmacies and was eventually
sentenced to a year in jail for burglary. After his release, he worked
a number of odd jobs and resumed drug dealing to support his habit.
In and out of jail and rehab, he moved to Portland in the early 1990s
hoping to get off drugs. But he ended up as a junkie living in a
rented motel room, then the streets, before finally checking himself
into a detox center in August 1995.
Clean and sober since then, he moved into a halfway house for
recovering addicts and alcoholics, then into a subsidized apartment on
the edge of Skid Row, where he scraped by on Social Security checks
until being hospitalized, Hallman said.
Near the end of his life Fafara took some acting classes, but his
aspirations to return to show business never gelled.