The RIP Famous Person Thread

[Mr Lick]

Ahmad Tejan Kabbah - obituary

Ahmad Tejan Kabbah was the President of Sierra Leone who showed that British military intervention abroad could be a triumph





Ahmad Tejan Kabbah, the former president of Sierra Leone who has died aged 82, invited British forces to rescue his capital from a brutal rebel army, paving the way for Tony Blair’s most successful foreign intervention.

A kindly and well-meaning man, temperamentally about as far from a war leader as could be imagined, Kabbah found himself confronting a singularly ruthless enemy when, in May 2000, rebels from the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) massed outside the capital, Freetown.


For almost a decade, RUF insurgents had ravaged Sierra Leone, specialising in hacking the arms and legs off their victims. Foday Sankoh, the RUF’s psychotic leader, had been trained in Libya by Col Muammar Gaddafi’s regime and sent back to West Africa to carry out a “people’s revolution”.





Foday Sankoh (AFP)


On January 6 1999 the RUF struck deep inside Freetown, carrying out a massacre which the city’s people still remember with horror. So when Sankoh and his men returned the following year Kabbah, who had already been overthrown once and restored once, faced the prospect of his capital again being sacked with trepidation

Ensconced in a gloomy official residence on a windswept hill overlooking the Atlantic – with a tank permanently stationed outside – Kabbah knew that his own Army was incapable of stopping the RUF. He was also grimly aware that he could not rely on the world’s biggest United Nations peacekeeping force, which maintained 17,000 ineffective and often inert troops in Sierra Leone.

So Kabbah turned to Britain, the former colonial power.

At first, he received a lukewarm response. Britain dispatched 800 troops, consisting of 1 Bn the Parachute Regiment and supporting elements, under the command of Brigadier David Richards. But the official mission was simply to evacuate British and other eligible citizens from Freetown.

In the event, this evacuation took less than a week. Instead of packing up and leaving, however, Brig Richards then decided – largely on his own initiative – to stay in Freetown and prevent the RUF from capturing the city. Tony Blair gave retrospective backing to his commander on the ground

Brig Richards was barred from going on the offensive, so he carefully deployed his troops in exposed forward positions and waited for the RUF to attack



The rebels took the bait and attacked British paratroopers near Lungi airport on May 17. The ensuing firefight was, in hindsight, the turning point of Sierra Leone’s civil war. For the first time since its foundation in 1991, the RUF collided not with a ragtag African army, but an elite fighting force. The rebels duly came off worse. Just how badly they were mauled remains unclear: Britain maintains that 30 insurgents were killed; the true figure was almost certainly far higher.

On the same day, Foday Sankoh was captured by Sierra Leonean forces acting with the help of British intelligence. After suffering this almost simultaneous double blow, the RUF began to fall apart and the threat to Freetown evaporated. The rebels opened talks with Kabbah and the civil war formally ended in 2002.

Fewer than 800 British combat troops had changed the course of history in a country of five million people – without suffering a single loss (although one British soldier was killed four months later during a mission to rescue 11 hostages

Brig Richards went on to become a general and Chief of the Defence Staff; Blair became a national hero in Sierra Leone, where babies were named in his honour.

Kabbah never forgot his debt to Blair. In his last weeks in office in 2007, Blair paid a triumphant visit to Sierra Leone where Kabbah made him a “paramount chief” with the right to sit in the country’s version of the House of Lords.

Ahmad Tejan Kabbah was born on February 16 1932 in what was then the British Crown Colony of Sierra Leone. Although a devout Muslim, he attended St Edward’s Catholic secondary school in Freetown, before moving to Britain where he lived for more than 10 years.

Kabbah studied at Aberystwyth University and was called to the Bar at Gray’s Inn in 1969. He then joined the United Nations Development Programme, working in Africa as its resident representative in Lesotho.

Kabbah returned to Sierra Leone in the late 1970s, where he became a senior civil servant and permanent secretary in several ministries. A bureaucrat rather than a politician, he nonetheless ran for president and won the election in 1996. He served for only a year before being overthrown in 1997 and then restored to office by a Nigerian military intervention the following year.

After the civil war, Kabbah won a sweeping victory in the 2002 election, running as the man who had brought peace. He served as president until 2007, but achieved little with his time in office.

Kabbah proved too weak to act against corrupt ministers. On his watch, Sierra Leone was penetrated by Latin American drug barons, who used the country as a staging post for running cocaine to Europe. When the opposition made (justified) complaints about his government’s corruption, Kabbah resorted to accusing them of a “lack of patriotism”. Few missed him when he retired from office.

Ahmad Tejan Kabbah’s wife, Patricia, predeceased him. They had five children.


Ahmad Tejan Kabbah, born February 16 1932, died March 13 2014

[Mr Lick]

Mike Parker - obituary

Mike Parker was the 'Godfather of fonts’ who took Helvetica global and suggested that Times New Roman was, in fact, stolen




Mike Parker, who has died aged 84, was known as the “Godfather of fonts” – typographical rather than ecclesiastical — and was responsible for popularising Helvetica, a lettering style which now pops up on everything from corporate logos to the washing instructions on clothing labels.


Much thought goes into designing a font, but people rarely think twice about the lettering they see all around them, their interest mildly aroused only when they scroll through the strangely-named fonts on their computers. Yet ever since Johannes Gutenberg began transforming handwritten texts into modular fonts of movable type, the art of font design has been integral to the advance of literacy and modern civilisation.



The Bible printed by Gutenberg in 1455 used an old German ornate “blackletter” font; the fluid lines of “Garamond” (which Parker studied for a Master’s degree at Yale) emerged from the pen of Claude Garamond, a French publisher and “punch-cutter” of the 16th century (who also gave us “Grecs du Roi”, “Granjon” and “Sabon”). Most of today’s newspaper typefaces derive from the “Roman” typefaces of another 16th-century printer, the Dutchman Hendrik van den Keere.


The late 19th century saw a renewed interest in font design, led in Britain by members of the Arts and Crafts movement. In the early 20th century perhaps the most famous letter designer, Eric Gill, designed nearly a dozen fonts, including “Perpetua” and “Gill Sans”, the latter becoming the standard typography for Britain’s railway system and featuring on Penguin Books’ classic jacket designs of the 1930s.


Helvetica’s roots, as the name suggests, were Swiss. It began life as “Neue Haas Grotesk”, developed by Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann for the Haas Type Foundry in Münchenstein in 1957 — when Swiss designers were promoting the idea of “rational typefaces” to suit the ethos of the modern industrial age. The pair tweaked a 60-year-old German font, stripping off unnecessary fripperies such as the small flourishes at the end of letter strokes known as serifs, to produce a clean and simple typeface.



A sign on the New York Subway in Helvetica (ALAMY)

Parker, then working as assistant to Jackson Burke, director of typographic development at the Mergenthaler Linotype Company, spotted the font, liked its clarity and set to work to adapt it, renamed Helvetica, for the company’s linotype machines that then led the world in book and newspaper typesetting technology.

In 1961 Parker succeeded Burke as Mergenthaler’s director of typographic development. He went on to develop some 1,000 fonts, but Helvetica was the one that really took off. From the 1960s onwards it became a popular choice for public signage and commercial logos such as those for Société Générale, Nestlé, 3M, BMW, Kawasaki, Lufthansa, McDonald’s, Microsoft, Motorola and Panasonic.


Helvetica entered the digital age by securing a place among the 11 fonts bundled with Apple’s early desktop computers, and the company continued to use it widely in devices such as the iPod. In Britain its rather bland functionality commended it to state-run monoliths such as British Rail, which adapted it into its own Rail Alphabet font (which was also adopted by the NHS and the British Airports Authority).

However, while Helvetica became dominant in the public world, it never really took off on the printed page, research showing that serif typefaces are easier for users to read in book-length stretches of text. While some criticised Helvetica as nondescript and dull, Parker waxed lyrical about its aesthetic appeal: “The meaning is in the content of the text, and not in the typeface,” he explained in a 2007 documentary. “It’s not a letter that’s bent to shape; it’s a letter that lives in a powerful matrix of surrounding space. What it’s all about is the interrelationship of the negative shape, the figure/ground relationship, the shapes between characters and within characters... Oh, it’s brilliant when it’s done well.”




Wall Street Subway station showing Helvetica signage (ALAMY)


The son of an American mining engineer, Michael Russell Parker was born in London on May 1 1929. The family returned to America after the Blitz and settled in Rye, New York State. Mike was educated at boarding schools, where he became interested in painting, only to discover that he was colour-blind. Instead he took a degree at Yale University in Architecture, followed by a Master’s in Design.

After graduation he got a job at the Plantin-Moretus Museum in Antwerp, Belgium, whose extensive historical typography collection inspired his fascination with fonts. Returning to America, he joined Mergenthaler in 1959.

By the beginning of the 1980s, however, revenues from the sale of typesetting equipment were dwindling; and as the digital age dawned Parker saw a business opportunity in the design and sale of fonts themselves — independent of equipment. In 1981 he left Mergenthaler and, with Matthew Carter, established Bitstream, a company based at Cambridge, Massachusetts, which became the first in the world to produce digital fonts that could be licensed for use by anyone.

The company was highly successful in the 1980s, when desktop publishing and personal computer use took off. In the Nineties, however, Parker lost money attempting to develop a joint venture with Steve Jobs which never quite came off.

Parker’s knowledge of the history of font design was exhaustive. In 1994 he created a stir when he published evidence that the design of Times New Roman, credited to the British typographer Stanley Morison in 1931, was based on 1904 drawings by the American Starling Burgess, which, he suggested, had been stolen in the 1920s.

Subsequently Parker became consultant and type historian for the Font Bureau, a typeface design foundry, and in 2009 he launched a font called Starling, based on Burgess’s original designs.

Parker’s two marriages were dissolved. He is survived by his ex-wife Sibyl who cared for him in his final years, by a son and two daughters and two stepdaughters

[harrybarracuda]

Sounds a bit like Bill Gates. Nick someone else's idea then take all the credit for it.

[harrybarracuda]

Tributes are being paid to former boxer, manager and promoter Mickey Duff, who has died at the age of 84.

Duff is best remembered as a promoter, working alongside the likes of Frank Bruno, Joe Calzaghe and Alan Minter.

Fellow promoter Barry Hearn led the tributes, tweeting: "Sorry to hear that Mickey Duff died today RIP Legendary promoter."

A statement from Stephen Powell on the London Ex Boxers' Association website added: "The London Ex Boxers Association offer their heartfelt condolences to the family of Micky Duff, who very sadly passed away peacefully in his sleep early this morning.

"This truly is the end of a golden era in British Boxing, the mould has been broken, there will never be another "true boxing man" like Micky Duff."

PA

Born in 1929 as Monek Prager in Kraków, Poland, Duff’s parents emigrated to England in the late 1930s during the rise of the Nazi Party. He began boxing aged 15, and retired four years later. After a brief period as a salesman, he became involved in promoting with Jack Solomons and Jarvis Astaire, eventually forging a relationship with BBC TV.
Duff was involved with 50 world champions and has shaped the careers of many world class British fighters, including Frank Bruno, Joe Calzaghe, John Conteh, Terry Downes, Lloyd Honeyghan, Maurice Hope, Charlie Magri, Alan Minter, John H Stracey, Jim Watt and Howard Winstone.
At one time, Duff had a near monopoly on UK boxing, but retired from promoting after the rise of Frank Warren, which was attributed to the latter's partnerships with ITV and SKY. In an interview with Alan Hubbard for the Independent back in 1999, Duff revealed:
“Maybe it was a mistake on my part. I never tried to bury the BBC. I stayed loyal to them for 33 years despite all sorts of offers. When Sky first came along I could have written my own ticket but I didn't. When the BBC ended our deal I believe it started the rot which has seen them lose so much major sport.”
Duff survived many battles with rival promoters, and was often the target of threats. East End gangsters The Krays once sent his wife a flower box containing a dead rat after he barred them from a show.
Duff was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of fame in 1999. One of his famous quotes to have been repeated many times by senior boxing figures:
“If you want loyalty, buy a dog.”
Up until his retirement, Duff was a colossal figure in boxing. May he Rest in Peace.

[harrybarracuda]

PUBLISHED 24 MARCH 2014 02:30 AM

Iconic character actor James Rebhorn best known of late for his role in 'Homeland', has died.

The 65-year-old died in his home on Friday, according to reports, but his family declined to announce it until now.

'Homeland' fans will recognise him as Claire Danes's character Carrie Matheson's father on the hit series and astute fans of 'Seinfeld' will hold a special place in their hearts for him, as he played the district attorney who hilariously convicted the gang in the 1998 series finale.

He has played supporting roles in 'Meet The Parents', 'Independence Day', 'My Cousin Vinny' and 'Scent of a Woman', as well as featuring on TV shows such as '30 Rock', 'The Good Wife', 'The Practice' and 'Boston Legal'.

[harrybarracuda]

Monday, March 24, 2014, 00:01 by Reuters
Spain’s Adolfo Suarez dies , aged 81
Former prime minister Adolfo Suarez, who died yesterday, steered Spain through one of the most turbulent periods in its political history and built bridges between the “two Spains” after fascist dictator General Francisco Franco died in 1975.
Suarez, who was 81, was hospitalised on March 17 with a respiratory infection. He had suffered from Alzheimer’s disease for many years. His death was reported by state television.
Many Spaniards remember Suarez’s unruffled demeanour during one of the most tense moments in the country’s modern history, an attempted coup on February 23 in 1981.
Six years earlier, after Franco’s death, King Juan Carlos called on Suarez, a young Francoist minister, to try to unite the two factions who were still in a sense fighting the 1936-1939 civil war, and indeed were further apart than ever after nearly 40 years of fascism exiled thousands of left-wingers.
At the time, his Francoist colleagues called him a turncoat and the main opposition Socialists accused him of opportunism.
The immediate aim was to organise Spain’s first democratic elections since the war, which Suarez ended up winning in 1977, serving as prime minister for four years in which the country was beset by myriad economic, political and secu-rity problems.
He drew criticism from all sides and eventually resigned. But decades later, Suarez came to be recognised as one of the founding fathers of modern Spain.
A 2007 poll showed that Spaniards regarded him as the most respected prime minister since Franco’s death.
“Prime Minister’s Suarez political career calls to mind the highest spirit of our democratic transition: recognition of dissenting voices, promotion of tolerance and the practice of dialogue.
“Thanks to that attitude he had the capacity to forge great agreements,” Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who served as prime minister from 2004 to 2011, said.
He steered the country from post-Franco turmoil
Handsome, charming both in and out of the political arena and acting with a notable sangfroid at potentially explosive times, Suarez was made a duke in 1981 and formed a close friendship with the King.
“He was a great statesman,” said King Juan Carlos in a TV address.
“Suarez saw with clarity and great generosity that the welfare and the future of everyone depended on consensus.”
PM Mariano Rajoy announced three days of official mourning, starting today.
“We have lost one of the great men of our time,” Rajoy said in a live TV address. “Adolfo Suarez was the best bridge for reconciliation between Spaniards.”
The death of a figure such as Suarez, respected for making sacrifices for the good of the nation, seems particularly poignant at a time when polls show that corruption has eroded Spaniards’ faith in the political class.
One of the most controversial steps in the transition process was Suarez’s 1977 legalisation of the Communist Party, which had been persecuted by Franco as the backbone of the forces against him.
Suarez carried out the move in stealth during the long Easter weekend, having agreed in advance with the exiled head of the Communists, Santiago Carrillo.
The surprise decision provoked fury in the establishment and the military, as well as fear amongst ordinary Spaniards who had been told for decades that the Communists and Carrillo were arch-enemies of the state. But Suarez understood it was unavoidable if Spain was to become a democracy after years of dictatorship.
“He was a transformational leader whose main priority as a politician was national reconciliation. This was probably due to the fact that the legacy of both sides of the Civil War was very much part of his family history,” biographer and historian Charles Powell said.
“When he was asked whether it was a good thing that former Francoists had played such a prominent role in the transition, he used to say: ‘I never asked anyone where they came from, only where they wanted to go’.”

[Mr Lick]

Micky Duff - Legend - RIP Sir

[palexxxx]

Micky Duff - Legend - RIP Sir

Who??

[rebbu]

BBC Sport - Mickey Duff: Boxing manager and promoter dies aged 84

Mickey Duff: Boxing manager and promoter dies aged 84



The renowned former boxing promoter and manager Mickey Duff has died aged 84.
Duff worked with 16 world champions and many world-class British fighters, including Frank Bruno, Joe Calzaghe, John Conteh and Lloyd Honeyghan.
Born Monek Prager in Krakow, Poland, Duff had a four-year career as a boxer in 1940s England, later rising to prominence as a manager and promoter.
He left boxing in 1999, having vowed to retire if Billy Schwer failed to win the WBC world lightweight title.
Barry Hearn, whose career as a boxing promoter coincided with Duff's, tweeted: "Sorry to hear that Mickey Duff died today. RIP legendary promoter."

Conteh, who held the WBC light-heavyweight crown from 1974 to 1977, said Duff loved the sport and knew it inside out.
"I turned pro in 1971 and Mickey was my promoter until I won the world championship in 1974," he told BBC Radio 5 live. "He was a boxer himself from a tough background so he knew where we were coming from.
"You listened to him and you trusted him. He was a great matchmaker and offered a tremendous vehicle for someone like me to turn professional.
"In those days you had to come to London to make it big. He had some fantastic venues, such as Wembley and the Royal Albert Hall."
Aged 15, Duff side-stepped the British Boxing Board of Control to acquire a promoter's licence - by law a licence could not be issued to anyone aged under 16.

After forming partnerships with Jack Solomons and Jarvis Astaire, he became a widely respected figure in the sport and established a broadcasting alliance with the BBC.
Over the course of a career spanning several decades, Duff saw off competition from rival promoters and was reportedly the target of threats. East End gangsters the Kray twins are said to have once sent his wife a flower box containing a dead rat after he barred them from a show.
In the 1980s, Duff enjoyed a near monopoly on UK boxing, but retired from promoting having witnessed the rise of Frank Warren, whose standing flourished through new partnerships with broadcasters ITV and Sky.
"He was one of the most important figures in post-War British boxing," Warren told the Daily Telegraph. "At his pinnacle he was one of the most astute match-makers."
Audley Harrison, who won super-heavyweight Olympic gold in 2000, said: "He left his mark on the game and was the main man for decades."
Barry McGuigan, president of the Professional Boxing Association and former WBA featherweight champion, described Duff as "a giant of boxing in a different era".
Duff was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1999 and will be fondly remembered for a quote that remains widely celebrated among senior figures in the sport: "If you want loyalty, buy a dog."

[harrybarracuda]

Patrice Wymore Flynn, a film and television actress who appeared opposite Frank Sinatra in the original "Ocean's Eleven" but earned wider notice for her real-life role as the last wife of matinee idol Errol Flynn died Saturday at her home in Portland, Jamaica. She was 87 and had pulmonary disease, said family spokesman Robb Callahan.
Wymore Flynn began her career on Broadway in the 1940s, performing in musicals such as "Hold It!" and "All for Love." She made her Hollywood debut in the Doris Day-Gordon MacRae romantic comedy "Tea for Two" in 1950.
That year she also co-starred in "Rocky Mountain," a western that was notable mainly for bringing her together with her future husband: She played a stagecoach passenger rescued from an Indian attack by Flynn in the role of a dashing Confederate army officer.
Soon after finishing the movie, Flynn broke off his engagement to a Romanian princess to marry Patrice. (In his 1959 autobiography — the aptly titled "My Wicked, Wicked Ways"— the actor wrote that he had his housekeeper break the news to the princess in a phone call.)
It was the third marriage for the notorious playboy, who in 1943 had been tried on statutory rape charges and acquitted, and the first for the elegant Wymore. She was 24 to his 41.
"Patrice typified everything that I was not, and I presumed that she knew what my life was, since my life had been an open newspaper," Flynn wrote in his memoir. "She could cook Indian curry, she could dance, she could sing, she was reserved, she had beauty, dignity … homebody qualities that go toward making a sensible and lasting marriage."
Their daughter, Arnella, was born in 1953, and they spent much of their time in Jamaica, where Flynn raised cattle and grew coconuts on a 2,000-acre ranch.
Despite his professed desire for a steady marriage, however, he continued his philandering, heavy drinking and drug use. He was also struggling in his career and had lost a fortune trying to make a film version of "William Tell."
He and Wymore were separated when he died of a heart attack in 1959 in Vancouver, Canada, where he had been staying with his teenage girlfriend. He was 50.
Wymore never remarried and defended her late husband in interviews, maintaining that his rakish public image was not the Flynn she knew. "He just lost his way," she told The Times in 2005.
Her first movie role after Flynn's death was in "Ocean's Eleven," the 1960 comedy about an 11-man criminal team that featured the fabled "Rat Pack" — Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Joey Bishop and Peter Lawford. Wymore played Sinatra's girlfriend who tells him, "You really are a rat," and hurls an ashtray at him after he unceremoniously dumps her.
The daughter of a farmer and businessman, Wymore was born in Miltonvale, Kan., on Dec. 17, 1926, and grew up in Salina, Kan. She appeared in vaudeville as a child, moving to New York in her teens to work as a model.
After Flynn's death, she appeared mainly on television, including episodes of "Perry Mason," "The Monkees" and "F Troop."
In the late 1960s she retired from acting to manage the Jamaica ranch and its 800 head of cattle. She was voted Jamaica Rancher of the Year in the 1980s and also ran a boutique and a company that made wicker furniture.
"She was very uncommon for an American actress … and a very successful businesswoman," Callahan said Monday.
Her daughter died in 1998. She is survived by a grandson, Luke Flynn.


Patrice Wymore Flynn dies at 87; actress, widow of Errol Flynn - latimes.com

[Mr Lick]

Gwar frontman Dave Brockie found dead at the age of 50




The frontman of the heavy metal band Gwar, Dave Brockie, has been found dead at his home in the US at the age of 50.

Officers were called to a home in Richmond, Virginia, on Sunday evening to a report of a dead person, said Dionne Waugh, a spokesperson for local police.

When police arrived, Brockie was found dead inside the home.

Waugh said the medical examiner's officer would determine the cause of death but foul play is not suspected.

"Dave was one of the funniest, smartest, most creative and energetic persons I've known," former Gwar bassist Mike Bishop told Richmond's Style Weekly newspaper.

"He was brash sometimes, always crass, irreverent, he was hilarious in every way. But he was also deeply intelligent and interested in life, history, politics and art."



Former bandmate Chris Bopst said: "I wish it was a joke. Everyone is in shock."

Earlier today a picture of the musician was posted on the band's official website, along with the dates of his birth and death.

The group's manager, Jack Flanagan, released a statement confirming the news.

"It is with a saddened heart, that I confirm my dear friend Dave Brockie, artist, musician, and lead singer of Gwar passed away at approximately 6.50pm EST Sunday 23 March 2014.

"His body was found Sunday by his band mate at his home in Richmond, Virginia.

Richmond authorities have confirmed his death and next of kin has been notified. A full autopsy will be performed," he said.

Flanagan added: "My main focus right now is to look after my band mates and his family. More information regarding his death shall be released as the details are confirmed."



Brockie had been part of the Grammy-nominated band since it was founded in 1984 and went by the stage name Oderus Urungus.

Gwar were known for the grotesque costumes, on-stage antics and extreme lyrics.

They had recently announced they would hold the fifth Gwar-B-Q concert on 16 August at Hadad's Water Park in Virginia.

The band released their last album in 2013 and had recently completed tours in Japan and Australia.

In 2011, lead guitarist 34-year-old Cory Smoot was found dead on the band's tour bus

[Mr Lick]

Dynasty star Kate O'Mara dies



"A shining star has gone out," said Kate O'Mara's agent

Former Dynasty star Kate O'Mara has died at the age of 74, her agent said.

The British actress was best known for her role as sister to Joan Collins' Alexis Colby in the US soap.

She also had prominent roles in the '80s series Howards' Way and Triangle, and in Doctor Who.

Her agent said she died in a Sussex nursing home following a short illness.

He praised her "energy and vitality" and her "love for theatre and acting".

"A shining star has gone out and Kate will be dearly missed by all who knew and have worked with her," said agent Phil Belfield, who labelled the actress "extraordinary".

O'Mara's first television roles were in the 1960s, but she came to public attention playing the manipulative Cassandra "Caress" Morrell in Dynasty.

She played a ruthless businesswoman in BBC drama Howards' Way and was briefly a regular on the North Sea ferry drama Triangle.

She also appeared in Doctor Who, opposite both Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy, as renegade Time Lord The Rani.


In 1976, she joined Ernie Wise and Eric Morecambe on their long-running show




The actress played Lady Windermere in Lord Arthur Savile's Crime alongside Lee Mead in 2010




O'Mara and fellow Dynasty star Joan Collins met the Queen at a Diamond Jubilee event celebrating the arts in 2012

Last year, she told the Huffington Post: "I'd love to come back as The Rani another time around.

"To have a much older woman as your adversary, there's something interesting about that."

In 2001, she made a string of appearances in ITV drama Bad Girls and more recently she had appeared in ITV soap Benidorm and a 2012 stage adaptation of Agatha Christie's Death On The Nile.

She was married to actors Richard Willis and Jeremy Young and leaves a sister, actress Belinda Carroll. Her son Dickon died last year.

The actress last posted a message on Twitter on 17 March.

"Thank you so much for your kind tweets," she wrote.

"It's both humbling and completely overwhelming to read all of your messages. Much Love x''

[Mr Lick]

Jerry Roberts - obituary

Jerry Roberts was a Bletchley Park codebreaker who cracked Hitler’s secret messages and warned of an attack on Kursk




Jerry Roberts, who has died aged 93, was one of a small group of Bletchley Park codebreakers who read Hitler’s messages to his generals, providing unprecedented details of the German preparations for the D-Day landings.

The German High Command’s teleprinter messages, which were broken in part with the help of Colossus, the world’s first large-scale electronic digital computer, also provided the German plans for the Battle of Kursk, now seen as the turning point of the war.


“I can remember myself breaking messages about Kursk,” Roberts recalled. “We were able to warn the Russians that the attack was going to be launched and the fact that it was going to be a pincer movement. We had to wrap it all up and say it was from spies, that we had wonderful teams of spies, and other sources of information. We were able to warn them what army groups were going to be used, and most important, what tank units were going to be used.”

Provided with the information by the British, the Red Army was able to rebuff the German attack, before launching an all-out assault that destroyed the German forces aligned against them in what led to a Soviet advance that did not stop until it reached Berlin

Raymond Clarke Roberts (always known as Jerry) was born in Wembley on November 18 1920. His father was a pharmacist, his mother the organist in the local chapel. He was educated at Latymer Upper School, Hammersmith, before studying German and French at University College, London.

His ambition was to join the Foreign Office, but his German professor, Leonard Willoughby, who had been a leading member of the Admiralty’s First World War code-breaking unit Room 40, put him forward for “work of a secret kind” which could not be discussed in advance.



Roberts found himself facing an enigmatic recruitment process at a War Office building just off Trafalgar Square during which he was asked by an anonymous major if he played chess. When he responded in the affirmative, the major asked if he could also “tackle crosswords”.

Another nod of the head was sufficient to see him sent to the codebreakers’ “War Station” at Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire, where John Tiltman, the chief cryptographer, recruited him into his research section, warning him that “absolute silence must be preserved” about what happened there.



Queen Elizabeth II speaks with code breaker Captain Jerry Roberts during a visit to Bletchley Park in 2011

Roberts was initially put to work breaking the Double Playfair hand cipher used by German police troops operating on the Eastern Front. The deciphered messages revealed the early stages of what would become known as the Holocaust, with German generals seemingly vying with each other to tell Berlin about the tens of thousands of Jews their men were killing.

Churchill requested a special series of reports on the atrocities and, despite the danger that it might lead to improved German cipher security and hinder Bletchley’s successes, publicly denounced the killings as “a crime without a name”.

The team working on the police messages was headed by Ralph Tester; and in July 1942 Tester and his team were put to work on a new problem — the enciphered teleprinter messages being sent between Hitler and his generals. German teleprinter messages had first been intercepted in the second half of 1940, but little had been done with them until it became clear, in late 1941, that they were being used more frequently. The messages were enciphered with the Lorenz SZ40 system, which had two sets of five cipher wheels, making it even more complex than the most difficult of the Enigma ciphers, which had one set of four.

Tiltman looked at the early messages, trying to find a way into them, initially without success. In August 1941, however, a German operator sent the same message twice on the same settings, shortening some of the text in the second message to save time.

This allowed Tiltman a way in; and in an extraordinary piece of code breaking he worked out the texts of the messages, giving a stream of 4,000 plain text letters and their cipher equivalents which might help to reconstruct the operation of the Lorenz machine. For two months the research section tried without success to use Tiltman’s decrypt to break the enciphered teleprinter messages, which were code-named Fish by the codebreakers. Then, in October, it was given to the young chemistry graduate Bill Tutte.



Jerry Roberts in later life

“He used to sit staring into the middle distance, twirling a pencil about in his fingers,” Roberts recalled. “I used to wonder whether he was getting anything done. My goodness, he was.”

In a stroke of genius, Tutte managed to find a way in, allowing the research section to reconstruct the Lorenz machine. The combined efforts of Tiltman and Tutte were described in an internal GCHQ history as “one of the outstanding successes of the war”, not least because of the high standard of intelligence the Fish messages produced.

The teleprinter links ran between all the major German front line headquarters and Hitler’s command posts in Berlin or at the Wolf’s Lair, his forward command post for the Eastern Front at Rastenburg in East Prussia.

Tester and his team, including Roberts, by now commissioned into the Intelligence Corps, were put to work on breaking the Fish messages on a regular basis in July 1942. “The people the messages were going to and coming from would be given at the beginning of the message,” Roberts recalled. “So you would have General so-and-so sending to Army HQ in Berlin.”

The Testery, as it was known, began with Roberts and five others actually breaking the messages, but grew to be 118-strong, including among its numbers Peter Benenson, who later founded Amnesty International, and Roy Jenkins, who went on as a Labour politician to become Chancellor of the Exchequer and was subsequently Chancellor of the University of Oxford.




One of its early members was Max Newman, who had been Turing’s tutor at Cambridge. Newman realised that one part of the code-breaking process for the Fish ciphers could be done by the kind of machine Turing had described in their discussions.

That belief led to the creation, by the GPO telecommunications engineer Tommy Flowers, of Colossus, which greatly speeded up the breaking of the Fish ciphers ahead of the D-Day landings, when the codebreakers were able to read details of Hitler’s conversations with Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt, the German commander in France.

“Some were signed by Hitler,” Roberts said. “I can remember myself deciphering at least one message − he called himself: 'Adolf Hitler, Führer’. I suppose I should have been unhappy that I wasn’t fighting the true fight. But this never bothered me. One knew that this was immensely more important than any other single contribution that you could make as a soldier, or as an officer.”



After the war Roberts spent two years in Germany with the War Crimes Investigation Unit before being demobilised in 1947 and beginning a career in market research which would take him all over the world.

In 1970 he set up his own companies, working for a number of high-profile clients including British Gas, Reebok, DuPont, American Airlines, Chrysler and Holiday Inn.

Roberts sold his companies in 1993 and retired. Two years later, he married Mei Li, an artist and book illustrator.

He spent his later years campaigning for greater recognition for Flowers and Tutte, which led to a BBC documentary on the latter’s work breaking the Fish ciphers, and for the preservation of Bletchley Park.

He was appointed MBE in the 2013 New Years Honours “for services to the work of Bletchley Park and to code breaking”.

Jerry Roberts was thrice married. He is survived by his third wife and by a daughter of his first marriage, a son and daughter of his second, and by four stepchildren.


Jerry Roberts, born November 18 1920, died March 25 2014

[Mr Lick]

Kazuo Yairi - obituary

Kazuo Yairi was a luthier whose loving eye and ear for wood thrummed through his guitars




Kazuo Yairi, who has died aged 81, was a Japanese classical guitar luthier whose fixation with acoustic sound drove him to make beautiful, resonant guitars favoured by musical such greats as Sir Paul McCartney and Carlos Santana.

In an era when many guitar manufacturers employ computers, lasers, and robotics in a race to produce more guitars faster, Yairi’s genius was to rely solely on the use of hands and hand-tools . “Good guitars are made of good wood, by good craftsmen” was the simple philosophy behind the creation of his Alvarez-Yairi acoustic guitars in the Spanish style. Musicians like McCartney agreed, preferring Yairi’s guitars for renditions of Blackbird and a specially designed K Yairi (as the guitars are also known) tuned down two notches for performing Yesterday.

Drawing on centuries of traditional craftsmanship, Yairi believed that the most laborious methods of wood selection, preparation and manual carving – or “listening with your hands”, as he put it – were central to creating the ideal sound. Musicians also praised his skill in developing innovative features, such as the K Yairi “Direct Coupled Bridge” (or DCB), which gave his instruments their responsive feel. Distinctive mahogany dovetail neck joints added to the warm, thrumming heart of his guitars , while an open-pore finish on the back and sides of his instruments allowed the wood to breathe and the sound to flow



But mostly it was his tireless attention to beauty, and to the materials, that made Yairi’s abalone-pitted, mocha-toned rosewood instruments stand out. “A well-experienced luthier selects the best material and processes them one by one, regardless of the time needed for each painstaking step,” he said. “Thinking of efficiency will hinder the production of genuine guitars.” By focusing solely on the acoustic guitar and its sound, Yairi hoped to achieve perfection with every instrument. For this reason he refused to make electric guitars, though many beseeched him to do so

With the help of a small team of manufacturers, Yairi became a leading ambassador for his craft. He was awarded a Yellow Ribbon Medal of Honour by the Japanese Emperor in 2006. Production took place in the sylvan Japanese mountains near Nagoya, the same region in which he had learnt his trade at the knee of his luthier father, Gi’ichi Yairi.

Kazuo Yairi was born on April 27 1932, and his early interest in the acoustic arts were sharpened by frequent visits to the family home in the 1950s by Masao Sasaki, one of Japan’s foremost classical guitar players. At 18, Kazuo started his own workshop devoted exclusively to building classical guitars. He was later joined by his three younger brothers, who still work with 20 others at the rural Yairi factory in the village of Kani, making Renaissance lutes, vihuelas, classical and dreadnought steel string guitars .

As industrialisation swept the country, Yairi became more focused than ever on a return to the aesthetic principles that make Japanese arts and crafts so desirable.

Just as his forefathers had laboured over scraps of ivory to create netsuke, he realised that Japanese industry could still offer the world something that embodied those same qualities of meticulous craftsmanship and attention to detail.

A partnership with the American distributors and manufacturers St Louis Music in the 1960s gave rise to the first Alvarez acoustic guitar. Yairi took over his father’s business in 1965 and steadily expanded production.

After a period in the United States to study making the steel string acoustic guitar, he formed the Yairi Guitar Factory and began exporting handmade acoustic and classical guitars .

Kazuo Yairi’s death leaves his family in charge at Kani, to continue traditional guitar production into the next generation.

He is survived by his wife and daughter

[Rupert Wanger]

The "Godfather of House Music" Frankie Knuckles has passed away today at age 59, as confirmed by fellow Chicago house artists DJ Deeon and Paul Johnson.

DJ Producer Frankie Knuckles dies

Born in the Bronx in 1955, Knuckles first began DJing in New York alongside Larry Levan. He then moved to Chicago in the 1970's to become the premiere DJ at The Warehouse, the nightclub that would birth the dance music genre "house." Knuckles then opened up his own club, The Power Plant, in 1983. Knuckles was also a producer on such famous songs as James Power's "Your Love" and "Baby Wants to Ride."

[Bogon]

Poor old Frankie Knuckles.

Didn't realise he was so old.

This is one of my favourite tracks from my "garage" days.

The English kids on the forum will know what I'm on about.

[Chittychangchang]

RIP the Legend Frankie

[FloridaBorn]

Hobie Alter the inventor of the famous surf board and the twin hull catamaran, Hobie Cats.

Hobie Alter, Innovator of Sailing and Surfing, Dies at 80

Hobie Alter, who was known as the Henry Ford of the surfboard industry for his manufacturing innovations and who used his idle time to create the Hobie Cat, the lightweight, double-hulled sailboat that achieved worldwide popularity, died on Saturday at his home in Palm Desert, Calif. He was 80

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/01/sp...t-80.html?_r=0

[Mr Lick]

Sir Robin Dunn - obituary

Sir Robin Dunn was a Lord Justice of Appeal who was decorated in war then dealt with film stars and traitors in peace



Sir Robin Dunn, the former Lord Justice of Appeal, who has died aged 96, was among the more engaging and colourful members of the bench; he was also awarded an MC in the Second World War .


Dunn’s often lengthy divorce cases made him a fierce critic of their cost to the taxpayer. His bench also became a platform for outspoken social commentary, including, most notoriously, his 1974 remark about the differences between wives north and south of the border.


In the North, said Dunn, wives did not mind their husbands beating them but drew the line at adultery; in the South, the opposite was the case. He withdrew his observations the next day, and apologised to the angry women of the North.


But despite the odd maverick outburst, Dunn was widely liked and respected, and was being tipped as a likely candidate to take over as president of the Family Division shortly before his promotion to the Court of Appeal in 1980.


As a committee member of the Devon and Somerset Staghounds, he was at the forefront of its legal battle with the League Against Cruel Sports in the mid-1980s, after the hunt fenced in the League’s so-called “sanctuaries” which it owned on Exmoor




Dunn was also unusual in the ranks of the judiciary in having served as a regular Army officer for 10 years; in 1980 he was made Honorary Colonel Commandant, the highest honour that the Royal Artillery can bestow on a non-serving officer.

The son of a Royal Artillery brigadier, Robin Horace Walford Dunn was born on January 16 1918 and educated at Wellington and the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, where he won the Sword of Honour. He joined the RA in 1938, and fought during the Second World War in France, Belgium and North Africa. He was thrice wounded, mentioned in despatches and awarded a Military Cross in 1944.

On July 8 of that year, Major Dunn, as he then was, was Battery Commander and Commanding Officer’s representative with 1st Battalion the Royal Norfolk Regiment during an attack on Lébisey wood, near Caen, accompanying the CO on foot with his signallers carrying the wireless sets.

During the whole period of the attack he was under heavy shell and mortar fire, but never failed to maintain communications with the regiment. In the later stages of the assault he organised a fresh fire plan to assist the infantry, who were being held down by an enemy post in the south-west corner of the wood.

The citation for his MC stated: “It was largely due to his efforts that the infantry were enabled to clear the wood with comparatively few casualties. Towards the end of the action Major Dunn was wounded in the head, but refused to go for treatment until ordered by the CO of the Norfolks. During the whole operation Major Dunn, under heavy fire, exhibited a calm and resolute bearing which was an example to both his own party and the infantry.”



Robin Dunn with Field Marshal Montgomery

After the war, Dunn attended Staff College but left the Army as an honorary major in 1948, the same year that he was called to the Bar by Inner Temple. He soon established himself as an eloquent and persuasive advocate, frequently appearing for the rich and famous. While still a junior, he represented Vivien Leigh (in her successful divorce action against Laurence Olivier), and the publisher George Weidenfeld, who was granted a divorce after his wife’s adultery with the writer Cyril Connolly.

Another client was the Russian-born marathon walker Barbara Moore, who alleged she had been defamed by a series of advertisements for shoes, bananas and oranges which surrounded coverage in the Daily Mail of her walk from John O’Groats to Land’s End. She said the advertisements implied that she had undertaken the walk for financial gain rather than to prove the capabilities of a 55-year-old woman on a vegetarian diet.

“Some people may think she’s a crank,” said Dunn, “but most great causes have been started by single-minded people who some consider to be cranks.”

From 1959 to 1962, Dunn was Western Circuit junior counsel to the Registrar of Restrictive Trading Practices. In 1961 he represented the Attorney General at the election petition over whether Viscount Stansgate (Tony Benn) should be allowed to take his place in the Commons following his Bristol South-East by-election victory.

Dunn took Silk in 1962, and as a QC his clients included the former MP Patricia Fisher, injured when a bottle of jewellery cleaner she had bought at Harrods exploded in her hand; the racehorse trainer Florence Nagle, to whom the Jockey Club refused to issue a licence because she was a woman; and the “spoilt” wife of the Swiss film producer Robert Velaise, himself described by Dunn as “a debonair international playboy, expert skier and water-skier, the dashing Don Juan with women”.

One of the highlights of Dunn’s career was the Vassal Tribunal in 1968, at which he represented The Daily and Sunday Telegraph. The inquiry concerned the activities of the homosexual Admiralty spy in Moscow, John Vassal, but an important side issue was whether journalists should disclose their sources.

Dunn was appointed a Judge of the High Court, Probate, Divorce and Admiralty Division (later Family Division) in 1969.

He was soon ordering the pop singer Gene Vincent to pay maintenance arrears to his former wife or go to prison; granting a divorce to a young wife who objected to her husband’s dressing up in drag; and refusing to believe a petitioner who claimed that his wife charged him half-a-crown for sex.

As presiding judge on the Western Circuit from 1974 to 1978, Dunn proved a tough sentencer. In 1977 he jailed stately home robber Denis Morley — who went in for fast cars, beautiful women and gambling — to 15 years. The trial was the longest in Exeter Crown Court’s history, involving 170 witnesses and more than 700 exhibits. He also gave mandatory life terms to several murderers .

Probably Dunn’s best-known judgment on appeal was in the Sidaway case in 1984.

Mrs Sidaway was suing Bethlem Royal Hospital over damage to her spinal cord. She said she was not told of the possibility of such damage before she consented to an operation. But Dunn agreed with the then Master of the Rolls, Sir John Donaldson, that a doctor (or surgeon) fulfilled his duty to inform a patient if he acted in accordance with a practice rightly accepted as proper by a body of skilled and experienced medical men.

Because the surgeon had assessed the risk of damage to the spinal cord at only one to two per cent, he had considered it too remote a risk to form the basis of Mrs Sidaway’s decision on whether or not to consent to the operation. The judges held this to be reasonable after listening to other expert witnesses.

The decision — later upheld by the Law Lords — was welcomed by medics, but criticised by others as legitimising the idea of passive patients and authoritarian doctors. Some went so far as to claim a professional conspiracy, with lawyers closing ranks behind the doctors.

Dunn was among the judges who ruled that a wife’s once-a-week sex ration was fair, and who turned down the Moonies’ request for a retrial following their failed libel action against the Daily Mail.

He warned divorced parents not to try to take revenge on their former husbands or wives by refusing them access to their children. “These courts have said over and over again, that although you can dissolve marriages, you cannot dissolve parenthood,” Dunn observed. He also warned divorced mothers not to expect that custody of their children would automatically be granted to them.

Dunn retired from the Court of Appeal in 1984. He was, variously, treasurer of the Bar Council (1967-69); deputy chairman of Somerset Quarter Sessions (1965-71); and a member of the Lord Chancellor’s Committee on Legal Education (1968-69). He was knighted in 1969 and sworn of the Privy Council in 1980.

In 1994 he published Sword and Wig: The Memoirs of a Lord Justice. He later wrote a book about stag hunting on Exmoor, one of his passions. He was a fierce opponent of the National Trust’s decision to ban stag hunting on their land.

Robin Dunn married, in 1941, Judith Pilcher, who died in 1995; they had a son and two daughters, and one daughter survives him with his second wife, Joan (née Stafford-King-Harman), whom he married in 1997

[Mr Lick]

Charles Keating - obituary

Charles Keating was an American philanthropist and anti-pornography campaigner who was convicted of fraud on a massive scale




Charles Keating, the former financier, who has died aged 90, was proof of the old adage that the louder a man boasts of his own honour, the faster you should count your spoons.

Until he was found guilty in 1992 of fleecing thousands of elderly American investors of their life savings (not to mention taxpayers, who had to stump up $3.4 billion to cover the losses of his savings and loan empire), to all outward appearances Keating led an exemplary life. As a lawyer in Cincinnati, he had handled poor clients for free; he donated millions of dollars to Mother Teresa and lent her his private jet when she visited the United States; he had led a national campaign against pornography and paid for thousands of gifted children from New York’s ghettos to attend good schools.

But there was always a darker side




In the late 1970s he bought American Continental Homes, an underperforming house-building company based in Phoenix, Arizona, and turned it from a loss-maker into America’s sixth largest house-builder. In 1983, he dropped the “Homes” and turned American Continental into an investment firm. The following year he bought a small savings and loan association (similar to a building society in Britain) called Lincoln

The acquisition coincided with the removal by Congress of nearly all regulations on savings and loan (or “thrift”) associations, and Keating took advantage of the new opportunities to turn Lincoln into a massive property and financing vehicle that channelled billions of depositors’ dollars into hotels, undeveloped land, risky housing developments — and junk bonds.

The jewel in his crown was the Phoenician, a $295 million luxury hotel in Scottsdale, Arizona, which featured 23-carat gold leaf ceilings and seven swimming pools, one lined with mother of pearl.

Keating’s own lifestyle was similarly glitzy. There were estates in Arizona, the Bahamas and Florida; an apartment in Monte Carlo; and company-owned jets and helicopters to ferry his family around the world. American Continental Corp paid the $56,820 bill for the wedding of one of his daughters .

But in the late 1980s the government reimposed regulation, catching Keating in a bind. He had billions of dollars tied up in long-term projects, and liquidating them to satisfy the regulators would incur huge losses. Faced with this prospect, he decided to play for time by juggling the books until his investments paid off.

His main method of declaring false profits was to sell property he owned in the Arizona desert for a large profit to small investors who would borrow the entire (inflated) purchase price from Keating . To cover his tracks, Keating arranged for a web of different companies to lend the money and sell the land; he even persuaded leading accountancy firms to sign off the transactions.

But federal examiners remained unconvinced, and launched a comprehensive audit of Keating’s business empire which uncovered the deceit. Finally, in April 1989, he filed for bankruptcy protection. About 23,000 customers were left with worthless bonds. Many lost their life savings.

In 1990 Keating and dozens of associates were indicted in a Los Angeles court on 42 counts of fraud, racketeering and conspiracy. Keating was convicted on 17 counts the following year.

Many of his victims, most of them poor and elderly, lined up to demand a tough sentence, in a scene likened by one witness to “vengeful French peasants venting their spite beside the guillotine”. To counter their animosity, Keating produced a message from Mother Teresa testifying to his good character and brought in an army of family members — including grandchildren whose tearful wailing was caught by the television cameras after the judge announced that he was sending Keating down for the maximum 10 years.

Charles Humphrey Keating was born on December 4 1923 and raised in poverty in Cincinnati after his father, a former dairy manager, succumbed to Parkinson’s disease.

After St Xavier High School he briefly attended the University of Cincinnati but dropped out and enlisted in the Navy in 1941. Trained as a night fighter pilot, Keating never saw combat, but nearly lost his life when, bringing his Hellcat fighter in to land, he forgot to lower the landing gear and had to jump out as the aircraft skidded across the runway before bursting into flames.

After being discharged, Keating returned to the University of Cincinnati where he took a degree in Law and married Mary Elaine Fette. In the mid-1950s Keating and his brother established a law firm that soon acquired a major client, the takeover expert Carl Lindner. In 1959 Keating helped Lindner to found his American Financial Corp, which grew into a multibillion-dollar holding company, with Keating as a vice-president and director.

At the same time Keating won a reputation as a crusader against pornography, winning victories against the Hustler publisher Larry Flynt and against stores selling “adult” magazines. In 1957 he founded Citizens for Decent Literature, and in 1969 President Nixon appointed him to the US Commission on Obscenity and Pornography.

In 1976, however, Keating made a surprise exit from American Financial which coincided with a flurry of lawsuits from shareholders angered by a precipitous drop in profits in 1974-75. Though market factors were largely to blame, a subsequent investigation by the US Securities and Exchange Commission saw Keating and others accused of illegally profiting at the expense of shareholders and receiving preferential treatment as insiders. American Financial coughed up $1.4 million in fines and Keating moved the base of his operations to Arizona.

In 1979 he agreed a settlement with the SEC in which he neither admitted nor denied the allegations . Two years later, in 1981, controversy over the settlement forced President Reagan to withdraw an offer of the US ambassadorship to the Bahamas.

When Keating’s business empire began to unravel in the late 1980s, he called in favours from influential Washington politicians, notably “the Keating Five”, a group of senators including John Glenn and John McCain, who interceded on his behalf with federal regulators. In 1991 the Senate Ethics Committee would reprimand one of the five, Democrat Alan Cranston of California, and criticise the others.

In the meantime Keating effectively shot himself in the foot with a breathtaking piece of hubris. Calling a press conference after the Lincoln collapse he railed at “obscene” bureaucrats who, because of their vendetta against him, were costing hundreds of billions of dollars that could otherwise be spent on “the poor of the world”. He then raised the issue of whether his financial support for politicians had in any way influenced them to take up his cause: “I want to say in the most forceful way I can: I certainly hope so.”

A year after his conviction in Los Angeles, a federal jury found Keating guilty on 73 counts of fraud, racketeering and conspiracy, leaving him facing an additional 525 years in prison. In 1996, however, these convictions were quashed on a technicality .

Following his release, in 1999 he pleaded guilty to four felonies in return for the prosecutors’ agreeing that he would serve no more time in jail.

Keating is survived by his wife, from whom he was separated, and by their son and four daughters. Another daughter predeceased him.


Charles Keating, born December 4 1923, died March 31 2014

[Mr Lick]

Captain Harry Beckingham - obituary

Captain Harry Beckingham was a bomb disposal officer who dealt with lethal butterflies in Hull and survived gas poisoning in Ilford




Captain Harry Beckingham, who has died on his 94th birthday, was a bomb disposal officer in the Second World War.

On the outbreak of war, Beckingham, a draughtsman fresh from technical college, was posted to 35 Bomb Disposal Section, which was subsequently incorporated into 5 Bomb Disposal (BD) Company RE.


He was given a day’s training at Sheffield, at the end of which, as he said afterwards: “We were given a drawing which showed how to deal with an unexploded bomb.” This depicted a wall being constructed around the bomb with corrugated metal and sandbags, with an area left so that a man could crawl inside and place a charge.


After the start of the Blitz, Beckingham worked on unexploded bombs first in the north of London and then – after moving to the Duke of York Barracks – in the West End, Fulham and Victoria.


One day his section was called out to the centre of Ilford to dig for a bomb when “out of the blue a German plane swooped down on us, machine guns blazing as he roared past”. Beckingham dived for cover, while the rest of his squad took shelter in nearby shop doorways

The next thing he knew, he was waking up in hospital. It turned out that he had fallen into a concealed camouflet – a chamber filled with odourless carbon dioxide created when a bomb exploded underground.

Such accidents almost invariably proved fatal. The bottom of the hole could be 30ft deep, and there was often no way of knowing that the bomb had already exploded.

Rescue attempts were forbidden because they usually only added to the casualties.

Fortunately for Beckingham, a policeman had seen his head suddenly disappear, and his colleagues had rushed over and pulled him out — although not before he had breathed several lungfuls of the deadly gas.

Henry William Beckingham was born at Ludlow, Shropshire, on February 28 1920 and educated locally. He was commissioned in 1943 and posted to 12 BD Company RE in Leeds. That summer he was kept busy clearing butterfly bombs from the hedges and ditches around Hull. He had to use straw, set alight, to burn off the thick undergrowth so that he did not miss any of these lethal devices

In September 1944 he was posted to Task Force 135, which had assembled at Plymouth for the liberation of the Channel Islands. He was involved in clearing British minefields in the Weymouth and Penzance areas until May 1945, when he embarked for Jersey as commander of a detachment of 24 BD Platoon.

He went to the Pomme d’Or Hotel on the esplanade and took prisoner the head of the German civil administration on the island. The hotel was to be used for the Task Force’s commander, and he checked the place for booby traps.

Beckingham took his unit to Guernsey at the end of the month and was involved in clearing mines and bombs along the coasts of the Channel Islands until May 1946, when he was demobilised in the rank of captain.

After the war he worked for the building division of English China Clay at St Austell, Cornwall, and subsequently as a consultant at Ilkley, Yorkshire. Settled in retirement at a village in Cumbria, he enjoyed sailing, gardening, and travelling.

Beckingham published Living with Danger: Memoirs of a Bomb Disposal Officer (1997) and Achtung! Minen! Guernsey (2005).

Harry Beckingham married first, in 1945, Joan Walker, who predeceased him. He married, secondly, in 1990, Mavis Hayward, who survives him with a son and a daughter from his first marriage.

[Mr Lick]

Patrick McGovern - obituary

Patrick McGovern was a publisher of guides to music, computing and sex 'For Dummies’ everywhere




Patrick McGovern, who has died aged 76, built a multibillion-dollar computer magazine empire, International Data Group (IDG), which, among other things, developed the “For Dummies” manuals, targeted at the computer illiterate.

The concept was the brainchild of John Kilcullen, with whom McGovern founded the IDG subsidiary IDG Books Worldwide in 1990. At first the concept of marketing books written specifically for people prepared to glory in their own ignorance was greeted with scepticism by booksellers and publishers. Readers, they claimed, would refuse to buy books that proclaimed their own inadequacies.


The first in the series, however, DOS for Dummies, written by Dan Gookin, was a runaway success when it was published in 1991. Within a few years the doubters were clamouring to stock or imitate the cheap and cheerful yellow and black paperbacks that appeared to take the side of people who feel challenged by the complexities of modern life.


As it turned out, people did not mind being called “dummies” when it came to computers – or anything else for that matter. IDG’s “For Dummies’’ series soon expanded to more than 200 titles, including manuals on economics, football, Jane Austen, freshwater aquariums, probability theory, classical music, hockey, job interviews and even sex (written by Dr Ruth Westheimer

IDG also published Computerworld, PC World, Macworld and hundreds of other techie magazines, including The Industry Standard, a “newsmagazine of the internet economy”, which in 2000 sold more ad pages than any magazine in American history.

When the internet bubble burst, the magazine closed, though IDG continued to grow, due in part to the “Dummies” series

Despite a fortune estimated at $5.7 billion, McGovern, known affectionately to his employees as “Uncle Pat”, cultivated a modest image, flying economy class, driving a used car and preferring business suits to Steve Jobs-style jeans and turtlenecks. He was known for turning up on his employees’ 10th anniversaries and treating them to an expensive meal at a restaurant. In the run-up to Christmas he would sometimes travel the world to hand out bonuses to people who worked for him.

In 2000 he and his wife, Lore, gave $350 million to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for the study of brain science — at that time the largest-ever gift to an American university.

The son of a construction manager, Patrick Joseph McGovern was born on August 11 1937 in the Queens district of New York and brought up in Philadelphia. There, browsing in a local library, he pulled out a book, Giant Brains, or Machines That Think (1949) by Edmund Callis Berkeley, the first book to talk about how computers could transform the world.

Inspired by this vision of the future, in the late 1950s, while studying Biophysics at MIT, McGovern began helping to edit one of the first industry magazines, Computers and Automation. A few years later a computer manufacturer suggested he create a database catalogue of all the computers known to be in use in America at that time.

In 1964 he founded IDG and sold subscriptions to the database to manufacturers who wanted to know more about their competitors. He soon became convinced there was a growing market for industry newspapers, and in 1967 he launched his first magazine, Computerworld.

As mainframes were replaced by minicomputers, then PCs, Macs and the internet, the company grew apace, expanding beyond the United States as far afield as Japan, communist China and even the Soviet Union. “In the mainframe era, we identified 140,000 people around the world who used computers,” McGovern recalled. “We predicted that based on miniaturisation and other factors there would be one billion users by the year 2000. By the end of 1999, there were 950 million users.”

Patrick McGovern is survived by his wife, by a son and daughter and by two stepdaughters

[Mr Lick]

Scott Asheton - obituary

Scott Asheton was the hell-raising co-founder of The Stooges, the band which made Iggy Pop a star




Scott Asheton, who has died aged 64, co-founded The Stooges, the band which catapulted Iggy Pop to fame.

Scott Asheton was the band’s drummer and, with his elder brother, Ron, who played guitar, and bassist Dave Alexander, played a crude form of rock and roll that provided the ideal musical foundation for Iggy Pop’s hugely exciting, influential and controversial performances.


As a result The Stooges developed a cult following and found a fan in David Bowie – who brought them to London and produced their third album, Raw Power. Yet The Stooges enjoyed almost no commercial success and imploded in 1974. Only in 2003, when the band was reformed by Iggy Pop, who had gone on to find fame as a solo artist, did the Asheton brothers win their own popular acclaim. By then The Stooges had become widely celebrated as one of the great rock groups; all three of their albums are now regarded as classics



Scott Asheton was born in Washington, DC, on August 16 1949. His father died while Scott was still young, leading his mother, Ann, to move the family to Ann Arbor, Michigan. There, at his new high school, Ron Asheton joined the choir, making friends with fellow chorister James Osterberg – later Iggy Pop. But it was Scott who made a real impression, Iggy later recalling that the tall, handsome youth looked “magnetic, like a cross between a young Sonny Liston and Elvis Presley”.

The three formed The Psychedelic Stooges in 1967, initially playing an improvised, experimental set that, with Pop’s charismatic performances, won them a keen following in Ann Arbor’s student population. Shortening their name to The Stooges and developing a set of minimalist rock songs, they were signed by Electra Records in 1968 and put in the studio with the Welsh rock musician and producer, John Cale.

Their eponymous debut album was released in 1969 with Scott Asheton credited by his nickname, “Rock Action”. The band’s crude, unvarnished sound celebrated boredom and submission and, while few rock fans beyond Michigan bought the album, the influential rock critic Lester Bangs praised the record in Rolling Stone magazine.

The 1970 album Funhouse found The Stooges chasing an even more dissonant sound, and poor sales and the band’s extensive drug and alcohol abuse lead to Electra terminating their contract. Yet they remained a popular live act, continuing to perform until Scott Asheton drove the band’s touring truck into a bridge.

David Bowie, a fan who is thought to have based his Ziggy Stardust character on Iggy Pop, then convinced his manager to bring The Stooges to London to record. In 1973, as Iggy & The Stooges, they recorded the album Raw Power for Columbia.

Again, the band’s sound was too fierce for most rock fans. With poor sales and both Iggy Pop and Scott Asheton addicted to heroin, the band fell apart.

Asheton returned to Ann Arbor and drummed with local rock bands, none of which gained any prominence. An upswing in his fortunes began in 1978, when he toured Europe as Iggy Pop’s drummer. By then punk rock had arrived and The Stooges were being hailed as the original punk band. The Sex Pistols recorded The Stooges’s song No Fun and their three albums were reissued to a new generation of listeners.

Having overcome his problems with drugs and alcohol, Asheton lived a largely quiet life out of the spotlight until The Stooges reformed, to popular delight, in 2003 .

But their hard-living past eventually took its toll. In 2009 Ron Asheton was found dead, from a suspected heart attack.

After playing a French rock festival in 2011, Scott Asheton suffered a stroke that left him disabled. His wife, Liz, survives him with his daughter

[Mr Lick]

US writer and environmentalist Peter Matthiessen dies aged 86



American novelist Peter Matthiessen, whose notable works include At Play in the Fields of the Lord, has died at the age of 86 following leukaemia.

The New York-born writer was also a committed environmentalist and adventurer, who wrote about his travels in the wilderness.

Among his other books were The Snow Leopard and Shadow Country.

His latest novel, In Paradise, is due to be published on Tuesday.

Matthiessen's publisher said the author had been diagnosed with leukaemia and had been ill "for some months" prior to his death at a New York hospital.

After graduating from Yale University, he travelled to France and co-founded literary journal The Paris Review, with fellow author George Plimpton.

Although the publication was a success - it is still running today - Matthiessen yearned for the US and returned home, mixing with the likes of artists Jackson Pollock and Wilem de Kooning.

In the 1960s, he shunned his wealthy upbringing to embrace Buddhist teachings, becoming a Zen priest, and during the same decade began gaining acclaim for his writing

At Play in the Fields of the Lord, published in 1961, told of missionaries and mercenaries working in Brazil.

The novel was turned into a film in 1991 - starring John Lithgow and Darryl Hannah - after the late producer Saul Zaentz spent more than 25 years trying to buy the rights.

Matthiessen travelled to Antarctica, the Himalayas and Australia to write about the environment and the wilderness, as well as exploring wildlife in America.

The Snow Leopard - which won the National Book Award for non-fiction in 1980 - retold his two-month Himalayan trip to search for the elusive snow leopard.

In 2008, he published Shadow Country - which brought together his "Watson trilogy", which he began in the 1980s, into one re-edited story. It went on to win the National Book prize.

Matthiessen was married three times, and had four children

[Thormaturge]

^^

I remember The Stooges. I was in my teens at the time and had a disco.

Jeez I'm getting old.