THOSE WE LOST IN 2021, CONTINUED:

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GEORGE SEGAL
Date of death:	March 23, 2021
Age at death:	87
About:	American actor, comedian and musician who was  popular in the 1960s and 1970s for playing both dramatic and comedic roles. Co-starred with Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor and sandy Dennis in the classic drama Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966), receiving a nomination for Best Supporting Actor for the role. On television, he was best known for his regular roles in two popular sitcoms, playing Jack Gallo on Just Shoot Me! (1997–2003) and Albert "Pops" Solomon on The Goldbergs (2013–2021).
By the way:	Segal was also an accomplished banjo player. He released three albums and performed with the instrument in several of his acting roles and on late-night television.
Cause of death:	Segal died of complications from bypass surgery.

 

G GORDON LIDDY
Date of death:	March 30, 2021
Age at death:	90
About:	American lawyer, FBI agent, talk show host, actor, and figure in the Watergate scandal as the chief operative in the White House Plumbers unit during the Nixon administration. Liddy was convicted of conspiracy, burglary, and illegal wiretapping for his role in the scandal. Working alongside E. Howard Hunt, Liddy organized and directed the burglary of the Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate building in May and June 1972. After five of Liddy's operatives were arrested inside the DNC offices on June 17, 1972, subsequent investigations of the Watergate scandal led to Nixon's resignation in 1974.  Liddy was convicted of burglary, conspiracy, and refusing to testify to the Senate committee investigating Watergate. He served nearly fifty-two months in federal prisons. Liddy served as a radio talk show host from 1992 until his retirement on July 27, 2012 and was a guest panellist for Fox News Channel.
By the way:	I recall reading Liddy’s autobiography Will when it came out in 1980.  I also recall him describing his German pro-Nazi nanny With him whom he was left a lot) instilling in him the belief of the triumph of the will. Liddy set out his use of the power of the will to overcome his childhood fear of lightning and thunder by climbing to the top of a tall tree during a violent electrical storm and tying himself there; and of rats by catching and eating one raw.
Cause of death:	Liddy died on March 30, 2021, at his daughter's house in Fairfax County, Virginia. He was 90, and had suffered from Parkinson's disease.

 

DMX
Date of death:	April 9, 2021
Age at death:	50
About:	A gruff-voiced, chart-topping rapper who electrified listeners with songs such as “Party Up (Up in Here)” and “X Gon’ Give It to Ya,” drawing inspiration from his hardscrabble life while also emerging as a star of action films and crime thrillers.
By the way:	He was the first artist to debut an album at No. 1 five times in a row on the Billboard 200 charts.[5] Overall, DMX sold over 74 million records worldwide.
Cause of death:	On April 2, 2021, DMX was hospitalised due to a cocaine-induced heart attack. He never regained consciousness and died of multiple organ failure a week later.

 

PRINCE PHILIP
Date of death:	April 9, 2021
Age at death:	99
About:	Prince Philip was the husband of Queen Elizabeth II, the marriage having taken place in 1947. He was the consort of the British monarch from Elizabeth's accession on 6 February 1952 until his death in 2021, making him the longest-serving royal consort in history. He retired from his royal duties on 2 August 2017, aged 96, having completed 22,219 solo engagements and 5,493 speeches from 1952. He was also noted for his gaffes, as well as his two fingers to convention, protocol and the press.
By the way:	From Her Majesty’s 2021 Christmas speech: Although it's a time of great happiness and good cheer for many, Christmas can be hard for those who have lost loved ones. This year, especially, I understand why.  But for me, in the months since the death of my beloved Philip, I have drawn great comfort from the warmth and affection of the many tributes to his life and work – from around the country, the Commonwealth and the world.  His sense of service, intellectual curiosity and capacity to squeeze fun out of any situation – were all irrepressible. That mischievous, enquiring twinkle was as bright at the end as when I first set eyes on him. But life, of course, consists of final partings as well as first meetings; and as much as I and my family miss him, I know he would want us to enjoy Christmas.
Cause of death:	Philip died of "old age" two months before his 100th birthday

 

BERNARD L MADOFF
Date of death:	April 14, 2021
Age at death:	82
About:	The mastermind of perhaps the largest Ponzi scheme in history, a reviled symbol of Wall Street greed and, once, one of the most sought-after stockbrokers in high finance.
By the way:	Madoff’s Ponzi scheme, the largest Ponzi scheme in history, was worth about $64.8 billion. A Ponzi scheme is a form of fraud that lures investors and pays profits to earlier investors with funds from more recent investors. The scheme leads victims to believe that profits are coming from legitimate business activity (e.g., product sales or successful investments), and they remain unaware that other investors are the source of funds. A Ponzi scheme can maintain the illusion of a sustainable business as long as new investors contribute new funds, and as long as most of the investors do not demand full repayment and still believe in the non-existent assets they are purported to own. It is named after Charles Ponzi who carried out this scheme in the 1920s.  Such schemes had been carried out earlier, even being included in some of Charles Dickens’ books, but became known by that name because of the huge amount of money that he took in and the resultant wide press coverage.
Cause of death:	A death certificate obtained by TMZ lists the cause of death as hypertension, atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease and chronic kidney disease.

 

WALTER MONDALE
Date of death:	April 19, 2021
Age at death:	93
About:	42nd vice president of the United States from 1977 to 1981 under President Jimmy Carter. The former Democratic senator and vice president’s bid to become President was blocked by President Ronald Reagan’s landslide re-election victory in 1984.
By the way:	Ronald Reagan won both the Electoral College vote and the popular vote by a landslide. Reagan won 49 states while Mondale carried his home state of Minnesota and the District of Columbia.
Cause of death:	Mondale died of natural causes in his sleep at his home in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

 

MICHAEL COLLINS
Date of death:	April 28, 2021
Age at death:	90
About:	Apollo 11 astronaut who orbited alone in the command module Columbia while Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin went to the surface of the moon in 1969.
By the way:	Buzz Aldrin, 91, is now the only surviving member of the mission. Paying tribute to Collins, Aldrin wrote in a tweet: "Dear Mike, Wherever you have been or will be, you will always have the Fire to Carry us deftly to new heights and to the future. We will miss you. May you Rest In Peace."
Cause of death:	Collins died from cancer.

 

JOHN W WARNER
Date of death:	May 25, 2021
Age at death:	94
About:	The five-term U.S. senator from Virginia who helped plan the nation’s 1976 bicentennial celebrations, played a central role in military affairs and gained respect on both sides of the political aisle for his diligence, consensus-building and independence.
By the way:	Warner was the sixth husband of actress Elizabeth Taylor, whom he married in December 1976, before being elected to the Senate. They divorced in November 1982. Warner was the last surviving, as well as the longest-lived, of Taylor's seven husbands.
Cause of death:	Warner died from heart failure at his home in Alexandria, Virginia.

 

F LEE BAILEY
Date of death:	June 2, 1987
Age at death:	87
About:	American criminal defense attorney. Bailey's name first came to nationwide attention for his involvement in the second murder trial of Sam Sheppard, a surgeon accused of murdering his wife. He later served as the attorney in a number of other high-profile cases, such as Albert DeSalvo, a suspect in the "Boston Strangler" murders, heiress Patty Hearst's trial for bank robberies committed during her involvement with the Symbionese Liberation Army, and US Army Captain Ernest Medina for the My Lai Massacre.  He was a member of the "dream team" in the trial of former football player O. J. Simpson, who was accused of murdering Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman.
By the way:	For most of his career he was licensed in Florida and in Massachusetts, where he was disbarred in 2001 and 2003 respectively, for misconduct while defending marijuana dealer Claude Louis DuBoc. Bailey had transferred a large portion of DuBoc's assets, including stock, into his own accounts. The stock, worth about $5.9 million, was supposed to be included in the forfeiture of assets that DuBoc made as part of a plea bargain. It had been held by Bailey because it would be sold immediately if it came into government possession, but it was expected to rise dramatically in value. Bailey later refused to turn it over, saying that it was payment of his legal fees and not part of DuBoc's asset forfeiture. in 2013 he was denied a law license by the Maine Board of Bar Examiners, a decision upheld by the Maine Supreme Judicial Court in 2014.
Cause of death:	After a period of ill health, he died under hospice care in Atlanta on June 3, 2021, a week before his 88th birthday

 

DONALD H RUMSFELD
Date of death:	June 29, 2021
Age at death:	88
About:	American politician, government official and businessman who served as Secretary of Defense from 1975 to 1977 under president Gerald Ford, and again from 2001 to 2006 under President George W. Bush. Additionally, Rumsfeld was a three-term U.S. Congressman from Illinois (1963–1969), director of the Office of Economic Opportunity (1969–1970), counselor to the President (1969–1973), the U.S. Representative to NATO (1973–1974), and the White House Chief of Staff (1974–1975). From The Guardian 01.07.2021: Donald Rumsfeld’s name will forever be associated with the biggest military fiasco in US history, the 2003 invasion of Iraq in pursuit of non-existent weapons of mass destruction, alongside the widespread use of torture that has dogged America’s reputation ever since. It is not just the poor decisions he made as defence secretary for which Rumsfeld will be remembered, but also his efforts to cover up inconvenient facts that did not align with his version of reality. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/01/history-unlikely-to-forgive-donald-rumsfelds-iraq-warmongering
By the way:	He was both the youngest and the oldest Secretary of Defense.
Cause of death:	Rumsfeld died from multiple myeloma at his home in Taos, New Mexico.

 

DON EVERLY Phil and Don Everly (left and right respectively)
Date of death:	August 21, 2021
Age at death:	84
About:	His soaring harmonies and aggressive rhythm guitar work as part of the Everly Brothers duo with his younger brother, Phil, influenced generations of rock performers. The duo combined elements of rock and roll, country and pop, becoming pioneers of country rock. The group declined in popularity in the 1960s, though the brothers continued to release hit singles in the U.K. and Canada, and had many highly successful tours throughout the 1960s. In 1973 they officially broke up. Starting in 1983, the brothers got back together, and would continue to perform periodically until Phil's death in 2014. D
By the way:	The group was highly influential on the music of the generation that followed it. Many of the top acts of the 1960s were heavily influenced by the close-harmony singing and acoustic guitar playing of the Everly Brothers, including the Beatles, the Beach Boys, the Bee Gees, and Simon & Garfunkel. In 2015, Rolling Stone ranked the Everly Brothers No. 1 on its list of the 20 Greatest Duos of All Time. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as part of the inaugural class of 1986, and into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2001.
Cause of death:	Cause of death not disclosed.

 

ED ASNER
Date of death:	August 29, 2021
Age at death:	91
About:	American actor and president of the Screen Actors Guild. H e is best remembered for portraying Lou Grant during the 1970s and early 1980s, on both The Mary Tyler Moore Show and its spin-off series Lou Grant, making him one of the few television actors to portray the same character in both a comedy and a drama. He is the most honoured male performer in the history of the Primetime Emmy Awards, having won seven – five for portraying Lou Grant (three as Supporting Actor in a Comedy Television Series on The Mary Tyler Moore Show and two as Lead Actor in a Dramatic Television Series on spin-off Lou Grant). His other Emmys were for performances in two television miniseries: Rich Man, Poor Man (1976), where he won for Outstanding Lead Actor for a Single Performance in a television series, and Roots (1977), for which he won for Outstanding Single Performance by a Supporting Actor in a television series
By the way:	The sudden cancellation of Lou Grant in 1982 was the subject of much controversy. The show had high ratings, being in the ACNielsen top ten throughout its final month on the air. However, the CBS television network declined to renew it. Asner believed that his left-wing political views, as well as the publicity surrounding them, were the actual root causes for the show's cancellation.
Cause of death:	Not disclosed.