Final Salute -- Part the first
American scientist George E. Smith (May 28, 2025) was co-inventor of the CCD image device, also called the electronic eye.
Composer Alf Clausen (May 29, 2025) scored several dozen films and TV shows. He’s most known for his 1990-2017 run as sole composer for The Simpsons.
Actress Valerie Mahaffey (May 30, 2025) started in soaps and appeared in films. She won an Emmy for her work in Northern Exposure and had recurring roles in Dead to Me and Young Sheldon.
Renée Victor (May 30, 2025) was a singer and actress who appeared in Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones, ER, and did voice work for the 2017 film Coco.
Actor Jonathon Joss (June 1, 2025) voiced John Redcorn for 10+ seasons of King of the Hill and had a recurring role in Parks and Recreation.
English novelist Frederick Forsyth (June 9, 2025) sold many millions of his espionage thrillers, many being filmed. Some of his most famous titles are The Odessa File, The Fourth Protocol, and The Day of the Jackal.
Actor Chris Robinson (June 9, 2025) guested in many properties, but his longest streaks were in soaps like Another World (20 episodes) and General Hospital (900+ episodes). His most memorable pop-culture attribute may be the 1984 couch-syrup commercial in which he proclaimed, “I’m not a doctor, but I do play one on TV.”
Musical performer and frontman Sly Stone (June 9, 2025) helped develop the funk sound across the 1960s and 70s airwaves. With the Family Stone, his most famous singles include “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin),” “Family Affair,” and “Everyday People.”
Oklahoma broadcasting legend Gary England (June 10, 2025) graduated from OU in 1965 and never stopped serving his fellow Sooners. He gave a live-TV cut-in for a Union City F4 in 1973 and in 1982 issued the first Doppler-verified tornado warning. He invented the Oklahoma-map TV overlay to provide alerts to viewers. His weather footage appeared in Twister! and he appeared in the 2021 film Iké Boys.
Musician Selby Minner (June 10, 2025) was in the band Blues on the Move. She co-founded Rentiesville’s historic Down Home Blues Club, and the Dusk ‘til Dawn Blues Festival in 1991.
Singer-producer-songwriter and Beach Boy Brian Wilson (June 11, 2025) co-founded the singing group which spread “the California sound” around the world. Among his most-known songs are “Don’t Worry Baby,” Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” “I Get Around,” and “God Only Knows.”
Ananda Lewis (June 11, 2025) was a host for BET and MTV and hosted a radio talk show.
Actor David Hekili Kenui Bell (June 12, 2025) voiced in Lilo & Stitch and appeared in the newer incarnations of Hawaii Five-O and Magnum, PI.
Anne Burrell (June 17, 2025) was a culinary instructor and hosted or co-hosted shows for the Food Network.
Actress Lynn Hamilton (June 19, 2025) was most known for recurring roles on The Waltons and Sanford and Son.
Oklahoma TV-comedy legend Gailard Sartain (June 19, 2025) won the hearts of Northeastern Oklahoma adolescents on his 1970-73 late-night show Mazeppa Pompazoidi’s Uncanny Film Festival and Camp Meeting, which also gave Gary Busey his onscreen start. Sartain appeared on Hee Haw in the Seventies. He played Chuck in three Ernest movies, Oliver Hardy in a 1999 video movie, and the Big Bopper opposite Busey in The Buddy Holly Story. He provided the cover art for Leon Russell’s Will O’ the Wisp and Tulsa’s 2001 Mayfest.
Frederick Smith (June 21, 2025) earned a C at Yale for a paper outlining a prospective overnight delivery service, but didn’t let that stop him. After serving in Vietnam, in 1971 he founded Federal Express, and look at us now.
Psychologist James Maas (June 23, 2025) worked mostly in sleep research, with an emphasis on the effect of sleep on performance; he coined the term “power nap.”
Onetime teen heartthrob Bobby Sherman (June 24, 2025) appeared on shows like Shindig! and co-starred on Here Come the Brides. Big radio hits include “Easy Come, Easy Go” and “Julie, Do Ya Love Me.”
Journalist Bill Moyers (June 26, 2025) worked for JFK and LBJ and helped establish the Peace Corps. He worked to found the Public Broadcasting System in the 1960s. He worked for decades at CBS and hosted Bill Moyers Journal on PBS. He’s also known for his six-hour 1988 documentary with Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth.
Typographer Jim Parkinson (June 26, 2025) did design work for rock bands (Kansas, CCR) and created the logo for Esquire magazine. His most-known work is the logo for Rolling Stone magazine.
Lalo Schifrin (June 26, 2025) was a jazz composer and pianist, but his biggest impact was film and TV scoring. He worked on Clint Eastwood’s Dirty Harry series and scored THX-1138. He’ll live forever in the title themes he crafted for Mannix and Mission: Impossible.
The end of Windows’ Blue Screen of Death was announced on June 26, 2025. However, later reports demonstrated that it merely switched to a black color, with different wording.
Jim Shooter (June 30, 2025) began his comics career at 14 with tales for the Legion of Super-Heroes, and went on to work for decades at both DC and Marvel as editor, publisher, and writer. In 1981, Dazzler #1 was sold only in comic-book stores, proving the strength of that market. He enforced a strict no-gays policy at Marvel, and later co-founded Valiant Comics.
Actor Julian McMahon (July 2, 2025) played an FBI agent on several CBS shows and starred as a doctor on Nip/Tuck. He’s also remembered as a doctor named Doom in Fantastic Four and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.
Actor Michael Madsen (July 3, 2025) was widely known for his work for Tarantino, but is also familiar from appearances in War Games, Die Another Day, Species, and Free Willy. He also voiced several video games.
Michael Dean (July 7, 2025) was an Oklahoma radio man for several decades, known as the Dean of Rock and Roll at KOMA. His 2019 history Oklahoma City Radio is available from Arcadia Publishing.
Writer Martin Cruz Smith (July 11, 2025) published mainly suspense and mystery fiction, including the Arkady Renko series, which began with Gorky Park.
Singer-actress Connie Francis (July 16, 2025) became the first woman to reach Billboard’s No. 1 in 1960 (with “Everybody’s Somebody’s Fool”). She performed some of her songs in as many as 12 languages. In 2025 her 1962 song “Pretty Little Baby” was revived on TikTok and other social media.
With his wife, composer Marilyn Bergman, lyricist Alan Bergman (July 17, 2025) won two Grammys, three Academy Awards, and four Emmys. Some of his familiar songs include “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers,” “Yellow Bird,” “The Windmills of Your Mind,” and “The Way We Were.”
Actor Kenneth Washington (July 18, 2025) is most known for recurring roles on Adam-12 and Hogan’s Heroes, also appearing in Star Trek’s “That Which Survives.”
Actor-musician Malcolm-Jamal Warner (July 20, 2025) is most widely known for his 1984-92 role as Theo on The Cosby Show.
Flugelhorner Chuck Mangione (July 22, 2025) enchanted and repelled folks at the same time with his smooth renditions of cuts like 1977’s “Feels So Good.” His music was featured in the 1976 and 1980 Olympics, and had a recurring role on King of the Hill.
Ozzy Osbourne, aka the Prince of Darkness (July 22, 2025) ruffled sensibilities and entranced youths worldwide as co-founder and singer for Black Sabbath, as well as solo releases. Other appearances include the 2002-05 The Osbournes MTV series and a playable character in the video game Guitar Hero World Tour.
Archivist Michael Ochs (July 23, 2025) was known for collecting rock ‘n’ roll photographs, with as many as three million images. At times he headed the publicity departments at ABC, Shelter, and Columbia Records.
Brash shirt ripper Hulk Hogan (July 24, 2025) outwrestled his grappling origins to work in film and TV, sell energy drinks and microwave burgers, and launch several short-lived restaurants.
Dame Cleo Laine (July 24, 2025) became known for her jazz and scat singing, appearing also on Broadway, the stages of Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall, and The Muppet Show.
Mathematician Tom Lehrer (July 26, 2025) had a side gig as a musical satirist in the 1950s and 1960s. Several songs, like “We’ll All Go Together When We Go” and “Poisoning Pigeons in the Park,” continue in popularity. Lehrer also provided songs for the sarcastic shows The Frost Report and That Was the Week That Was. In a truly selfless act, in 2022 he relinquished all of his songs into the public domain.
George Nigh (July 30, 2025) was both 17th and 22nd governor of Oklahoma, and the first to win all 77 counties. In earlier service in the state House of Representatives, he introduced House Bill 1094 in 1953, suggesting “Oklahoma!” as the state song.
Actress Loni Anderson (August 3, 2025) made her splash on the 1978-82 series WKRP in Cincinnati as receptionist Jennifer Marlowe, deliberately inverting the Dumb Blonde stereotype with poise and wit.
Dame Stella Rimington (August 3, 2025) was the first female Director General of Britain’s MI5, as well as writer of a dozen or so spy novels.
Astronaut Jim Lovell (August 7, 2025) was the Apollo 13 commander. He was also the first astronaut to go to space four times, was in the first crew to launch on the Saturn V rocket, and first to orbit the moon, as part of the Apollo 8 crew.
Songwriter-singer-pianist Bobby Whitlock (August 10, 2025) worked with Booker T and the MGs, Eric Clapton, George Harrison, Delaney & Bonnie, and others.
Actress Danielle Spencer (August 11, 2025) became known as Dee Thomas on ABC’s What’s Happening!! After fame passed, she became a veterinarian, TV-segment host, and clothing designer.
TV producer-writer Michael Sloan (August 13, 2025) worked on shows like Battlestar Galactica, Harry O, McCloud, and was co-creator of The Equalizer.
Author Greg Iles (August 15, 2025) published over 15 books including Sleep No More, The Footprints of God, and Natchez Burning.
Actor Terence Stamp (August 17, 2025) utilized his fruity English accent to great effect in films including Wall Street, The Mind of Mr Soames, The Phantom Menace, and more. But he’ll also be remembered as the Kryptonian General who had the effrontery to tell Superman to “KNEEL before Zod!”
Actor Jerry Adler (August 23, 2025) appeared all over, including recurring TV roles on The Good Wife, Mad About You, Rescue Me, Hudson Street, and The Sopranos.
Writer Chelsea Quinn Yarbro (August 31, 2025) published under several pseudonyms across many genres. Perhaps her biggest genre contribution was her series about the historical Count Saint-Germain, who in her mythos derived his rumored long life from vampirism.
These people and things impacted the pop-culture REALM, and thus the whole world. Thanks for reflecting on some of those who went before. Join us on Monday for the next installment!
