c.m: Pneumonia
Dwight Arrington Myers (May 24, 1967 - November 8, 2011), better known as Heavy D, was a Jamaican American actor, rapper, record producer, singer and former leader of Heavy D & the Boyz, a hip hop group which included G-Whiz (Glen Parrish), "Trouble" T. Roy (Troy Dixon), and Eddie F (born Edward Ferrell). The group maintained a sizable audience in the United States through most of the 1990s. Heavy D had several massive hits -- including "Now That We Found Love." He also wrote and performed the theme song for "In Living Color," and appeared as an actor in the movie "Life."
(Sources: Wiki, Rolling Stone, TMZ)
c.m: Liver cancer
Joseph William "Joe" Frazier (January 12, 1944 – November 7, 2011), also known as Smokin' Joe, was an Olympic and Undisputed World Heavyweight boxing champion, whose professional career lasted from 1965 to 1976, with a one-fight comeback in 1981.
Frazier emerged as the top contender in the late 1960s, defeating opponents that included Jerry Quarry, Oscar Bonavena, Buster Mathis, Eddie Machen, Doug Jones, George Chuvalo and Jimmy Ellis en route to becoming undisputed heavyweight champion in 1970, and followed up by defeating Muhammad Ali on points in the highly-anticipated "Fight of the Century" in 1971. Two years later Frazier lost his title when he was knocked out by George Foreman. He fought on, beating Joe Bugner, losing a rematch to Ali, and beating Quarry and Ellis again.
Frazier's last world title challenge came in 1975, but he was beaten by Ali in their brutal rubbermatch. He retired in 1976 following a second loss to Foreman. He made a comeback in 1981, fighting just once, before retiring for good. The International Boxing Research Organization (IBRO) rates Frazier among the ten greatest heavyweights of all time. He is an inductee of both the International Boxing Hall of Fame and the World Boxing Hall of Fame.
Frazier's style was often compared to that of Henry Armstrong and occasionally Rocky Marciano. He was dependent on bobbing, weaving, grunting, snorting as he grimaced with all out aggression wearing down his opponents with relentless pressure. His best known punch was a powerful left hook, which accounted for most of his knockouts.
After retiring, Frazier made cameo appearances in several Hollywood movies, and two episodes of The Simpsons. His son Marvis became a boxer — trained by Frazier himself — although was unable to emulate his father's success. Frazier continued to train fighters in his gym in Philadelphia. His later years saw the continuation of his bitter rivalry with Ali, in which the two periodically exchanged insults, interspersed with brief reconciliations.
(Sources: NPR, Wiki, People)
c.m: Post-op complications (reason for operation unknown)
Andrew Aitken "Andy" Rooney (January 14, 1919 – November 4, 2011) was an American radio and television writer. He was most notable for his weekly broadcast "A Few Minutes with Andy Rooney", a part of the CBS News program "60 Minutes" from 1978 to 2011. His final regular appearance on "60 Minutes" - his 1,097th - aired October 2, 2011. He died a month later at age 92.
Rooney wrote for television since its birth, spending more than 60 years at CBS, 30 of them behind the camera as a writer and producer, first for entertainment and then news programming, before becoming a television personality - a role he said he was never comfortable in. He preferred to be known as a writer and was the author of best-selling books and a national newspaper column, in addition to his "60 Minutes" essays.
His wife of 62 years, Marguerite "Margie" Rooney (née Howard), died in 2004 of heart failure. Rooney later wrote, "her name does not appear as often as it originally did [in my essays] because it hurts too much to write it." He has four children, including a daughter, Emily Rooney, who is a TV talk show host and former ABC News producer; she currently hosts a nightly Boston-area public affairs program, Greater Boston, on WGBH. Emily's identical twin, Martha, is Chief of the Public Services Division at the National Library of Medicine in Bethesda, Maryland. The third daughter, Ellen, is a photographer based in London. His son, Brian Rooney, has been a correspondent for ABC since the 1980s.
(sources: Wiki, People, CBS, NY Times, Yahoo)
c.m: TBA - Jobs had been suffering from pancreatic cancer and had a liver transplant in 2009
Steven Paul "Steve" Jobs (February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011) was an American entrepreneur and inventor. He was co-founder, chairman, and former chief executive officer of Apple Inc. Jobs also previously served as chief executive of Pixar Animation Studios; he became a member of the board of directors of The Walt Disney Company in 2006, following the acquisition of Pixar by Disney. He was credited in Toy Story (1995) as an executive producer.
In the late 1970s, Jobs, with Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, Mike Markkula, and others, designed, developed, and marketed one of the first commercially successful lines of personal computers, the Apple II series. In the early 1980s, Jobs was among the first to see the commercial potential of Xerox PARC's mouse-driven graphical user interface, which led to the creation of the Macintosh. After losing a power struggle with the board of directors in 1985,Jobs resigned from Apple and founded NeXT, a computer platform development company specializing in the higher-education and business markets. Apple's subsequent 1996 buyout of NeXT brought Jobs back to the company he co-founded, and he served as its CEO from 1997 until 2011. In 1986, he acquired the computer graphics division of Lucasfilm Ltd which was spun off as Pixar Animation Studios. He remained CEO and majority shareholder at 50.1% until its acquisition by The Walt Disney company in 2006. Consequently Jobs became Disney's largest individual shareholder at 7% and a member of Disney's Board of Directors. His aim to develop products that are both functional and elegant has earned him a devoted following.
On August 24, 2011, Jobs announced his resignation from his role as Apple's CEO. In his letter of resignation, Jobs strongly recommended that the Apple executive succession plan be followed and Tim Cook be named as his successor. Per his request, Jobs was appointed chairman of Apple's board of directors.
At a 2005 commencement address at Stanford University, Jobs shared the philosophy that drove him.
“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life,” Jobs said. “Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”
Jobs is survived by his wife of 20 years, Laurene, and four children, including one from a prior relationship.
(Sources: Wiki, CNN, Wired, Mimi Snow)
c.m: Natural causes
Eve Brent (1929 – August 27, 2011) (often billed in acting roles as: Jean Lewis) was a Saturn Award-winning American actress.
Born as Jean Ann Ewers in Houston, Texas, and raised in Fort Worth, she appeared on radio and television (guest-starring roles and hundreds of commercials), in movies and on the theater stage.
Some of her early film work includes roles in Gun Girls, 1956, Journey to Freedom, 1957 and Forty Guns, 1957.
She became the twelfth actress to play Jane when she appeared opposite Gordon Scott's Tarzan in the film Tarzan's Fight for Life (1958). She also played the role in Tarzan and the Trappers.
In 1980 she won a Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actress for her work in Fade to Black. Her best-known recent work in films was in The Green Mile.
On the smallscreen, Brent regularly guested on shows ranging from "thirtysomething" to "Twin Peaks," appearing most recently in a 2006 episode of "Scrubs" and in an episode of "Community."
She is survived by her son.
(Sources: Variety, Wiki, IMDb, Matt Orsman)
c.m: non-Hodgkins lymphoma
Andy Whitfield (July 17, 1974 – September 11, 2011) was a Welsh-born Australian actor and model. He was best known for his leading role in the Starz television series Spartacus: Blood and Sand.
Whitfield was born in Amlwch, Wales. He studied engineering at the University of Western Sydney and worked in Lidcombe as an engineer before moving to Sydney in 1999. He attended Screenwise Film & TV School for Actors, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia and appeared in several Australian television series, such as Opening Up, All Saints, The Strip, Packed to the Rafters and McLeod's Daughters.
He is survived by his wife and two children.
(Sources: People, Us, Wiki, EW, Matt Orsman)
c.m: Natural causes
Clifford Parker "Cliff" Robertson, III (September 9, 1923 – September 10, 2011) was an American actor with a film and television career that spanned half of a century. Robertson won the 1968 Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in the movie Charly. His last film role was "Uncle Ben Parker" in the Spider-Man film series.
The California native was married to Cynthia Stone from 1957 to 1960; they had one daughter together, Stephanie. He was married to Dina Merrill from 1966 to 1986 and had a daughter named Heather together. Heather passed away in 2007 of pancreatic cancer, before both of her parents.
(Sources: Screen Rant, Us Weekly, NY Daily News, Wiki, Matt Orsman)
