Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
JAMES CARTER, 77, the singer whose version of Po' Lazarus was the lead song on the Grammy Award-winning O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack, died Nov. 26 in a suburban Chicago hospital. He was unwittingly thrust into the spotlight when producer T Bone Burnett included Po' Lazarus among songs for the O Brother soundtrack. The song was first recorded by musicologist Alan Lomax in 1959 as Mr. Carter worked on a chain gang at the Mississippi State Penitentiary in Parchman. After O Brother and its soundtrack became hits, the Alan Lomax Archive tracked down Mr. Carter and in early 2002 presented him with a royalty check for $20,000.
JOE SMARZIK, 98, who gained national attention 26 years ago when he placed a newspaper ad looking for a family to eat Christmas dinner with, died in Minnesota on Thanksgiving. His classified ad, in which he promised to "furnish the turkey," resulted in a long relationship with the family of the Rev. Homer Dobson, pastor of the Church of Christ in Tracy, Minn. The relationship continued through Christmases, birthdays, shopping trips and clinic visits. It was Dobson who took Mr. Smarzik to a hospital two weeks ago when he wasn't feeling well.
WALTER T. REDMOND, 80, who spent 37 years working for the Kellogg Co. and rose through the ranks to become president of the cereal giant, died Tuesday in Battle Creek, Mich. He got his start in the cereal business at rival Post Cereals. While earning $50 a week in 1948 at a Post plant in Battle Creek, he walked down the street one day to Kellogg, where he accepted an offer to leave Post for $55 a week.
ROBERT PETERSON, 71, an actor who rose to fame after filling in for ailing Robert Goulet in a 1961 production of Camelot, died Monday in Salt Lake City of a heart attack while playing handball. After substituting for Goulet more than 70 times, he took over the role of Lancelot for eight months of the New York run for Camelot and for the show's national tour.
EARL BELLAMY, 86, who directed scores of popular TV shows in a prolific career that began with the birth of commercial television and continued well into the 1980s, died Nov. 30 in Albuquerque, N.M. Adept at Westerns, he had credits on almost every popular show of that genre, including The Lone Ranger, Rawhide and Wagon Train. He was awarded the Golden Boot Award last year by the Motion Picture and Television Fund.
MICHAEL KAMEN, 55, the Grammy-winning and Oscar-nominated composer, died Nov. 18 in Los Angeles of a heart attack. He fused hard-rock riffs with classical styling in albums for Pink Floyd and provided music for the Lethal Weapon and Die Hard movies. His scores, including those for the film Mr. Holland's Opus and the HBO series Band of Brothers, made him one of Hollywood's most successful composers.
RICHARD THOMAS GOLDHAHN, 88, who wrote Sioux City Sue, a Western anthem popularized by Bing Crosby and by Gene Autry in a movie of the same title, died Nov. 29 in Abington, Pa. His own recording of the song sold more than 150,000 copies. When Crosby recorded it in 1946, the song made the Lucky Strike Hit Parade for 14 consecutive weeks.
ARTHUR CONLEY, 57, a 1960s soul singer and protege of Otis Redding's, died Nov. 17 in Ruurlo, Netherlands. He had intestinal cancer. He was best known for his 1967 hit, Sweet Soul Music, which he co-wrote with Redding based on a number by Sam Cooke.