The Wall

People who died -- November, 2025

If you’re reading this you survived Thanksgiving, which frankly is my favorite holiday. No gifts, no religion, just food, family, and friends. Oh, and wine, wine, wine. The only problem with the day lately is politics. With the country so divided, I am sure there were many a heated political fray at numerous holiday tables. Hopefully no one threw the drumsticks.

If I said: over 70 years in showbiz, more than 200 movies and television shows, three Academy Award nominations, three primetime Emmy Award nominations, four Golden globe nominations with one win, a Drama Desk and BAFTA award, you might ask how many people am I talking about? The answer would be one - Diane Ladd (no relation to Cheryl), who died this month at 89. Plus, she birthed Laura Dern who herself is a pretty accomplished actor. I don’t understand what the problem is with the word actress. I never ascribed a lesser meaning to actress as opposed to actor. I rather prefer actresses to actors myself. Anyway, both Ms. Ladd and Ms. Dern are great actresses or actors. Ms. Ladd appeared in movies such as “Rambling Rose,” “Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore,” (which spun off the hit television show “Alice”), “Primary Colors,” “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation,” “Chinatown,” “Wild At Heart,” “Ghosts of Mississippi,” and a boatload of others. In “Rambling Rose” and “Wild At Heart,” she starred with her daughter Laura Dern. In “Rambling Rose,” they were both nominated for Oscars; Laura for Best Actress, and Ms. Ladd for best supporting actress. It was the first time that a mother and daughter had been nominated for a single film. In addition, Ms. Ladd, Ms. Dern, and her father, Bruce, all have stars on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame; the first time three members of a single family had been so honored. Ms. Ladd’s life was not all roses. With Mr. Dern, in addition to Laura, she gave birth to a second daughter, Diane Elizabeth, who died at 18 months in a drowning incident, and her third husband, the former PepsiCo chief, died this July. Unlike his wife, he didn’t make the cut here. While Ms. Ladd got her real start in television, it was movies where she made her true mark, even though it was the theatre where her heart truly lay. That said, she only made it to Broadway twice, in “Carry Me Back to Morningside Heights,” and “Texas Trilogy,” for which she received the aforementioned Drama Desk award. On television, in the HBO series “Enlightened,” she also played the mother of her true-life daughter, Ms. Dern. Her last role was as the widow of a Vietnam Veteran, in “The Last Full Measure.” She once said that “many years ago I used to say I haven’t lived long enough to be great. I don’t say that anymore.” For good reason.

On to politics. Say what you want about him, Dick Cheney, who died this month at 84 (in itself a miracle), elevated the office of Vice President beyond anything I have ever seen, and probably higher than anyone in the history of the Republic. A man who veered dangerously to the right in his time, he more recently announced that he would vote for Kamala Harris for President, which says more for his complete detestation of Mr. Trump than it does for his support of Ms. Harris. What makes it all the more interesting is that Mr. Cheney was a true proponent of the expansion of executive power, something Mr. Trump has put on steroids. Cheney, grew up largely in Wyoming, married his high school sweetheart (the homecoming queen, Lynne Vincent), and headed off to Yale where he dropped out and spent some time sowing his wild oats. He eventually received an undergraduate degree and master’s in political science from the University of Wyoming. He went to work ultimately for Congressman William Steiger, where he met another House member, Donald Rumsfeld, and hitched his wagon to Mr. Rumsfeld who eventually wound up as Chief of Staff to President Gerald R. Ford. When Ford named Rumsfeld to be his Secretary of Defense, Cheney rose to the Chief of Staff position at the age of 34 – the youngest person ever to hold the gig. Cheney ran for Congress in 1978 and won. He served there for ten years. Back in his Chief of Staff days, he had befriended George H.W. Bush and in 1989, then President Bush asked Cheney to be his Secretary of Defense. While in that job, he engineered the invasion of Panama and then the first Iraq war (he was also there for the sequel), where he had the able assistance of Generals Colin Powell and Norman Schwarzkopf. In that war (conflict), Bush did what he said he would do, drive Iraq out of Kuwait. He didn’t linger. Did the job and left. Many bemoaned not going further, but I applauded his doing what he said he would do and then ceasing the action. After his tenure with Bush the senior, he retreated to private life and did some research on whether he should run for President himself. Deciding not to, he was drafted to assist George W. Bush in his quest for the big job. Once W locked up the nomination, he asked Cheney to be his VP, but Cheney declined, instead agreeing to head up a search committee to find a good candidate. By this time, Cheney’s heart had been giving him problems and perhaps that was a factor in his initial declination. In any event, whether it was because he didn’t like the field of candidates, or because of W’s need to have someone with real federal government experience, in juxtaposition to Bush’s six years as a governor, he got the nod. Once elected, he had an oversize position in the administration. Normally, Vice Presidents attend funerals and hold meetings with Countries that the President doesn’t give a shit about. They have little sway with the boss and are mocked by the President’s staff. That was not the Cheney Vice Presidency. He had real power. Some wondered whether he had Presidential power but, in the end, Bush was the boss, but one who relied heavily on Cheney for foreign affairs and domestic security. A little here about his heart, which many said he didn’t have. He had five heart attacks, his first at 37. He had a pacemaker implanted for years. Three years after retiring he had a heart transplant, and many thought he improperly jumped the line. The new heart worked reasonably well, and he led an active life with the new ticker. Back to him, he was loyal and never wanted the presidency so he used his power in the minds of many, to exert sufficient muscle to be the President or at least have the kind of influence that could further his beliefs and agenda. When the 9/11 attacks occurred, Cheney, in Washington (the President had been in Florida and did not immediately return to D.C. for security reasons), coordinated the immediate aftermath of the events. He also shepherded through the Patriot Act which he had a big hand in crafting. It gave the government important tools in fighting terrorism, which many people believe went too far in cutting back on important Constitutional protections. On this I was on Cheney’s side. It was also Cheney who pushed to go back to Iraq in 2003, which proved a troublesome engagement whose efficacy is still questioned today. And it was Cheney that pushed to expand Presidential powers. He became a lightning rod for criticism and at the time seemed very far right. Today, many would accept his conservatism over what we have. As Bush became more comfortable in the job, especially in his second term, Cheney’s influence waned. Even with his waned influence, he still had more of it than any other Vice President. Although conservative, Cheney opposed Trump’s Muslim ban and the manner in how Trump cast Mexicans as lawless drug smugglers. Cheney’s daughter, Liz, also a principled conservative, became the enemy of MGA who served on the January 6^th committee and called for Trump’s impeachment. It all led to a rift between the Cheney’s, conservatives, but not MAGA folks, as I believe there is a difference, and the Trumps. His was an amazing life on the inside of national politics and international relations. Say what you will about the man, he was a person of consequence.

The harder they come. Jimmy Cliff, born James Chambers, died this month at 81. This blog really owes its life to reggae, the music Cliff brought into the mainstream, paving the way for Bob Marley and a host of other great artists. Back when I was a lowly associate at a firm that tolerated (and in instances fostered) quirkiness, I had a particular seat staked out in the firm’s library. This was before the era of computerized legal research when you had to actually find things in the books and assemble about 32 Sheppard’s citation books to ensure that whatever you were citing to in a brief hadn’t been overturned. In any event, as associates did, I spent most of my time in the library. I was a Peter Tosh fan and when he died at 42 of a gunshot wound, out of respect, I put his obituary on the wall of the library where I sat. Fast forward, a number of years, and I was no longer an associate in a law firm but elsewhere. Even if the new place didn’t foster quirkiness, I brought it. A woman who called into the sports radio station that I listened to, Doris from Rego Park, who suffered from neurofibromatosis, which disfigured her, died at 58. She coughed her way through all of her calls but you could tell that she did little but pay attention to sports and call the FAN to recap what she heard. She was beloved by everyone, myself included, and I felt she needed more recognition than just an obit so, harking back to Peter Tosh, I cut it out of the New York Times (yes she got a Times obit for being a caller to a sports-talk radio station), and put it on my wall. Then the guy who wrote the song “Love Potion No. 9,” perished and his obit (also the Times), went up next to Doris. Then H. David Dalquist, the guy who invented the Bundt pan made it when he baked his last cake, and it went on from there. Certain people would come and recommend people for the “Wall” and I became the go-to guy for death. That ended, but people (you know who you are), would write me when notable fold died, like the guy who started the Friendly’s franchises, which I love, and the like. Eventually it was recommended that I get back in the death business and this piece of dreck you waste your time perusing came into being. Thus, this is a long-winded way of saying that Peter Tosh was instrumental in getting to the lowly place I am at, and Jimmy Cliff paved the way for the Peter Tosh’s of the world, so everything in life is interconnected – a seamless web if you will. Cliff started off singing ska and R&B in Kingston Jamaica, got “found” by Chris Blackwell, moved to England and starred in a low budget movie “The Harder They Come,” also a hit song, and the rest is Reggae history. Cliff had some real hits in addition to “The Harder They Come” (excellent cover by Joe Jackson here), most notably, “You Can Get It If You Really Want,” “Reggae Night,” “Many Rivers to Cross,” and “Wonderful World, Beautiful People.” He also did a great cover of Johnny Nash’s “I Can See Clearly Now,” and Cat Stevens’ “Wild World.” He won two Grammy’s including Best Reggae Album for “Rebirth,” in 1983. He broadened beyond Reggae to Rocksteady and Soul. He played with Kool and the Gang and sang background on the Rolling Stones’ “Dirty Work.” Bruce Springsteen began doing the Cliff song “Trapped,” in his live show. In 2002, Cliff put out an album “Fantastic Plastic People,” featuring duets with Annie Lennox, Joe Strummer, and Sting. Bob Dylan called his tune “Vietnam,” one of the greatest protest songs. “I’d rather be a free man in my grave, than living as a puppet or a slave.” Free he is.

This rag is really for the unheralded. The people behind things that we all know, but don’t know them. This month we lost Burt Meyer at 99. His name doesn’t mean much but Rock ‘Em Sock’ Em Robots certainly means something to those of us of a certain age (a nice way of saying old). Rock ‘Em Sock’ Em Robots were the Grand Theft Auto of their time. Where kids could get together and knock their surrogate’s block off. When I went to work for State government, my admin got me Rock ‘Em Sock’ Em Robots as exemplary of what world I was heading for. The combatants actually have names – the Red Rocker and the Blue Bomber. As to Mr. Meyer, he served in the Navy and ultimately got a degree from the Institute of Design at the Illinois Institute of Technology. After knocking around, (get it), he went to work for Marvin Glass & Associates, a toy developer. It was there that he collaborated on such toys as Mouse Trap, Mr. Machine (one of my brother’s favorites), and something called Lite Brite, which I have never heard of. For me, I was all about Rock ‘Em Sock’ Em Robots. Meyer apparently worked on the toy for years but stopped when boxer Davey Moore died from a brain injury suffered in the ring. Bob Dylan wrote the song “Who Killed Davey Moore,” about the death (thanks Dave). When he went back to it some time later, he substituted robots for humans and rather than knocking the other guy down, the object was to land a punch that would trigger the spring-loaded mechanism to knock the opponent’s head off its shoulders, which is probably a lot more gruesome than simply knocking a guy down. Thankfully, no blood spurts out when the loser’s head is disembodied. Surprisingly, it was not Rock ‘Em Sock’ Em Robots that was Mr. Meyer’s favorite game, but rather the aforementioned Lite Brite, which is less a game than a toy, where you can plug in small lights to create illuminated art. Meyer left Marvin Glass & Associates to start Meyer/Glass but never reached the heights of Rock ‘Em Sock’ Em Robots. Meyer was an explorer, flew planes into his 80’s, rode his bike solo across the Country, and made a 12 day 135 mile hike to the North Pole when he was 69. I’ll stay on the couch, thank you. In the end, though, his block was figuratively knocked off.

Donna Godchaux, and more recently Donna Godchaux McKay, best known for her singing with the Grateful Dead, died at 78, hopefully gratefully. She was born in Alabama and started her career singing at Muscle Shoals studio where she sang on Percy Sledge’s, “When A Man Loves A Woman,” Elvis’ “Suspicious Minds,” and “In the Ghetto,” as well as with a host of other folks such as Neil Diamond, Boz Scaggs, Duane Allman, and Cher. She went out to San Francisco and a friend was raving about the Dead. She didn’t particularly care for what she felt was their rather primitive musicianship (she was then married to the Jazz pianist Keith Godchaux), and figured that their appeal must have been in their looks. However, upon looking at their faces on the back of an album, she realized that looks were not their appeal either. What it was, was their live show which she saw and got hooked. She realized that with the dead, the music was really a never-ending journey, and it was one she embarked on for about nine years before amicably parting ways with the band in 1979. The following year, her husband, Keith died in a car accident. She did some work with bands of her own and continued to musically intersect with Phil Lesh in his post-Dead projects. She married the bassist David McKay and then ultimately moved back to Alabama, near the Muscle Shoals studio, so she came full circle. What a long, strange trip it’s been.

Being a Jets fan, it is hard to get really involved in the team where quarterbacks go to die, so I generally remember the announcers of the game, far more than the participants. This month, one of those voices, that of Bob Trumpy, has been silenced at 80. Trumpy, served in a booth with the likes of Bob Costas, Dick Enberg, and Don Criqui. He was a three-letter player in high school (football, basketball and track), started college at Illinois but flunked out after two years. He did another year at the University of Utah but left without graduating. He served in the Naval Reserve and held some jobs without picking up a football for well over a year, when he got a notice that the Cincinnati Bengals had drafted him in the 12^th round. This was well before the modern-day draft extravaganza that the NFL stages. The organization that gets America jazzed over having BBQ’s in parking lots, also gets fans to watch hours of essentially nothing. He made the team and went on to play for ten years, making the Pro-Bowl in four of them. Cincinnati was good with him but never made the playoffs. It wasn’t like today when pretty much every team save for the Jets plays in the post-season. After football, Trumpy worked in sports-talk radio in Cincinnati where he was outspoken and controversial. When he left that gig, he was replaced by Chris Collinsworth, who has also done well with that as a springboard. In addition to his NFL work, where he called three Superbowl’s, he also did three Olympic games work and golf, where he called three Ryder Cups. In 2014 he received the Pete Rozelle Radio and Television Award from the Football Hall of Fame. One night, while doing talk radio, a despondent woman who had been drinking called him after being beaten by her husband, claiming to want to kill herself. Trumpy kept her on the line while the authorities tried to locate her. Eventually her son got on the line and the woman received help. Trumpy was so emotionally distraught by it all, he broke down when the woman was safe. That defines him more than all else.

John Cleary, one of nine people wounded, in addition to the four that were killed at Kent State University in 1970, died this month at 74. He was not into politics much but when he heard there was going to be a big protest at the school, he borrowed a friend’s camera to watch the protest and take some pictures. After the students ignored a disperse order, the National guard troops launched tear gas and charged. Cleary wanted to get a picture of the troops cresting the hill but as they did, they opened fire, hitting him in the chest. He said it felt like getting hit with a sledgehammer. He was given first aid by some students and his picture, laying on the ground, being attended to by others, was on the cover of Life Magazine and along with the Crosby Stills Nash and Young tune “Ohio” became the signatures of the anti-Vietnam movement. Cleary spent some months in the hospital but returned to Kent State and graduated in 1974. Coming from a conservative family, he was pressured not to talk about the shooting and did not for over 12 years. However, with the birth of his son, he felt that he had to speak out and he began attending yearly ceremonies at Kent State with the other survivors, of which now, there are only five. “Gotta get down to it, soldiers are cutting us down.” Hope it never happens again.

Paul Tagliabue, a son of Jersey City, who played basketball for Georgetown and went on to be the Commissioner of the National Football League for 17 years, died at 84. He took the reins from Pete Rozelle and oversaw the sport’s incredible financial growth. His tenure was marked by labor peace and television contracts that outstripped both baseball and Basketball. During his time, the League added four franchises (Carolina, and Jacksonville as new cities, and Cleveland and Baltimore to replace teams that had left those cities) and went through a realignment of teams. He set out to be a lawyer, graduating from N.Y.U. Law School and starting his career with Covington and Burling, which did a lot of work for the NFL. He picked up on a lot of that work and ingratiated himself to the league and the owners. Not so much, though, because it took the League seven months to announce Tagliabue as the Commissioner. He managed the League, though, with incredible confidence and ability with the exception of a major low point being player safety. He opposed the folks who wanted the concussion situation addressed. Like many with climate change, he denied there was a problem. Studies and real reforms did not come about until after he left. On the other hand, when the Saints wanted to leave New Orleans after Katrina, he forbade it. Not equating the two, but like everyone, he had his good points and his blind spots. You can’t argue with how successful he made the league. “The NFL owns the day of the week. The same day that the church used to own. Now it’s theirs.”

Being born into wealth has definite advantages. In the case of Lorinda de Roulet, who died this month at 95, not only did it mean having to deal with a bunch of silver spoons in her mouth, so many I’m surprised she didn’t choke to death, it also meant running the New York Mets, the ball team that breaks my heart every year. Ms. De Roulet’s mom, Joan Payson Whitney, the first woman to own a major league baseball team, owned the Mets from their inception. When she died in 1975, her ownership interest shifted to her husband, a Red Sox fan. At first, M. Donald Grant ran the team but after the debacle that was the trade of Tom Seaver to the Reds in 1977, Ms. Payson’s daughter was chosen to run the team. I mean, you couldn’t do worse. Given what had happened with Seaver (which caused me to boycott the team, not go to games or watch or listen to games, or even read about the team), even someone who was not a baseball person could do no worse. That didn’t stop her from trying. Rather than spend money on the team, she did things like introduce a mule as the team mascot, displacing Mr. Met (America’s favorite mascot). Mettle, as the mule was known, never caught on. Shocking. Here is my question? Why in the world would someone pick a mule as a mascot? Slow, yet surefooted, obstinate and not known for urgency, hardly the attributes you want in your players. How about lions or tigers? A mule? That is pretty much what the Met’s became, though. Thankfully, although the team is not quite there, Mr. Met is back. In a final kick in the ass to Met’s fans, the team was sold to the Doubleday-Wilpon group who as we all know, did all they could to make Mets fans’ lives miserable. I feel good with our present ownership, but we still have a ways to go. That said, I don’t think we will have a mule or donkey or possum as our mascot. To her credit, Ms. De Roulet remained a Met’s fan to the end.

The incredibly talented basketball player, who was the first to be banned by the National Basketball Association, Michael Ray Richardson, died at 70. Richardson was drafted by the New York Knicks ahead of Larry Bird. He was a talented player, but no Bird. Magic Johnson once said that Richardson was the player he most liked to watch because he reminded him of himself, just on a smaller scale. He had all the tools and in his four years with the Knicks he made the All-Star team three times. He played back in the Studio 54 era when the streets were flowing with cocaine which Richardson found suited him. After clashing with Hubie Brown, the Knicks traded Richardson to the Golden State Warriors for Bernard King, who himself had overcome some drug problems. King was a great Knick who the team ruined by overplaying him in my mind. Richardson’s time with the Warriors was marked by injury and self-medication. He was then traded to the then New Jersey Nets in 1983. In fairness to Richardson, back in the day, anywhere from 40-70% of basketball players were reported to be coked-up, so he was far from alone. With the Nets, and throttling back on his drug use, Richardson was named the comeback player of the year. In February of 1986, after testing positive for drugs for the third time, David Stern banned Richardson for life. The first player to be so decorated. He went off to play in Europe. The ban was lifted in 1988 but Richardson decided to remain in Europe where he had become a star. He played in Europe for various teams until he was 47. He kicked his cocaine habit and spent the rest of his life sober. He wrote a book entitled “Banned: How I Squandered an All-Star NBA Career Before Finding My Redemption.” Isiah Thomas, a great player before he squandered his legacy with the Knicks, said of Richardson: “he had it all as a player, with no weaknesses.” Except cocaine. Thankfully he recovered and in his later years coached in the CBA and Europe and lectured about the dangers of drugs. It’s all about redemption.

Sticking with basketball greats, Lenny Wilkins, a perennial All-Star and the great head coach after his playing career, died this month at 88. He was three times inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame. First as a player, then as a coach, and finally as a part of the American basketball Olympic machine. A product of Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, Wilkins played for Boys High school (back when there was also Girls High School, before they were merged to make what is now Boys and Girls High School) and went on to play his college ball at Providence. He was drafted in the first round of the 1960 draft by the St. Louis Hawks, where he played for eight seasons. His final seven seasons were with Seattle, Cleveland, and Portland. He made the All-Star team nine times as player (and another four times as a coach). His coaching career spanned 32 seasons which were spent with Seattle (twice), Portland, Cleveland, Atlanta, Toronto, and New York, where even with all his talents, he could do little with the Knicks. His coaching record was 1,332-1,155, making him the third most winningest coach, behind Don Nelson and Gregg Popovich. With Seattle, where he coached a combined eight years, he won his only NBA title in 1979. After coaching, he became an executive with the Seattle SuperSonics. During his regular season playing career, Wilkins scored 17,772 points and when he retired, he was second in the league in career assists, behind the great Oscar Robertson. In 2021, the Athletic named him the 75^th greatest player in the history of the NBA and is on the list of the 15 greatest NBA coaches. Heckuva career.

Tom Stoppard, who died this month at 88, didn’t make it, in more ways than one. Neither did Fuzzy Zoeller.

Thanksgiving is behind us. On to Christmas. You better be good for goodness sake.