This year about 565,650 Americans are expected to die of cancer, more than 1500 people a day. Cancer is the second most common cause of death in the US, exceeded only by heart disease. In the US, cancer accounts for 1 out of every 4 deaths.
I am pleased to have been contacted by Equesse and the American Cancer Society to help sponsor the "Ride of Your Life" in 2008 by donating use of my photography in the campaign. The event will be held May 10 of this year.
This is a photograph of the beautiful and talented country singer Templeton Thompson riding Kawlidja at SpiritReins Ranch in Liberty Hill Texas. You can find out more information about the Ride of your life HERE.
So the famous daredevil motorcyclist died, of natural causes, (probably exacerbated by his formally, shall we say "reckless" lifestyle?) quietly in his own bed.
Its almost a shame, isn't it? After all of his stunts, all of his death defying leaps, the headlines and the fame of cheating the grim reaper, the man dies of old age, in bed.
I was a kid in the 70's. All the boys adored Evel. There was NO one like him and we all would shout and invoke his name as we jumped our bikes over, say, the ditch in front of our house.
If I had been Evel, I would have hatched a plan. No way would I leave this earth in the quiet normal way. At least I wouldn't let people think I did. I would have had them tie my lifeless body to a motorcycle and launch it into some desolate canyon somewhere. I would have let the world at least THINK my 69 year old beat up and sick old bones went out and tried one last stunt...and didn't make it. I would have gone out in a blaze of glory.
I would have at least talked about it. I bet Evel thought about a plan like this too. I really bet he did.
For an excellent recap on Evel's life, please visit our good friend Ron at the Final Taxi HERE.
(My friend Ron writes a terrific blog and podcast called The Final Taxi. I have enjoyed his writings and recordings for a few months now and would like to introduce you to what I think is some of his finest work so far, a piece about character actor Charles Lane. Thanks for allowing me to repost your blog here, Ron, this story is just first rate!)
I was floored
when I found out that character actor Charles Lane had taken the Final
Taxi this week. Not because of his death but that he had lived so long.
He as 102. He was the oldest living actor in the US. ( The oldest actor
is Dutch actor Johannes Heesters who is 103 and only did 80
productions)
I remember seeing him as a boy and thinking he was old then.
Lane’s lean frame and stern features were familiar to millions of
movie and television fans, most of whom, it is safe to say, never knew
his name. He was in over 800 productions in his 60 years in show
business.
Lane was born Charles Levison on Jan. 26, 1905, in San Francisco and
started his work life in the insurance business. In 1928, he joined the
company at the Pasadena Playhouse, which was known for training actors
for the movies. If you listen to this week’s Final Taxi podcast you
will hear that Kerwin Mathews was ‘discovered’ there as well.
Lane made his film debut as a hotel desk clerk in “Smart Money” (1931) with Edward G. Robinson and James Cagney.
He went on to act in films such as “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” (a
newsman), “It’s a Wonderful Life” (the rent collector), “You Can’t Take
It With You” (an IRS agent), “No Time for Sergeants” (the draft board
driver) and hundreds of others in which he played shopkeepers,
professors, judges, bureaucrats, doctors, “a guy at the bar,” policemen
and salesmen. In the 1930s alone, he appeared in 161 films, sometimes
moving from set to set to deliver a few lines in each of several movies
in one day.
Starting in the early 1950s, Lane also appeared on dozens of TV
shows, including “The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show.” Perhaps most
famously, he appeared in classic episodes of “I Love Lucy,” playing
several characters who all seemed to have in common a stunned if
comical lack of patience for the bumbling Lucy. He said it was on this
show that he perfected the crusty skinflint.
Throughout the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s, Lane could be seen on “Perry
Mason,” “Dennis the Menace,” “The Twilight Zone,” “Bewitched,” “Get
Smart,” “The Flying Nun,” “The Andy Griffith Show,” “Lou Grant” and
many other shows. In the 1970s, he had running parts on “The Beverly
Hillbillies” as Foster Phinney and in “Soap” as Judge Anthony Petrillo.
In the 1960s, audiences got to know him as Homer Bedloe, a scheming
trouble-shooter for the railroad in “Petticoat Junction.”
Max Baer Jr., who played Jethro on “The Beverly Hillbillies,” said
that although Lane played “a gruff, arrogant kind of guy” there and in
dozens of other roles, “That was not him at all, that was a character.”
In 2005, when friends and industry admirers gathered to celebrate
his 100th birthday at a TV Land special event, he accepted their
plaudits from a wheelchair and declared, “If you’re interested, I’m
still available.”
Oh, to have that kind of energy when I am that age and to be seen by as many people has Charles Lane has been seen by.
A person like Charles Lane is the reason I created the Final Taxi podcast.
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