Gone But Not Forgotten: Celebrities Who Left Us in 2023

Jimmy Buffet (foto Gary Firstenberg)

They danced, they sang, they made us laugh, they made us think. And sometimes they made us wince... As 2023 closes out, newspapers and magazines around the world will assemble a veritable list of iconic figures and pop culture makers whose lives are now gone, but not forgotten.

This morning I read that actor Tom Wilkinson, who played major roles in two of my favorite films--The Ghostwriter and Michael Clayton--died yesterday. This prompted me to see who else left us behind this year.

Entertainment Week has a very long page of celebs with photos and mini-bios, which I skimmed through just now. Many who left us were in their 80s and 90s, and a few over 100. It's sad to read of others who died in their fifties, or earlier.

Here are some of the many whom we no longer have among us, with a comment or two of my own as they relate to my own life.

Bob Barker was the host of The Price Is Right for oh so many years, an all around nice guy, so it was hilarious when he got into a rough-and-tumble fist fight with a hot-headed Adam Sandler in Happy Gilmore. Barker was 99 when he died.

Tony Bennett was one of many crooners who emerged before my time, whom I actually had little interest. But like the little engine that could, his longevity and vocal chords resulted in many accolades. It caught my attention when he recorded with Amy Winehouse, whose music was introduced to me by my son.

I discovered author Cormac McCarthy via a pair of audiobooks at our Duluth Public Library, one of these being No Country For Old Men which I read ten months before it became a film. This fall I devoured Blood Meridian, a book like no other that I have ever read, brutal and dazzling. McCarthy was 89.

There were two Robertsons who passed this year. Pat Robertson, the Christian media personality/founder of the 700 Club, and Robbie Robertson, who made a name for himself with The Band, Bob Dylan's backing group during that famous mid-Sixties world tour. Controversies swirled around each, but I'm not going to get into it.

Tina Turner died this year, definitely a force. She overcame a lot to get where she got.

Cleveland Browns fullback Jim Brown was my hero as a kid growing up in Cleveland and one of the NFL's greatest running backs. (I could make a case that he was indeed the greatest.) In 1963 I got a Jimmy Brown football card for the first time in years of trying. Unfortunately, my brother Ron was shoplifting football cards from the Klir's store and my mother punished him by burning ALL of our football cards. I saved Jim Brown from the fire and slid the card between the cinder blocks in the wall of the garage. Though irretrievable, he was at least preserved from being burned.

Gordon Lightfoot died this year. A Canadian singer/songwriter he never achieved the acclaim of a Bob Dylan, but definitely wrote a lot of excellent songs. In college "If You Could Read My Mind" was a track that repeated itself in my mind. Gord's Gold was listened to much over the years.

Actor and singer Harry Belafonte was born in Harlem to Jamaican-born parents. His daughter produced a documentary about his career, which included his work in the civil rights movement. Bob Dylan played harmonica on one of Belafonte's albums, Dylan's first paid recording gig in the Big Apple.

Al Jaffee was a cartoonist for Mad Magazine for six decades. When I was a kid the satirical mag only cost a quarter. One time in the early Sixties I bought a box of them for a penny apiece at a sidewalk sale in Mapletown. How cool is that? Jaffee was 102 when he passed.

Raquel Welch was one of those sex symbol heart throbs that Hollywood would thrust onto posters to the delight of teenage boys. She was 82 when she died this year.

Gina Lollobrigida was an Italian sex symbol from a decade earlier who died at age 95 this year. I doubt I ever saw her in a movie and couldn't even say I knew what she looked like, nor did I have any fantasies about her. I only recall that her name sounded sexy.

David Crosby of CSN&Y passed away this year. If you ever compete in a Bob Dylan Trivia Contest, DC is the answer to the question, Who was Bob referring to in his song "Day of the Locusts"? Crosby was 81.

Lisa Marie Presley was only 54 when she died this year. Only child of The King, it must have been hard growing up in that world.

Jeff Beck was once dubbed one of the most influential guitar players in rock history by Rolling Stone magazine. Eight or ten years I go I obtained permission from Beck to use one of his collector cars in one of my ads for AMSOIL. I'm half curious where his car collection is today.

My brother Ron and I used to enjoy watching the TV show The Man from U.N.C.L.E. I would pretend I was the Robert Vaughn character Napoleon Solo, and he would be Illya Kuryakin, played by David McCallum who died this year just six days after his 90th birthday.

Everyone remembers Burt Young as Paulie in the Rocky series of films starring Sly Stallone. I remember him for his role in the perfectly crafted Polanski film Chinatown, starring Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway.

I once performed Margaritaville, by Jimmy Buffet in a celebrity fundraiser at the Sports Garden here in Duluth. Backed by a live band and patterned after one of those TV shows where you're critiqued (lacerated) publicly, I chose the song that Roger Reinert had intended to select. Roger, a state legislator, is now Mayor of Duluth. I wasn't the first time I competed against local mayors. 15 or more years ago I beat the mayors of Hermantown, Duluth and Superior in a celebrity race at Proctor Speedway. Buffet, who was born on Christmas Day, would have been 77 had he not passed away in September.

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For a more complete list of Celebrities We Lost in 2023 visit EW.

Profiles in Courage: Breaking Records and Breaking Barriers in Pro Sports--Henry Aaron, Jim Brown, Marion Motley

I saw all three of these heroes in the 1963 All Star Game.

Hank Aaron passed away today. The headline of the AP news story reads, "Hank Aaron, the baseball legend who endured racist threats with stoic dignity as he broke Babe Ruth's home run record, has died at 86."

The title is heartbreaking because it says so much about the cruelty many of our black heroes were experiencing while we cheered for them from the stands. The story, if you are unfamiliar with it, was that as the veteran all-star Aaron was approaching Babe Ruth's home run record, he began getting death threats. 

This was not in the news, but did come out later. It is an appalling commentary of our nation. It took courage to go out there and do the work he'd be called to do. 

 It also brings to mind for me some other stories from sports history.

An Aside: My favorite player of the era was the Puerto Rican star from the Pittsburgh Pirates, Roberto Clemente. Sometime in the mid-Sixties I sent him a letter and said how much I appreciated him (or something to that effect.) He sent me a note and an autographed photo of himself. The striking thing about that was that this was not a publicity still or a professionally printed photo made for signing. It looked like a page from a magazine that was cutout and signed with a ballpoint pen. I had that photo on the bulletin board in my room all through high school.

Henry Aaron influenced me, too. I had read a long article in Sports Illustrated about his consistency as a player. The sportswriter described how Aaron's power was in his wrists. Because I was determined to be a baseball player one day--had been playing seemingly every day since 7--I used to work out a lot. Our coach of the freshman team at BRHS-Wet shared an exercise that was designed to strengthen your wrists and I took it to heart based on the Aaron article. There is no sweeter sound than the crack of a bat on a ball the lines into the outfield and it's done with a flick of the wrists.  

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Marion Motley and Jimmy Brown

Nearly everyone knows the story of how Jackie Robinson was the first African American to cross into the Majors from the Negro  Leagues in baseball. Football stories are less well known.

When I read Jimmy Brown's autobiography years ago, he told stories about some of the tricks white opponents from the Jim Crow South did to hurt him. For example, when he was tackled, they would sometimes have a fistful of dirt, sand or whatever and fling it into his eyes while he was on the ground under a pile where the refs couldn't see.

In preparation for last Sunday's playoff game between the Browns and the KC Chiefs, I decided to watch a "History of the Cleveland Browns" DVD that I have. Every Browns fan should own a copy. It would make you proud. Paul Brown, founder and first head coach of the team, is one of the truly great coaches in NFL history. Many of his innovations are still in use today.

Paul Brown took the lead in bringing black players into pro football. It seemed strange to him that these men who fought for our country in WW2 could not participate in pro sports. In 1946, the year before Jackie Robinson crossed the color barrier in baseball, Paul Brown recruited three Negro players, among them the powerful running back Marion Motley.

Motley and the Browns were the best in the game for many years, but few knew the challenges he had to deal with. Again, just one anecdote tells a lot. Football is a very physical game, and normally the goal is to tackle the guy running with the ball. Sometimes, however, the white boys on the other team took a different approach. Instead of tackling him they would hold him up to keep him from falling, pummeling his body with their fists. 

I only learned about this from the documentary, which I'd watched before but with fresh eyes again last weekend.

Here's some football trivia you may not know. As you know, there are many arguments about who is the greatest this or greatest that. I did a research paper on who is the greatest baseball player of all time. The first step is to establish criteria.

That being said, who was the greatest running back of all time? It could be argued that the player who has the most rushing yards in a season is the top dawg. But as we know, today they play more games in a season than they used to. Today's rushers get four extra games in a season.

My favorite player was Jimmy Brown. Over the last half century I have compared all highly touted running backs against Brown. Here is a stat worthy of note: most yards per game, lifetime. No player in NFL history has averaged more than 100 yards per game, except Jimmy Brown. 

Interestingly, Marion Motley, the Cleveland Browns running back who preceded brown, set another record that no other running back has ever broken: most yards per carry average, lifetime. Motley averaged 5.7 yards rushing every time he touched the ball. 

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These two stories came to mind when I learned of Hank Aaron's passing today. They were heroic not just for the achievements on the field, but for the character they displayed. 

In his Hall of Fame acceptance speech Henry "Hank" Aaron said, "A man's ability is only limited by his lack of opportunity." These are words to ponder well and take to heart.

Photo courtesy Gary Firstenberg

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