Ramblin' with Roger

Famous people I’ve met, posthumous edition

Springboks

Oddly, I found the exercise of noting 70 people in my life who have passed therapeutic. So, I figured I’d list some famous people I’ve met who have since died.

Rod Serling: When you grew up in Binghamton, NY, in the early 1960s, Serling, born in the Syracuse area but grew up on the West Side of the Parlor City, was a big deal. The Twilight Zone television series was chockful of Binghamtonian references, from a rundown bus station to a carousel, which looked much like Recreation Park’s merry-go-round.

In 1970, I, as president of the student government, was given the honor of introducing Serling at a schoolwide assembly. Rod had been the student government leader thirty years earlier.

His favorite teacher, Helen Foley, who was namechecked in a TZ episode, wrote me a too-long introduction that mentioned him being a paratrooper in World War II.

While briefly mortified then, I understood why he came out on stage during my introduction. After the assembly, he spoke to La Foley’s last-period public speaking class, which I got permission to attend. Rod smoked incessantly in the classroom. The coffin nails killed him five years later at 50; fame doesn’t immunize one from disease.

Earl Warren: My Constitutional hero., as recently noted. I never did figure out how my SUNY New Paltz professor, Ron Steinberg, managed to arrange for his class of about 15 students to meet a former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.

A former Weaver

Pete Seeger: Reading my diary, I noticed I had seen Pete sing at least thrice in the autumn of 1972, including twice in one day. I estimate that I’d seen him perform at least 30 times.

When the Springboks rugby team from apartheid South Africa was scheduled to play at Bleeker Stadium in Albany in September 1981, with the approval of long-time mayor Erastus Corning II, there was a call for protests. I was at the demonstration, along with over a thousand others.

There might have been an even larger response, except it was POURING. But Pete was there, and we were standing outside the stadium getting soaked, umbrellas notwithstanding, while discussing the moral necessity to respond to racism and other evils.

Ed Dague: My favorite newsperson in the Albany market. Somewhere in the attic, I have the transcript of an April 1994 11 p.m. news broadcast on WNYT-TV, Channel 13, that I got to watch being broadcast while near the set.

Back when he had a mustache

Alex Trebek: My sense of the JEOPARDY host was that he enjoyed the show’s rhythm in the Los Angeles area—two or three shows, a meal break, then three or two more episodes.

When I saw him at the Wang Theater in Boston in September 1998, I sensed he was uncomfortable doing a series of interviews with the Boston Globe, Christian Science Monitor, and other media outlets. I got to watch him a lot because there was a lot of waiting around.

He was explicitly annoyed with not getting into our hotel, the Boston Park Plaza Hotel, quickly that first evening because of a Bill Clinton fundraiser, which followed a massive demonstration both against Clinton and against special prosecutor Ken Starr, who had put out explicit information online regarding the President and Monica Lewinsky. I don’t know if his irritation was political/cultural – he tended to be rather conservative – or merely the inconvenience.

Regardless, I’m disappointed I don’t have a photo with him because he was doing the bunny-ears thing with his fingers behind my back, which I saw on a monitor.

Día de los Muertos

All Souls Day

Día de los Muertos is Part Two of 70 who have passed, which began yesterday.

Please come to hear a special choir concert on November 3 at 6 p.m. at First Presbyterian Church, 362 State Street, Albany, NY. The choir will sing Morten Lauridsen’s Lux Aeterna, a 30-minute work with orchestra.

Margaret Lia: The den mother of my Cub Scout troop and mom of one of my best friends in elementary school and junior high.

Darby Penney: She wanted to save the world. Very occasionally, I tried to help.

Bonnie Deschane: She would clean our house some weekends. She was less good at the cleaning thing and better at the friend thing.

Robert Yates: My mother’s youngest first cousin; he was only seven years older than I was. Though we saw him only twice a year when I was growing up – I was in Binghamton, he was in Queens, NYC – he was the closest thing to an older sibling I had.

Paul Peca: Our sixth-grade teacher let us, even encouraged us to disagree with him. He supported Barry Goldwater for President and agreed with the US dropping the bomb on Hiroshima.

Comic books

Phil Seuling: Seagate was FantaCo’s primary comic book distributor, and he and Jonni Levas were Seagate. I went to a couple of his lavish parties in Brooklyn. Phil lived large.

Freda Gardner: I didn’t know that the nice older lady at church was a legend in the Presbyterian Church USA. Her wise counsel was invaluable when she and I were on pastor Glenn’s congregational team to aid him in his doctoral quest.

Tim Ryan-Pepper: Music was our bond

Sinon O’Neil: Every time I saw him, he always cheered us with questions about current events joyfully. And he was a crafty card player.

Helen Foley: The Binghamton Central High School public speaking and drama teacher and Rod Serling’s mentor was also involved with theater with my father.

Stan Moore: When I was church shopping in 1982, he gave the sermon at Trinity UMC on June 13 that got me to come back. But I avoided his vicelike handshake.

Paul Crowder: The choir director when I joined the Trinity UMC choir after not singing for over a decade.

Samuel Walker: When items were discovered in the possession of my father’s mother’s father that a good Christian man presumably should not own, it rocked my mother’s theological underpinning.

Charlie Kite: a First Pres church member and a physician. He was particularly effusive when he knew he was dying,

Donna George: She tried to do good things but often wasn’t taken seriously. Beleaguered would be the term I’d used. We bonded over this.

Margaret Hannay was the epitome of hospitality and grace. She was also brilliant.

A force

Ken Screven: A great local journalist and a fellow Times Union blogger for a time.

Lillian Johnson: Before my time there, she was the associate pastor at Trinity UMC. We fought the good fight, getting the then-current pastor to change his ways.

Fred Goodall: the youth choir director at Trinity AME Zion for many years.

Arnold Berman: my mother’s Charlotte’s brother, genealogist of the Berman/Barosin tribe.

Ida Berman: Charlotte’s sister, who used to take me to New York City art galleries and museums. She was a fine photographer.

Alice Schrade: an older member of First Pres. We adored each other. We’d have great philosophical conversations about race, justice, and other topics.

Arlene Mahigian: When I joined the Trinity UMC choir, she adopted me. She would take my robe home to wash, though I didn’t ask her. She had a tremendous soprano voice.

Keith Barber: We kept crossing paths on CDTA buses for which he was a ride evaluator, in Bible study, where he was the purveyor of a specific text, and as a raconteur.

Richard Powell: my father-in-law. I loved going to minor league baseball games with him. His love for jazz and country music I didn’t appreciate until after he died when I inherited part of his CD collection.

Robert Pennock: a baritone in the Trinity UMC choir, he was wise regarding Methodist polity.

Keyboards

Marcheta Hamlin: the organist at Trinity AME Zion who tried to teach me piano. My wife met her and commented on how warm and wonderful she was.

Agatha Green: My paternal grandmother died when i was 11. I’ve since learned so much about her courage and character.

Fran Allee: She was an educator and cook at Trinity UMC. Several of us traveled to her cottage, about an hour away each summer.

Mike Attwell: My racquetball competitor long before I joined him in the First Pres choir.

Adenia Yates: my mother’s maternal aunt, a buffer between me and her sister. She and I watched JEOPARDY, played cards and SCRABBLE.

Pat Wilson: A friend of my father, with whom I talked theology extensively.

Gertrude Williams: My maternal grandmother was a superstitious and controlling person who attempted to pass it along to her grandchildren; my sister and Leslie bought into it, but baby sister Marcia rightly ignored her.

Charlotte Yates: the mother of four of my mother’s first cousins. She had a strong sense of politics and art.

Jim Kalas: I knew from both work and Trinity UMC.

McKinley Green: Thanks to Pop, I got on TV a lot as a kid.

FantaCo

Raoul Vezina: Ever since I became the de facto keeper of the FantaCo flame, Raou never goes away, even though he died in 1983.

Gladys Crowder: We were in two choirs together at Trinity UMC and First Pres.

Trudy Green: Increasingly, I suspect there was more there than my mom showed. She’s mentioned a lot on February 2 (the anniversary of her death), November 17 (her birthday), Mother’s Day.

Norman Nissen: racquetball partner, book suggestion-maker, best man at my last wedding.

Les Green: My dad was a really complicated guy. He shows up on Father’s Day, August 10 (the anniversary of his death), and September 25 (the day before his birthday).

I can quickly think of a dozen more, but I will let it be.

70 who have passed

Lux Aeterna

70 who have passed has two origins. One was Chuck Miller, who wrote about 60 deceased people he remembered, for good or ill, on his 60th birthday in August. This intrigued me, so I mentioned it to my sisters during a weekly Zoom meeting. Leslie said that at an icebreaker, someone suggested discussing someone who influenced your life.

My birthday was in March, so I’ve decided to write about this on November 1, All Saints Day, and November 2, All Souls’ Day, part of the Día de los Muertos.

I don’t mean this to be a definitive list. Undoubtedly, I’ve left off someone. Also, some people are probably deceased or 110; I didn’t scour obituaries.

Related: There will be a special choir concert on the First Friday, November 3rd, at 6 p.m. at First Presbyterian Church, 362 State Street, Albany, NY. The choir will sing Morten Lauridsen’s Lux Aeterna, a 30-minute work with orchestra. It sets many of the Requiem texts. This will be a concert of remembrance for the many in our choir and community members lost in the last several years.

Jimmy Rocco: Even before he was a choir guy, we always talked about music.

Will McMorris: He was a guy from my current church, First Pres Albany, whose life was more interesting, complicated, and painful than I had realized. The fact that he felt comfortable enough sharing it during an adult education class at church pleased me.

Mary Backus Dye: I knew her in kindergarten, then she moved away. I reconnected with her online and discovered she’s related to me on my father’s side.

Violet Keleshian: a member of the First Pres choir who prepared great Middle Eastern food.

Mary Durkot: A childhood friend’s mom who LOVED seeing that I had a child.

Barnyard

Bernie Massar: I last saw him at our 35th high school reunion. He almost certainly died from fighting fires.

Greg O’Neil: A younger brother of a high school friend, he had Type 1 diabetes and injected himself regularly, very matter-of-factly. I assumed that if I had to do that to myself, I could, but I’m far from certain.

Elinor Brownstein: When I worked at the Schenectady Arts Council in 1978, she was one of the Ladybugs who educated and entertained kids in the school. We stayed in contact for years.

Donald Yates: One of my mother’s first cousins, whom we saw often, given we were four hours away.

Garland Hamlin: One of the pillars of my first church, Trinity AME Zion, growing up. He also was on my draft board. When I was 19 and appealing to get conscientious objector status, he acted as though he didn’t know me, which I found instructive.

Robert Lamar: The pastor at First Pres when I was attending Trinity UMC. When I would see him at a FOCUS service, he was particularly warm and friendly. More importantly, he was a legend in positive social activism.

Mary Ellenbogen: She was our neighbor. Her house was immaculate inside and out. In her mid-80s, she was an avid gardener. She died trying to save her husband from drowning.

Godmother

Constance Whitfield: My godmother always seemed critical of me when I was a kid, and we’d be at some church conference. When I saw her in Binghamton at a funeral in the mid-1980s, she asked me what church I was attending. I told her, and she snapped, “Isn’t that the WHITE church?” I never saw her again.

Dwight Smith: A significant leader in PCUSA circles. Choir member. He never figured out how to mute himself when we were doing Bible study on ZOOM, and he’d receive a call from his doctor.

Susan Easton: First Pres choir member and the point person for choir hospitality.

Greg Haymes: a/k/a Sarge Blotto

Sandy Cohen: the tenor soloist at Trinity UMC with an outsized personality. At a funeral I attended in 2023, I was talking with his widow about how we got Sandy the funeral they wanted for him despite the resistance of the pastor.

Albert Wood: My wife knew him from a previous work situation, while my relationship with him was music at First Pres.

Matt Staccone: He was a counselor at the local (Albany) Small Business Development Center. Twice a year, he invited me to speak to a group of his clients, sharing tips on how to find demographic information. This was a significant change of pace from my daily reference work. Also, there was a racquetball court at one of his work locations, and I would beat him regularly.

Hugh Nevin: The acting pastor at my church before I attended there. I knew him from his booming bass voice and steadying presence.

Jack White: the husband of my wife’s cousin, he, my FIL, and I could talk baseball forever, which we tended to do at the Olin Family reunion. I’ve acquired some of his books on the sport.

Q

Stacy Wilburn: After Sandy Cohen died, I joined Q in trying to hold down the tenor section at Trinity UMC until reinforcements came.

Joe Sinnott: Not only one of the comic book industry’s greatest inkers but one of the sweetest, least pretentious human beings I’ve ever known.

Irwin Corey: Seeing our near-relative on the TV was always entertaining. In person, he was even more irascible.

Marion Motisher: My dear friend, a retired librarian from the Trinity choir. She died on March 4, 1992. Three days later, I was a pallbearer on my 39th birthday, the last time I got intentionally drunk.

Paul Weinstein: A fellow dad of two kids my daughter’s age. He did anything for them. And he admired me greatly for some reason.

Leo Mahigian: Once the concertmaster of the Albany Symphony Orchestra, I knew him when his wife became sick.

Gloria Wood: She made a blanket for my then-baby daughter and a lot more for others.

Tom Hoffman: A political junkie of the first order. But he opined with great humor and wit. My wife recently said she wonders what he would have thought of djt.

John Powell: My wife’s brother. An advocate for me between the first and second times she and I dated.

More tomorrow.

October rambling: Three Chaplains

“he pledged to donate almost all of his money to causes before he died”

I’ve seen and recommend that you watch the hour-long film Three Chaplains. “Muslim chaplains aim to make change in one of America’s most powerful institutions—the military.

“For them, the fight for equality and religious freedom begins on the inside.” Broadcasting on PBS, Independent Lens, November 6, 2023, and available elsewhere after that date. Here’s a review.

“The Lie Detector Was Never Very Good at Telling the Truth”

Per Giffords.org, there have been at least 565 mass shootings in the United States this year. Five hundred sixty-five mass shootings in the first 299 days.

Legal Eagle: When Police Raid A Newspaper for No Reason

There Is No Such Thing as Cancer (Hank) and A Tale of Two Cancers (John)

The Census Bureau has posted a new Federal Register Notice inviting public comments on proposed changes to the 2025 American Community Survey (ACS) and Puerto Rico Community Survey (PRCS) questionnaires. Comments are due on or before December 19, 2023, and, once submitted, are part of the public record.

NYS geographic primer Food Safety and Prison Health Care and McKinsey consultants and chocolate: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver

The GOP bets on extremist Mike Johnson (LA) as Speaker, risking 2024 prospects; also, his positions on health issues, his impossible agenda, and his belief that separation of church and state Is only a ‘shield for people of faith.’ A blistering rebuke from his hometown newspaper’s op ed. He is worse than you think.

Using Learning Styles to Your Advantage: the Complete Guide.

Early History of Bedloe’s Island, now known as Liberty Island.

When Hybrid Works … But Doesn’t

Culcha

An early name for Albany and how it’s pronounced

How Lena Horne Won Over MGM — and Became a “Test Case” for Hollywood

Hasan Minhaj Offers Detailed Response to New Yorker Story: “It Was So Needlessly Misleading”

Oscar Winner Buffy Sainte-Marie Responds to Questions About Her Native Heritage: “I Know Who I Am”

The 100 Greatest Film Books of All Time. The only two I’ve read were the annual Leonard Maltin’s Movie Guide (#17) – I’ve had at least a half dozen iterations over the years, and Life Itself by Roger Ebert (#45)

Interview with a SamuraiFrog by Splotchy

Opening titles for 18 situation comedies of the seventies. I watched two of them, both on CBS, on Saturday nights at 8:30 p.m.

“The kick is up … and it’s … CLANG…”

Now I Know: The Halloween Costume You Can’t Buy and When Science Gets Unexpectedly Expensive and An Awkward Phone Call from Mom and The Giant Pink Bunny in the Middle of Nowhere and Everybody Was Kung Fu Panda Fighting and Paved With Good Intentions and Why Dorothy Couldn’t Surrender

Obits

Charles Feeney, Who Made a Fortune and Then Gave It Away, Dies at 92. “After piling up billions in business, he pledged to donate almost all of his money to causes before he died. He succeeded and then lived a more modest life.”

Kevin Phillips, who died at 82, published his first book at 29, a landmark work, The Emerging Republican Majority, which “presciently predicted a rightward realignment in national politics driven by ethnic and racial divisions and white discontent.”

Richard Roundtree, Suave Star of ‘Shaft,’ Dies at 81. I never saw Shaft, but I did watch him as “the disgraced doctor Daniel Reubens on the NBC daytime soap opera Generations,” c. 1990.

Matthew Perry, Chandler on ‘Friends,’ Dies at 54. He “Masterfully Walked the Line Between Mirth and Melancholy.” All spiders are named Phil.

Burt Young, Oscar-Nominated ‘Rocky’ Actor, Dies at 83. I saw the initial four Rocky pics, the first one with my mother

Richard Moll, Bull the Bailiff on ‘Night Court,’ Dies at 80

MUSIC

Ghost Story soundtrack album

Celtic Rock – Donovan

Bless The Child OST suite

Songs from the Woods – Jethro Tull

The Great Pumpkin Waltz – Vince Guaraldi

Theme From Shaft – Isaac Hayes. My sister got this double album, but it contained two copies of the same record (Sides 1 and 4, I believe), and we had to get it replaced.

Somebody Like You – Giant Rooks

Coverville 1461: Cover Stories for Ultravox and Thomas Dolby and 1462: The Natalie Merchant & 10,000 Maniacs Cover Story

Closer To Fine – Indigo Girls

Honky Tonk Heroes – Waylon Jennings

Greg’s Drinking Song from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend

The Beatles’ ‘Last Song,’ ‘Now and Then,’ Is Set for Release (Nov 2), Along With Expanded, Remix-Filled ‘Red’ and ‘Blue’ Hits Collections (Nov 9)

The Israel/Hamas conflict

‘I Love You. I Am Sorry’

I’ve avoided writing about the Israel/Hamas conflict because I may have nothing fresh to say. Also, it’s fraught with the potential to tick off people. It’s a complicated history.

One can support Israel’s right to exist, understanding how the repercussions of pogroms past are shaping the reaction to the utterly horrific 7 October attack.

At the same time, one could also voice concern about the fate of the Palestinian people, with over 5,000 killed and insufficient aid coming via Egypt.

There’s an opinion piece in the South China Morning Post (behind a paywall) suggesting that “Hamas’ leaders desperately want the de facto veto Palestinians once had on concessions other Arabs make to Israel, ” and Israel’s “mighty vengeance” might be the only way they might get it.

Also, Gaza: The Cost of Escalation by Ben Rhodes. The consequences of the US’s vengeful reaction to September 11 should remind us of the risks of responding to violence with greater violence. The Weekly Sift guy writes about his 9-11 flashbacks. After the US war against Iraq, c. 2003, it’s reasonable to note: Israel Says It Will Destroy Hamas. But Who Will Govern Gaza?

So, the conversations about whose “side” one is on are, to me, not helpful. It’s been brought up regarding the Writer’s Guild, the Democratic Party, even reporters covering the war, etc, etc, etc. The LA Times reports that Muslim parents say the LA Unified School District’s ‘pro-Israel’ statement made their kids targets.

An article in Medium, which you may not be able to read, talks about the wrongheadedness of the hatred towards the Russian PEOPLE in the Ukraine war and of the Palestinian PEOPLE in the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Taking care

Moreover, “inaccurate news reports of atrocities have flooded social media, spreading horror and rage worldwide,” per several sources, including the Boston Globe.

“Some misinformation researchers say it’s primarily up to social media users to protect themselves (and each other) from false information by developing new habits. If we can’t tell fact from fiction at today’s speed of information flow, researchers say, we need to slow down, prepare ourselves mentally, and be extra careful about what we share and with whom.” This is where I’m coming from.

Let me be Pollyannic and say I’m on the side of peace, as reflected in ‘I Love You. I Am Sorry’: One Jew, One Muslim and a Friendship Tested by War. “A Los Angeles program that connects Muslims and Jews has been strained by the war in Israel. But the group’s leaders found that it has strengthened their bond.”