Charles Blondin

popular name: Joan Merriam Smith

date_of_death: February 17, 1965

age: 28

cause_of_death: Plane crash

claim_to_fame: The Odd and the Interesting

best_know_for: Joan Merriam Smith was an American aviator, famous for her 1964 solo flight around the world in which she became the second woman to complete the trip, by following the equatorial route attempted in 1937 by Amelia Earhart. (Jerrie Mock set off the same week on a different route, and finished before Smith did.) In doing so she also became the first woman to fly a twin-engine aircraft around the world, and the first woman to fly the Pacific Ocean from west to east in a twin-engine plane. Following the equatorial Amelia Earhart route, Joan became the first person in history to successfully complete a solo flight around the world at the equator, as well as the first person to complete the Amelia Earhart route. Smith also was the the first person in history to fly solo around the world at the equator, to complete the longest single solo flight around the world, first woman to fly a twin-engine aircraft around the world, the first woman to fly the Pacific Ocean from west to east in a twin-engine plane, the first woman to receive an airline transport rating at the age of 23, the youngest woman to complete a solo flight around the world, and the first woman to fly solo from Africa to Australia, from Australia to Guam via New Guinea, and from Wake to Midway Island. Sadly she died the following year when the plane she was piloting suffered structural failure and crashed in California.

popular name: Elizabeth Glaser

date_of_death: December 3, 1994

age: 47

cause_of_death: Complications from AIDS

claim_to_fame: The Odd and the Interesting

best_know_for: Elizabeth Glaser was an actress, educator, activist, author, and founder of the Pediatric AIDS Foundation, Elizabeth Glaser. In fact, it was Elizabeth Glaser’s fight to save her HIV-positive children led to her creation of the Pediatric AIDS Foundation to save children worldwide from the devastation of AIDS. Shortly after her marriage to actor Paul Michael Glaser, while giving birth to Ariel, Elizabeth hemorrhaged and was transfused with seven pints of blood. It wasn't until four years later that Elizabeth found out that she had been infected with the AIDS virus through the blood transfusion, and passed it on through her breastmilk to Ariel, who later died at the age of seven years old. The couple also had a son, Jake, who was infected with the virus in utero. Upon the death of her daughter, Glaser raised awareness of pediatric AIDS and pushed to extend availability of the drug AZT to children. In 1988, Glaser founded the Pediatric AIDS Association. In 1992, she spoke at the Democratic National Convention, criticizing the government’s failure to address the AIDS crisis. Her 1991 book, In the Absence of Angels, was praised for its honest discussion of losing a child. Glaser lost her battle with AIDS in 1994.

popular name: Amelia Maggia

date_of_death: September 12, 1922

age: 25

cause_of_death: Radium sarcoma, industrial poisoning

claim_to_fame: The Odd and the Interesting

best_know_for: Amelia ‘Mollie’ Maggia was the middle child of seven Maggia sisters; listed in order of age: Louise, Clara, Albina, Mollie, Quinta, Irma and Josephine. Children of Italian immigrants, Albina, Mollie, Quinta and Irma all worked in the radium-dial factory. Mollie was an exceptional dial-painter – but paid the price. She was the first dial-painter to die in September 1922. The initial effects of radium seemed harmless, and the substance was popular amongst the younger girls in the factory. They would go home from a day of painting with their clothes glowing from the radium exposure. Some would even paint the buttons on their dresses or their nails, but the joy of the radium glow was short lived. Long-term radiation sickness symptoms soon became present among many of the women who worked with radium paint. Common issues included bone cancer, anemia, lesions, and sores. These problems were exhibited in Amelia Maggia, the first dial painter to die from radiation sickness. Amelia worked in the factory for almost a decade and was known to be a diligent employee. Amelia had initially gone to the doctor complaining of a toothache and got an extraction. However, the ache in her jaw continued. During a routine exam, when the doctor gently probed here jaw, her jawbone literally fell out of her mouth into his hands. Upon closer examination he found extensive deterioration of her lower jaw bone and tissue damage from the radiation. Most of her jaw was removed and she developed severe anemia and lesions with massive infections. Amelia passed away in September of 1922 at the age of 25 when the radiation caused a jugular vein to rupture and she bled to death in front of her family. Her death was wrongly attributed to syphilis.