Bridgwood, Charlotte
The Odd and the Interesting
Age 68
August 18, 1861 - August 20, 1929
Hollywood Forever Cemetery / Los Angeles / California / USA / North America
Charlotte Bridgwood patented the first electrically powered windshield wiper in 1917, improving previous manually-operated wipers such as the one patented by Mary Anderson in 1905. However, her wiper used rollers rather than blade...
Gehrig, Lou
Sports
Age 37
June 19, 1903 - June 2, 1941
Kensico Cemetery / Valhalla / New York / USA / North America
Voted the greatest first baseman of all time, Lou Gehrig was a member of the NY Yankees baseball team and nicked named the Iron Horse for 2,170 consecutive games played over a 17 year career. Fans and teammates were stunned when w...
Beiderbecke, Bix
Music
Age 28
March 10, 1903 - August 6, 1931
Oakdale Memorial Gardens / Davenport / Iowa / USA / North America
Bix Beiderbecke was an American jazz cornetist, pianist and composer who was one of the most influential jazz soloists of the 1920s. As a cornet player noted for an inventive lyrical approach and purity of tone and with such clari...
Harper, Valarie
Show Business
Age 80
August 22, 1939 - August 30, 2019
Hollywood Forever Cemetery / Los Angeles / California / USA / North America
Beginning her career as a dancer on Broadway, Harper is best remembered for her role as Rhoda Morgenstern on The Mary Tyler Moore Show (1970–1977) and its spin-off Rhoda (1974–1978). During her career she received four Emmy Aw...
Aragon, Louis
Writers and Poets
Age 85
October 3, 1897 - December 24, 1982
Maison Elsa Triolet-Aragon / Saint-Arnoult-en-Yvelines / France / Europe
Louis Aragon was a French poet who was one of the leading voices of the surrealist movement in France. He co-founded with André Breton and Philippe Soupault the surrealist review Littérature. He was also a novelist and editor, a...
Upshaw, Berrien
The Odd and the Interesting
Age 47
March 10, 1901 - January 12, 1949
Oakwood Cemetery / Raleigh / North Carolina / USA / North America
Berrien "Red" Upshaw was a mean, nasty, ill-tempered loser and wife beater - and those were some of his good qualities. But he did have one quality that served him well - he was known as a suave and charming man to the ladies. His...
Dumas, Alexandre
Writers and Poets
Age 68
July 24, 1802 - December 5, 1870
Le Panthéon / Paris / France / Europe
Alexandre Dumas was a French writer, best know for his works "The Count of Monte Cristo", "The Three Musketeers", "Twenty Years After", and "The Vicomte of Bragelonne: Ten Years Later". His novels have been adapted since the early...
Cunningham, Carl Lee
Music
Age 19
December 31, 1948 - December 10, 1967
New Park Cemetery / Memphis / Tennessee / USA / North America
As a member of the Bar-Kays, Carl played drums for Otis Redding and died in the plane crash that took the life of Otis Redding, Phalon Jones, Carl Cunningham, Ronnie Caldwell, guitarist Jimmy King and valet Matthew Kelly. Only B...
Shor, Toots
Historical Figure
Age 73
May 6, 1903 - January 23, 1977
Ferncliff Cemetery / Hartsdale / New York / USA / North America
Until recently, Toots Shor was long forgotten by most –– now a whole new generation is discovering NYC’s legendary “saloon” thanks to Mad Men. The Mad Men design team even built a virtual Toots Shor set (where Don and ...
Berigan, Bunny
Music
Age 33
November 2, 1908 - June 2, 1942
Annunciation Cemetery / Fox Lake / Wisconson / USA / North America
Bunny Berigan was an American jazz trumpeter and bandleader who rose to fame during the swing era of the 1930s and early 40s. Although he composed some jazz instrumentals such as "Chicken and Waffles" and "Blues", Berigan was bes...
Buchanan, Roy
Music
Age 48
September 23, 1939 - August 14, 1988
Columbia Garden Cemetery / Arlington / Virginia / USA / North America
Roy Buchanan was an blues guitarist and a pioneer of the Telecaster sound, Buchanan worked as a sideman and as a solo artist, with two gold albums early in his career and two later solo albums that made it to the Billboard chart. ...
Kennedy, Patrick Joseph
Historical Figure
Age 71
January 14, 1858 - May 18, 1929
Holy Cross Cemetery and Mausoleum / Malden / Massachusetts / USA / North America
Patrick Joseph Kennedy (P.J. to his friends and grandfather to President John F. Kennedy) was the son of Irish immigrants. His father, Patrick Kennedy, died of cholera ten months after he was born while his mother, Bridget Kennedy...
Thomas, Dave
Business and Finance
Age 69
July 2, 1932 - January 8, 2002
Union Cemetery / Columbus / Ohio / USA / North America
Dave Thomas was a successful businessman, philanthropist, fast-food tycoon and the founder and chief executive officer of Wendy's, a fast-food restaurant chain. In 1979 sales exceeded $1 billion dollars and at the time of his deat...
Bradham, Caleb
Business and Finance
Age
May 27, 1867 - February 19, 1934
Cedar Grove Cemetery / New Bern / North Carolina / USA / North America
Caleb Bradham was an American pharmacist who is best known as the inventor of soft drink Pepsi. Around 1890, he dropped out of the University of Maryland School of Medicine, owing to his father's business going bankrupt. After ret...
Gowdy, Curt
Sports
Age 86
July 31, 1919 - February 20, 2006
Mount Auburn Cemetery / Cambridge / Massachusetts / USA / North America
In the history of sports broadcasting, few figures have had the power to legitimize an event simply by attending it. For 40 years, Curt Gowdy was that figure. Over the course of a career that spanned five decades and all three bro...