Pterry bothered me personally, but we’d already had the news beforehand of his Alzheimer’s, so his eventual passing was less of a shock to me than it might have been.
I’d met and received a brief putting lesson—consistent grip, set wrists, swing from the shoulders—from the golfer Payne Stewart while I was working at the hotel he was staying in. Really nice guy. His bizarre and tragic demise saddened me. Of all of the athletes that I’d met and dealt with, you pick this one, God?
Stevie Ray Vaughn. I saw him live multiple times and met him briefly once. He fell into the depths of addiction and came out the other side. He was starting to go into some interesting directions with his music. Then the helicopter pilot hit some wires.
Chris Squire. Lost of musicians have died in recent years which have made me sad, but he was the first who was an integral part of one of my favorite bands.
Michael Hutchence. I remember watching VH1 and they played a block of INXS videos which was a treat so I stopped what I was doing to sit down and watch. Wow, that’s a fun surprise on a Saturday morning, I thought. Then the screen went black and the dates of his birth and death appeared and nothing but silence for 30 seconds or so. Like a punch to the gut it was. The rest of the day as I was running errands, the radio stations were playing INXS and talking about it and I just drove around with tears in my eyes. None of the people in my life at that time were fans so I had no one to commiserate with. Years later my experience with the death of David Bowie would be very similar.
Walt Disney, when I was six.
John Lennon.
Before Martin Luther King died, I was kind of under the impression that he was some kind of gangster; all the news anchors (I lived in Nashville at that point) did an eyeroll whenever he got arrested again. At seven, I was really unprepared for the about-face they all did after he was murdered.
May 8th, 1988-I was driving home from a convention meeting when I heard over the radio that Robert Heinlein had died. I had to pull over and just sit because it hit me so hard.
Jim Henson effected me at the time as well. As did Robin Williams.
John Lennon’s effected me but mostly in hindsight. I was a kid when he was murdered and only as an adult understood the regret.
George Carlin was a big blow to me. I was in stand up comedy and he was one of my biggest influences both as a comedian and as a person. I was very sad when he died.
Leonard Nimoy hit me harder than I would have expected. Star trek was very important to me growing up and Spock made me feel less weird for being smart as a kid. I had rediscovered Nimoy by following him on Twitter and his sudden death got to me.
John Lennon. It never even occurred to me that anyone would want to kill a Beatle. In spite of growing up with the shooting of public figures (JFK, RFK, ML King), I thought our musicians would live fast and die hard, not be assassinated.
BB King. He introduced this little white girl to my lifelong passion - the blues. At least he enjoyed a long and full life, but it still felt as though I’d lost a favorite grandfather.
John Denver. I wanted to be him for the longest time. His death was senseless but he died doing something he loved.
Roger Ebert. With every new movie I see, I still try to imagine what he would have thought about it.
Jim Henson. I actually DID cry when I saw a bit of his funeral on TV and everytime I hear ‘The Rainbow Connection’ I still tear up. I had a young child at the time, so we were both sad (and also when author Shel Silverstein died - my little girl teared up and said, ‘oh, no more poems!’ 
). Robin Williams, his death was just tragic and will sadden me forever. Alan Rickman and Leonard Nimoy, their passings, too. These three in particular. …As for musicians, I’m never surprised when they die early. Though I am saddened at the loss to the world, it’s not like their deaths are totally unexpected. There are exceptions, but early deaths go with the territory for musicians.
The two recent (Prince, Bowie) have hit me hard and I’m far from over them, but the one that took me completely off guard and really sucker-punched me was Robert Palmer’s early death of a heart attack in Paris. I was at work and a close friend who is also a long-time diehard RP fan had the thoughtful grace to call me with the news. I remember speedwalking to the restroom so I could do my bursting into tears in private, away from all the people who only know him for “Addicted to Love”…it can’t be explained to anyone who isn’t a longtime fan.
The worst was Princess Diana, but that’s mainly because dying in a horrible car wreck was my worst nightmare at the time. Still is, in fact.
Jim Henson - he represented my childhood. Prince, he represented my coming of age.
Fred Rogers, but in the way you mourn when your elderly grandfather dies - you feel it, but it isn’t unexpected.
I guess I’m not a very good person. I haven’t been hit hard by any. The closest was John Lennon, but mostly because it was such a shock. Other than that, I have certainly admired the work of many celebrities, but I can’t say I’ve ever been “hit hard” by their death. My reaction ranges from “that’s too bad,” (Robin Williams) to indifference (Michael Jackson).
How about River Phoenix? Like Heath Ledger, it was a sad end to a promising career. Instead we got left with Joaquim.
I also got hit hard by Robin Williams and it cemented the feeling in my heart more than ever that we should have a dignified way of ending our lives voluntarily, be able to say goodbye, end our affairs, and die surrounded by our friends and family, in love, rather than continuing to suffer or being forced to hide it.
And Alan Rickman really hit me hard. I loved Alan Rickman. I admired him greatly.
JFK (my grandmother had died just before that)
Walt Disney - say what?
John Lennon
Not any lately, but Prince was a special case here in Minnesota. I was driving home at lunch time when I noticed the local radio station had played three Prince songs in a row, and the morning DJs (on KDWB) were still on the air. I didn’t associate those things with the news until I picked up my wife for a drive across the state when WCCO-AM had the breaking news. We were pretty quiet for the rest of the trip, listening to Mark Goodman do a great job on SiriusXM on their 80’s channel. Driving through the Twin Cities on Sunday gave me some sad times, seeing the electronic billboards for Prince and the purple lighting around town.
The only one that really hit me was Jim Henson. I’m not even sure why - it’s not like I was a rabid Muppets fan.
There have been too many who have died too soon, and while some of them saddened me, none of them affected me like Henson’s passing.
That’s a pretty fair summation of how I felt at the time. As I put it, “Jim Henson is a big part of why I grew up right.”
Count me in. I don’t know these people. I only know their work.
Other than that any death is sad, I’m not affect by any celebrities’ deaths. Do they feel sad when us “little people” die?