I thought of another - Freddie Mercury. I was in high school and was a huge fan of his music and voice. What a gift to be given, that gorgeous voice, and for it to be taken from us in such a manner was so unfair. It was like a knife to the heart to know that he was gone forever.
My friends and I got drunk for three days after Lynyrd Skynyrd plane went down October 20, 1977. That was so messed up. Half the band dead.
Bunch of us got together and started listening to their albums. Drinking and hanging out. For awhile we didn’t care about school, grades or our part time jobs. We wanted to remember the greatest band that came out of the 70’s. That was my first semester of college.
Leaving out John F Kennedy, because I’m not sure if a POTUS is a celebrity, I will say baseball manager Gil Hodges. Maybe it shouldn’t have been that surprisingly since he had suffered a major heart attack four years earlier. But his death happened during the first baseball strike in 1972.
Since some people have mentioned Christa Macauliffe, I will mentioned astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee in 1967.
I missed the second half of the question. I answered Dale Earnhardt, but I didn’t mention that I watched him die on live tv. I didn’t realize he was dead though until an hour or 2 later when my dad told me. I was shocked.
Follow up to post I rushed writing earlier…
For me the first major loss of a celebrity from my generation was the toughest. Lynyrd Skynyrd was my band. The band that was purely the 70’s. Not some aging 60’s band. Lynyrd Skynyrd belonged to my generation. Not the 60’s boomers. They taught me Rock N Roll. We never dreamed anything could happen to them. They were guitar gods to our impressionable 12 year old minds. Then one day the unthinkable happens. Half the band gone in an instant.
After that I became more jaded and guarded. I learned to not let anything get too close. I’ve read about a lot of celebrity deaths in the last 25 years. The younger ones are hard to understand. Lady Di was very difficult. Few things pierce the walls I put up all those years ago. It’s the only way to remain sane in this F’d up world. I save the deepest feeling for my family. Not some image on a poster.
The trigger event could have been anyone from that time. We lost Jim Croce, John Lennon, Mama Cass and others. It just so happened that I personally identified with Lynyrd Skynyrd.
Michael Jackson was sad but the 50 points in the Death Pool was some compensation.
This may be too close to count, but for the first time in a long time I had a minor heart palpitation just hearing about the death of Robert Schimmel. Not like he was some great hero of mine, but I liked him. He beat cancer and then dies in a car wreck. What a downer.
It was just mentioned in the Death Pool today.
Freddie Mercury
After I heard the news that Freddie had died, I had to put in all my Freddie Mercury & Queen CD’s in and listen to them as a kind of tribute to him. Freddie was simply amazing…The greatest performer of all time, IMO.
Dimebag from Pantera. That one was a punch to the gut. Amazing guitarist cut down in his prime.
Another one I just remembered: D. Boon of the Minutemen. Amazing band, and I was at the right age (15) to be really affected by it.
The number of Death pool crossovers here would take a degree in psych to evaluate. I wouldn’t have expected to see them.
Obligatory “But yes, I am playing in it as well.”
Here’s an asterisk for me…racecar driver Alex Zanardi. No, he didn’t die, but he was in an absolutely horrible crash in a CART race that took place in Germany the weekend after 9/11 (basically the only sporting event going on in the world at the time). I didn’t cry that week…up until I saw the crash reported on ESPN. So much emotion poured out of me. I figured he was dead, that there was no way he could survive. Zanardi lost both his legs in the crash, but he returned to his racing career after a few years absence driving top level sports cars with hand controls and his artificial legs.
Also, Phil Hartman.
I’m not one to be affected by celebrity death either, but a couple have really hit me that haven’t been mentioned yet:
I’m going to echo Mr. Rogers, first off. He was the kind, comforting voice of my childhood spent watching PBS.
Mitch Hedberg bothered me quite a bit. I was a huge fan of his from the first time I heard his stand up. My friends in high school and I would all constantly quote his jokes back and forth to each other. When he died I couldn’t believe I would never hear new Mitch work.
Finally, the biggest one for me was David Foster Wallace. I read Infinite Jest at something like 15 to fit in with my pretentious friends, and didn’t pick him back up again for a couple years. Then I re-read it, and read some of his other work, and was taken aback by both his introspection and his intelligence. Then he killed himself and I found myself disappointed in him for giving up, after coming so far and accomplishing so much. I was surprised by how deeply saddened I was, considering how it wasn’t someone I ever met or knew. It was almost as though part of my teenage years was now completely gone.
For sheer physical reaction: Diana, Princess of Wales. Sudden premature death of someone who’d been a public figure since I was wee. I just went to the floor. “Oh no.”
I suppose it’s hard for people to understand, but a lot of us just liked Di.
Oddly, the other one that springs to mind was another that summer: Gianni Versace, of whom I was not a fan or anything. I wasn’t really that affected by it, except that it was a murder, but I guess it’s part of that season for me.
I can only think of three that actually affected me. One was Karen Carpenter. I kept thinking, “Well that’s the end of that.” I also felt that way when Minnie Riperton lost her battle with cancer.
The other was Rebecca “My Sister Sam” Schaeffer, the young actress that was shot by a stalker
I was saddened by a lot of other deaths but those were the only ones I really felt
Kurt Cobain. I was just the right age (almost 18) and Nirvana’s music had been a revelation for me. It seemed to come from nowhere, and so did his death. Even creepier was years later when the “Black Album” was released, with the new song “You Know You’re Right.” The lyrics sure sound like a suicide note to me.
Also, Chris Benoit, which shocked me even before the full situation was revealed. I had admired his skill and tenacity in the ring for years. And, then, he was gone, with his family.
Mainly just due to the suddenness and shock: Lady Di, Steve Irwin, Sam Kinison, Karen Carpenter, Indira Gandhi
Lots of plane crash victims: John Denver, Therman Munson, Ron Brown, Paul Wellstone, Keith Green, Kennedy Jr.
Warren Zevon.
John D. MacDonald
Jim Croce
Rebecca Schaefer from the short-lived TV show My Sister Sam (I was in *love *with her)
The only time I recall getting really emotional was over George Harrison.