Dead, Not Forgotten

The Alex Foundation announced that the famed and beloved African Grey parrot, Alex, was found dead this morning, September 7, 2007, of unknown causes. The cause of death is expected to be announced in a press conference on Monday.

It is reported that Alex was fine yesterday and his death was totally unexpected.

Alex was purchased by Dr. Irene Pepperberg in 1977 at a Chicago pet store. He has been the featured African Grey parrot in more than 30 years of research into the intelligence of African Grey parrots, most recently at the Department of Psychology at Brandeis University in Waltham, MA.

Though he had his detractors, such as Noam Chomsky who called Alex’s talents “operant conditioning”, Alex’s intelligence is quite amazing. As far back as 2002 Alex had a vocabulary of more than 100 words and as far back as 1999 he could “identify 50 different objects and cognize quantities up to 6; that he could distinguish 7 colors and 5 shapes, and understand the concepts of “bigger”, “smaller”, “same”, and “different,” and that he was learning “over” and “under” according to the New York Times.

Wonderful stories about Alex came not only from his intelligence but also from his charm and humor. One episode that sticks with me involves a press conference where Dr. Pepperberg was trying to get Alex to identify the shape and color of an object she was hold in front of him. He gave her the cold shoulder by not saying a word, and the press conference was falling flat. Pepperberg decided to leave the stage to get another African Grey, hoping it would help Alex lighten up and respond as hoped. No sooner had she left then Alex looked at the gathered press and said very quietly, into the microphone, to the delight of his audience, “Triangle. Purple.” It sure seems like he had more going for him than Noam thought.

Thanks, Alex, for showing humans — the one animal that thinks it isn’t an animal — that animals are intelligent, even Noam Chomshky.

I will publish Alex’s cause of death next week, when it is announced.

Click here for cause of death information

For more information:
Visit the Alex Foundation website

Popularity: 44%

Dead, Not Forgotten is usually about the great accomplishments of little known people, but sometimes we have to honor the people who lived life with a spirit that made every day an adventure. Sylvia Marjorie Tuft, late of Denver Colorado, is such a person.

Sylvia Tuft developed a love for sailing as a child in New Jersey where she sailed with her father, a local fireman who helped authorities confiscate the boat from rum runners.

She met her husband-to-be, Harold Tuft, a physician, where she worked as a nurse after graduating from nursing school. When WWII broke out Sylvia cared for soldiers wounded in the war as Harold fought on the front lines in Europe.

At the war’s end Harold setup an Allergy practice and Sylvia worked alongside him. Eventually they moved the practice to Colorado where so many allergy patients went for the clear air. There they raised their family. From there Harold and Sylvia traveled extensively including a trip to Russia prior to the fall of the Iron Curtain and the traversing of the Panama Canal. Sylvia Tuft later traveled across Canada by train.

In her late 70’s, still filled with the spirit of adventure, Tuft started a trip around the world - by freighter! As she slow-boated herself around the seas she saw not only the backside of cities across the globe as she watched the coming and going of freight, but she also saw other sides of the sea such as when she used her nursing skills to care for a boat load of Vietnamese refugees plucked from the ocean.

Sylvia Tuft died August 8, 2007 at Brookdale Senior Living in Lakewood, CO. She was 95. True to her spirit her family will memorialize her atop of Vail Mountain and scatter her ashes from a sailboat in the Atlantic ocean.

Good luck on your next voyage, Sylvia!

Popularity: 23%

Carolyn Goodman, a social activist in her own right, came to national attention in 1964 when her son was killed in Mississippi while supporting the efforts to register black voters. The campaign was called “Freedom Summer.”

Together with black Meridian, Mississippi resident James Chaney and fellow New Yorker Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman left Chaney’s home on June 21, 1964 to deliver books and was not heard from again. Early that evening the trio was stopped by Neshoba County deputy Cecil Price; Chaney was arrested for allegedly driving 35 miles per hour over the speed limit and Goodman and Schwerner were booked “for investigation.” All were denied calls and concerned friends and colleagues were lied to when they called the Neshoba County jail to find out if the three were being held there.

Later that evening James Chaney was fined $20 and all were released and escorted to the edge of town. Shortly after, and far from where Price said he last saw them, the three were ambushed by Ku Klux Klan members who beat Chaney severely and shot him three times. Goodman and Schwerner were both shot once in the heart.

After the slayings Carolyn Goodman was asked, in a New York Times article, if she had it to do all over again would she let her son go to Mississippi. She said, “I still feel that I would let Andy go to Mississippi again. Even after this terrible thing happened to Andy, I couldn’t make a turnabout of everything I believe in.”

At the trial of her son’s killer, Dr. Goodman read a postcard her son wrote on June 21, 1964, the last day of his life.

“Dear Mom and Dad,” it read, “I have arrived safely in Meridian, Miss. This is a wonderful town, and the weather is fine. I wish you were here. The people in this city are wonderful, and our reception was very good. All my love, Andy.”

The slayings were one of the events that led to the Selma to Montgomery march and the passing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. They were recounted in the well known movie, Mississippi Burning , a 1988 production starring Gene Hackman and Willem Dafoe.

Justice for the three was a long time coming but forty-one years later to the day Ku Klux Klan leader Edgar Ray Killen was convicted on three counts of manslaughter in the infamous case on June 21, 2005.

Goodman’s life of activism may have been inspired by her father who hired one of the first black attorneys to work at a white New York law firm. It began in earnest during the 1930s when she worked to organize local farmers’ cooperatives and aided exiled Spanish Republicans during the Spanish Civil War.

Carolyn Goodman (then Drucker) married Robert W. Goodman, a civil engineer, in the late 1950’s and their apartment was the scene of many interesting gatherings whose guests included Alger Hiss and Leonard Bernstein. Goodman remained an activist throughout the rest of her life. She and her husband Robert established the Andrew Goodman Foundation, which supports a variety of social causes.

Goodman’s husband Robert died in 1969 and her second husband, Joseph Eisner, died in 1992.

Carolyn Goodman, a clinical psychologist, died August 17, 2007 at home in Manhattan, New York. She was 91.

For more information:
Read an interview with Carolyn Goodman
Visit The Andrew Goodman Foundation
Read the DeadNotForgotten.com obituary of Fanny Lee Chaney, James Chaney’s mother

Popularity: 66%

Merv Griffin was at the forefront of some of the most visible industries of the second half of the 20th century. His multi-decade success as a talk show host, the wildly successful game shows his production company created and his well publicized deals in the real estate industry made him a standout among his peers.

After a childhood of entertaining the neighborhood and producing “shows” with the local kids, Griffin began his professional career as a singer when he was 19 on San Francisco Sketchbook, a nationally syndicated radio program based at KFRC in San Francisco. Being overweight at the time, Griffin did not easily move on from radio. After trimming down, however, he started a four year stint as a singer known for his good looks with big band leader Freddy Martin. Soon his entrepreneurial spirit kicked into high gear and he launched his own record label, Panda Records. His release Songs by Merv Griffin is reported to be the first American album recorded on magnetic tape.

After considerable success in the music business, including his hit “I’ve Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts”, which sold over three million copies, a chance nightclub performance in front of Doris Day started him on the next step in his career when she helped him land a screen test at Warner Bros. and subsequent film roles.

In the late 50s Merv Griffin began what would become the first of the three major paths of his career; the game show business. He started as a host, first on the Mark Goodson and Bill Todman production called Play Your Hunch and then on an evening game show for ABC called Keep Talking.

Luck came his way when Jack Paar mistakenly walked on the live set of Play Your Hunch and launched him on the second major path of his career: television talk shows. Griffin took advantage of the moment and got an impromptu, walk through interview with Paar and soon was invited to substitute for Paar on The Tonight Show. His own daytime talk show followed, but soon failed. NBC offered him a new game show to host and produce, Word for Word, in 1963. The next year his production company created the iconic Jeopardy! which still enjoys great success.

When NBC canceled Jeopardy! in 1975, a short lived situation, Griffin produced the show’s successor, Wheel of Fortune. Though it was only moderately successful in its original version, a syndicated version starring Pat Sajak and Vanna White is a television mainstay to this day.

Meanwhile, back in 1965, Griffin also began a nearly non-stop presence as a talk show host on American TV that ended in 1986 when he retired from is then long running The Merv Griffin Show and sold his production company, Merv Griffin Enterprises, to Columbia Pictures Television unit for $250 million. His TV game show legacy turns out not to be over though. His current production company, Merv Griffin Entertainment, began pre-production on a new syndicated game show set to air in September 2007, Merv Griffin’s Crosswords.

After his retirement Griffin was quick to get bored and soon, after making considerable gains through investments he started on his third major career path in real estate. A notable event was his well publicized feud with Donald Trump for control of Resorts International, an operator of hotels and casinos from Atlantic City to the Caribbean. Griffin eventually acquired Resorts International for $240 million. Over his career in real estate he has also owned the Beverly Hilton Hotel (Beverly Hills), St. Clerans Manor (an Irish hotel), and Paradise Island (the Bahamas).

Merv Griffin’s phenomenal success in all that he tried left him one of America’s richest men.

Merv Griffin was born in San Mateo, California. He died in Los Angeles California of prostate cancer August 12, 2007. He was 82 years old. He said once that his tombstone would say, “I won’t be back after this message.”

For more information:
See Merv Griffin’s filmography

Popularity: 72%

In the days when the institutions of racial segregation were sounding their death rattles everything was radicalized so it is no surprise that a person who took a moderate position on the controversy would be seen as a radical. That’s when Richmond Flowers, a moderate on the issues of racial segregation, was elected attorney general of Alabama in 1962, the same year George Wallace won his first term as governor of the state. It didn’t take long before the two were at odds.

Wallace’s mantra was “segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever!” Knowing that Wallace and his kind were destined for the “it’s just wrong” dust bin when voting rights would be finally accorded to black people in the U.S., Richmond Flowers championed the side of racial equality.

As an example, Flowers personally replaced local prosecutors (presumably to ensure a robust prosecution) trying those accused of the 1965 slaying of Viola Liuzzo, a white resident of Detroit who was fatally shot from a car of Ku Klux Klan nightriders as she drove protesters from the Selma-to-Montgomery voting rights march to the airport. The four men, Collie Wilkins (21), Gary Rowe (34), William Eaton (41) and Eugene Thomas (42), were quickly arrested and three stood trial. The fourth,Gary Rowe, a FBI agent, testified against the others.

Curiously, while the FBI agent was testifying against the defendants, rumors were circulating in the press that painted Viola Liuzzo as a member of the Communist Party who had abandoned her five children in order to have sexual relationships with black men involved in the civil rights movement. It was a full-press assault on racial equality using all of the buzzwords Americans had learned to respond to with fear, and sometimes violence. The racist killers were acquitted and it was later revealed that the FBI itself had started the rumors. Some justice was done, however, when President Lyndon B. Johnson had them tried under an 1870 federal law for conspiring to deprive Viola Liuzzo of her civil rights. Wilkins, Eaton and Thomas were found guilty and sentenced to ten years in prison.

Flowers ran in the Democratic primary for governor of Alabama in 1966. Wallace’s wife, Lurleen, won the final contest but died in office.

In 1968, Flowers was accused with two others of extorting payments from life insurance companies in return for being allowed to do business in the state when Flowers was attorney general. All three defendants were convicted in federal court in 1969. Flowers was sentenced to eight years in prison and served about 1 1/2 years before he was paroled. He was fully pardoned President Jimmy Carter in 1978.

It has never been clear what Richmond Flowers’ motivations were, and many questioned them, but genuine or opportunistic, it was good to have him destabilizing the Alabama old boys club at that crucial time.

Richmond Flowers died from Parkinson’s disease at his home in Dothan, Alabama on August 9, 2007 at age 88.

Popularity: 53%