Deaths do come in threes - Ann, Bobby & Freddy - none of these three could fend death any longer...
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Sep 14, 2006 2:52 pm US/Central
Funeral Set For Former Governor Ann Richards
(AP) AUSTIN Former Texas Gov. Ann Richards, the witty and flamboyant Democrat who went from homemaker to national political celebrity, died Wednesday night at her home surrounded by her family after a battle with cancer, a family spokeswoman said. She was 73.
Texan singer Freddy Fender dies
14/10/2006 5:18:46 PM
American singer Freddy Fender, best known for his 1975 smash hit Before the Next Teardrop Falls, died Saturday, October 14th 2006, in his home in Texas. He was, in his own words, "one away from 70" - but lung cancer didn't let him get further than that...
Musique country
Décès de Bobby Hachey
Bobby Hachey was Quebec's Johnny Cash, pretty much. His wife and son had died before him - and now, at 74, he joins them.
More details - in the funeste comments section.
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posted by Luminous (\ô/) Luciano™ @ 11:17 AM
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A public funeral service for Ann Richards will be held Monday, at the University of Texas Frank Erwin Center in Austin. Her body will lie in state in the Texas Capitol rotunda Saturday and Sunday.
A private burial is planned.
Richards was diagnosed with esophageal cancer in March and underwent chemotherapy treatments.
Her four adult children spent the day with her, said Cathy Bonner, a longtime family friend and family spokeswoman.
"They're a strong group of people but they're broken-hearted, of course," Bonner said.
Political leaders remembered Richards Wednesday night for her leadership.
"We've lost a little bit of that mystique and that wonderfulness that so captivates the rest of this country about Texas," former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk said. "She was a wonderful spirit, a great fighter and humanitarian, and a political leader of enormous courage and compassion and a wonderful inspiration to so many Texans for so many reasons."
Gov. Rick Perry described Richards as "the epitome of Texas politics: a figure larger than life who had a gift for captivating the public with her great wit."
The silver-haired, silver-tongued Richards had said she entered politics to help others -- especially women and minorities who were often ignored by Texas' male-dominated establishment.
"So much of what I know about things ... are driven by the passion she had," former Laredo Mayor Betty Flores said.
"I did not want my tombstone to read, 'She kept a really clean house.' I think I'd like them to remember me by saying, 'She opened government to everyone,' “Richards told an interviewer shortly before leaving office in January 1995.
"She had a political instinct. I wrote her a note when I heard about her cancer and she wrote me back a wonderful letter. She was upbeat and positive and I think she was going to go out with guns blazing," said Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas. "She's a person that never stopped enjoying whatever there was in life that she could enjoy."
Richards served as Texas governor for one term before losing a re-election bid to Republican George W. Bush.
Her family said as governor she was most proud of two actions that probably cost her re-election. She vetoed legislation that would allow people to carry concealed handguns, automatic weapons and "cop-killer bullets." She also vetoed a bill that critics said would have allowed the destruction of the Edwards Aquifer, a major underground water system that now serves 1.7 million in people in south central Texas, including the city of San Antonio.
She grabbed the national spotlight with her keynote address to the 1988 Democratic National Convention when she was the Texas state treasurer. Richards won cheers from delegates when she reminded them that Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, "only backwards and in high heels."
Richards sealed her partisan reputation with a blast at a fellow Texan, Bush's father, George H.W. Bush, then-vice president: "Poor George, he can't help it. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth."
Four years later, she chaired the Democratic convention that nominated Bill Clinton for president.
Richards rose to the governorship with her come-from-behind victory over millionaire cowboy Clayton Williams in 1990. She cracked a half-century male grip on the Governor's Mansion and celebrated by holding aloft a T-shirt that showed the state Capitol and read: "A woman's place is in the dome."
In four years as governor, Richards championed what she called the "New Texas," appointing more women and more minorities to state posts than any of her predecessors.
She appointed the first black as a University of Texas regent, the first crime victim to the state Criminal Justice Board, the first disabled person to the human services board and the first teacher to chair the State Board of Education. Under Richards, the fabled Texas Rangers pinned stars on their first black and female officers.
She polished Texas' image, courted movie producers, championed the North American Free Trade Agreement with Mexico, oversaw a doubling of the state prison system and presided over rising student achievement scores and plunging dropout rates.
She even took time out to celebrate her 60th birthday by earning her motorcycle driver's license.
Throughout her years in office, her personal popularity remained high. One poll put it at over 60 percent the year she lost her re-election bid to Bush.
"I may have lost the race," Richards said after that defeat. "But I don't think I lost the good feelings that people have about me in this state. That's tremendously reassuring to me."
Richards went on to give speeches, work as a commentator for Cable News Network and serve as a senior adviser in the New York office of Public Strategies Inc., an Austin-based consulting firm.
In her last 10 years, Richards worked for many social causes and helped develop the Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders, scheduled to open in Austin in 2007.
Born in Lakeview, Texas, in 1933, Richards grew up near Waco, married civil rights lawyer David Richards and spent her early adulthood volunteering in campaigns and raising four children. She often said the hardest job she ever had was as a public school teacher at Fulmore Junior High School in Austin.
In the early 1960s, she helped form the North Dallas Democratic Women, "basically to allow us to have something substantive to do; the regular Democratic Party and its organization was run by men who looked on women as little more than machine parts."
Richards served on the Travis County Commissioners Court in Austin for six years before jumping to a bigger arena in 1982. Her election as state treasurer made her the first woman elected statewide in nearly 50 years.
But politics took a toll. It helped break up her marriage. And public life forced her to be remarkably candid about her 1980 treatment for alcoholism.
"I had seen the very bottom of life," she once recalled. "I was so afraid I wouldn't be funny anymore. I just knew that I would lose my zaniness and my sense of humor. But I didn't. Recovery turned out to be a wonderful thing."
The 1990 election was rugged. Her Democratic primary opponent, then-Attorney General Jim Mattox, accused her of using illegal drugs. Williams, an oilman, banker and rancher, spent millions of his own money on the race she narrowly won.
After her unsuccessful re-election campaign against Bush, Richards said she never missed being in public office.
Asked once what she might have done differently had she known she was going to be a one-term governor, Richards grinned.
"Oh, I would probably have raised more hell."
Richards is survived by her four children -- Cecile Richards, Daniel Richards, Clark Richards and Ellen Richards; their spouses and eight grandchildren. Funeral arrangements are pending.
The family requests that memorial gifts be made to the Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders through the Austin Community Foundation, P.O. Box 5159, Austin, Texas 78763, 512-472-4483, or by email: www.austincommunityfoundation.org.
(© 2006 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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CBC Arts
Grammy-winning musician Freddy Fender died in his South Texas home after a battle with lung cancer.
(Chris Pizzello/Associated Press)
Ron Rogers, a family spokesman, announced late Saturday the Mexican-American crooner passed away at noon at his home surrounded by his family.
Fender had been in failing health, diagnosed with lung cancer earlier this year. He stopped performing after it was revealed there was nothing doctors could do for him.
"I feel very comfortable in my life. I'm one year away from 70 and I've had a good run," he told a local newspaper in August.
Fender had a long battle with drugs and received a kidney transplant from his daughter in 2002 and then underwent a liver transplant two years later.
Fender was born Baldemar Huerta in 1937 in San Benito, Texas, the son of migrant workers. He sang on radio as a boy and also picked crops. His time with Mexican and African-American field workers shaped his musical style - learning a type of Mexican polka called conjunto as well as blues music.
He was a regional sensation in the south Texas town but it was his single, Before the Next Teardrop Falls, that catapulted him to fame. It hit No. 1 on both the pop and country charts in the U.S. in 1975. That year, he garnered the Academy of Country Music’s best new artist award.
Soon, other songs hit No. 1, including a re-release of his 1960 song Wasted Days and Wasted Nights, Secret Love and You’ll Lose a Good Thing.
"The Old Man upstairs rolled a seven on me," he once said in a 1975 interview.
Fender was proud of his heritage and frequently sang songs in Spanish.
In 1999, then Texas governor George W. Bush wrote to the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce urging them to honour Fender. The singer was given a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
"I think he was the precursor to Los Lonely Boys," said Cristina Balli of the Narciso Martinez Cultural Arts Center in San Benito.
Fender also appeared in the 1987 movie The Milagro Beanfield War, directed by Robert Redford.
He continued to put out music, winning a Grammy for Best Latin Pop Album in 2002 for La Musica de Baldemar Huerta. He already had two Grammys, in 1990 and 1998, with his new group, The Texas Tornados.
With files from the Associated Press
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Un Rêve éventréLe chanteur country Bobby Hachey meurt d'un cancer du poumon à l'âge de 74 ans, mercredi.
Il était à l'unité des soins intensifs de l'hôpital Honoré-Mercier, à Montréal. Souffrant depuis une dizaine de mois de ce cancer du poumon, il était aussi diabétique.
Bobby Hachey est issu d'une famille de musiciens d'Atholville, au Nouveau-Brunswick.
Le jeune Bobby a embrassé très tôt sa vocation et a participé à sa première émission de radio à l'âge de six ans. Doué pour la musique, il apprendra au fil des ans à jouer de la guitare, du violon et de la mandoline.
Avec ses frères Terry et Curly, qu'il retrouve à Montréal, il formera son groupe country. Il sera également le compagnon musical d'un autre artiste country très populaire, Willie Lamothe.
Son album Mon sourire, ma limousine lui vaut le Félix du Meilleur artiste country en 1979, le premier décerné dans cette catégorie.
La dernière production de Bobby Hachey remonte à quatre ans. Il avait offert à ses fans deux disques compacts pour fêter un demi-siècle de carrière.
Le musicien devait entreprendre sous peu une série de spectacles au Casino de Montréal et au Casino du Lac-Leamy, à Gatineau.
Il laisse dans le deuil ses deux enfants.
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