Patricia Hamilton obit

Veteran actor Patricia Hamilton played fierce matriarchs

 

She was not on the list.

Hamilton was a Canadian actress who had an active career on stage, television, and film from the 1960s through the 2010s. She had a lengthy association as a stage actress with the Tarragon Theatre with whom she appeared in multiple world premieres of works by Canadian playwrights; including Judith Thompson's I Am Yours (1987) for which she won a Dora Mavor Moore Award in 1988. She also appeared as a guest actress at other theaters in Canada and internationally including the American Shakespeare Theatre, the Stratford Festival, the Edinburgh International Festival, and The Old Vic.

Hamilton is best known for her portrayal of Rachel Lynde in several screen adaptations of works by Lucy Maud Montgomery. These include the television mini-series Anne of Green Gables, its sequels: Anne of Green Gables: The Sequel, Anne of Green Gables: The Continuing Story, and Anne of Green Gables: A New Beginning. She also portrayed Lynde in the television series Road to Avonlea; a performance for which she was nominated for a Gemini Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Dramatic Series three times, winning in 1996. She also was the voice of Rachel Lynde in the PBS animated series Anne of Green Gables.

In addition to her work as an actress, Hamilton taught on the faculties of the University of Calgary's Banff Centre for the Arts and George Brown College.

Patricia Hamilton was born on 27 April 1937 in Regina, Saskatchewan. Her father, James Hamilton, was a lawyer, and her mother, Florence Hamilton (née Stuart), was a nurse. She was trained as an actor at Pittsburgh's Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University), and began her career as a stage actress in the United States. She later went to London to pursue further studies in drama at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama.

While working as an actress in the United States in the 1960s, Hamilton began a romantic relationship with the actor Les Carlson. In 1966 the couple moved to Toronto, and they were married in 1967. Their marriage ended in divorce when their son, the actor Ben Carlson, was two years old.

In 1971 Hamilton performed in the inaugural season of the Tarragon Theatre. She maintained a long association with that theatre that lasted for decades. She appeared in several world premieres at the Tarragon Theatre, including Judith Thompson's I Am Yours (1987), Joan MacLeod's Amigo's Blue Guitar (1990), Michel Tremblay's Impromptu on Nun's Island (2002) and David Gow's Bea's Niece (2005). Some of the other highlights of her work at that theatre include performances in Jack Cunningham's See No Evil, Hear No Evil (1972), Tremblay's Forever Yours, Marie-Lou (1972]), David Freeman's Battering Ram (1973), Joanna Glass's Artichoke (1976), Lillian Hellman's Toys in the Attic (1978), Margaret Hollingsworth's Mother County (1980), and Tremblay's Albertine in Five Times (1985) among other works.

In November 2008, Hamilton starred in the Harold Green Jewish Theatre production of Kindertransport in Toronto.

Hamilton died of undisclosed causes at a nursing home in Stratford, Ontario at the age of 86, 3 days after her birthday.

Filmography

 

Year     Title            Role            Notes

1972    The House Without a Christmas Tree            Narrator (uncredited)            TV movie

1973    Purple Playhouse                     Episode: "Ticket-of-Leave Man"

CBC Drama '73       Mrs. MacLeod            Episode: "A Bird in the House"

Dr. Simon Locke  Marian            Episode: "Dark Pages"

The Thanksgiving Treasure            Narrator - Addie as an adult     TV movie

1974    The ABC Afternoon Playbreak            Rebecca Glover            Episode: "Last Bride of Salem"

Why Rock the Boat?   Hilda   

1975    Lucy Maud Montgomery - The Road to Green Gables            Marilla            TV movie

Performance                 Episode: "The Captain of Kopenick"

1976            Goldenrod       Mrs. Gunderson       

1977    Who Has Seen the Wind    Miss MacDonald     

1980    Middle Age Crazy            Barbara Pickett          

1981    My Bloody Valentine            Mabel Osborne          

1983    Hangin' In         Mrs. Holitski            Episode: "The Hero"

1984    When We First Met                TV movie

Heartsounds            Flo            TV movie

1985    Love and Larceny            Florida G. Blythe

Night Heat            Millie            Episode: "Crossfire"

The Last Polka            Mrs. Vicki Mahoney-Cohen  TV movie

Anne of Green Gables  Rachel Lynde

1986            Connection                  

The Lawrenceville Stories  Mrs. Conover            Miniseries

1987            American Playhouse            Mrs. Conover            Episode: "The Prodigious Hickey"

Really Weird Tales            Assessor         TV movie

Alfred Hitchcock Presents            Mrs. Greysome            Episode: "The Impatient Patient"

Fight for Life                 TV movie

Air Waves            Kate            Episode: "A Second Look"

Anne of Avonlea            Rachel Lynde   TV movie

Echoes in the Darkness            Dorothy Hunsberger

Friday the 13th            Sadie King            Episode: "Shadow Boxer"

1988    Blades of Courage                   TV movie

Chasing Rainbows            Miss Kidd            Miniseries

1988    Check It Out!  Mrs. Kelbo            Episode: "My Hero, Mr. Bannister"

The Christmas Wife     Dora            TV movie

Screwball Hotel            Chastity         

1990    Street Legal    Grace Whitney            Episode: "Security Exchange"

In Defense of a Married Man            Eileen Lloyd   TV movie

1990–1996            Road to Avonlea            Rachel Lynde   30 episodes

1996    Holiday Affair    Susan Ennis    TV movie

1997    When Secrets Kill            Eliza Emery

1998    Traders            Ambassador            Episode: "Boom"

An Avonlea Christmas            Rachel Lynde   TV movie

2000    Anne of Green Gables: The Continuing Story

2000–2001            Anne of Green Gables: The Animated Series  

2005    Anne: Journey to Green Gables            Video

2008    Anne of Green Gables: A New Beginning            TV movie

2008    A Miser Brothers' Christmas            Mother Nature (voice)            TV special

Ralph Boston obit

Tennessee State and Olympic track great Ralph Boston, who set world long jump record, dies at 83

 

He was not on the list.

Tennessee State's Ralph Boston, an Olympic athlete who set the world record in the long jump, died Sunday morning after recently suffering a stroke. He was 83.

Boston, who had set a national high school record in the high hurdles and while at TSU won the NCAA long jump championship, set the long jump world record in August 1960 in an Olympic tune-up meet at Southern California. He jumped 26 feet,11 1/4 inches, which beat the record set 25 years earlier by Jesse Owens.

A month later the Laurel, Mississippi, native won the gold medal in the Olympics in Rome with a jump of 26-7 1/2. Boston later said that was the night that changed his life for the next 50 years.

Olympians Suleiman Nyambui, left, Carl Lewis and Ralph Boston pose for a photo during a reception at the Gordon Hotel in Eugene.

In 1961 Boston broke his own long jump record with a 27-foot mark and would go on to break it four more times.

From 1960-67, Boston ranked No. 1 in the world in the long jump. He won the Olympic silver medal in 1964 in Tokyo and the bronze in 1968 in Mexico City.

Boston also won four AAU national championships in the long jump (1961, 1962, 1963 and 1964). In 1963, he held the longest triple jump mark for an American.

Boston was selected World Athlete of the Year and the North American Athlete of the Year during his career.

During his time in the Olympics, Boston served as an assistant track coach at TSU.

"Ralph was a giant of a man," said TSU director of track and field Chandra Cheeseborough-Guice, who was asked to speak on behalf of the family. "He was humble and just a special individual."

Boston served as Cheeseborough-Guice's coach after she graduated from TSU. And when she became coach of the Tigerbelles, Boston would often return to help at meets.

In 1993 TSU named its annual spring individual track and field meet in honor of Boston. The TSU Wellness Center also bears his name.

Later in his life Boston joined ESPN as a sportscaster before becoming part owner of the Knoxville television station WKXT-TV.

 Boston is in the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame, U.S. Track and Field Hall of Fame, National Black College Alumni Hall of Fame, Helms Hall of Fame in Los Angeles, Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame, Mississippi's Sports Hall of Fame and TSU Athletics Hall of Fame.

Final arrangements have not been set.

Larry Rivers obit

Former Harlem Globetrotter Larry "Gator" Rivers dies

 

He was not on the list.

SAVANNAH, Georgia -- Larry "Gator" Rivers, who helped integrate high school basketball in Georgia before playing for the Harlem Globetrotters and becoming a county commissioner in his native Savannah, died Saturday at age 73.

Rivers died from cancer, Chatham County Commission Chairman Chester Ellis told the Savannah Morning News. Campbell and Sons Funeral Home said Rivers died at a hospital in Savannah.

Rivers was a sophomore on the all-Black Beach High School team that won the first Georgia High School Association basketball tournament to include Black and white players in 1967. He blossomed into an all-state player, graduating from the Savannah high school in 1969 and going on to be a small college All-American at Moberly Junior College in Missouri and an all-conference guard at what is now Missouri Western State University in St. Joseph.

He went on to play and coach for 16 years with the Harlem Globetrotters, reuniting for a time with high school coach Russell Ellington.

Rivers once told WTOC-TV that during his tryout for the Globetrotters, team legend Marques Haynes led Rivers into a closet storing tables and folding chairs, handed Rivers a basketball and said "Let's see you dribble around this."

"So I was dribbling around chairs, under tables, doing anything I could do to impress him," Rivers said.

Rivers came home to Savannah and got involved in the community, volunteering in schools, promoting the rebuilding of neighborhood basketball courts and opening the non-profit youth mentorship organization Gatorball Academy to teach basketball.

Rivers ran for the county commission in 2020 as a Republican and was elected without opposition after the Democratic nominee was disqualified over a previous felony conviction.

"I don't know when we weren't friends," Ellis told WTOC-TV, calling Rivers "a legend."

"That was a big part of him, giving to the children that's behind him," Ellis said. "Like he said, 'Somebody gave to me, and so it's my job and my responsibility to give back.' And that's going to be missing a whole lot."

Rivers' death brought condolences from U.S. Rep. Buddy Carter, Savannah Mayor Van Johnson and others. Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp said Rivers "led a life of accomplishment and chose to spend much of that life serving the people of his community."

Johnson wrote on social media that "Legends never die, so you will always be around, my friend," adding in an official city statement that Rivers "never forgot Savannah or Beach High School and dedicated endless hours of mentoring and teaching the rules of basketball and life to scores of young people. For this, he will always be remembered."

Funeral arrangements had not been announced Sunday.

In March 1973, Rivers impressed the Harlem Globetrotters during a tryout in Topeka, Kansas, with both Clown Prince Meadowlark Lemon and Curly Neal praising his natural talent. Rivers frequently told the story of how Marcus Haynes had tested his dribbling skills in a folding-chair closet, and how he had dribbled around chairs and under tables to demonstrate his ability to control the ball around obstacles. At 6 ft (1.83 m) in height, Rivers was the shortest member of the Globetrotters when he joined. He toured with Globetrotters from 1973 to 1977, and took a two-year hiatus to assist with coaching and recruiting at Missouri Western, rejoining the Globetrotters in 1979.

For many years, Rivers shared routines with Curly Neal, until Neal was sidelined due to injury and Rivers took over in the main dribbler role in 1982, at the age of 32. That year, he partnered with a Burger King franchise to create the "Burger King / Gator Rivers Basketball Scholarship" In 1984, Rivers appeared with four other Globetrotters in an episode of The Love Boat.

In 1985, Rivers started his first year as a player-coach with the Globetrotters, and worked with his former coach Russell Ellington. Rivers led tryouts during the Globetrotters' nationwide search for one or two female players to perform alongside the men for the first time in their 60-year history. However, in 1986, Rivers left the Globetrotters, citing his disillusionment with their direction under new management. One of his frustrations was that while he had been searching for a highly skilled female player who could play with the male players and be respected, Globetrotter management instead went with a player they had in mind from the start, who had publicly stated that she would not have been able to "make it" in the NBA.

In February 1986, Rivers joined the Shooting Stars, a new exhibition basketball team formed by Meadowlark Lemon. The team also featured other former Globetrotters such as Curly Neal and Jerry "Lovebug" Venable, and former NBA star Pete Maravich. Rivers and the team were invited to The White House, where they announced the start of their 1986 Commitment With a Purpose Tour, and their support of First Lady Nancy Reagan's campaign against drug abuse.

By January 1987, Rivers had signed with a new team called Basketball Magic, along with six other former Harlem Globetrotters, including Louis "Sweet Lou" Dunbar, Jimmy Blacklock, Ovie Dotson, Osborne Lockhart, Billy Ray Hobbley, and Robert "Baby Face" Page. The team had formed after several players from the 1985–1986 starting lineup were unable to agree on a new contract with Harlem Globetrotter management.

Don Sebesky obit

Don Sebesky, composer-arranger with a golden touch, has died at 85

He was not on the list.

Don Sebesky, whose dynamic flair as a composer and arranger left an indelible mark on the sound of modern jazz and pop orchestration, notably through a prolific association with the producer-executive Creed Taylor, died on April 29 at a senior living center in Maplewood, New Jersey. He was 85.

Sharing the news on social media, his son Ken Sebesky said he had died after a six-year struggle with post-stroke Parkinsonism.

For a generation or two of listeners, Sebesky’s arrangements are synonymous with worldly sophistication in a jazz-crossover lane. His work for Taylor’s CTI Records in the 1960s and ‘70s set the gold standard on albums like Freddie Hubbard’s First Light, Milt Jackson’s Sunflower, and Wes Montgomery’s Bumpin’ and A Day in the Life.

The focused shimmer of strings and harp on the title track of that 1967 Beatles tribute album — initially swaddling Montgomery’s trademark octaves, and then bursting into a full orchestral blare — amount to a watershed moment for adult-contemporary pop.

Sebesky collaborated with many artists who held that space: songbook stewards like Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett and Barbra Streisand, as well as pop singers like Carly Simon, Christina Aguilera and Cyndi Lauper. He also orchestrated extensively for Broadway, winning a Tony Award for a 2000 revival of Kiss Me, Kate. In his own recording career, which earned him three Grammy awards, Sebesky favored impeccably crafted large-ensemble work within the mainstream language of modern jazz.

Self-taught as an arranger, Sebesky had developed his view from the inside: trained as a trombonist, he logged his first professional experience filling the shoes of Carl Fontana in a band led by Kai Winding. He joined the trombone section of the Maynard Ferguson band in 1958, appearing that year on the album A Message From Newport — as both a player and a composer of two new pieces. Sebesky then joined the Stan Kenton Orchestra, but his tenure was short-lived, once he committed to arranging full-time.

“I don’t think that there is what you might call a Sebesky sound, at least not that I’m aware of,” he said in The Contemporary Arranger, a book first published in 1975. “I think it’s more a general attitude toward music, a willingness to blend various influences without worrying where they come from. I look at music the way I look at life; I have no preconceived ideas about either. I don’t think I could ever be happy with just one sound — that would drive me crazy.”

Donald John Sebesky was born on Dec. 10, 1937 in Perth Amboy, NJ, the son of a factory worker and a homemaker. His first instrument was the accordion, as he explained in a 2010 interview with Marc Myers; he took up the trombone to join his high school marching band. In short order he was serious about his new instrument, taking the train into New York to study with Warren Covington, a veteran big band and session player. (Sebesky would later have occasion to hire Covington for some albums on CTI.)

Sebesky studied trombone at the Manhattan School of Music, after which he served his stints with Ferguson and Kenton. He met Creed Taylor in the early ‘60s, and they forged an instant compatibility, rooted in musical enthusiasm and pragmatic deference. “There was never a problem with Sebesky, because he was an absolute, polished professional,” Taylor later recalled (in an interview for The Art of Record Production, originally published in 2012). “If I asked him to take out four bars of Letter ‘A,’ take out that figure, and, then, change anything, he’d do it immediately.” (Taylor died last August, at 92.)

Not all Sebesky’s interventions met with acclaim; fans of Montgomery, for instance, often blamed him for what they saw as a turn toward commercialism. Writing in 1976, critic Gary Giddins excoriated the guitarist’s A&M Records output in particular: “Don Sebesky, a hack arranger with a talent for blending received ideas into an eclectic goulash, was hired to write and overdub strings and woodwinds arrangements on the tracks Montgomery recorded with rhythm. The material was occasionally good but more frequently not.”

Pianist and composer Randy Weston, writing in his 2010 autobiography African Rhythms, lodged a related complaint about his CTI album Blue Moses. Having recorded the album with just a rhythm section, he was surprised to hear the finished product: “I immediately put it on the turntable and out burst all this added orchestration from Don Sebesky. I couldn’t believe it.” (Weston allowed that, despite his misgivings, Blue Moses was his biggest-selling album.)

Sebesky had freer license on his own albums, beginning in 1968 with Don Sebesky and the Jazz-Rock Syndrome. He made his CTI debut in 1973 with Giant Box, an album that earned its momentous title, opening with a fanfare that fused Stravinsky’s Firebird with the Mahavishnu Orchestra’s Birds of Fire. In addition to composing and conducting, Sebesky played electric piano, organ, accordion and clavinet.

Sebesky was a perennial nominee at the Grammy Awards, and his three wins came in quick succession, all for his own recordings. He took best instrumental arrangement for a version of “Waltz For Debby” off the 1998 album I Remember Bill: The Tribute to Bill Evans. His next two were both for selections on Joyful Noise: A Tribute to Duke Ellington, which Sebesky often cited as the favorite among his albums. In addition to the arranging award for a take on “Chelsea Bridge,” he won best instrumental composition for “Joyful Noise Suite,” a three-part invention.

In The Contemporary Arranger, which was published with an accompanying LP of highlights, Sebesky laid out his vision succinctly: “There are four basic factors that are essential in the construction of a good arrangement: Balance, Economy, Focus, and Variety.” For Sebesky, whose papers were acquired by the Library of Congress in 2016, the incorporation of those factors assumes myriad combinations over the course of his expansive career.

Mike Shannon obit

Cardinals broadcaster, World Series champ Mike Shannon dies

 He was not on the list.

Mike Shannon, a two-time World Series winner and longtime St. Louis Cardinals broadcaster, has died. He was 83.

The Cardinals said he died Saturday night in St. Louis. The team did not cite the cause of death.

“Mike’s unique connection to Cardinals fans and his teammates was reflected in his unbridled passion for the game, the Cardinals and the St. Louis community,” Cardinals owner Bill DeWitt Jr. said in a statement Sunday.

Shannon spent 50 years in the broadcast booth, starting in 1972. That followed a short stint in the front office and a nine-year playing career with his hometown team, the first two seasons with future Hall of Famer Stan Musial.

Joe Buck, a longtime friend of Shannon’s and onetime radio partner, said Shannon was a big influence on his career.

“I learned broadcasting from my father (Hall of Fame announcer Jack Buck) but I learned baseball from Mike,” Buck said in a phone interview. “He was a loyal and great man. I didn’t know anyone who had more fun. He had the best schedule and always had stuff going on.”

Shannon was the regular right fielder for the 1964 championship team and moved to third base in 1967, when St. Louis acquired Roger Maris and won another World Series.

Buck noted that Shannon had a great eye for talent and trends, but one of the few things he got wrong was thinking Maris’ single-season home run record would stand. Aaron Judge of the New York Yankees hit an American League record 62 home runs last year, breaking Maris’ mark of 61 that had stood since 1961.

“I think he was surprised as anyone because he didn’t think anyone would break the record because of the pressure and attention,” Buck said of Shannon.

Shannon, affectionately known as “The Moon Man” to St. Louis fans who listened to his colorful tales in the booth, retired after the 2021 season. He was owned a pair of restaurants near Busch Stadium before they closed in 2016.

“His close relationship with Cardinals fans demonstrates the unique impact that Baseball has linking generations of fans,” Commissioner Rob Manfred said in a statement.

Cardinals broadcaster Chip Caray’s family also had a long history with Shannon. Caray’s grandfather, Hall of Fame announcer Harry Caray, called Shannon’s games when he was a player.

“Everywhere he went, he just made people laugh. He was one of the great characters of our game and in our industry, in a business where, frankly, so many people are not allowed to be themselves. Mike was quintessentially Mike and there will never be another one like him,” Caray said at Dodger Stadium before a game between the Cardinals and Dodgers.

Shannon is survived by his second wife, two sons, three daughters, 18 grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren.

Shannon attended grade school at Epiphany of Our Lord Catholic School and graduated from Christian Brothers College High School in 1957. He was the Missouri High School Player of the Year in both football and basketball his senior year and remains the only athlete to win both awards in the same year.

Shannon attended the University of Missouri and played college baseball for the Missouri Tigers before leaving in 1958 to begin his professional baseball career after signing with Bing Devine, general manager of the St. Louis Cardinals. Shannon, who believed himself to be a better football player, has said that if football players were paid better during his era, he probably would have stayed at Missouri and sought a professional football career. His former coach Frank Broyles said that had he stayed in school, Shannon might have won the Heisman Trophy.

Shannon began his big league career with the St. Louis Cardinals in 1962. In 1964, he became the team's regular right fielder, shifting to third base (in order to make room for the newly acquired Roger Maris) in 1967. Shannon played in three World Series for the Cardinals. He hit a game-tying two-run homer off Whitey Ford in Game 1 of the 1964 World Series against the New York Yankees, which St. Louis won 9–5.

In 1966, Shannon batted .288 in 137 games played with 16 home runs and 64 runs batted in (RBIs). He was named the National League's (NL) Player of the Month in July (.395, seven home runs, 23 RBIs). For 1968, he batted .266 in 156 games, with 15 home runs and 79 RBIs; he finished in seventh place in voting for the NL Most Valuable Player Award, behind teammates Bob Gibson, Curt Flood, and Lou Brock, as well as Giants Willie McCovey and Juan Marichal, and Pete Rose of the Cincinnati Reds.

 

In Game 3 of the 1967 World Series against the Boston Red Sox, Shannon hit a home run off Gary Bell. In Game 7 of the 1968 World Series against the Detroit Tigers, Shannon's solo home run off Mickey Lolich was the Cardinals' only run off Lolich as the Tigers clinched. Shannon also hit the last home run in Sportsman's Park in 1966 and the first one for the Cardinals in Busch Memorial Stadium. In 1970, he contracted nephritis, a kidney disease, which ended his playing career.

For almost three decades Shannon was paired with Hall of Fame announcer Jack Buck on AM 1120 KMOX and the Cardinals Radio Network. After Buck's death in 2002, Shannon became the team's lead radio voice, teaming with Joel Meyers (2002), Wayne Hagin (2003–2005), and John Rooney (2006–2021). In 2006, he moved to KTRS (550) which had won broadcasting rights for the Cardinals and ownership of the station. For the 2011 season, KMOX regained the rights for Cardinals broadcasting and Shannon returned to his former employer.

Shannon received a local Emmy Award for his work on Cardinal broadcasts in 1985, and was inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 1999. He was named Missouri Sportscaster of the Year in 2002 and 2003.

Shannon's signature home run call is "Here's a long one to left/center/right, get up baby, get up, get up...oh yeah!"

During the 1980s, Shannon worked as a backup analyst behind Joe Garagiola and Tony Kubek for NBC's Game of the Week telecasts, typically working with play-by-play man Jay Randolph.

Claude Gray obit

“Family Bible” Singer, ‘The Tall Texan’ Claude Gray Has Died

 

He was not on the list.

He stood 6’5″ tall, which is why people referred to him as “The Tall Texan.” He wrote, recorded, and performed songs for decades in country music. He was the first performer to record and release the song “Family Bible” written by Willie Nelson, and the success of the song helped put Willie Nelson on the country music map. His real name was Claude Gray, and for many years he was beloved for his classic country and Countrypolitan songs.

At 91, Claude Gray was also one of country music’s oldest living legends, even older that Willie Nelson. On April 18th, Gray entered hospice care after doctors found a large tumor on his brain that had left him non-cognitive. He died on Friday, April 28th.

Claude Gray’s recording of “Family Bible” was the native Texan’s first hit, and came in 1960. The story of the song is one of country music legend, where a struggling and hungry Willie Nelson sold the song for $100 to Paul Buskirk shortly after moving from Vancouver, Washington to Houston, Texas. Willie had no money and needed to feed his family, so he “sold” the song, meaning that Willie agreed to let Paul Buskirk claim he wrote it with Claude Gray and partner Walt Brelin. The rest is history.

Born in Henderson, Texas on January 25th, 1932, Claude Gray served in the United States Navy from 1950 to 1954. When he returned home, he took a job as a salesman, but got into music in 1959 while working as a radio announcer in Kilgore, TX. Showcasing a voice perfect for country music, Gray was signed by D Records and recorded a few singles, but failed to garner much attention until “Family Bible” hit #10 on the country charts.

The success of “Family Bible” was not only partially responsible for inspiring Willie Nelson to move to Nashville to become a professional songwriter, it also got the attention of Mercury Records, who signed Claude Gray and released the album Songs of Broken Love Affairs in 1961. The album included “I’ll Just Have a Cup of Coffee (Then I’ll Go)” that hit #4 on the charts, followed by “My Ears Should Burn (When Fools Are Talked About)” at #3, and suddenly Claude Gray was one of the most promising voices in country music.

But Claude struggled to find the same chart success from there. He co-wrote a song called “The Ballad of Jimmy Hoffa” that Mercury wanted nothing to do with due to its pro-Hoffa stance. It was eventually recorded by Smokey Stover. Gray moved on from Mercury to record a successions of singles for Decca, Hilltop, and later Koala, landing a Top 10 hit with the song “I Never Had The One I Wanted” on the album Claude Gray Sings from 1966. Even though he didn’t have a lot of big radio hits, Claude Gray still enjoyed a strong following from those who felt his voice and songs were the essence of true country music.

The Claude Gray song “How Fast Them Trucks Can Go” originally released by Decca in 1967 has become a standard in the world of country trucker songs. Claude’s 1982 “Who Sent My Ex to Texas” is considered by some a precursor to George Strait’s “All My Ex’s Live in Texas.” And many country fans consider Claude’s recording of Neil Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline” from 1986 to be the definitive country music take on the song.

Claude Gray continued to tour well into older age in the “Claude Gray Roadshow,” and was active in the industry up until his death. A proud Texan and a towering individual, Claude Gray left a big impression on country music, if only from his success with the now country music standard, “Family Bible.”

Willie Nelson said in his autobiography, “After “Family Bible’ hit the top, I knew that all my other songs were good .. I needed that money in a big way when I sold those songs, and I was real glad to get it. I appreciate that Paul [Buskirk] and his partners knew a bargain when they saw it.”

It was a bargain that paid off big from Willie Nelson, Claude Gray, and country music.

Tim Bachman obit

Tim Bachman, Co-Founder of Bachman-Turner Overdrive, Dies

 

He was not on the list.

Guitarist Tim Bachman, who co-founded the Canadian rock band Bachman-Turner Overdrive along with his brothers Randy and Robbie Bachman, and Fred Turner, in 1973, died yesterday (April 28, 2023) after battling cancer. The announcement was made by Tim Bachman’s son, Ryder Bachman, who posted to Facebook, “My Dad passed this afternoon.������ Thank You Everyone for the kind words. Grateful I got to spend some time with him at the end. Grab yer loved ones and hug em close, ya never know how long you have.”

No details were shared regarding the place of death. Bachman was 71. His death follows that of his drummer brother Robbie just three months earlier. Both Randy Bachman and Fred Turner survive. On May 1, Randy Bachman wrote, “my heart [is] heavy. I am the last of my family on this side with all my memories of our life growing up in Winnipeg. So grateful for that. I’m sure my parents welcomed him home with my other 2 brothers who have passed in quick succession since the pandemic. I was the oldest. Rest in Peace, Timmy with mummy, daddy, Gary & Robbie.”

Timothy Gregg Bachman was born August 1, 1951, in Winnipeg, Manitoba. According to his Wikipedia entry, Tim Bachman “wrote or co-wrote several songs during his tenure with Brave Belt and BTO, including ‘Put It in a Song’ (with Turner) for the Brave Belt II album, ‘Down and Out Man’ (with R.B. Charles) for the first BTO album, and ‘Blown’ (with Randy) and ‘I Don’t Have To Hide’ for Bachman–Turner Overdrive II.

Bachman-Turner Overdrive, also known as BTO, formed in Canada in 1973 from the ashes of a band called Brave Belt, which Randy Bachman formed after leaving the Guess Who. The original BTO lineup that Randy Bachman (lead guitar, lead vocals), Fred Turner (bass, lead vocals), Tim Bachman (guitar, vocals) and Robbie Bachman (drums). Following the departure of Tim Bachman and the addition of Blair Thornton on lead guitar, the band’s commercial prospects brightened, with the back-to-back single hits “Takin’ Care of Business,” which reached #12 in the U.S., and “You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet,” a #1 hit.

Tim Bachman left BTO in 1974 but rejoined 10 years later for a reunion tour. He subsequently led touring versions of the band in 1987-88. In 2008, Bachman experienced a heart attack and underwent quadruple bypass surgery. He was also charged on more than one occasion with sexual assault, although the charges were dropped in each case.

BTO would ultimately place 12 singles on the charts in the U.S., and 11 albums, including the 1974 #1 Not Fragile. In Canada, meanwhile, they were superstars, winning several Juno awards and being inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 2014.

Dick Groat obit

Pirates legend Dick Groat, a staple of Pittsburgh sports culture, dies at 92

 

He was not on the list.

Dick Groat, a Pirates legend and integral member of the Pittsburgh sports landscape, died early Thursday morning at age 92, the club announced Thursday.

Groat, who played 14 MLB seasons at shortstop, most memorably spent nine of those with the Pirates. As a Buc, he helped the team capture the 1960 World Series and capped off the season by winning National League MVP and the NL batting title with a .325 average.

The shortstop’s MLB career spanned 16 years, but he did not play in 1953 or ’54 due to military service. After his Pirates stint, Groat spent time with the Cardinals, Phillies and Giants. He added a second World Series ring with St. Louis in 1964.

Groat hit .286 for his career with 707 RBIs in 1,929 games and made the All-Star team in five seasons.

He was a two-sport star who attended Duke on a basketball scholarship. He played three seasons on the hardwood for the Blue Devils and was a two-time All-American in both basketball and baseball (1951 and ’52). He ranks second in the basketball program’s history with an average of 23.0 points per game.

The UPI College Basketball Player of the Year in 1952, Groat was also a two-time All-Southern Conference member. After playing 26 games and averaging 11.9 points per game for the Pistons in the NBA, he enlisted in the Army. Upon his release, he committed to focusing on baseball professionally after being persuaded by Pirates general manager Branch Rickey.

A two-sport star who went from All-American guard in basketball to a brief stint in the NBA to ultimately an All-Star shortstop and the 1960 National League MVP while playing baseball for his hometown Pittsburgh Pirates, died Thursday. He was 92.

Groat’s family said in a statement that he died at UMPC Presbyterian Hospital from complications of a stroke.

“We are deeply saddened by the loss of such a beloved member of the Pirates family and Pittsburgh community,” Pirates Chairman Bob Nutting said in a statement, calling Groat “a great player and an even better person.”

Groat, who was from the Swissvale neighborhood just east of Pittsburgh’s downtown, starred at Duke in basketball and baseball in the early 1950s, earning All-American honors in both. His No. 10 jersey hangs in Cameron Indoor Stadium; the program retired his number following the end of his senior season in 1952.

Groat attempted to play both baseball and basketball professionally, signing with the Pirates and being drafted by the Fort Wayne Pistons of the then-fledgling NBA within weeks of each other in 1952.

Long before Bo Jackson and Deion Sanders made two-way playing en vogue in the 1980s and ’90s, Groat was regularly shuttling from Durham, North Carolina, to Fort Wayne, Indiana in the winter of 1952-53 so he could split time between his classes at Duke — where he was finishing his degree after his eligibility expired — and the Pistons.

“I had a ball playing for them and had some of the scariest trips in my life,” Groat said. “I never had to practice, just play on the weekend.”

Quick hands, keen baseball instincts and a will to win made Groat an ideal candidate for the second spot in the batting order. There he was a master of the hit-and-run play, a skill that he developed under Pirates batting coach George Sisler, who was a future Hall of Fame hitter back in the day.

Joe Brown was Pirates general manager in the final seven seasons that Groat spent with the team. In a 1961 Sport magazine story, Brown described his value like this: "(Groat) sets an example for the rest of the team. If he goes 5-for-5 and the team loses, he's unhappy. If he goes zero-for-5 and the team wins, he's happy. He's a constant reminder to the other players that a fellow can make himself a star without having all the tools."

While basketball was Groat’s sport of choice, a stint in the military and an ultimatum from Pirates general manager Branch Rickey redirected the arc of Groat’s athletic career.

“Baseball was always like work for me,” Groat said in a 2014 interview. “Basketball was the sport that I loved, but it was baseball where I knew I would make a living.”

Rickey agreed, telling Groat after he returned home and played for the Pirates in 1955 that the young shortstop needed to step away from basketball. Groat somewhat reluctantly agreed, a decision that morphed into a lengthy 14-year career with Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Philadelphia and San Francisco. He made the All-Star team in five seasons and led the majors in hitting in 1960 when he batted .325.

The 1960 season ended with Groat earning NL MVP honors for a Pirates team that upset the New York Yankees in seven games to win the World Series.

Groat finished with 2,138 career hits during a major league career spanning 1952-67. The Pirates announced last week that Groat would be inducted into the team’s recently established Hall of Fame this summer.

A member of the college basketball and college baseball Halls of Fame, Groat was a two-time All-American guard at Duke in the 1950s and remains the second-leading scorer in school history, averaging 23.0 points for the Blue Devils. He was taken third overall by the Pistons in the 1952 NBA draft.

Groat played 26 games for the Pistons, averaging 11.9 points, 3.3 rebounds and 2.7 assists. His basketball career, however, ended after he enlisted in the Army in 1953. He spent nearly two years in the service and when he was discharged, Rickey essentially threatened to take away Groat’s signing bonus if he didn’t turn his attention to baseball.

Groat relented and became one of the most consistent shortstops of his era. He played in eight All-Star games (there were two games a season for a brief period in the 1950s and ’60s) and during Pittsburgh’s improbable run to a World Series title in 1960, it was Groat and not future baseball Hall of Famers Roberto Clemente and Bill Mazeroski who spearheaded the Pirates’ unlikely rise from perennial also-ran to championship club.

The list of players who finished behind Groat in the 1960 NL MVP voting includes Hall of Famers Clemente, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Stan Musial and Eddie Matthews.

A smooth defender who teamed with Mazeroski to lead the NL in double plays five times — a record that still stands — Groat played 1,290 games at shortstop for the Pirates, fourth on the club’s all-time list for a player at that position.

Pittsburgh traded Groat to St. Louis in November 1962. He responded by having the best statistical season of his career in 1963, finishing second in MVP voting behind Dodgers pitcher Sandy Koufax while hitting .319 with a major league-leading 43 doubles. Groat won a second world championship that fall as the Cardinals toppled the Yankees in seven games.

Groat played briefly for Philadelphia and then the Giants before retiring after the 1967 season. He remained active in the Pittsburgh area following his playing days, running the golf course he owned in the Laurel Highlands about an hour east of the city and spending four decades as a color commentator for the University of Pittsburgh basketball team.

While the Pirates failed to build on the momentum in 1959, Groat was selected to an All-Star team for the first time in his career. He hit .275 and paced the NL in putouts and double plays once again. The team finished last in home runs in the league, which convinced Brown to pursue a power hitter in the offseason. One potential trade would have sent Groat to the Kansas City Athletics in exchange for Roger Maris, a highly regarded 24-year-old outfielder. Manager Danny Murtaugh opposed the move, however, and Brown eventually cooled on the idea.

In 1960, Groat produced his best season yet, as the team captain became the first Pirate to be selected Most Valuable Player since Paul Waner in 1927. He hit .325 to become the first right-handed Pirates hitter to win the batting title since Honus Wagner in 1911. He sat out 20 days after his right wrist was fractured by a Lew Burdette pitch on September 6. Originally, Groat was expected to sidelined for at least one month. But he claimed to be a quick healer and lobbied hard for an early return in order to be better prepared for the expected trip to the World Series.

Current Pitt coach Jeff Capel said Groat lived “a storybook life.”

Groat is survived by daughters Tracey, Carol Ann and Allison, along with 11 grandchildren.

Statistically, the 1965 season was the worst for Groat as a regular in his career. Afterward, as part of a six-player transaction, he was traded with catcher Bob Uecker and first baseman Bill White to the Phillies, whose manager Gene Mauch had been impressed by his skills and leadership for years. Groat hit .265 in his only full season with the team, after which his contract was sold to the San Francisco Giants in June of the following year. He spent the final months of the 1967 season mostly as a late-inning defensive replacement and pinch-hitter before he announced his retirement.

In his career, Groat totaled 829 runs scored, 707 runs batted in, 352 doubles, 67 triples and 39 home runs in 1,929 games. He helped turn 1,237 double plays at shortstop, the 14th most at the position in MLB history.

From the late 1950s to mid-1960s, Groat was a perennial All-Star candidate who ranked among the elite players at his position. Yet Groat, Dave Parker, and Pete Rose are the only non-Hall of Famers to be Most Valuable Players, batting and World Series champions, and have appeared in at least five All-Star Games in their careers. Groat never garnered more than 1.8 percent of the vote in any Hall of Fame election in six years on the ballot.

"Because Groat wasn't blessed with great speed or power, he had to be seen on a regular basis to be fully appreciated," said Paul Ladewski, former Pirates beat writer and current Baseball Writers' Association of America member and Hall of Fame voter. "Even though he lost two seasons in his athletic prime because of military service, which cost him approximately 250 hits and delayed his development, his career numbers are comparable to those of contemporary middle infielders Luis Aparicio, Nellie Fox and Bill Mazeroski, all of whom are in the Hall of Fame today. Based on plate appearances, his Wins Above Replacement total is substantially better than Harold Baines, Jim Bottomley, Lou Brock, Rabbit Maranville and Lloyd Waner, who also are Hall of Fame members. Given that the bar for election has been lowered in recent years, the Veterans Committee would be wise to take a closer look at him."

In August 2022, the Pirates organization did not include Groat in its inaugural Hall of Fame class. Former teammates Clemente and Mazeroski were among the 19 selections chosen by a panel whose names were not disclosed.

Less than two months after Groat played his final game of the 1952 baseball season, he made his NBA debut on November 9 with the Fort Wayne Pistons. Even though the guard could not practice with the team because of his student responsibilities – he commuted from Duke to play in three exhibition games – the transition was a relatively seamless one. He scored 11 points in a 74–71 victory over the rival Indianapolis Olympians, the first for the Pistons after an 0–3 start.

Groat quickly became a fan favorite in Fort Wayne, whose partisans took a liking to his pull-up jump shot, leaping ability and boundless energy. In only his second game, the rookie scored a career-high 25 points in a 112–83 rout of the New York Knicks, who had advanced to the NBA Finals the previous season.

Groat saw his first season come to a halt in February, when he enlisted in the Army rather than delay the inevitable. He left the vastly improved Pistons in much better position than when he arrived – they had a 24–24 record at the time of his departure en route to a postseason berth.

When Groat was discharged in 1954, Rickey was adamant that his prized shortstop would play only baseball because of the potential health risks that a dual career could pose for him. "Mr. Rickey said, 'You have played your last game in the NBA,'" Groat recalled the conversation. "I would never have given up basketball, but I would have lost the rest of the my bonus. He played hardball."

Groat admitted to being "heart-broken" by the news. In what would be his only season of pro basketball, he ranked second on the Pistons in points (11.9) and third assists (2.7) per game. "I have thought many times about how I would have reacted had I been able to play three years back-to-back in both sports," he said.

Groat is the great uncle of golfer Brooks Koepka, who won the 2017 and 2018 U.S. Open, and the 2018 and 2019 PGA Championship.

One of 13 athletes who played in both the National Basketball Association and Major League Baseball. The others: Danny Ainge, Frank Baumholtz, Hank Biasatti, Gene Conley, Chuck Connors, Dave DeBusschere, Steve Hamilton, Mark Hendrickson, Cotton Nash, Ron Reed, Dick Ricketts and Howie Schultz.