Dead Celebrity Alert

September ?, 1939 - May 31, 2008

Glamorous and scandal-prone newspaper columnist who confessed to being the long-term mistress of the Irish Prime Minister

Terry Keane, the mistress of the former Taoiseach Charles Haughey, created a sensation in May 1999 when she went on Irish television giving details of their affair, which had gone on for 27 years and had long been the subject of speculation, much of it fanned by herself. She followed on with extracts from a forthcoming book in The Sunday Times containing rather intimate photographs for which she received £50,000. The book never appeared. …

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June 2, 1915 - May 7, 2008

Margaret Yelding was a circus artiste born and bred to the travelling world, and one of the longest serving trapeze artistes in the world.

She was born Margaret Fossett in 1915, into one of the oldest circus families in the world. She was one of the four children of John Fossett, the original clown Comical Jacko, who was one of eleven children of the original circus proprietor “Sir” Robert Fossett. John Fossett’s mother Maria was one of the twelve children of George and Annie Proctor, from a family of circus and fairground folk. …

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Former Tottenham Hotspur goalkeeper who went on to have a successful career as a police officer, receiving two commendations

As well as being a popular figure at Tottenham Hotspur, Newport County and Wolverhampton Wanderers, and playing both at Wembley and in Europe, Mark Kendall was also a much-respected police officer who once prevented a chain-saw attack. …

Mark Kendall, footballer and policeman, was born on September 20, 1958. He died of a heart attack on May 1, 2008, aged 49 …

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March 19, 1913 - February 14, 2008

Country and Western singer and entertainer dubbed ‘Australia’s first cowboy’, who became the world’s oldest recording artist

Smoky Dawson was one of Australia’s most enduringly popular entertainers. He was a western singer before it was coupled with country and was dubbed Australia’s first cowboy. He went on to become the world’s oldest recording artist. He made his first record, I’m a Happy Go Lucky Cowhand, in 1941 and his last, Homestead of My Dreams, in 2005, when he was 92, although a DVD featuring new performances was completed just before his death. …

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July 24, 1900 - May 27, 2008

Franz Künstler was not overimpressed with the sudden attention he attracted at the very end of his extraordinarily long life. Living quietly in the small German town of Niederstetten, in Baden-Württemberg, he was discovered to be one of the very few former First World War soldiers still alive, and the only one who had fought in the armies of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. …

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Alton Kelley, an artist who helped create the psychedelic style of posters and other art associated with the 1960s San Francisco rock scene, has died. He was 67. …

The pair created dozens of classic rock posters, including the famous Grateful Dead “skull and roses” poster designed for a show at the Avalon Ballroom, as well as posters and album covers for Journey, Steve Miller, Jimi Hendrix and The Beatles. …

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Mel Ferrer, the tall, darkly handsome star of such classic films as “Lili,” “War and Peace” and “The Sun Also Rises,” as well as producer and director of movies starring his then-wife, Audrey Hepburn, died Monday at age 90. …

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Hugh Jarrett’s distinctive bass voice imbued Elvis Presley classics with unparalleled richness.

Mr. Jarrett, a member of the famed Jordanaires quartet, sang backup for Mr. Presley on “Hound Dog,” “Don’t Be Cruel,” “Love Me Tender,” “All Shook Up,” “Jailhouse Rock” and “I Want You, I Need You, I Love You.” …

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December 30, 1928 - June 2, 2008

“I don’t sound like nobody!” was Bo Diddley’s maxim in the 1950s, but over the decades dozens have tried to sound like him. Often imitated but not always acknowledged, the influence of the Bo Diddley beat — driving and relentless like the chant of a chain gang — is heard clearest and most famously on the Rolling Stones’ Not Fade Away. But that sound, which Bo Diddley called his “tradesman’s knock”, is just as discernible on U2’s Desire, or versions of the garage classic I Want Candy recorded by the Strangeloves and Bow Wow Wow two decades apart, or on George Michael’s Faith. …

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Yves Saint Laurent, one of the top French designers of the 20th century, has died in Paris, aged 71. …

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