Obituaries

Judy Lewis, 76, the daughter of Loretta Young and Clark Gable, died last Friday. The cause of death was lymphoma, according to her daughter.

The circumstances surrounding her birth remain one of the most enduring scandals in Hollywood history.

Lewis wrote a good memoir about the affair of her parents. It was called Uncommon Knowledge.

More about her birth and the sham "adoption" by her natural mother Young:

Ms. Lewis grew up in Los Angeles, cushioned in the luxury of her mother’s movie-star lifestyle even as she endured what she later described as an outsider’s isolation within her family and the teasing of children at school.

They teased her about her ears: they stuck out like Dumbo’s. Or, as Hollywood rumors had it, they stuck out like Clark Gable’s. Ms. Lewis’s mother dressed her in bonnets to hide them. When Ms. Lewis was 7 her ears were surgically altered to make them less prominent.

Until Ms. Lewis, as an adult, confronted her years later, Young did not acknowledge that Ms. Lewis was her biological daughter, or that Gable was Ms. Lewis’s father. When Young married and had two children with Tom Lewis, a radio producer, Judy took his name but remained the family’s “adopted” daughter.

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When I note obituaries of prominent people, I don't always include everybody that I should, mostly because I have never heard of them, such as Patrice O'Neill, who passed away the other day at only 41 years of age from complications of a stroke. There are too many who aren't worth listing here because of what I deem is the lack of true notoriety.

Unfortunately, there are times when I really drop the ball and omit people who are really famous. A few years ago, racing great Johnny Longden died, and I didn't even know it, let alone note it, for something like six months after the fact. Jamaican singing great Desmond Dekker fared even worse on this blog. His most famous recording, "Israelites," was a smash hit in the United States in early 1969 and was instrumental in the popularity of ska and reggae music. "Israelites" was one of my favorite recordings from the late sixies. I knew he had died in 2006, but I didn't even bother to note the death until right now.

Better late than never, I guess.*
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Another prominent Jamaican musician, Barry Llewelyn, a founder of the Heptones, has died from complications of pneumonia.

Founded by Mr. Llewellyn and his schoolmate Earl Morgan, the Heptones rose from singing on the streets of Trenchtown to take their place alongside the Wailers and the Maytals as one of the island’s most important vocal groups. As Jamaican popular music shifted from the hard-driving ska beat to a dreamier sound known as rock steady, the Heptones were among the most consistent hit makers in reggae, with romantic records like “Sweet Talking” and “Party Time.”

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*--Actually in researching the archives of this blog I DID note Dekker's death in 2006 albeit with a brief notation. Oh, well. I guess I can like somebody enough to get his obit mentioned twice.