Roy Disney died he was 79

Roy Edward Disney, KCSG ^[1] died he was 79was a longtime senior executive for The Walt Disney Company, which his father Roy Oliver Disney and his uncle Walt Disney founded. At the time of death he was a shareholder (over 16 million shares or about 1%),^[2] and served as a consultant for the company and Director Emeritus for the Board of Directors. He is perhaps best known for organizing the ousting of two top Disney executives: first, Ron Miller in 1984, and then Michael Eisner in 2005.

(January 10, 1930 – December 16, 2009)

As the last member of the Disney family to be actively involved in the company, Roy Disney was often compared to uncle and his father. In 2006, Forbes magazine estimated his personal fortune at about USD$1.2 billion.^[3]

Disney was born in Los Angeles, California, the son of Edna (née Francis) and Roy Oliver Disney, and nephew of Walt Disney. He graduated from Pomona College in 1951 and first began working for The Walt Disney Company as an assistant director and producer (True-Life Adventure). He continued until 1967 when he was elected to the Board of Directors of the company.

Roy Disney resigned as an executive from the Disney company in 1977 due to disagreements with corporate decisions at that time. As he claimed later, "I just felt creatively the company was not going anywhere interesting. It was very stifling."^[4] He retained a seat on the board of directors. His resignation from the board in 1984, which occurred in the midst of a corporate takeover battle, was the beginning of a series of developments that led to the replacement of company president and CEO Ronald William Miller (married to Walt's daughter Diane Marie Disney) by Michael Eisner and Frank Wells. Roy soon returned to the company as vice-chairman of t

He set his goal as revitalizing the company's tradition of animated feature films and by the end of the decade there were successes in this department. Although Roy acted largely as a figurehead, he could wield significant power, even over Eisner, his ostensible boss, and employees of the department have praised Roy for ensuring them plenty of artistic freedom on their projects.

During the 1990s, Roy's department produced a number of commercially successful, critically acclaimed films and the era has been called a renaissance for the company and animation in general, though there was a decline in profits starting at the end of the decade. On October 16, 1998 in a surprise presentation made at the newly unveiled Disney Legends Plaza at the company's headquarters, Disney Chairman Michael Eisner presented him with the prestigious Disney Legends Award. Roy Disney's pet project was the film Fantasia 2000, a sequel to the 1940 animated movie Fantasia produced by his uncle Walt Disney. Walt Disney had planned a sequel to the original movie but it was never made. Roy decided to make this long-delayed sequel, and he was the executive producer of the film that took nine years to produce and was finally released on December 17, 1999. Like its predecessor the film combined high-quality contemporary animation and classical music, however it was not a financial success at the US box office.

After a struggle with CEO Michael Eisner, Roy Disney's influence began to wane as more executives friendly to Eisner were appointed to high posts. When the board of directors rejected Disney's request for an extension of his term as board member, he announced his resignation on November 30, 2003, citing "serious differences of opinion about the direction and style of management" in the company. He issued a letter criticizing Eisner for mismanaging the company, neglecting the studio's animation division, failures with ABC, timidity in the theme park business, instilling a corporate mentality in the executive structure, turning the Walt Disney Company into a "rapacious, soul-less" conglomerate, and of refusing to establish a clear succession plan.^[5]

After his resignation, Disney helped establish the website SaveDisney.com, intended to oust Michael Eisner and his supporters from their positions and revamp the Walt Disney Company. On March 3, 2004, at Disney's annual shareholders' meeting, a surprising and unprecedented 43% of Disney's shareholders, predominantly rallied by former board members Roy Disney and Stanley Gold, voted to oppose the re-election of Eisner to the corporate board of directors. This vigorous opposition, unusual in major public corporations, convinced Disney's board to strip Eisner of his chairmanship and give that position to George J. Mitchell. The board didn't give Eisner's detractors what they really wanted: his immediate removal as chief executive. In fact, Roy Disney's campaign regarded Mitchell himself unfavorably; 25% of shareholders opposed Mitchell's re-election to the board in the same election.

As criticism of Eisner intensified in the wake of the shareholder meeting, however, his position became more and more tenuous, and on March 13, 2005, Eisner announced that he would step down as CEO on September 30, one year before his contract expired. On July 8, Roy and the Walt Disney Company, then still nominally headed by Eisner but, in fact, run by Eisner's long-time lieutenant, Bob Iger, agreed to "put aside their differences." Roy rejoined the Walt Disney Company as a non voting Director Emeritus and consultant. Roy and Gold agreed to shut down their SaveDisney.com website, which went offline August 7.

On September 30, Eisner resigned both as an executive and as a member of the board of directors, and, severing all formal ties with the company, he waived his contractual rights to perks such as use of a corporate jet, a Golden Pass and an office at the company's Burbank headquarters. Eisner's replacement was Bob Iger. One of Roy Disney's stated reasons for engineering his second "Save Disney" initiative had been Eisner's well-publicized but financially unjustified dissatisfaction with long-time production partner Pixar Animation Studios and its CEO Steve Jobs, creators of shared hits Toy Story, Monsters, Inc., Finding Nemo, and other critically acclaimed computer animated motion pictures. This estrangement was quickly repaired by successor Iger upon Eisner's exit, and on January 24, 2006, the company announced it would acquire Pixar in an all-stock deal worth US $7.4 billion, catapulting Jobs, also co-founder and CEO of Apple, Inc, to Disney's largest shareholder with 7% of the corporation's outstanding shares. Jobs also gained a new seat on Disney's board of directors. Former CEO Eisner, who still holds 1.7% of shares, became Disney's second largest shareholder, and Director Emeritus Roy Disney, with 1% of shares, became its third largest owner.

Roy Disney's efforts to oust Eisner from the company were chronicled by James B. Stewart in his best-selling book, DisneyWar.

• On the initial VHS release of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Disney hosted a mini-documentary chronicling the progress made by his uncle and the Walt Disney Company.^{[citation needed]}

• Disney held a position of Trustee to the California Institute of the Arts.^[6]

• He voiced a cameo of himself in the animated show, Disney's House of Mouse where Mickey had accidentally sent him an angry fax meant for Mortimer Mouse.^[7]

• He was the Executive Producer of the Multiple Network anti-drug Program "Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue" in 1990.^[8]

• He was Executive Producer of the documentary Morning Light.^[9]

• Shamrock Holdings, which Roy Disney chaired and Stanley Gold runs as CEO, is an investment company that manages Roy Disney's personal investments.
• Disney was well known in the sailing community. He has held several sailing speed records including the Los Angeles to Honolulu monohull time record. He set it on his boat Pyewacket in July 1999 (7 days, 11 hours, 41 minutes, 27 seconds).^[10]
• On January 19, 2007, Roy Disney (then 77 years old) filed for divorce from his wife, Patricia (then 72), citing "irreconcilable differences", according to court documents. The couple, married 52 years, had been living apart for an unspecified amount of time, according to the Los Angeles County Superior Court filing. They have four adult children.^[11]
• In 2008, Roy Disney married Leslie DeMeuse, a former ESPN and current CSTV producer, and Emmy winner of various sailing documentaries. The two created the sailing documentary "TransPac—A Century Across the Pacific" in 2000, and are executive producers of the sailing documentary "Morning Light", which follows the selection and training of 18- to 23-year-old sailors on the 2007 Transpacific Yacht Race.^[12]

• On April 26, 2008, Roy Disney received a Doctorate honoris causa from The California Maritime Academy for his many contributions to the state and the nation, including international sailing.

On December 16, 2009, Disney, who had been battling stomach cancer for a year, died at Hoag Memorial Hospital in Newport Beach, California. His death occurred 43 years and one day after Walt Disney died, also from cancer. In addition, he died exactly 12 years after his aunt, Lillian Bounds Disney. Roy Disney was 79 years old.^[1]

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Dan Burton died he was 88

Dan Barton died he was 88. Burton was an American actor.

(1921-2009)

Dan Barton served in the Army in World War II and was editor of a humor magazine in Paris. ^[1]

Dan Barton was first married to Anne Barton, better known as Eddie Haskell’s mother in “Leave it to Beaver.” She passed away in 2000. He married again in 2005 to Gyl Roland. The best man at their wedding was actor John Forsythe, better known as Blake Carrington on the nighttime soap “Dynasty.” ^[2]

In the late 1940s Dan Barton appeared on stage in the successful Broadway stage production “Mr. Roberts” alongside Cliff Robertson, Lee Van Cleef and Brian Keith. ^[1]

He had a long career of television work from the 1950's until the 1970's playing in a variety of different shows including the highly acclaimed "Playhouse 90." Other series include "Zane Grey Theater," "Bonanza," “Barnaby Jones,” "The F.B.I.," "Ironside," "The Streets of San Francisco," "The Rockford Files,” "Battlestar Galactica" and “Quincy M.E.” ^[1]

He was also popular as a voice actor and narrated documentaries and commercials. He was the spokesman for Northrup Aviation for twelve years and worked with Coke and Nike. Barton also did voice-over work for prominent Republicans Arnold Schwarzenegger and Elizabeth Dole despite his own position as a life-long Democrat.^[1]

On December 13, 2009, Dan Barton died of heart failure and kidney disease, this coming after the actor had been ill for several months. He was 88.^[1]

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Oral Roberts died he was 91

Granville Oral Roberts ^[2] was an American Pentecostal television evangelist and a Christian charismatic.

(January 24, 1918 – December 15, 2009)

Roberts was born in Pontotoc County, Oklahoma, the fifth and youngest child of Reverend Ellis Melvin Roberts and Claudia Priscilla Irwin.^[3]

After finishing high school, Roberts studied for two years each at Oklahoma Baptist University and Phillips University. In 1938, he married a preacher's daughter, Evelyn Lutman Fahnestock.^[4]

Roberts became a traveling faith healer after ending his college studies without a degree. According to a TIME Magazine profile of 1972, Roberts originally made a name for himself with a large mobile tent "that sat 3,000 on metal folding chairs" where "he shouted at petitioners who did not respond to his healing."^[5]

Roberts was a pioneer televangelist (he began broadcasting his revivals by television in 1955)^[6] and attracted a vast viewership.

In 1947, Roberts resigned his pastoral ministry with the Pentecostal Holiness Church to found Oral Roberts Evangelistic Association. He began conducting evangelistic and faith healing crusades, mainly in the U.S. He appeared as a guest speaker for hundreds of national and international meetings and conventions. Thousands of sick people would wait in line to stand before Oral Roberts so he could pray for them.

He founded Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1963, stating he was obeying a command from God. The university was chartered during 1963 and received its first students in 1965. Students were required to sign an honor code pledging not to drink, smoke, or engage in premarital sexual activities. Another part of the Oral Roberts Evangelistic Association is the Abundant Life Prayer Group.

In 1977 Roberts claimed to have had a vision from a 900-foot-tall Jesus who told him to build City of Faith Medical and Research Center and the hospital would be a success.^[7][8][9]

In 1980, Roberts said he had a vision which encouraged him to continue the construction of his City of Faith Medical and Research Center in Oklahoma, which opened in 1981. At the time, it was among the largest health facilities of its kind in the world and was intended to merge prayer and medicine in the healing process. The City of Faith operated for only eight years before closing in late 1989. The Orthopedic Hospital of Oklahoma still operates on its premises. In 1983 Roberts said Jesus had appeared to him in person and commissioned him to find a cure for cancer.^[10][11]

Roberts's fundraising was controversial. In January 1987, during a fundraising drive, Roberts announced to a television audience that unless he raised $8 million by that March, God would "call him home".^[12][13] Some were fearful that he was referring to suicide given the passionate pleas and tears that accompanied his statement. He raised $9.1 million.^[14] Later that year, he announced that God had raised the dead through Roberts' ministry.^[15] Some of Roberts's fundraising letters were written by Gene Ewing, who heads a business writing donation letters for other evangelicals like Don Stewart and Robert Tilton.^[16]

He stirred controversy when Time reported in 1987 that his son, Richard Roberts, claimed that he had seen his father raise a child from the dead.^[17] That year, the Bloom County comic strip recast its character Bill the Cat as a satirized televangelist, "Fundamentally Oral Bill". In 1987 Time stated that he was "re-emphasizing faith healing and [is] reaching for his old-time constituency."^[17] However, his income continued to decrease (from $88 million in 1980 to $55 million in 1986, according to the Tulsa Tribune) and his largely vacant City of Faith Medical Center continued to lose money.^[17]

Harry McNevin said that in 1988 the ORU Board of Regents "rubber-stamped" the "use of millions in endowment money to buy a Beverly Hills property so that Oral Roberts could have a West Coast office and house."^[18] In addition he said a country club membership was purchased for the Robertses' home. The lavish expenses led to McNevin's resignation from the Board.

Richard Roberts resigned from the presidency of ORU on November 23, 2007, after being named as a defendant in a lawsuit alleging improper use of university funds for political and personal purposes and improper use of university resources.^[19][20] The university was given a donation of $8 million by entrepreneur Mart Green, and although the lawsuit is still in process, the school has submitted to an outside audit, and with a good report will be given an additional $62 million by Green. ^[21] Oral Roberts announced he would return to help fulfill this administrative role along with Billy Joe Daugherty, who was named as the executive regent to assume administrative responsibilities of the Office of the President by the ORU Board of Regents.^[22]

Roberts's daughter, Rebecca Nash, died in an airplane crash on February 11, 1977, with her husband, businessman Marshall Nash.^[23] Roberts's eldest son, Ronald, committed suicide in June 1982, five months after receiving a court order to get counseling at a drug treatment center.^[24] Two other children of Roberts are living: son Richard, a well-known evangelist and former president of Oral Roberts University (ORU), and daughter Roberta Potts, a lawyer.

On May 4, 2005 Evelyn, Roberts's wife of 66 years, died in a Southern California hospital at the age of 88.^[25]

Roberts died on December 15, 2009^[26] at the age of 91. He had been "semi-retired" living in Newport Beach, California.^[27]

According to a 1987 article in the New York Review of Books by Martin Gardner the "most accurate and best documented biography is Oral Roberts: An American Life, an objective study by David Harrell Jr., a historian at Auburn University. Two out-of-print books take a more critical stance: James Morris's The Preachers (St. Martin's Press, 1973) and Jerry Sholes's Give Me That Prime-Time Religion (Hawthorn, 1979

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Mike Cinqmars died he was 31

Mike "Cinq" Cinqmars was quite literally a pioneer of freestyle motocross. In 1999, he finished just below Travis Pastrana, taking home the silver medal at the X Games' first year of freestyle competition. Unlike some of his competitors, Mike preferred to ride for fun, rather than compete. From an interview in 1999, "Films sit in people's homes forever, and people watch them all the time. Contests are cool but I'd rather go shoot a vid. In contests, sometimes you do well, sometimes you don't. Your talent doesn't always show. And there's a lot of pressure, and I'm kind of over that. I want to just go ride and have fun." Mike did do many films, including MTV's "Senseless Acts of Video" where he most famously jumped over his own two-story home. Unfortunately, it was during the filming of his own movie, "35/01 My Trip" that he broke his back and ended his motocross career. Recently Mike had expressed interest during an interview in making a comeback.



It has been rumored that Mike was battling with demons after his career crushing injury. Despite the obstacles that befall many of the talented and gifted, he was always proud of his life and accomplishments. "Once I started making money, my biggest goal was to have a nice house that I could call my own, and have all nice stuff in it, and to have a car and a truck, bikes and all that. I've got all that. I've got land, and it's good to be able to have all that. It was a big goal of mine and I've done it." Sounds like the words of a true champion at heart.


Yes, it is a sad day in the motocross world indeed. Mike never got the chance at his comeback but his talent will forever be remembered in the memories of his fans. My condolences to his friends, family and thousands of fans.

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Robert G. Heft died 67

Robert G. "Bob" Heft died he was 67 . Heft born in Saginaw, Michigan, was a designer of the 50-star flag, and one of the proposed designs for a 51-star flag for the United States of America. He spent his childhood in Lancaster, Ohio, where he created the flag as a school project.

(1942 - December 12, 2009)

He designed the current U.S. flag in 1958 while living with his grandparents. He was 17 years old at the time and did the flag design as a class project. He unstitched the blue field from a family 48-star flag, sewed in a new field, and used iron-on white fabric to add 100 hand-cut stars, 50 on each side of the blue canton.^[1]

He originally received a B- for the project. After discussing the grade with his high school teacher, Stanley Pratt, it was agreed that if the flag was accepted by Congress, the grade would be reconsidered. Heft's flag design was chosen and adopted by presidential proclamation after Alaska and before Hawaii was admitted into the union in 1959. According to Heft, his teacher did keep to their agreement and changed his grade to an A for the project.

Heft has also stated he had copyrighted designs for 51- through 60-star American flags.^[2]

When Alaska and Hawaii were being considered for Statehood, more than 1,500 designs were spontaneously submitted to President Dwight D. Eisenhower by Americans. Although some of them were 49-star versions, the vast majority were 50-star proposals. At least three, and probably more, of these designs were identical to the present design of the 50-star flag. These designs are in the Eisenhower Presidential Archives in Abilene, Kansas. Only a small fraction of them have ever been published.

After graduating from college, Heft became a high school teacher and later a college professor, and he also served as mayor of Napoleon, Ohio for 28 years. After retiring from teaching, he became a motivational speaker. Heft was a longtime member of the Harvey Spaulding Toastmasters club in Saginaw. He earned the nickname "father time" as he often filled the role of timer during meetings. While he was seen as one of their own, other members of the club were always honored when Heft would deliver a speech at a meeting.

Heft died from complications of a heart attack on December 12, 2009.

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Paul Samuelson died he was 94

Paul Anthony Samuelson died he was 94. Samuelson was an American economist known for his contributions to many fields of economics, beginning with his general statement of the comparative statics method in his 1947 book Foundations of Economic Analysis. Samuelson was awarded the John Bates Clark Medal in 1947 and was sole recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1970, the second year of the Prize.^[2]

(May 15, 1915 – December 13, 2009[1])

Samuelson was born in Gary, Indiana on May 15, 1915. In 1923 Samuelson moved to Chicago; he studied at the University of Chicago and received his Bachelor of Arts degree there in 1935. He then completed his Master of Arts degree in 1936, and his Doctor of Philosophy in 1941 at Harvard University. As a graduate student at Harvard, Samuelson studied economics under Joseph Schumpeter, Wassily Leontief, Gottfried Haberler, and the "American Keynes" Alvin Hansen. Samuelson comes from a family of well-known economists, including brother Robert Summers, sister-in-law Anita Summers, and nephew Larry Summers.

Samuelson is considered one of the founders of neo-Keynesian economics and a seminal figure in the development of neoclassical economics. The following is an excerpt on the reasons for awarding him the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences:

More than any other contemporary economist, Samuelson has helped to raise the general analytical and methodological level in economic science. He has simply rewritten considerable parts of economic theory. He has also shown the fundamental unity of both the problems and analytical techniques in economics, partly by a systematic application of the methodology of maximization for a broad set of problems. This means that Samuelson's contributions range over a large number of different fields.

He was also essential to creating the Neoclassical synthesis, which incorporates Keynesian principles with neoclassical principles and dominates current mainstream economics. In 2003, Samuelson was one of the 10 Nobel Prize winning economists signing the Economists' statement opposing the Bush tax cuts.^[6]

He died on December 13, 2009, at the age of 94.

His professional positions include:

• Coming to M.I.T. in 1940 as an Assistant Professor of Economics and was appointed Associate Professor in 1944.
• Serving as a staff member of the Radiation Laboratory from 1944 to 1945
• Professor of International Economic Relations (part-time) at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in 1945.
• Professor at M.I.T. in 1947 and then an Institute Professor.
• Guggenheim Fellow from 1948 to 1949.

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Robert Holdstock died he was 61

Robert Paul Holdstock died he was 61. Holdstock was an English novelist and author best known for his works of Celtic, Nordic, Gothic and Pictish fantasy literature, predominantly in the fantasy subgenre of mythic fiction.

(2 August 1948 – 29 November 2009)

Holdstock's writing was first published during 1968. His science fiction and fantasy works explore philosophical, psychological, anthropological, spiritual, and woodland themes. He received three BSFA awards and won the World Fantasy Award in the category of Best Novel of 1985.

Robert Holdstock, the oldest of five children, was born in Hythe, Kent. His father, Robert Frank Holdstock, was a police officer and his mother, Kathleen Madeline Holdstock, was a nurse. At the age of seven years, Robert started attending the Gillingham Grammar School in the Medway Towns. As a young adult he had jobs including banana boatman, construction worker, and slate miner.^[1]

Holdstock's works have been subject to much literary analysis. The majority of this analysis is of Mythago Wood.

David Pringle describes Eye Among the Blind, Holdstock's first science fiction novel, as a "dogged, detailed, somewhat slow-moving planetary mystery."^[10] Regarding the same novel Ursula K. Le Guin remarked "As strong a treatment of a central theme of science fiction – alienness, and the relation of the human and the alien – as any I have read."^[11]

According to Michael D. C. Drout, a modern J. R. R. Tolkien scholar, Holdstock's fantasy is a significant part of the fantasy literature genre. This is because (in the Ryhope wood series) Holdstock has created literary arts containing the power and aesthetic standards of Tolkien’s fantasy without being either a "close imitation of" or a "reaction against" Tolkien. Drout considers Holdstock, along with Ursula K. Le Guin, a worthy inheritor of the fantasy tradition created by Tolkien. ^[12] According to a study of Tolkien's works by Partrick Curry, Holdstock is placed in a quartet of noteworthy fantasy authors including Ursula K. Le Guin, John Crowley and Marion Zimmer Bradley for writing fantasy books that come close to Tolkien's breadth and depth of imagination, and "in some respects surpass Tolkien."^[13]

One essayist states "Robert Holdstock's gift for evoking landscapes and weaving mythic patterns is outstanding."^[14] Accordingly, the covers of his books have been produced by a variety of notable Science Fiction and Fantasy illustrators. The original UK and US covers of Mythago Wood were illustrated by Eddi Gornall and Christopher Zacharow, respectively; Geoff Taylor illustrated the original UK covers for the Mythago Wood sequels Lavondyss, The Bone Forest, The Hollowing and Merlin's Wood. Illustrators of subsequent covers and editions include Jim Burns, Tom Canty, John Howe, Alan Lee, John Jude Pallencar, Larry Rostant, and Ron Walotsky. John Howe stated "Holdstock is to me one of the best Celtic fantasy authors alive today."^[15]

David Langford offers praise for most of Holdstock's work, but regarding Merlin's Wood he states "the overall narrative is flawed, distorted by its weight of undeserved loss and inaccessible healing."^[16]

As an adult he earned a Bachelor of Science from University College of North Wales, Bangor, with honours in applied Zoology (1967–1970). He continued his education, earning a Master of Science in Medical Zoology at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine in 1971. He conducted research at the Medical Research Council in London from 1971 to 1974 while also doing part-time writing. He became a full-time writer during 1976 and lived out the rest of his life in North London. ^[2][3]

He died in hospital at the age of 61, following his collapse with an E. coli infection on 18 November 2009.^[4][5]

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