Frances Bay, Canadian character actress (Happy Gilmore, Blue Velvet, The Middle), died she was 92.

Frances Bay was a U.S.-based Canadian character actress, best known for playing quirky, elderly women on film and television  died she was 92. She began her acting career in her mid-50s.

(January 23, 1919^[2] – September 15, 2011)^[3] 

Personal life

Bay was born Frances Goffman in Mannville, Alberta to a Ukrainian Jewish immigrant father, Max Goffman, and his wife, Ann (née Averbach), and raised in Dauphin, Manitoba. Her younger brother was the noted sociologist Erving Goffman. Before World War II she acted professionally in Winnipeg and spent the war hosting the Canadian Broadcasting Company's radio show, Everybody's Program, aimed at service members overseas.^[4]
She married and moved to Cape Town, South Africa, living in the Constantia and Camps Bay areas. She studied with Uta Hagen at this time.^[5] Charles and Frances Bay had one son, Josh (Eli Joshua; 14 March 1947 – 6 June 1970)^[6], who died at the age of 23. Soon after the death of her husband in 2002, she was struck by a car in Glendale, California, and as a result she had to have part of her right leg amputated.^[7]
She was inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame on September 6, 2008, in large part thanks to a petition with 10,000 names which was submitted on her behalf. The selection committee also received personal letters from Adam Sandler, Jerry Seinfeld, David Lynch, Henry Winkler, Monty Hall and other celebrities.^[8][9]

Early roles

Bay did not appear in films until she got a small part in Foul Play, a 1978 comedy starring Goldie Hawn and Chevy Chase. A year earlier, she appeared as Mrs. Hamilton in the Christmas television special Christmastime with Mister Rogers. She went on to play small roles in films like The Karate Kid, Big Top Pee-wee and Twins.
Her first major television appearance occurred playing the grandmother to the character of Arthur Fonzarelli (aka "The Fonz") on Happy Days. She described Henry Winkler (who played Fonzarelli) as "just a sweet guy. He lost his own grandmother in the Holocaust, and he wrote me a letter saying I was his virtual grandmother".^[10] In 1983, she played the grandmother in Little Red Riding Hood in Faerie Tale Theatre for Showtime. In 1994, she played Mrs. Pickman in John Carpenter's In the Mouth of Madness.

Work with David Lynch

In 1986, Bay appeared as the doddery aunt of Kyle MacLachlan's character in David Lynch's Blue Velvet. This role seems to have endeared the actress to Lynch, who recast her in several subsequent works, including as a foul-mouthed madam in Wild at Heart, and as Mrs. Tremond on Twin Peaks and its movie spin-off, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me.

Other roles

She may be best-remembered for her performance as the loving grandmother of Adam Sandler's titular character in the 1996 film Happy Gilmore. Bay is also familiar from her performance in the music video for Jimmy Fallon's comedy song "Idiot Boyfriend". She made an appearance as Mrs. Pickman in John Carpenter's In the Mouth of Madness.

Television

She has the distinction of appearing in the final episodes of three long-running sitcom series: Happy Days, Who's the Boss? and Seinfeld. Bay had the opportunity to play Cousin Winifred in the fourth to last episode of Road to Avonlea, for which she won a Gemini Award.

Notable television appearances

• In a The Dukes of Hazzard episode, "The Return of Hughie Hogg", Bay played Hortense Coltrane, Boss Hogg's sister-in-law, the previously unmentioned sister of Lulu Coltrane Hogg and Rosco P. Coltrane.
• In episode 19 ("The Gift") of Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction, Bay played a dying woman, Mildred Grayson, who has been abandoned by her daughters.
• In the Seinfeld episode "The Rye", she played Mabel Choate, an irritable old woman from whom Jerry steals a loaf of marbled rye bread. She guest-starred with her former Twin Peaks co-stars Grace Zabriskie and Warren Frost, although she did not share scenes with them. Following a story arc, she then appeared in a later episode, "The Cadillac". She recognized Jerry as the thief, and cast the deciding vote to impeach Jerry's father as president of his condo community. She also appeared in the final episode to recount the incident.
• In the episode "Excelsis Dei" of The X-Files, Bay played Dorothy, a resident of the nursing home who could see the spirits that had been awakened.
• She appeared in an episode of Charmed as an older version of the character Phoebe Halliwell.
• She appeared in an episode of Grey's Anatomy in 2009 as an elderly patient who "just wouldn't die".
• Her last part was a recurring role as the silent Aunt Ginny on The Middle. The episode "The Map" was dedicated to her.

Death

Bay died in Tarzana, California on September 15, 2011, of complications from pneumonia, aged 92.^[11]

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Malcolm Wallop, American politician, United States Senator from Wyoming (1977–1995), died he was 78.

Malcolm Wallop was a Republican politician and former three-term United States Senator from Wyoming  died he was 78..

(February 27, 1933 – September 14, 2011^[1]) 

Early years

Wallop was born in New York City, graduated from the Cate School in Santa Barbara, California, and attended Yale University, where he was a member of St. Anthony Hall. His roots in Wyoming stemmed back to pioneer ancestors in Big Horn.^{[citation needed]} After his graduation from Yale in 1954, Wallop served in the U.S. Army as a first lieutenant from 1955 to 1957. He worked for a decade as a cattle rancher and small businessman, having entered politics in 1969 as a successful candidate for the Wyoming House of Representatives. He served two terms, followed by a stint in the Wyoming State Senate from 1973 to 1976. In 1974, Wallop sought the Republican gubernatorial nomination but was defeated by Richard R. "Dick" Jones, a trucking executive from Cody and Powell in Park County in northwestern Wyoming. Jones went on to lose the general election in a heavily Democratic year to Edgar Herschler of Kemmerer in Lincoln County in southwestern Wyoming.
In 1976, in another nationally Democratic year, Wallop unseated three-term Democratic U.S. Senator Gale W. McGee by a margin of nearly 10 points in a rare bright spot for Republicans that year.

Marriages

Wallop was married four times:^[2]

• Vail Stebbins (1956–65; divorced); (three sons and one daughter)
• Judith Warren (1967–1981; divorced)
• French Carter Gamble Goodwyn (1984–2001)
• Isabel Thompson (2005–2011)

Senate service

In his first term, Wallop authored the legislation that established the Congressional Award program to recognize outstanding volunteerism among America's youth. The 1977 Wallop Amendment to the Surface Mining Control Act was hailed by property rights advocates for forcing the federal government to compensate property owners whose ability to mine was undercut by regulation. Three years later, Wallop successfully amended the Clean Water Act to protect states' interests.^{[citation needed]}
His bill to cut inheritance and gift taxes in 1981 was a key component of President Ronald Reagan's tax reform package and is remembered as one of the most substantive changes to tax policy that decade. Four years earlier, Wallop was partially responsible for phasing out President Jimmy Carter's Windfall Profits Tax. In 1982, he was re-elected by a 14-point margin over Democrat Rodger McDaniel, a Wyoming state legislator. Six years later, Wallop won his final term by earning just 1,322 more votes than another state senator, Democrat John Vinich.^{[citation needed]}
Wallop's later career was characterized largely by his participation in the foreign policy and trade debates of the late 1980s and early 1990s. He was a member of the Helsinki Commission and travelled extensively in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union as an arms control negotiator. Wallop was also a strong advocate of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and U.S. participation in the World Trade Organization. From 1990-94, he was the top Republican member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. In 1992, Wallop was a key force behind passage of the far-reaching Energy Policy Act.^{[citation needed]}
In 1994, Wallop opted out of a race for a fourth term. He was succeeded by Republican Craig Thomas.

Post-senate career

Immediately upon his retirement from the Senate in January 1995, Wallop founded the Frontiers of Freedom Institute, a Virginia-based non-profit group that lobbies for constitutionally limited government and a strong national defense.^[3] George Landrith is the current president of the Institute, a position he has held since 1998. One of the Institute's early staffers was Myron Ebell.^[4]
In 1996, Wallop served as General Chairman of the Steve Forbes presidential campaign.^[3] Wallop died after a protracted period of illness in Big Horn, Wyoming. He was 78.

Aristocratic connections

Malcolm Wallop was the second son of Jean Wallop and the Hon. Oliver Malcolm Wallop, son of Rt. Hon. Oliver Henry Wallop, 8th Earl of Portsmouth, making him a first cousin, once removed, of the current Earl of Portsmouth.^[5] As a result he was in remainder to the Earldom and subsidiary titles. His sister, Jean, is the current dowager Countess of Carnarvon, having married Henry Herbert, 7th Earl of Carnarvon in 1956; he was Queen Elizabeth II's horse racing manager.^[6] Senator Wallop was therefore an uncle of the current Earl of Carnarvon. Among his cousins are the present Earl Cadogan and the Marquess of Abergavenny.^[7]

Works by Malcolm Wallop

Wallop, Malcolm. "The Environment: Air, Water & Public Lands," In A Changing America: Conservatives View the 80s from the United States Senate, edited by Paul Laxalt and Richard S. Williamson, pp. 133–56. South Bend, Ind.: Regnery/Gateway, 1980.
Wallop, Malcolm, and Angelo Codevilla. The Arms Control Delusion. San Francisco: ICS Press, 1987.

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Buddy Tinsley, American-born Canadian football player (Winnipeg Blue), died he was 87.

Robert Porter "Buddy" Tinsley was a Canadian Football League offensive lineman for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. died he was  87. He was inducted into the Canadian Football Hall of Fame in 1982, and was a member of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers Hall of Fame, the Manitoba Sports Hall of Fame and the Baylor University Hall of Fame.

(August 16, 1924 – September 14, 2011)

Tinsley died on September 14, 2011, aged 87, from undisclosed causes, in Winnipeg, Manitoba.





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Rudolf Mössbauer, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (1961), died he was 82.

Rudolf Ludwig Mössbauer was a German physicist best known for his 1957 discovery of recoilless nuclear resonance fluorescence for which he was awarded the 1961 Nobel Prize in Physics  died he was  82.. This effect, called the Mössbauer effect, is the basis for Mössbauer spectroscopy.^[2]

(January 31, 1929 – September 14, 2011^[1]) 

Career

Mössbauer was born in Munich, where he also studied physics at the Technical University of Munich. He prepared his Diplom thesis in the Laboratory of Applied Physics of Heinz Maier-Leibnitz and graduated in 1955. He then went to the Max Planck Institute for Medical Research in Heidelberg. Since this institute, not being part of a university, had no right to award a doctorate, Mössbauer remained under the auspices of Maier-Leibnitz who was his official thesis advisor when he passed his PhD exam in Munich in 1958.
In his PhD work, he discovered recoilless nuclear fluorescence of gamma rays in 191 iridium, the Mössbauer effect. His fame grew immensely in 1960 when Robert Pound and Glen Rebka used this effect to prove the red shift of gamma radiation in the gravitational field of the earth; this Pound–Rebka experiment was one of the first experimental precision tests of Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity. The long-term importance of the Mössbauer effect, however, is its use in Mössbauer spectroscopy. Along with Robert Hofstadter, Rudolf Mössbauer was awarded the 1961 Nobel Prize in Physics.
On suggestion of Richard Feynman, Mössbauer was invited in 1960 to Caltech, where he advanced rapidly from Research Fellow to Senior Research Fellow; he was appointed full professor of physics in early 1962. In 1964, his alma mater, the Technical University of Munich (TUM), convinced him to come back as full professor. He retained this position until he became professor emeritus in 1997. As a condition for his return, the faculty of physics introduced a "department" system. This system, strongly influenced by Mössbauer's American experience, was in radical contrast to the traditional, hierarchical "faculty" systems of German universities, and it gave the TUM an eminent position in German physics.
In 1972, Rudolf Mössbauer went to Grenoble to succeed Heinz Maier-Leibnitz as director of the Institut Laue-Langevin, just when its newly built high-flux research reactor went into operation. After serving a 5 years term, Mössbauer returned to Munich, where he found his institutional reforms reversed by overarching legislation; till the end of his career he often expressed bitterness over this "destruction of the department". His research interests shifted to neutrino physics.
Rudolf Mössbauer was an excellent teacher. Highly specialized lectures were given by him on numerous courses including Neutrino Physics, Neutrino Oscillations, The Unification of the Electromagnetic and Weak Interaction and The Interaction of Photons and Neutrons With Matter. In 1984 he taught undergraduate lectures to the 350 people taking the physics course. He told his students: “Explain it! The most important thing is, that you are able to explain it! You will have exams, there you have to explain it. Eventually, you pass them, you get your diploma and you think, that's it! – No, the whole life is an exam, you'll have to write applications, you'll have to discuss with peers... So learn to explain it! You can train this by explaining to another student, a colleague. If they are not available, explain it to your mother – or to your cat!”

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Frank Parkin, British sociologist and novelist, died he was 80.

Dr. Frank Parkin was a British sociologist and novelist  died he was 80.. He was a professor emeritus at the University of Kent and editor of the Concepts in the Social Sciences series published by Open University Press.



(26 May 1931 – 14 September 2011) 

Biography

Frank Parkin was born in 1931 in Aberdare, Mid Glamorgan, Wales. He studied at the London School of Economics and was awarded a Ph.D. in 1966. He worked briefly as an assistant lecturer at the University of Hull in 1964 and 1965. By 1974, he was a reader in sociology at the University of Kent.^[3] He later became lecturer in politics and a fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford.^[4] At some point he left this position.^[5] From the early 1980s and onwards, Parkin wrote little sociology, focusing instead on fiction. Exceptions to this are his book on Durkheim from 1992, and the second edition of his book on Weber in 2002.

Closure theory

In sociology, Frank Parkin is best known for his contribution to the theory of social closure, most fully laid out in his Marxism and class theory: A bourgeois critique. In quite sharp tone, Parkin argues that Marxist theories of social class were marked by fundamental deficiencies, particularly associated with the ambiguous status of their central explanatory concept, mode of production.^[6] He attacks the Marxists' overemphasis on deep levels of structure, at the expense of social actors, and suggests a radical recasting of the theory of class and stratification. He proposes to do this by centering theory around the concept of social closure. Parkin follows Weber in understanding closure as

the process by which social collectives seek to maximize rewards by restricting access to resources and opportunities to a limited circle of eligibles. This entails the singling out of certain social or physical attributes as the justificatory basis of exclusion. Weber suggests that virtually any group attribute - race, language, social origin, religion- may be seized upon provided it can be used for "the monopolization of specific, usually economic opportunities". This monopolization is directed against competitors who share some positive or negative characteristic; its purpose is always the closure of social and economic opportunities to outsiders. The nature of these exclusionary practices, and the completeness of social closure, determine the general character of the distributive system.^[7]

Parkin goes on to elaborate this concept, by identifying two main types, exclusionary and usurpationary closure. 'The distinguishing feature of exclusionary closure is the attempt by one group to secure for itself a privileged position at the expense of some other group through processes of subordination'.^[8] He refers to this metaphorically as the use of power downwards. Usurpationary closure, however, is the use of power upwards, by the groups of subordinates created by the exclusionary closure, aimed at winning a greater share of resources, threatening 'to bite into the privileges of legally defined superiors'.^[9]
Arguably, the most novel aspect of Parkin's contribution was that he wanted to define classes in terms of their closure strategies, as opposed to defining class with reference to some structure of positions. The bourgeoisie could be identified, he held, by their reliance on exclusionary closure, as opposed to, say, their ownership of the means of production. Similarly, a subordinate class would be identified by their reliance on usurpationary closure:

the familiar distinction between bourgeoisie and proletariat, in its classic as well as its modern guise, may be conceived of as an expression of conflict between classes defined not specifically in relation to their place in the productive process but in relation to their prevalent modes of closure, exclusion and usurpation, respectively.^[10]

Writing style

Parkin's works, at least those from the late '70s and onwards, are notable for their lively discursive tone, frequently using sarcasm and irony in driving home their points. This was noted by many reviewers of Marxism and class theory. Dennis Wrong called it a 'bitingly witty and incisive assault on the sociological pretensions of western academic Marxism'.^[11] Guenter Roth remarked: 'This is an unusually well-written essay. Its wit, sense of irony, and elegance of phrase add stylistic power to a trenchant critique of Marxist class theories and to "re- thinking class analysis"...'.^[12] Gavin Mackenzie called it "a beautifully written, savage and supremely witty attack' on Marxism: 'I haven't laughed so much since ethnomethodology'.^[13] Anthony Giddens commented on the 'vivid change in [Parkin's] writing style': While Class inequality and political order(1971) was 'written neutrally and dispassionately', Marxism and class theory was marked by a 'deliberatively provocative tone'. 'Parkin's discussion of contemporary marxist accounts of class is heavily ironic and often openly sarcastic.' Giddens drew particular attention to the first page of the Preface:.^[14]

Lenin's wry comments on the efflorescence of Marxism in Russia at the turn of the century seem quite pertinent to our own time and place:

'Marxist books were published one after another, Marxist jour-nals and newspapers were founded, nearly everyone became a Marxist, Marxists were flattered, Marxists were courted and the book publishers rejoiced at the extraordinary, ready sale of Marxist literature.'

Lenin was not too enthusiastic about a species of Marxism that appeared to be more congenial to the literati than to the class that really mattered. On these grounds alone, it is unlikely that he would have felt very differently about the Marxist products that have been manufactured and marketed in western universities over the past decade or so. Contemporary western Marxism, unlike its classical predecessor, is wholly the creation of academic social theorists - more specifically, the creation of the new professoriate that rose up on the wave of university expansion in the 1960s. The natural constituency of this Marxism is not of course the working class, but the massed ranks of undergraduates and postgraduate students in the social sciences; its content and design mark it out exclusively for use in the lecture theatre, the seminar room, and the doctoral dissertation. Hence the strange and fascinating spectacle to be witnessed in social science faculties throughout western Europe and beyond of diligent bands of research students and their mentors busily combing through the pages of Theories of Surplus Value in search of social reality.^[15]

Parkin continues:

As if to make secure its newly-won respectability, professorial Marxism has, in the manner of all exclusive bodies, carried out its discourse through the medium of an arcane language not readily accessible to the uninstructed. Certainly no-one could possibly accuse the Marxist professoriate of spreading the kind of ideas likely to cause a stampede to the barricades or the picket lines. Indeed, the uncomplicated theory that has traditionally inspired that sort of extra-mural activity is now rather loftily dismissed as 'vulgar' Marxism - literally, the Marxism of the 'common people'. This is not necessarily to suggest that the new breed of Marxists are less dedicated than the old to the revolutionary transformation of society; their presence at the gates of the Winter Palace is perfectly conceivable, provided that satisfactory arrangements could be made for sabbatical leave.^[16]

Parkin's wit was not exclusively reserved for Marxist academics. The passage quoted below follows a sharply critical review of American theories of stratification, particularly their interpretation of Weber:

... one searches these various offerings in vain for any trace of the persistent Weberian concerns with property or state bureaucracy or class antagonisms and structural change; or for any small recognition that for Weber the "dimensions" of stratification were never regarded as aggregates of individual attributes but as "phenomena of the distribution of power." Instead, the American reality portrayed gives every appearance of a society in which property has been liquidated, classes have dissolved, and the state has withered away. It is a sociological portrait of America as drawn by Norman Rockwell for the Saturday Evening Post. One can only surmise whether Weber, if confronted with the knowledge of the things said and written in his name, would take a leaf out of his predecessor's book and declare, "Je ne suis pas Weberien".^[17]

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Jorge Lavat, Mexican actor, died he was 78.

Jorge Lavat Bayona was a Mexican film and television actor died he was 78..

(3 August 1933 − 14 September 2011)

Life and work

Born in Mexico City, Mexico, he appeared in more than 25 serialized telenovelas over the decades between 1958 and 2001 including his participation in Senda Prohibida, the first telenovela ever produced in Mexico. He was also known for his recordings combining music and the spoken word, particularly a single he released for the essay-poem Desiderata.
He was married four times: first with Ana María Torres, then with Silvia Burgos, his third marriage was once again with Ana María Torres and finally he was the husband of the actress Rebeca Martínez. He had two sons and two daughters. One of them, Adriana Lavat also became an actress. He is also related to the Mexican telenovela actress Queta Lavat, his sister, and his brother is also an actor José Lavat.

Death

After a back operation he suffered a severe infection, he was kept in a coma and was never able to recover. He died from complications of a respiratory infection in a Mexico City hospital, his remains were cremated. ^[2]


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Steven Michael Woods, Jr., American murderer, died from lethal injection he was 31.

Steven Michael Woods, Jr. was an American who was executed by lethal injection in the state of Texas died from lethal injection he was 31.

(April 17, 1980 - September 13, 2011)

 Woods was sentenced to the death penalty after a jury convicted him of the capital murders of drug dealer Ronald Whitehead, 21, and Bethena Brosz, 19, on May 2, 2001 in The Colony, Texas.^[3] Woods petitioned to media outlets for prisoner rights in February 2004.^[4]
In late 2006, Woods was part of a hunger strike in the Polunsky unit in West Livingston, Texas, to oppose death row inmates' treatment.^[5]
Woods' co-defendant, Marcus Rhodes, pled guilty to shooting both victims to death with a firearm in the same criminal transaction and received a life sentence. During the trial it was revealed that authorities had recovered backpacks belonging to the slain pair along with shell casings and a bloodied knife in Rhodes' car. Guns used in the slayings were also recovered from the home of Rhodes' parents.^[6]
However, in Texas, the Law of Parties states that a person can be criminally responsible for the actions of another if he or she aids and abets, conspires with the principal or anticipates the crime. Although Rhodes pled guilty to the murders and Woods' did not, and there was no physical evidence tying Woods to the scene, Woods was executed for the crime.^[7] Witnesses testified at Woods' 2002 trial that he and Rhodes said that they lured Whitehead to an isolated road on the pretense of a drug deal and that Woods shot and killed him, because Whitehead knew about a killing two months earlier in California. Rhodes was later found guilty of the California murder and Woods was not. Prosecutors said Brosz was merely driving her boyfriend Ron to the drug deal. Brosz had been killed because she witnessed Whitehead's death, yelled and then attempted to flee.^[2]

Fairness of Sentencing/Conviction Dispute

The fairness of Woods' case and punishment was criticized by Noam Chomsky^[8] and Amnesty International.^[9] Woods' criminal case was reported locally and internationally. Woods' final motion for a stay was denied on September 2, 2011.^[13]

Execution

In his last words, Woods stated, "You're not about to witness an execution, you are about to witness a murder. I am strapped down for something Marcus Rhodes did. I never killed anybody, never. I love you, Mom. I love you, Tali. This is wrong. This whole thing is wrong. I can't believe you are going to let Marcus Rhodes walk around free. Justice has let me down. Alex Calhoun completely screwed this up. I love you too, Mom. Well Warden, if you are going to murder someone, go ahead and do it. Pull the trigger. It's coming. I can feel it coming. Goodbye everyone, I love you".^[14] then took several deep breaths before all movement stopped.^[2] A needle carrying the lethal drugs on his right arm pierced a green tattoo of a rose branch. The distinctive tattoo had identified him when he was arrested. Woods was pronounced dead on September 13, 2011 at 6:22pm.^[15] Woods' was the 10th execution carried out in Texas in 2011^[16] and the 474th since Texas resumed the death penalty in 1982.


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