Some people view obituaries as morbid stories, but in truth only one line of an obit deals with death. The rest of the story focuses on the amazing lives people led.
In 2021, these obituaries featured people whose lives — and deaths — most affected me:
* Helga Weyhe, bookseller
* James Cross, British diplomat
* Larry King, talk show host
* Captain Sir Tom Moore, British knight, veteran and philanthropist
* Danny Ray, emcee and cape man for James Brown
* S. Prestley Blake, co-founder of Friendly’s ice cream chain
* Florence Jones-Smith, fashionista and social media star
* Lawrence Ferlinghetti, poet, publisher, bookseller
* Bruce Meyers, creator of the first fiberglass dune buggy
* Glynn Lunney, NASA flight director who helped save Apollo 13 mission
* Beverly Cleary, children’s author
* Sharon Matola, zookeeper who was dubbed the “Jane Goodall of jaguars”
* Tempest Storm, burlesque dancer
* Kathie Coblentz, librarian
* Olympia Dukakis, actress
* Janine Brookner, ousted CIA officer and attorney
* Chad Kalepa Baybayan, seafarer who sailed using the stars
* Vance H. Trimble, Pulitzer Prize-winning badass
* Alice Clark Brown, pioneering Ringling Bros. circus perfomer
* Jehan Sadat, former first lady of Egypt and women’s advocate
* Marianne Bly, Dollar Tree worker
* Jimmy Elidrissi, Waldorf bellhop
* Phyllis Gould, World War II welder
* Maki Kaji, “Godfather of Sudoku”
* Carolyn Shoemaker, detector of comets and asteroids
* Michael K. Williams, actor
* Willie Garson, actor
* Colin Powell, former secretary of state
* Margaret York, homicide detective
