Some More 2020 Deaths-- Part 2: Heath, Jones, Lehrer and Clark

These are folks I didn't write about in my December list of deaths.

DEATHS IN JANUARY

JIMMY HEATH, 93

Grammy-nominated jazz saxophonist.  Died Jan. 19

TERRY JONES, 77

Founding member of the really zany Monty Python group.  Died Jan. 21

JIM LEHRER, 85

Longtime host of the nightly PBS "News Hour."  Died Jan. 23.

MARY HIGGINS CLARK, 92

"Queen of Suspense" whose stories of women beating the odds made her one of the world's most popular writers..  Died Jan. 31.

How Americans Struggled to Bury the Dead in 1918 Flu Pandemic-- Part 4: Like a Scene Out of the Middle Ages

Those buried in the mass graves were primarily poorer and immigrant residents so there was a class aspect to death and what happened to you.  The more affluent were more likely to secure the rites of passage into the hereafter than the poorer, more recent arrivals.

The scenes on the streets of Philadelphia appeared to be straight out of the plague-infested Middle Ages.  Throughout the day and night, horse-drawn carriages  kept a constant parade through the streets as priests joined the police   in collecting corpses draped in sackcloths and blood-stained  sheets that were left on porches and sidewalks.

The bodies were piled on top of each other in the wagons and limbs were protruding from underneath the sheets.  I couldn't help but think of that scene in the Monty Python movie.

The parents of one small boy who had succumbed to the flu begged the authorities to at least have him the dignity of being buried in a wooden box that had been used  to ship macaroni instead of wrapping him in a sheet and having him taken away in a patrol wagon.

Monty Python's Flying Circus Boys Hit 42

From the October 18, 2009, Chicago Tribune "Flying Circus hits 40" by Robert Lloyd.

Definitely one of my all-time favorite shows, "Monty Python's Flying Circus," essentially six guys being as silly as they could...and, funny.  Now, it has been 42 years since "five young British lads and a young American animator" got together in 1969 and searched for a name, considering "Owl-Stretching Time" and "A Horse, a Spoon, and a Basin" before settling on the one we all know.

Back in 2009, the five remaining ones got together for an excellent six hour documentary series, "Monty Python: Almost the Truth (The Lawyer's Cut).  I saw it and did it ever bring back memories as well as made me laugh all over again.  I'd forgotten some of the skits, "Hey, 'No One Expects the Spanish Inquisition!!!'"

Terry Jones, John Cleese, Michael Palin, Eric Idle and Terry Gilliam are still alive.  Graham Chapman died of  throat cancer in 1989.  Their creative life-span was from 1969 to 1983, and, of course several have gone on to other movies and TV shows.

Then, there was that great movie, "Holy Grail."  I still "Run-away" and say "Kneep." 

I didn't see it until the 70s when PBS showed it.  Much would have been censored on regular TV because of the nudity "And now for something completely different."  I rarely missed it.  And, the flying sheep and foot-squashing animation of Gilliam.

That Was Just Mighty Funny Stuff.

John Philip Sousa would eb so proud.

Thanks Monty.  --Cooter