Welcome all to this week’s attempt at deadly humour. Some of you may have noticed that the media picked up on the fact that Eli Wallach has died, but the loss to the Wallach family has given Barry, Liz and Dave 52 points each!! All finally breaking their death duck and shooting them unto the giddy heights of joint last but one place. Well done all three! Now lets see what else has happened in the world of pain that we live in…

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Steve Rossi, 82, American comedian (Allen & Rossi), cancer.
• Shogo Kubo, 54, American skateboarder (Z-boys), suspected drowning.
• Eli Wallach, 98, American actor (The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, The Magnificent Seven, Baby Doll).
• Mary Rodgers, 83, American composer (Once Upon a Mattress) and children’s author (Freaky Friday).
• Bobby Womack, 70, American Hall of Fame R&B singer (“Lookin’ for a Love“, “Woman’s Gotta Have It“) and songwriter (“It’s All Over Now“, “I Can Understand It”).
• Terry Richards, 81, British movie actor and stuntman (Raiders of the Lost Ark, Tomorrow Never Dies)

In Other News

Sting has revealed his children will not inherit his £180m fortune, fearing that his riches are “albatrosses round their necks”. The former frontman of The Police grew up in a working-class family in Wallsend, North Tyneside, and has gone on to become one of Britain’s wealthiest musicians. He said he has told his six children not to expect to inherit much money because he doesn’t believe in trust funds. The 62 year old singer believes his kids should go out and work and not ask for a penny from him. Let’s rename him Stingy eh?

On the other hand, since his death five years ago, Michael  Jackson seems to be raking it in. The Michael Jackson Estate – which runs his affairs on behalf of Jackson’s mother and three children – has earned over £411million!! Not bad since the King of Pop was struggling to avoid bankruptcy when he died on June 25, 2009. Looks like Prince, Paris and Blanket are laughing it all the way to the bank, wonder if they will take the piss out of Stingy’s kids??

Maybe they should use a few pennies of that fortune to buy Michael Schumacher’s medical records. Yup, someone has nicked his paperwork. Schumacher’s representatives say they will press charges and sue for damages against any publication of the content of the notes, so they seem a bit pissed off about it. Not to worry though, Michael’s wife has gone out and spent £10 million on a private medical suite at their home on the shore of Lake Geneva. So by the sound of it, he’s not going to be driving anything anytime soon, unless its a mobility scooter…

On This Day

• 1613 – The Globe Theatre in London, England burns to the ground.
• 1644 – Charles I of England defeats a Parliamentarian detachment at the Battle of Cropredy Bridge, the last battle won by an English King on English soil.
• 1888 – George Edward Gouraud records Handel‘s Israel in Egypt onto a phonograph cylinder, thought for many years to be the oldest known recording of music.
• 1914 – Jina Guseva attempts to assassinate Grigori Rasputin at his home town in Siberia.
• 1975 – Steve Wozniak tested his first prototype of Apple I computer.
• 1995 – Space Shuttle program: STS-71 Mission (Atlantis) docks with the Russian space station Mir for the first time.
• 2007 – Apple Inc. releases its first mobile phone, the iPhone.

Deaths

• 1933 – Roscoe Arbuckle, American actor, director, and screenwriter (b. 1887)
• 1967 – Jayne Mansfield, American actress and singer (b. 1933)
• 1995 – Lana Turner, American actress and singer (b. 1921)
• 2003 – Katharine Hepburn, American actress and singer (b. 1907)

Horrible Ways to Die #8 –  The Electric Chair by Dexychik

The electric chair had been used in the USA since its invention in the 1880s. It is still offered in five states, as an alternative to lethal injection. It was considered a relatively painless death, and some employees of Thomas Edison utilised alternating current to make a chair o’death. It replaced hanging as the execution method of choice (possibly because hanging was associated with lynching) until the 1980s, when lethal injection slowly superseded it.

The first man to die in the chair was William Kemmler, in 1890. He’d killed his partner with a hatchet. The most recent is Robert Gleason, who first shot a man in a drug-gang related incident, then murdered two cell mates to ensure he’d get the death penalty, which he did last year. Ted Bundy, charming serial killer, was electrocuted, as was Bruno Hauptmann, responsible for the Lindbergh baby murder and Anna Marie Hahn, poisoner extraordinaire.

The first electric chair had two electrodes, attached to the head and base of the spine. Alas, when William Kemmler was initially shocked for 17 seconds with 1000 volts, he didn’t die. He was shocked again a few minutes later, with 2000 volts for EIGHT minutes, with the current only switched off when blood pooling around the electrodes began to burn. Thankfully by then, he really was dead, and a post-mortem showed his brain had burned into his skull. There was a lot of debate before his execution over whether this method could be classed as cruel and unusual punishment. Oddly, they surmised it didn’t.

The technique has had a good 140 years to be perfected, and should you opt for electrocution on death row, you should expect to have your head and legs shaved. You will have your jaws bound shut. You wear a metal electrode on the head, buffered by sponge moistened with saline. You’ll be strapped into a sturdy wooden chair, and another electrode will be attached to each of your legs, with conductive jelly on it. The executioner will apply a 12 amp current to you, for a few seconds, and then another. You’ll probably be dead after the first jolt, but some people survive it. You will piss and shit yourself, your brain tissue will actually boil, smoke rises, and it doesn’t smell good. You die from the damage to your medulla, which controls your heart and lung activity. There is no conclusive proof that you will feel nothing. At least anything you do feel won’t last long. In Florida, your executioner will be paid $150, a relatively small price to kill someone. Oh, and your final meal has to cost less than $40. No Wagu Beef for you.

As with all executions, things can go awry. Spare a  thought for Willie Francis, who in 1946 was electrocuted for the murder of his former employer who’d probably been sexually abusing him. Willie, who was only 17, screamed for help as the first jolt was applied. The guard who had set up the chair had been drunk and done it wrong. He appealed against being electrocuted again, citing that it wasn’t his fault the machine hadn’t worked. This didn’t work (possibly because he was a black man in 40s Louisiana), and he was re-electrocuted, successfully, a year later.

John Evans, executed for armed robbery and murder in 1983, needed three jolts of electricity to finish him off after one of his leg straps came loose. He was checked and found to be alive after the first jolt. The strap was adjusted, but John survived the second jolt as well. The officials present asked the governor for clemency at this point. The governor said no, and the third time was the charm.

So, should you commit a capital crime in one of the states still carrying the electric chair, you should probably opt for lethal injection. Which, coincidentally, I’ll be covering next time.

Last Week’s Birthdays

Minka Kelly (34), Kris Kristofferson (78), Meryl Streep (65), Cindi Lauper (61), Ricky Gervais (53), Carly Simon (69), George Michael (50), Toby Maguire (39), Mel Brooks (88), Kathy Bates (66), John Cusack (48), Frances McDormand (57), Zinedine Zidane (42), Solange Knowles (28), Jason Schwartzman (34), Chris O’Donnell (44), Selma Blair (42), JJ Abrams (48), Chris Isaak (58), Mick Fleetwood (67), Jeff Beck (70), Felicia Day (35), Aileen Quinn (43), Amanda Donohoe (52), Gary Busey (70), Al Molinaro (95), Christopher Mintz-Plasse (25), Bruce Campbell (56), KT Tunstall (39), Selma Blair (42) and Joss Whedon (50).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

Another week flashes by and the flying monkeys have kept busy, bringing home  another handful of celebrities to be cremated or interred. As you may have heard from the emails, Casey Kasem sadly died, but luckily for Ashley, he managed to guess that his expiration would occur this year, thus garnering 62 points!! Well done Ash!

Also Patsy Byrne, who played Bernard Nurse in Blackadder II passed away, she died on the 17th and her family put a small obituary in the Telegraph, which is only now being picked up by the newspapers. Seems so be a bad month for Blackadder fans 🙁

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Francis Matthews, 86, English film and television actor (Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, The Revenge of Frankenstein, Dracula: Prince of Darkness).
• Casey Kasem, 82, American radio personality (American Top 40) and voice actor (Shaggy Rogers), Lewy body dementia.
• Patsy Byrne, 80, English actress (Blackadder II).
• Stephanie Kwolek, 90, American chemist, inventor of Kevlar.
• Johnny Mann, 85, American composer, Grammy Award-winning arranger (“Up, Up and Away“) and singer (Alvin and the Chipmunks).
• Vladimir Popovkin, 56, Russian military officer, head of the Federal Space Agency (2011–2013).
• Jeffry Wickham, 80, British actor (Ransom, The Remains of the Day, Vera Drake), President of Equity (1992–1994).
• Gerry Goffin, 75, American Hall of Fame lyricist (“Will You Love Me Tomorrow“, “The Loco-Motion“, “Go Away Little Girl“, “Take Good Care of My Baby”).
• Gerry Conlon, 60, Northern Irish author and human rights activist, Guildford Four member wrongfully convicted of the Guildford pub bombings.

In Other News 

As you may have heard, our current cabbage of the pool, Michael Schumacher, is no longer in a coma and has left the hospital in Grenoble that has been his home for the past six months. Reports say that the 45 year old has been moved to Switzerland, hopefully not to the Dignitas Clinic, to continue his recovery. News is very scarce as the family want his rehabilitation to take place away from the public eye, so lets start some rumours shall we?

Tracy Morgan has also been moved out of hospital to a rehab centre where he is expected to remain for a few weeks whilst recovering from a six-car pile-up. Morgan, 45, suffered a broken femur, squished ribs and a broken nose in the accident, which is considered critical in America, over here it’s just a slight inconvenience and you’d be expected back at work on Monday, bringing the cake to the office as an apology for letting your workmates down.

And a contribution form Nickie 😀

As a confirmed planner and stationery addict, I was saddened to hear of the sudden death of Charles Letts this week – the last remaining member of the diary dynasty. He was aged 49.  He and his business partner, Gordon Presley had been involved in various stationery buyouts over the past 15 years or so, acquiring Filofax in 2001. The only worrying aspect of this is that “some form of seizure” is becoming a common form of killer these days. Letts (see what I did there) hope they find a cure for this soon…

On This Day

• 1633 – The Holy Office in Rome forces Galileo Galilei to recant his view that the Sun, not the Earth, is the center of the Universe in the form he presented it in, after heated controversy.
• 1906 – The flag of Sweden is adopted.
• 1911 – George V and Mary of Teck are crowned King and Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
• 1978 – Charon, a satellite of the dwarf planet Pluto, is discovered by American astronomer James W. Christy.
• 1984 – Virgin Atlantic Airways launches with its first flight from London Heathrow Airport.
• 1986 The controversial Hand of God goal by Diego Maradona in the quarter-finals of the 1986 FIFA World Cup match between Argentina and England. This was later followed by the Goal of the Century also by Maradona. Argentina would win 2-1 and go on to win the world cup.
• 1990 – Checkpoint Charlie is dismantled in Berlin.
• 2009 – Eastman Kodak Company announces that it will discontinue sales of the Kodachrome Colour Film, concluding its 74-year run as a photography icon.

Deaths

• 1965 – David O. Selznick, American film producer (b. 1902)
• 1969 – Judy Garland, American actress and singer (b. 1922)
• 1987 – Fred Astaire, American actor, singer, and dancer (b. 1899)
• 1993 – Pat Nixon, American economist and educator, 44th First Lady of the United States (b. 1912)
• 1997 – Don Henderson, English actor (b. 1932)
• 2008 – George Carlin, American comedian, actor, and author (b. 1937)

Bizarre Victorian Deaths, Part 1 by KoA

In a new series we shall take a look at life, or in our case, death in Victorian times, which was considerably more dangerous than now, if the newspaper reports of the time are anything to go by.

 1. Killed by a Mouse!

This uneasy tale begins in England, 1875, when a mouse dashed suddenly onto a work table in a south London factory. In the general commotion which followed, a gallant young man stepped forward and seized the rodent. For a glorious moment, he was the saviour of the women who’d scattered. It didn’t last. The mouse slipped out of his grasp, ran up his sleeve and scurried out again at the open neck of his shirt. In his surprise, his mouth was agape. In its surprise, the mouse dashed in. In his continued surprise, the man swallowed. “That a mouse can exist for a considerable time without much air has long been a popular belief and was unfortunately proved to be a fact in the present instance,” noted the Manchester Evening News, “for the mouse began to tear and bite inside the man’s throat and chest, and the result was that the unfortunate fellow died after a little time in horrible agony.”

2. Crushed by His Own Invention 

Sam Wardell couldn’t afford to oversleep. He was the lamplighter in the New York town of Flatbush in the mid-1880s. He lit the streetlights in the evening, and needed to be up early to put them out again at dawn. It wasn’t a job for slobs. And so, with the boundless ingenuity of the age, he hit on a neat failsafe. He took a standard alarm clock and supercharged it, adding a Wallace and Gromit-style embellishment to ensure he woke in time. First he connected the clock by a wire to a catch he fitted to a shelf in his room. Then he placed a 10lb stone on the shelf. When the alarm struck, the shelf fell and the stone crashed to the floor. Ta-da! It worked perfectly, and perhaps would have carried on doing so, if Wardell hadn’t toyed with the configuration. One Christmas Eve he invited some friends round for a party and cleared his room of furniture to make space. When they left, he dragged his bed back into the room. He was tired, and didn’t pay much attention to where he put it. At 05:00 the next morning, the alarm sounded. The shelf fell. The stone dropped straight onto the sleeping Wardell’s head. Ouch!

Last Week’s Birthdays

Paula Abdul (52), Prince William (32), Courtney Cox (50), Kathleen Turner (60), Paul McCartney (72), Neil Patrick Harris (41), Isabella Rossellini (62), Barry Manilow (71), Nicole Kidman (47), Lionel Richie (65), Helen Hunt (51), Juliette Lewis (41), Zoe Saldana (36), Ice Cube (50), Mia Sara (47), Jim Belushi (60), Newt Gingrich (71), John Goodman (62), Lana Del Ray (28), Brian Wilson (72), Martin Landau (86) and Olympia Dukakis (83).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

When I sent out the flying monkeys last week, little did I know that they would reap so many souls! Amongst them Rik Mayall, a true comedy genius and top bloke. I’m sure all of us will miss his comic talents. Sadly the game continues and yes, there are points to be awarded! We shall begin with Rebecca correctly guessing Carla Laemmele would die this year, but being 104 years old only reaps her 46 points, but well done anyway, that’s 46 points more than the rest of us! But this is not all my fellow morbid minions, Lee and Luke correctly surmised that the oldest man in the world would die, again, a small amount of points awarded, 39 each, but an extra 100 to Lee for marking him as his cert. Woo! Just what we needed, a little shake-up in the league table where we now have a new points leader!!

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Eric Hill, 86, British children’s writer and illustrator (Spot the Dog).
• Alexander Imich, 111, Russian Congress Poland-born American chemist, parapsychologist and supercentenarian, oldest man in the world.
• Veronica Lazăr, 76, Romanian-born Italian actress (Inferno, Last Tango in Paris, The Stendhal Syndrome).
• Rik Mayall, 56, English comedian, writer and actor (The Young Ones, Bottom, The New Statesman), Emmy Award winner (The Wind in the Willows), heart attack.
• Ruby Dee, 91, American Emmy Award-winning actress (Decoration Day), Grammy Award-winner (2007) and civil rights activist, National Medal of Arts laureate (1995).
• Carla Laemmle, 104, American actress (The Phantom of the Opera, The Broadway Melody, Dracula), natural causes.
• Jimmy Scott, 88, American jazz singer.
• Richard Rockefeller, 65, American billionaire physician, plane crash.
• Sam Kelly, 70, British actor (‘Allo ‘Allo!, Porridge).

In Other News

Harrison Ford has been injured on the set of Star Wars:  Episode VII and was taken to hospital, seems the 71 year old has broken his ankle when the door of the Millennium Falcon decided to attack him. His wife, Calista Flockhart is now en-route to be at his bedside as they fear he might have damaged his pelvis too! Filming of the new Star Wars film will continue in his absence but if his recovery is not as straight forward as some reports are suggesting, it looks like the tight scheduling of the shoot might be in danger. We all know what happens when an old fart breaks a hip don’t we!

In birthday news, Prince Philip managed to reach the ripe old age of 93 without any undue mishap. No time to enjoy his birthday though, the old codger has a diary full of events that he has to attend, so it looks like he’s here to stay for a while longer. Not to be outdone, George Bush Snr celebrated his 90th birthday by jumping out of a helicopter, much like The Queen did during the Olympics!! The 41st president of the United States was strapped to an instructor as he can no longer use his legs due to Parkinson’s, but enjoyed the experience immensely.

Casey Kasem is in a bad place. The voice of Shaggy in Scooby-Doo is in the middle of a family feud about his vast fortune and impending death. The courts have decided that his eldest daughter, a millionaire in her own right, is to be his care giver and she’s decided that the 82 year old is to be spared the indignity of treatment, so his food, water and medication have been withheld. So now its just a matter of time, one feels a quick smothering with a pillow would be better for the poor fucker.

The novelist and former MP Jeffrey Archer has revealed that he was diagnosed with prostate cancer late last year. After the diagnosis, he chose to have an operation in which the whole prostate and the cancer would be removed, rather than go through radiotherapy. The 74 year old is now infertile, but I doubt that will cause him any sleepless nights. Sadly he’s still writing crap novels and reckons he’ll survive to see 88. Lets hope for a passing bus shall we?

If you were looking to go see a concert with Morrissey or Paul McCartney any time soon, sell your ticket, both of them are too ill to sing. Paul  has been ill since early May with the squits since visiting Japan, but Morrissey was hospitalised with a respiratory infection. He’s cancelled the rest of his US tour which is a repeat of last year when he cancelled 22 shows due to ill health. His previous ailments have included pneumonia, an ulcer, the throat condition Barrett’s oesophagus and anaemia. Morrissey, being the cunt that he is, publicly blamed his support act Kirsteen Young for passing on a ‘horrendous cold’. She’s obviously a bit angry about these ‘bizarre lies’. Better order some lilies soon…

On This Day

• 1215 – King John of England puts his seal to the Magna Carta.
• 1667 – The first human blood transfusion is administered by Dr. Jean-Baptiste Denys.
• 1752 – Benjamin Franklin proves that lightning is electricity (traditional date, the exact date is unknown).
• 1785 – Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier, co-pilot of the first-ever manned flight (1783), and his companion, Pierre Romain, become the first-ever casualties of an air crash when their hot air balloon explodes during their attempt to cross the English Channel.
• 1878 – Eadweard Muybridge takes a series of photographs to prove that all four feet of a horse leave the ground when it runs; the study becomes the basis of motion pictures.
• 1970 – Charles Manson Infamous trial for the Sharon Tate murders begin.
• 1996 – The Provisional Irish Republican Army explodes a large bomb in the middle of Manchester, England, United Kingdom.

Deaths

• 1993 – James Hunt, English race car driver (b. 1947)
• 1996 – Ella Fitzgerald, American singer and actress (b. 1917)
• 2008 – Stan Winston, American makeup artist and director (b. 1946)

Death Row Prisoners Last Meals by KoA

This week we’re taking a peek at what Timothy McVeigh had for his parting dinner. You’ll remember him as the chap responsible for the Oklahoma Bombing that killed 168 people and injured 600 more, which is still the worst act of domestic terrorism in the US, the only other that beats it is 9/11, but some Johnny Foreigners were responsible for that one!

McVeigh was an odd sort, his whole reason for the bombing was revenge against the federal government for their  handling of the Waco Siege. He obviously thought they did it wrong.

Like most nut jobs he was bullied at school and had a huge fascination with guns, so obviously his grandfather bought him a gun which he took to school with him. Following dropping out of college he joined the US Army, where they ‘trained him up good’, giving him the skills he needed to finally get his revenge against everything he thought was pissing him off, which included women, as nobody would go out with him, and the government, for making him pay tax.  Following the bombing he was jailed and  sentenced to death.

So here we are at his final meal. He ordered two pints of mint chocolate chip ice cream. Boring or what!?!

McVeigh showed no remorse for his actions and was executed by lethal injection at 7:14 a.m. on June 11, 2001, at the U.S. Federal Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana, the first federal prisoner to be executed by the United States federal government since 1963.

Ice cream! Nom nom…

Last Week’s Birthdays

Kanye West (37), Tim Berners-Lee (59), Nancy Sinatra (74), Joan Rivers (81), Jerry Stiller (87), Barbara Bush (89), Natalie Portman (33), Johnny Depp (50), Michael J Fox (53), Elizabeth Hurley (49), Linda Evangelista (49), Prince Philip (93), Shea LeBeouf (28), Peter Dinklage (45), Hugh Laurie (55), Adrienne Barbeau (69), Gene Wilder (81), Adriana Lima (33), Richard Ayoade (37), George H. W. Bush (90), David Rockefeller (99), Mary-Kate & Ashley Olsen (28), Chris Evans (33), Steve-O (40), Ally Sheedy (52), Tim Allen (60), Richard Thomas (63), Stellan Skarsgård (63), Malcolm McDowell (71), Diablo Cody (36), Steffi Graf (45), Boy George (53), Donald Trump (68), Neil Patrick Harris (41), Ice Cube (45), Courtney Cox (50), Helen Hunt (51) and Jim Belushi (60).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week peeps!

Welcome all, no points to award, but please don’t be downhearted, I’ve sent out the flying monkeys to reap a few souls in readiness for next week. Not many famous people have bit the bullet during the last week, so I’ve padded out the weekly newsletter with two features to keep you interested, I know, I’m awesome!

Look Who You Could Have Had:

• Sir Hugo White, 74, British admiral, Governor of Gibraltar (1995–1997).
• Mary Soames, Baroness Soames, 91, British aristocrat, last surviving child of Winston Churchill. 
• Ann B. Davis, 88, American actress (The Brady Bunch), winner of two Emmy Awards (The Bob Cummings Show), subdural hematoma from a fall.
• Alexander Shulgin, 88, American pharmacologist and chemist, MDMA pioneer, liver cancer.
• Jane Gray, 112, Scottish-born Australian supercentenarian, oldest living Scottish-born person and Australian resident.
• Chester Nez, 93, American Navajo code talker, last remaining Navajo who developed the code, recipient of the Congressional Gold Medal (2000), renal failure.

In Other News

US actor and ‘comedian’ Tracy Morgan is in intensive care after the limousine he was riding was involved in a fatal crash in New Jersey. Six vehicles were involved, including one carrying the 45-year-old former Saturday Night Live and 30 Rock star. One passenger died after the bus overturned on the New Jersey Turnpike early on Saturday, police said. Four are in hospital, three remain critical. A lorry driver is facing criminal charges over the crash.

South Africa’s President, Jacob Zuma, has been admitted to  hospital for tests, his office has announced. “Yesterday President Zuma was advised to rest following a demanding election,” a statement said. Doctors were satisfied with his condition. Mr Zuma, 72, was sworn in for a second term on 24th May following the African National Congress election victory. Lets hope the old codger survives long enough so we can include him on next years lists.  

King Juan Carlos of Spain has announced his intention to abdicate, after nearly 40 years on the throne. “A new generation must be at the forefront… younger people with new energies,” the 76-year-old king said in a televised address. His son, Crown Prince Felipe, 45, will take over the throne. For much of his reign, Juan Carlos was seen as one of the world’s most popular monarchs, but recently many Spaniards have lost confidence in him. We all know what happens to men after they retire, best get him on a list quick!  

In a sure sign of impending death, stars have paid tribute to actress and political activist Jane Fonda as she accepted the American Film Institute’s Life Achievement Award. As she accepted the award, Fonda offered some advice on career longevity for the roomful of celebrities gathered: “Ask questions, stay curious. It’s much more important to be interested than to be interesting.” Well said Jane, I’ll try to keep your words in mind when you need your headstone carved. 

On This Day

• 632 – Muhammad, Islamic prophet, dies in Medina and is succeeded by Abu Bakr who becomes the first caliph of the Rashidun Caliphate.
• 793 – Vikings raid the abbey at Lindisfarne in Northumbria, commonly accepted as the beginning of the Scandinavian invasion of England.
• 1191 – Richard I arrives in Acre (Palestine) thus beginning his crusade.
• 1929 – Margaret Bondfield is appointed Minister of Labour. She is the first woman appointed to the Cabinet of the United Kingdom.
• 1949 – The celebrities Helen Keller, Dorothy Parker, Danny Kaye, Fredric March, John Garfield, Paul Muni and Edward G. Robinson are named in an FBI report as Communist Party members.
• 1949 – George Orwell‘s Nineteen Eighty-Four is published.
• 1953 – The United States Supreme Court rules that restaurants in Washington, D.C., cannot refuse to serve black patrons.
• 1968 – Robert F. Kennedy‘s funeral takes place at the Basilica of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, New York City.
• 1972 – Vietnam War: The Associated Press photographer Nick Ut takes his Pulitzer Prize-winning photo of a naked 9-year-old Phan Thị Kim Phúc running down a road after being burned by napalm.

Deaths

• 632 – Muhammad, Last Prophet of Islam (b. 570)
• 1874 – Cochise, American tribal chief (b. 1805)
• 1924 – Andrew Irvine, English mountaineer (b. 1902)
• 1924 – George Mallory, English lieutenant and mountaineer (b. 1886)
• 2003 – Leighton Rees, Welsh darts player (b. 1940)
• 2006 – Robert Donner, American actor (b. 1931)

Death Row Prisoners Last Meals by KoA

This week we shall be looking at Ronnie Lee Gardner, an awesome individual who received the death penalty for murder in October 1984. He killed a chap called Melvyn John Otterstrom during a robbery in Salt Lake City and while being transported in April 1985 to a court hearing for the homicide, he fatally shot attorney Michael Burdell in an unsuccessful escape attempt. So you can see he’s a stirling upstanding citizen. He spent the best part of 25 years in the system before being executed by firing squad, that in itself was interesting as it was the first one carried out in the U.S. for 14 years.

On June 15, 2010, Gardner ate a last meal of steak, lobster tail, apple pie, vanilla ice cream and 7-Up, before beginning a 48-hour fast while watching The Lord of the Rings film trilogy and reading Divine Justice.  

• Lobster Tail
• Steak
• Apple Pie
• Vanilla Ice Cream
• 7-Up
• Lord of the Rings Trilogy DVD’s
• Copy of Devine Justice
• 48 Hour fasting period

According to his lawyers, the fast was motivated by “spiritual reasons.” As a good inmate, Gardner walked voluntarily to his place of execution.When asked if he had any last words, he responded, “I do not, no.” So they proceeded to shoot the shit out of him.

As you do, a commemorative coin was commissioned for prison staff who participated in the execution. Well done America, way to show us all how to do it!

Human Bindings by KoA

In ‘good news for bibliomaniacs and satanists’, scientists say the binding of 1880s study of the human soul is in fact made of human skin! Scientific analysis of the 19th-century book has proved “without a doubt” that its leather binding is made from human skin, Harvard University has confirmed.

After it emerged in April that, despite an inscription claiming that its binding was formed from “all that remains of my dear friende Jonas Wright”, the 17th-century book Practicarum Quaestionum Circa Leges Regias Hispaniae was actually bound with sheepskin, Harvard set out to test the provenance of an unusual binding on a copy of Arsène Houssaye’s Des destinées de l’ame.

The book includes a note by its binder Dr Ludovic Bouland, which claims it is “bound in human skin parchment on which no ornament has been stamped to preserve its elegance”. “By looking carefully you easily distinguish the pores of the skin,” wrote Bouland. “A book about the human soul deserved to have a human covering: I had kept this piece of human skin taken from the back of a woman.”

Harvard called the discovery “good news for fans of anthropodermic bibliopegy, bibliomaniacs and cannibals alike”. Anthropodermic bibliopegy is the practice of binding books in human skin, something which enjoyed a spate of popularity in the 19th century, but which has occurred since at least the 1500s.

Antiquarian bookseller Tim Bryars, who runs a shop in London’s Cecil Court, said that “anthropodermic biblopegy has a grisly pull on everyone who has heard of it, booksellers included”, but that “identifying the origin of some leathers used historically in bookbinding can be tricky”.

“But does that mean that leather-bound books on your shelves at home might involve human remains? It’s highly unlikely,” said Bryars. “Most examples seem to cover works on anatomy and trial reports (sometimes bound in the skin of the accused), the product of a different age, an entirely different way of thinking, and the provenance is generally well attested, the whereabouts known.”

He pointed to the case of John Horwood, who was hanged for murder in Bristol almost 200 years ago, his skin used to bind an account of the case.

Books, who thought they were boring?

Last Week’s Birthdays

Alanis Morissette (40), Heidi Klum (41), Jonathan Pryce (67), Rene Auberjonois (74), Morgan Freeman (77), Pat Boone (80), Justin Long (36), Zachary Quinto (37), Dana Carvey (59), Rafael Nadal (28), Russell Brand (39), Angelina Jolie (39), Bruce Dern (78), Mark Wahlberg (43), Paul Giamatti (47), Sandra Bernhard (59), Robert Englund (67), Michael Cera (26), Anna Kournikova (33), Bill Hader (35), Prince (56), Liam Neeson (61), Kayne West (37), Tim Berners-Lee (59), Nancy Sinatra (74), Joan Rivers (81), Barbara Bush (89)  and Tom Jones (74).

2013 League Table

[confidential]

Next week  peeps!