Mario Cuomo - Mr. Cuomo was the governor of New York from the mid-80s to the mid-90s. It seemed like he was a regular presence in the news when I was in high school and college. While I do not know much of anything about politics and know still less of Mr. Cuomo's leanings or record, he was just a larger than life public figure that was part of a very formative time in my life before my pudding was set and I became jaded. Mario Cuomo died at age 82 on January 1, 2015.
Donna Douglas - When I would get home from high school I would watch a bit of T.V. before working on my homework. Back in those days before cable television, we only got four channels, the affiliates of ABC, NBC, and CBS, which broadcast soap operas in the afternoon, and a local channel out of Boston, MA that showed reruns of The Beverly Hillbillies. For some reason, even then, that show seemed like something from a long ago time, and it left its imprint on me and my childhood. Donna Douglas played the part of sweet, innocent, tom-boy Elly May Clampett who loved her critters and her rasslin' down by the cement pond. Donna Douglas died at age 81 on January 2, 2015.
