I wanted to mention the death of Princess Diana and Mother Theresa, which I thought both happened on (my birthday) August 31, 1997. But it turns out Mother Theresa died on September 5th, which didn't make the 3-day window. It just shows that when something personal, like my birthday, is involved, how memory can be skewed. Still, Diana's death definitely overshadowed Mother Theresa's death for weeks.
I saw this when I was looking up other lists. But yeah fell outside the window. I thought 7 days might be too large. But in this case Diana was gettin wall to wall coverage
I disagree that Princess Diana's death overshadowed Mother Teresa's. My memory is that the opposite happened. The Diana media coverage was so completely over the top saturation that the networks later spent an inordinate amount of coverage when it was Mother Teresa's turn, just so they wouldn't look as craven. Mother Teresa's funeral was covered in full, commercial-free. Do you think that would have happened if she had died first? I doubt it.
Interesting observation. I may have a skewed view for two reasons. I am Catholic, and was more so at the time, so we were rather emotionally invested in Mother Theresa. The other reason is that I was living in Alaska at the time, and the news coverage may not have been as pervasive there. And maybe there's a third reason, simply because of the nearly 30 years since it occurred--there has been a lot more Diana news since then.
An adjacent idea. Former President Dwight “Ike” Eisenhower died March 28, 1969, immediately changing the plans for weekly news magazine cover stories. Janis Joplin is said to have lamented her being bumped from her expected appearance on the cover of Time magazine that week, with a “just my luck” kind of shrug.
Here's a good example regarding two musicians, both working in different corners of the rock/pop/folk world: Jim Croce and Gram Parsons died on consecutive days in September, 1973. Gram Parsons died on September 19 from a drug overdose, and Jim Croce died on September 20 in a plane crash. Jim Croce's death far overshadowed Garam Parsons' death in the media.
I first learned that Kennedy, Huxley, and Lewis died on the same day when I had 'Between Heaven and Hell' by Peter Kreeft assigned to read in high school. It's a fascinating trialogue between the three of them on the subject of Christ while they're in some kind of waiting room right after they die. It's a cool imaginative exercise.
You've touched on a very old obsession of mine. I think it was discovering the Abraham Lincoln/Charles Darwin birthday that got me started looking up other simultaneous famous births. Except I started in the 1980s, long before an internet. I scoured all those "today in history" newspaper features for years. If you'd like, I can send you my pdf with well over 100 simultaneous birthdays (including today, which has two singers with Number One records: David Ruffin and Bobby Goldsboro, 1/18/1941).
- The JFK/Huxley/Lewis combination is the subject of a quiz bowl question that came up a couple times in my playing career. Hard to beat such a coincidence for trivia nerds.
- These days, one death overwhelming another is less likely, if only because we have such a fast news cycle. In the age of the daily newspaper, maybe one major obit would make the front page. Now they all get notable space, if occasionally just for a short time. For example, I was working -- as the Entertainment editor! -- the day Fawcett and Jackson died. We spent the morning on Fawcett, then as rumors of Jackson started coming in, the coverage turned accordingly. Maybe people don't recall it NOW, but at the time both received the same gasps. (And then Jackson became the focus of the next several weeks, which also led to me not being an Entertainment editor anymore.)
- James Brown, and others on your list, had the misfortune of dying on Christmas Day, when newsrooms are occupied by a skeleton crew and people have other things going on. So they not only had other deaths in the same span, but the holidays to compete against as well. (Carrie Fisher -- who died on Dec. 27 -- and Betty White -- Dec. 31 -- are exceptions.)
Great work. It’s also a bad idea to die at the end of the year because by then all the major pubs have published their “Notable Deaths of the Year”. Two recent ex-presidents have suffered that fate: Gerald Ford (died 12/26/2006) and Jimmy Carter (12/29/2024).
Another pairing of singers in death was that of the less well known folk singer-songwriter Bill Morrissey (whose frankly incomparable songwriting skills merited him much more acclaim then he ever got) and the legendary Amy Winehouse, who both passed on July 23rd, 2011. Sadly, however dissimilar their styles of music and their level of popular regard, they both struggled with their mental health as well as substance abuse. However, as is most often the case, their art transcended their suffering and has proven to be a long-lasting gift to the world.
Yeah, but the Catholic Church has been on this already. A saint’s feast day is usually their day of death, as that is considered a mark of their ascent into Heaven. I am more interested in the historic and cultural significance of nearness of some dates.
Ronald Reagan was shot on March 30, 1981, and Pope John Paul II also on May 13, 1981–both 45 days apart. President and Pope would survive to become good friends, with Reagan being told by Pope the significance of May 13 as the apparition of Our Lady of Fatima. Egyptian president Anwar Sadat would be killed July 1981.
But wait—just a few months before Reagan, John Lennon was shot in NYC on December 8, 1980. All Catholics know this as the feast of the Immaculate Conception.
Not saying he is a saint. Not saying it’s all conspiracy. But there is story that Yoko Ono prevented John from looking into Catholicism.
On the flip side -- the best day to die. Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both died on July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
It's definitely poetic that jefferson and adams died on the same day given their rivalry and similar pessimism tjey shared about the country's future and that they made amends. I'm sure that wasn't lost on the public. It's when they don't share the same narrative publically.
You must consider the sad "miscalculation" of Germs' vocalist, Darby Crash, who somehow planned his suicide-as-manifesto not knowing that there wouldn't be much attention to it considering it happened almost simultaneously to the fatal autograph John Lennon gave to Mark Chapman outside of the Dakota building.
Also interesting is when a famous person dies and a (much later) famous person is born on the same day. One example is that Charlie Watts was born, and Lou Gehrig died, on June 2, 1941. My favorite near miss in this regard is Leadbelly dying on December 6, 1949, and Tom Waits being born the next day on December 7, 1949. As Waits once remarked, "I was born the day after Leadbelly died. I'd like to think we passed in the hall."
Why do famous people always seem to pass in groups of three? Also, this brings to mind Sheryl Crow’s lyrics- “she was born in November, 1963 - the day Aldous Huxley died”
I wanted to mention the death of Princess Diana and Mother Theresa, which I thought both happened on (my birthday) August 31, 1997. But it turns out Mother Theresa died on September 5th, which didn't make the 3-day window. It just shows that when something personal, like my birthday, is involved, how memory can be skewed. Still, Diana's death definitely overshadowed Mother Theresa's death for weeks.
I saw this when I was looking up other lists. But yeah fell outside the window. I thought 7 days might be too large. But in this case Diana was gettin wall to wall coverage
I disagree that Princess Diana's death overshadowed Mother Teresa's. My memory is that the opposite happened. The Diana media coverage was so completely over the top saturation that the networks later spent an inordinate amount of coverage when it was Mother Teresa's turn, just so they wouldn't look as craven. Mother Teresa's funeral was covered in full, commercial-free. Do you think that would have happened if she had died first? I doubt it.
I remember having precisely that same intuition in the moment.
Interesting observation. I may have a skewed view for two reasons. I am Catholic, and was more so at the time, so we were rather emotionally invested in Mother Theresa. The other reason is that I was living in Alaska at the time, and the news coverage may not have been as pervasive there. And maybe there's a third reason, simply because of the nearly 30 years since it occurred--there has been a lot more Diana news since then.
An adjacent idea. Former President Dwight “Ike” Eisenhower died March 28, 1969, immediately changing the plans for weekly news magazine cover stories. Janis Joplin is said to have lamented her being bumped from her expected appearance on the cover of Time magazine that week, with a “just my luck” kind of shrug.
Here's a good example regarding two musicians, both working in different corners of the rock/pop/folk world: Jim Croce and Gram Parsons died on consecutive days in September, 1973. Gram Parsons died on September 19 from a drug overdose, and Jim Croce died on September 20 in a plane crash. Jim Croce's death far overshadowed Garam Parsons' death in the media.
That’s crazy. I love Jim Croce
Gram Parsons wasn’t so shabby, either. :)
I first learned that Kennedy, Huxley, and Lewis died on the same day when I had 'Between Heaven and Hell' by Peter Kreeft assigned to read in high school. It's a fascinating trialogue between the three of them on the subject of Christ while they're in some kind of waiting room right after they die. It's a cool imaginative exercise.
Great article! My kind of stuff, too. I bought your book and thoroughly enjoyed it! Thanks, Chris!
That means so much. Thank you!
You've touched on a very old obsession of mine. I think it was discovering the Abraham Lincoln/Charles Darwin birthday that got me started looking up other simultaneous famous births. Except I started in the 1980s, long before an internet. I scoured all those "today in history" newspaper features for years. If you'd like, I can send you my pdf with well over 100 simultaneous birthdays (including today, which has two singers with Number One records: David Ruffin and Bobby Goldsboro, 1/18/1941).
Sure. Cdallarivamusic at gmail
I love this.
A couple notes:
- The JFK/Huxley/Lewis combination is the subject of a quiz bowl question that came up a couple times in my playing career. Hard to beat such a coincidence for trivia nerds.
- These days, one death overwhelming another is less likely, if only because we have such a fast news cycle. In the age of the daily newspaper, maybe one major obit would make the front page. Now they all get notable space, if occasionally just for a short time. For example, I was working -- as the Entertainment editor! -- the day Fawcett and Jackson died. We spent the morning on Fawcett, then as rumors of Jackson started coming in, the coverage turned accordingly. Maybe people don't recall it NOW, but at the time both received the same gasps. (And then Jackson became the focus of the next several weeks, which also led to me not being an Entertainment editor anymore.)
- James Brown, and others on your list, had the misfortune of dying on Christmas Day, when newsrooms are occupied by a skeleton crew and people have other things going on. So they not only had other deaths in the same span, but the holidays to compete against as well. (Carrie Fisher -- who died on Dec. 27 -- and Betty White -- Dec. 31 -- are exceptions.)
Great work. It’s also a bad idea to die at the end of the year because by then all the major pubs have published their “Notable Deaths of the Year”. Two recent ex-presidents have suffered that fate: Gerald Ford (died 12/26/2006) and Jimmy Carter (12/29/2024).
James Brown also died right around Ford
My birthday is June 18th! Thanks for the lovely reminder to make some art and think deeply about it :)
Another pairing of singers in death was that of the less well known folk singer-songwriter Bill Morrissey (whose frankly incomparable songwriting skills merited him much more acclaim then he ever got) and the legendary Amy Winehouse, who both passed on July 23rd, 2011. Sadly, however dissimilar their styles of music and their level of popular regard, they both struggled with their mental health as well as substance abuse. However, as is most often the case, their art transcended their suffering and has proven to be a long-lasting gift to the world.
Yeah, but the Catholic Church has been on this already. A saint’s feast day is usually their day of death, as that is considered a mark of their ascent into Heaven. I am more interested in the historic and cultural significance of nearness of some dates.
Ronald Reagan was shot on March 30, 1981, and Pope John Paul II also on May 13, 1981–both 45 days apart. President and Pope would survive to become good friends, with Reagan being told by Pope the significance of May 13 as the apparition of Our Lady of Fatima. Egyptian president Anwar Sadat would be killed July 1981.
But wait—just a few months before Reagan, John Lennon was shot in NYC on December 8, 1980. All Catholics know this as the feast of the Immaculate Conception.
Not saying he is a saint. Not saying it’s all conspiracy. But there is story that Yoko Ono prevented John from looking into Catholicism.
On the flip side -- the best day to die. Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both died on July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.
Totally. I note that in the piece
Gah! My bad. I did the dumb thing where I enjoy a piece so much I read through it too quickly.
It's definitely poetic that jefferson and adams died on the same day given their rivalry and similar pessimism tjey shared about the country's future and that they made amends. I'm sure that wasn't lost on the public. It's when they don't share the same narrative publically.
You must consider the sad "miscalculation" of Germs' vocalist, Darby Crash, who somehow planned his suicide-as-manifesto not knowing that there wouldn't be much attention to it considering it happened almost simultaneously to the fatal autograph John Lennon gave to Mark Chapman outside of the Dakota building.
Also interesting is when a famous person dies and a (much later) famous person is born on the same day. One example is that Charlie Watts was born, and Lou Gehrig died, on June 2, 1941. My favorite near miss in this regard is Leadbelly dying on December 6, 1949, and Tom Waits being born the next day on December 7, 1949. As Waits once remarked, "I was born the day after Leadbelly died. I'd like to think we passed in the hall."
Why do famous people always seem to pass in groups of three? Also, this brings to mind Sheryl Crow’s lyrics- “she was born in November, 1963 - the day Aldous Huxley died”