Obituary

CHICAGO – Television fans from the early 1980s lost a bit of their era yesterday as Gary Coleman, Arnold Jackson from the NBC sitcom “Diff’rent Strokes,” died of a brain hemorrhage at the age of 42. Coleman is the second of the three siblings on the show to pass away, as Dana Plato, who played his sister Kimberley, took her own life in 1999.

CHICAGO – Beloved actor and legendary easy rider Dennis Hopper lost his long battle with prostate cancer this morning at age 74. With a career spanning over the last half-century, Hopper is best known for directing, co-writing and co-starring in 1969’s counterculture classic “Easy Rider”.

CHICAGO – “Dirty Dancing,” “Ghost,” film, TV and dance icon Patrick Swayze died on Sept. 14, 2009 at 57 after a 1.5-year public battle with pancreatic cancer. He was in his Los Angeles home beside friends and family.

CHICAGO – Influential and beloved Chicago director John Hughes has unexpectedly passed away at the age of 59.

CHICAGO – Michael Jackson, who is widely regarded as the king of pop music, is dead at the age of 50, the Los Angeles Times confirmed on Thursday.

CHICAGO – Actress Farrah Fawcett, who rose to fame by starring in 29 episodes of TV’s “Charlie’s Angels” from 1976 to 1980, has died of anal cancer in the ICU at St. John’s Hospital in Santa Monica, Calif., according to her representative.

CHICAGO – He was cooler than you. He was cooler than me. He was Cool Hand Luke. Paul Newman – an activist, philanthropist, race car driver and one of the most legendary movie stars of the post studio system era – died on Friday of cancer at his farmhouse near Westport, Conn.

CHICAGO – “Death is caused by swallowing small amounts of saliva over a long period of time,” comedian George Carlin once said. The iconic and award-winning figure died of heart failure on Sunday at the age of 71.

CHICAGO – Heath Ledger has been found dead in his Manhattan apartment, according to CNN. He was 28.

CHICAGO – Deborah Kerr, who is remembered for one of Hollywood’s most famous kisses opposite Burt Lancaster in “From Here to Eternity” and made her mark with roles such as the proper widow in “The King and I,” has died. She was 86.