2018 Alpaca Farm Dead Celebrity Montage by RobinJRichards

JAN: John Young is the only astronaut to have flown on Gemini, Apollo and STS missions (including the first on Columbia) during his career. He was a member of this Apollo mission alongside Ken Mattingly and Charles Duke.

FEB: John Mahoney had a memorable career in stage and screen, garnering two Emmy nominations (but no wins) for his role as Martin, the blue-collar father of two painfully pretentious white-collar sons on this sitcom.

MAR: Tom Benson, who took his string of car dealerships and funneled the money into pro sports, was the colorful and proud owner of an NFL and an NBA franchise that play their games yards apart from each other, the latter doing so in the Smoothie King Center. Name that NBA team. (City and Mascot required).

APR: Larry Harvey is credited for establishing this music festival on a San Francisco Beach in 1986, often called a week long “fringe culturefest,” “a hallucinogenic state fair,” and “a full-scale countercultural declaration of independence.”

MAY: Billy Cannon, winner of the 1957 Heisman Trophy, played for this SEC school. He is best known for a certain 89 yard punt return against Mississippi on Halloween night that same year.

JUN: Frank Carlucci served as both a National Security Adviser and Secretary of Defense under this US President.

JUL: Sergio Marchionne is credited for turning around two vastly different car companies on two continents that would later merge in 2009. Name either company.

AUG: Aug 16th saw the death of the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin, cementing the idea that that date is not a good day to die as a musician. Give the other two noted musicians who both died on August 16th albeit 39 years apart. (edited at 5:45 pm, December 14, 2018 (PST))

SEP: Marty Balin, who died in San Francisco, was a founding member of this rock band, who had major hits with "Lather," "White Rabbit," and "Somebody to Love."

OCT: In a death that has an inadvertent yet comical connection to yours truly, "Whitey" Bulger was offed in a West VA prison. His death announcement in Boston preempted the end of my second episode of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire." You know, when things were getting good? Good times. So what was "Whitey" Bulger's real first name?

NOV: William Goldman as a Screenwriter/novelist/playwright who won two Academy Awards for two radically different historically based films set around eighty years apart. Name either one.

DEC: Ken Berry was best known for several TV and film roles, one of which was Vint Harper on the TV sitcom "Mama's Family." What job did Vint Harper have on the show?