Derby Dead Pool

WHISTLE BLOWN ON ELLSBERG Pentagon Papers exposer Daniel Ellsberg has died aged 92. Hired by RAND Corporation as a nuclear strategist, he was thrust into the LBJ orbit and was commissioned by Robert McNamara to collate a top-secret report on the Vietnam War. Ellsberg was shaken by the insider knowledge that the Kennedy and Johnson […]

NO COUNTRY FOR DEAD MEN Literary titan Cormac McCarthy’s death aged 89 happened three days after the death of one of his closest friends, the whale biologist Roger Payne. Indeed, McCarthy preferred to hobnob with scientists instead of other writers, emblematic of the reclusive quirks that took him decades to gain wider recognition despite his […]

WINNIE GETS HER EWINGS Winnie Ewing’s victory for the SNP in the 1967 Hamilton by-election was one of the great upsets of UK political history. Though she wasn’t the first SNP MP, Robert McIntyre’s 1945 win at Motherwell only lasted three months and largely a fluke. Labour were the 10-1 favourites for Hamilton, and Ewing […]

RETURN TO SENDER Woah yeah wait a minute Mr. Postman… don’t touch that letter. Explosive environmentalist Ted Kaczynski (long known just as the Unabomber) has been defused aged 81. Once a prodigious mathematician, he ultimately decided technology was the root of all evil and retreated to a simplistic life in a Montana cabin. If he […]

NERVOSA BREAKDOWN Drummer Teresa Taylor has died aged 60. Under the name “Teresa Nervosa”, she joined cult punk rockers Butthole Surfers in the 80s. The era with her is considered the band’s classic lineup, though their biggest hit “Pepper” was released after she left. She also became a familiar face as a woman selling Madonna’s […]

TIMBER! Actor Frederic Forrest is no longer part of the conversation, aged 86. Forrest became known through a string of Coppola roles, first in a small-but-key role in The Conversation (he held the titular conversation with fellow 2023 cadaver Cindy Williams) and later more renowned as Chef in Apocalypse Now. He was also Oscar nominated […]

THE ROOF FALLS IN Not long after Topol left us, so follows the man who helped supply the milk. Together with composer Jerry Bock, lyricist Sheldon Harnick was half of one of musical theatre’s dominant duos of the 50s and 60s. Successes included Fiorello! and The Apple Tree, but none proved more enduring than the […]

VOLKOV AND DIE A nice pick, an ice pick… Mexican chemist Esteban Volkov, despite helping develop the birth control pill, would’ve struggled to QO in most circumstances. However, a historical connection boosted his odds. He was returning home from a seemingly ordinary school day in 1940 when coming home to witness his grandfather lying bloodied […]

GRIEVE MCQUEEN Scottish footballer Gordon McQueen has died aged 70. Brought onto Leeds as Jack Charlton was retiring and the team needed a player of a similar mould, the hulking McQueen delivered with his stubborn heading. He was also noted for his playing with Manchester United and the Scottish national team, and perhaps his finest […]

PORTCULLED Architect Michael Hopkins has died aged 88. A leading figure of the “High-Tech” movement, he pioneered the usage of lightweight materials in architecture. Which sounds unsafe when I word it like that. Among his best known structures are the Portcullis House at the Palace of Westminster and the Mound Stand at Lord’s Cricket Ground, […]