1926: The Year in Death

Everyone is going nertz about Marilyn Monroe’s upcoming centennial, but being Queen of the Dead, I am nodding toward all the high-profile deaths that happened in 1926. The most famous, of course, is Rudolph Valentino (there better be a clutch of Ladies in Black at his grave this year!). Among the others who popped their clogs (as my British friends would say) were performers Barbara La Marr, Annie Oakley, Zip the Pinhead, Harry Houdini, Billy Quirk, Alva Garbo (Greta’s actress sister), James K. Hackett, Jacob Adler, Tom Forman, Jean Stuart, and Sophie Tucker’s Yiddishe Mama. Also hopping the twig in 1926 were high-camp author Ronald Firbank, painters Claude Monet and Mary Cassatt, and Thomas Burberry (famed for his coats and as the inventor of gabardine). And yes, I have the complete bound set of Variety obits, do you even have to ask? Great bedtime reading.