X-SciTech

Web Site Of The Dead And Famous

August 24, 1998 / 5:37 PM EDT / AP

Wondering if the kid who played Mikey in those Life cereal commercials actually died? How about Sally Struthers or Ricardo Montalban?

To titillate the morbidly curious, a suburban Pittsburgh woman is keeping tabs on who's cold and who's very much alive (just dead in Hollywood) on her web site, the Dead People Server.

"It's informative and amusing," said Laurie Mann, 41, of Mount Lebanon, who maintains the site. "If you don't see someone regularly, suddenly they're out of sight, out of mind and you're like, `Gee, whatever did happen to Chet Huntley?' "

Answer: He died March 20, 1974.

"I try not to get overly morbid about it," said Mann, a technical writer and trivia buff. "It's irreverent."

Entries include Dick Clark, who was born Nov. 30, 1929, and remains immortal, and Kenny of television's South Park, who dies in every episode.

Although some of the entries seem harsh, Mann said, "If you don't offend a few people here and there, you're probably not saying anything."

Celebrities are listed alphabetically, and some include links to other pages with home pages and biographies.

The site also debunks false death reports, like the one about Bob Hope that started in June. An Associated Press obituary being prepared in the event of Hope's death moved inadvertently on a web site, prompting a congressman to mistakenly announce his death on the floor of the House.

Hope, very much alive, survived to be awarded a papal knighthood a few days later.

Also debunked was the rumored death of actor James Earl Jones, which was mistakenly announced by Pittsburgh Pirates play-by-play announcer Lanny Frattare, who actually meant to announce the death of convicted assassin James Earl Ray.

There are links to other web sites filled with gallows humor Find-A-Grave, Celebrities For Whom the Bell Tolls, and the Lee Atwater Invitational Dead Pool.

A friend of Mann's came up with the idea for the page, then turned it over to someone else who gave it to her in March 1997. She plans to expand it by adding more links next month.

Philip Kain, a net culture expert for the New York-based Mining Co. which mines the Internet for the best information on different subjects said odd sites like Mann's thrive in cyberspace.

"The web gives people the power to indulge their eccentricities, show off their quirks and indulge themselves," said Kain. "The net allows you to find a very specific niche of information."

Mann welcomes suggestions from readers about who she should add to her list. Some followers even send her death advisories, although they vary in accuracy.

"I can't tell you how many reports of Frank Sinatra's death I had before last May," she said. "I used to get one a month."