A look back at the esteemed personalities who left us this year, who'd touched us with their innovation, creativity and humanity.

By CBSNews.com senior producer David Morgan. The Associated Press contributed to this gallery.

Oh, my sorrows,
Sad tomorrows,
Take me back to my own home.
Oh, my crying (Oh, my crying),
Feel I'm dying, dying,
Take me back to my own home.
-- "Reflections of My Life"

Scottish singer-songwriter Dean Ford (September 5, 1946-December 31, 2018) was best known as the frontman for the pop group Marmalade in the late '60s-early '70s. He co-wrote their hits "Reflections of My Life" and "I See the Rain," and recorded a cover of The Beatles' "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da" that went to #1 in the U.K. Prior to Marmalade, he was lead singer of Dean Ford and The Gaylords, whose songs included "Twenty Miles."

Marmalade toured with Joe Cocker and The Who, but after moving to the United States, Ford entered AA and conquered his alcoholism. He returned to music in the late '80s, including his 2017 solo album, "Feel My Heartbeat." (Pictured: His eponymous 1975 album.)

Play excerpt: Marmalade's "Reflections of My Life"

Play excerpt: Dean Ford's "Glasgow Road"

In 2015 he told The Scottish Mail, "I tend not to look back too often. I don't like looking back. As I get older, I want to do new things while I still have time."

She was a nun who became a television star, talking about art history and rhapsodizing about classical depictions of male and female nudes. Born in South Africa, raised in Scotland and educated at Oxford, Sister Wendy Beckett (February 25, 1930-December 26, 2018) was a sister of the Catholic Church who taught literature in Cape Town until she suffered three grand mal seizures and was diagnosed with a form of epilepsy. She returned to England in 1970, moving into a trailer on the grounds of the Carmelite Monastery in East Anglia. She would maintain the responsibilities of a hermitic life even after appearing as the host of a BBC documentary series, "Moving Art," in 1991.

Standing in front of paintings in her nun's habit, Sister Wendy discussed artwork without a script or teleprompter. The series was a hit, and made the 61-year-old an unlikely TV star. Her debut was followed by several other series, including "Sister Wendy's Odyssey," and "Sister Wendy's Grand Tour," in which she visited landmarks of art in Rome, Paris, Amsterdam, Florence, Berlin, Vienna, Madrid and elsewhere. She also wrote 15 books on art and religion.

In 2000 she talked with PBS producer David Willcock about how she chose the American museums to feature in her series "Sister Wendy's American Collection": "If I had stuck just to what I myself love best, every program would have been exactly the same, because each of these museums has superb holdings in my four favorite areas – medieval art, Oriental art, ceramics, and the Old Masters. But nobly, self-sacrificingly, thinking only of the good of others, I forced myself to investigate areas of art into which perhaps I had up to now taken little interest. As always happens with self-sacrifice, I was blissfully rewarded."

In 2012 actress and director Penny Marshall (October 15, 1943-December 17, 2018) told "CBS This Morning" that she had been sent by her father to the University of New Mexico (and her brother, director Garry Marshall, to Northwestern) in order to lose their Bronx accents. "It didn't work," she said, not that she had to. Marshall's distinctive voice and smart-alecky delivery were the bedrock of her character Laverne DeFazio, a brewery worker who dreams of better things, in the top-rated '70s sitcom "Laverne & Shirley." The series would take her character from Milwaukee to California during its eight-year run (with even a cartoon spinoff along the way). Her early roles also included Myrna, Oscar's secretary, in "The Odd Couple," and appearances on "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and "Love, American Style."

But she became a formidable force behind the camera, as the director of the comedies "Big" (featuring Tom Hanks as a 12-year-old boy magically transformed into a 30-year-old boy), and "A League of Their Own" (in which Hanks' coach memorably castigates a player with "There's no crying in baseball!"). Both movies passed the $100 million gross mark, blazing a trail for female-directed films. 

Marshall's other credits included "Awakenings," starring Robin Williams and Robert De Niro (only the second film directed by a woman to be nominated for a Best Picture Oscar), "The Preacher's Wife," and "Riding in Cars With Boys."

In her memoir "My Mother Was Nuts," Marshall wrote that she never wanted to grow up, still seeing a connection to the little girl in the Bronx who'd plead with her mom to be allowed to play outside for five more minutes: "Through all the changes and the challenges of adulthood, I have never strayed too far … from that little girl with the ponytail and the overbite who wanted to keep playing for five more minutes." 

Canadian-born composer Galt MacDermot (December 18, 1928-December 17, 2018), who had studied African music in Cape Town and won a Grammy, was enlisted by Gerome Ragni and James Rado to write the music for their irreverent stage show replete with drug use, profanity, and a racially diverse cast, called "Hair." "In those days, there was a Broadway style of singing that we didn't want to use," MacDermot told "Sunday Morning" in 2009. "So Jim and Gerry used to go out and look for people who weren't trained, but just had natural talent."

MacDermot would win a Grammy for his score, which included "Aquarius," "Good Morning Starshine," "Easy to Be Hard" and the title song – memorable blends of rock and funk. "The '60s, when we were doing it, was a wonderful time for American music," MacDermot said. "That's when rock and roll reached its peak, really. So I was influenced by everything I heard. And everything I heard, I liked."

Play excerpt: "Hair"

MacDermot's other credits would include the stage shows "Two Gentlemen of Verona," "Dude," and "The Human Comedy," and the films "Cotton Comes to Harlem" and "Mistress."

"The Wrecking Crew" was the name given the unsung heroes of many '60s pop hits – session musicians, gifted in jazz, classical, blues and rock, who served as backup for artists like Herb Albert, Glen Campbell, Frank Sinatra, the Beach Boys, Simon & Garfunkel, the Mamas and the Papas, and Sonny and Cher. Among their number was bassist Joe Osborn (August 28, 1937-December 14, 2018), who performed on "Bridge Over Troubled Water," "California Dreamin'," "Aquarius/Let the Sun Shine In," "MacArthur Park," "Windy," and the theme song of the TV show "The Monkees," among hundreds of others.

Play excerpt: "Aquarius/Let the Sun Shine In"

Play excerpt: "California Dreamin'"

Play excerpt: "The Monkees Theme Song"

After Osborn moved from L.A. to Nashville he performed with Merle Haggard, Reba McIntire, Kenny Rogers, Chet Atkins, Neil Young, Billy Joel and Bob Dylan.

In a 2013 interview with KHCS DJ Chris May, Osborn recalled how in the 1950s, when he first took up the electric bass, he was criticized by other bass players for using a pick, telling him, "'The bass should be felt and not heard.' I didn't pay any attention to that!"

The polished pop-jazz vocals of Nancy Wilson (February 20, 1937-December 13, 2018) made her a platinum artist and top concert performer. Influenced by Dinah Washington, Nat King Cole and others, Wilson covered everything from jazz standards to "Little Green Apples," and in the 1960s alone released eight albums that reached the top 20 on Billboard's pop charts.

Born in Chillicothe, Ohio, the eldest of six children of an iron foundry worker and a maid, Wilson sang in church as a girl and by age 4 had decided on her profession. In high school she won a local TV station's talent contest and was given her own program. When she later moved to New York, she soon had a regular gig at The Blue Morocco. Then, a demo recording of "Guess Who I Saw Today" got her a phone call from Capitol Records. "Within six weeks I had all the things I wanted," she said in an interview.

Sometimes elegant and understated, or quick and conversational and a little naughty, she was best known for her breakthrough "Guess Who I Saw Today," and the 1964 hit "(You Don't Know) How Glad I Am," which drew upon Broadway, pop and jazz.

Play excerpt: "Guess Who I Saw Today"

"How Glad I Am" brought her a Grammy in 1965 for best R&B performance, and she later won Grammys for Best Jazz Vocal Album in 2005 for the intimate "R.S.V.P (Rare Songs, Very Personal)," and in 2007 for "Turned to Blue," a showcase for the relaxed, confident swing she mastered later in life. She performed worldwide at nightclubs, concert halls and jazz festivals.

Wilson also had a busy career on television, film and radio, including years hosting NPR's "Jazz Profiles" series. Active in the civil rights movement, including the Selma march of 1965, she received an NAACP Image Award in 1998.

She resisted being identified with a single category, especially jazz, and referred to herself as a "song stylist," covering songs by Stevie Wonder, the Beatles and Aretha Franklin.

"The music that I sing today was the pop music of the 1960s," she told the San Francisco Chronicle in 2010. "I just never considered myself a jazz singer. … I take a lyric and make it mine. I consider myself an interpreter of the lyric."

Sondra Locke (May 28, 1944-November 3, 2018), whose passing was not publicized until several weeks after her death, grew up in Tennessee, where she worked at a radio station and appeared in a handful of plays before winning a nationwide talent search to be cast opposite Alan Arkin in the movie adaptation of Carson McCullers' "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter." She won raves, and an Oscar nomination, for her debut film performance.

She was best known for the six films she made with director and co-star Clint Eastwood (whom she dated for 13 years), starting with the Western "The Outlaw Josey Wales" (1976), and including "The Gauntlet," "Every Which Way But Loose," "Any Which Way You Can," "Bronco Billy," and the Dirty Harry movie "Sudden Impact."

Locke also played singer Rosemary Clooney in a 1982 TV biopic, and directed the 1986 film "Ratboy," which flopped in the U.S., but was popular with critics in Europe. 

In 1997 she released her memoir, titled "The Good, the Bad and the Very Ugly: A Hollywood Journey," an account of her tumultuous relationship with Eastwood (she would sue him for palimony, and then fraud), and her battle with breast cancer. She told the Associated Press at the time that the title (a play on one of Eastwood's films) was "applicable to the story.

"I try to cover the good years as well as the bad and the ugly," Locke said. "Also, that in even the worst, ugly things, there can sometimes be a lot that will make you a better person."

Melvin Dummar (August 28, 1944-December 9, 2018) maintained that in late December 1967, he found an unshaved man with long stringy hair and baggy clothes face-down and bloody on a dirt road near Lida, Nevada. The man claimed to be Howard Hughes, an aviation and business tycoon who spent years in seclusion. "He told me who he was, but I didn't believe him," Dummar told the AP in 2006. "I thought he was just a bum or a prospector or something." Dummar ended up driving the man nearly 190 miles to Las Vegas before giving him some pocket change and dropping him off behind the Sands Hotel.

About eight years later, after Hughes died, a handwritten will, rife with misspellings, was dropped off at Dummar's gas station, addressed to the Mormon Church. The will named the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as beneficiary of $156 million – a 1/16 share of the Hughes estate – and also bequeathed $156 million to Dummar for rescuing him in the desert.

For years Dummar, whose story was depicted in the 1980 film "Melvin and Howard" (starring Paul Le Mat as Dummar and Jason Robards as Hughes), fought legal battles over the authenticity of the will. Jurors and judges decided against him. "I've been called everything from a crook to a forger," Dummar told the AP in 2007 in Utah, where he was then running a business selling frozen meat. "I don't care what people say - as long as they get the facts straight."

In 2005 a retired FBI agent uncovered new evidence and witnesses supporting Dummar's claim of finding Hughes and driving him to the Sands, and about the delivery of the envelope containing the will. But in 2008 a U.S. appeals court affirmed a Nevada state court jury's decision 30 years earlier that found the will was a fake.

"You've got to keep on living," Dummar told the Salt Lake Tribune in 2005 about his set-backs. But as the aspiring songwriter wrote in "All-American Dreamer":

Some say I'll never make it.
But one day I will score.
Some say I've lost the battle.
But I don't think I've lost the war.

One of the U.K.'s most influential songwriters, Pete Shelley (April 17, 1955-December 6, 2018) was co-founder of the punk rock band Buzzcocks, best known for songs dripping with irony and humor and played with manic speed, including "Ever Fallen in Love (With Someone You Shouldn't've)" and "What Do I Get?"

The band debuted in Manchester in 1976, opening for the Sex Pistols. When Howard Devoto left in 1977, Shelley took over as lead singer. The group would break up in 1981, thanks in part to exhaustion (they'd put out three albums in a year-and-a-half), but Shelley and Steve Diggle, two of the group's original members, reunited eight years later, and released the albums "Trade Test Transmissions" and "The Way," and the 2006 single "Wish I Never Loved You."

Play Excerpt: "Ever Fallen in Love (With Someone You Shouldn't've)"

Play Excerpt: "What Do I Get?"

Shelley also produced solo records, including "Sky Yen," the electronic "Homosapien," "XL1," and "Heaven and the Sea."

Play Excerpt: "Homosapien"

In 2010 Shelley told The A.V. Club that the secret for rock bands to stick together in their 50s, or older, compared to younger musicians was, "You don't panic. I suppose it's like being a stock-market investor. When you start off, the market goes up and then they're happy; when the market goes down, then they panic. So it's a bit like that with … a band. When you start out and you have initial success you think, 'Oh, this is great. We can do anything we want.' And then you get bad reviews and then you think, 'Oh no, the whole world is falling apart.' But after time, you get used to the ups-and-downs. … It's far more enjoyable, because you get to realize what [the work's] true value is."

When he was 14, Isiah Robertson (August 17, 1949-December 6, 2018) survived a freak accident aboard a fishing boat off Louisiana, when a fuel can exploded, killing two coaches from his high school. Robertson swam two miles to shore. "Life became very precious to me," he said of the experience to the Baton Rogue Advocate in 2017. "I've been trying to give back all my life to thank God for sparing me and giving me an opportunity to have this unbelievable life and the great people I've met."

An outstanding Southern University defenseman, and a first-round draft choice of the Los Angeles Rams in 1971, Robertson was one of the fastest NFL linebackers of his era. The Defensive Rookie of the Year, Robertson would be elected to the Pro Bowl six times, and finished his career with two seasons in Buffalo with the Bills.

But he hit a wall with a crack cocaine addition after retiring from the game, at one point nearly dying from a beating by drug dealers who stuck a shotgun in his mouth and pulled the trigger; the gun jammed. 

Remembering his ordeal in the fishing boat, Robertson overcame his addition, and founded the House of Isaiah, a faith-based drug and alcohol treatment center in Mabank, Texas. More than 5,000 men have passed through his program, what Robertson called his greatest achievement. 

Before acting, Philip Bosco (September 26, 1930-December 3, 2018) worked in a carnival as a trailer truck driver. He would emerge as one of Broadway's most respected actors, who won a Best Actor Tony Award in 1989 for his performance as the head of an opera company in the comedy "Lend Me a Tenor."

After earning a Tony nomination for his 1983 performance in George Bernard Shaw's "Heartbreak House" opposite Rex Harrison's Capt. Shotover, Bosco returned in a 2006 revival as Shotover himself. He also received Tony nominations for "The Rape of the Belt," ''You Never Can Tell," "Moon Over Buffalo" and "Twelve Angry Men."

Other Broadway credits include the musical "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang," "Copenhagen," "Twelfth Night," "The Heiress," "An Inspector Calls," "The Miser," "The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial," "Major Barbara," "Whose Life Is It Anyway?" "Threepenny Opera," "A Streetcar Named Desire," and "The Crucible." (Pictured: Bosco in "Master Class.")

His film credits included "Children of a Lesser God," "Working Girl," "My Best Friend's Wedding," "The Savages," "The First Wives Club," "Wonder Boys," and "The Money Pit."

A song-and-dance man who, while in the Army's Special Services entertainment branch served under Sgt. Leonard Nimoy, Ken Berry (November 3, 1933-December 1, 2018) had hoped for a career in movie musicals. But as that genre died out in Hollywood, he found himself a popular presence in television comedy, from guest appearances on musical variety shows (including Carol Burnett's, Glen Campbell's and Sony & Cher's), to starring roles in the sitcoms "F Troop" (as the pratfall-prone Captain Parmenter), "Mayberry RFD" and "Mama's Family." He also performed musical numbers in Las Vegas revues, and starred in family films like "The Cat From Outer Space" and "Herbie Rides Again."

A self-described "working actor" who loved his calling, despite the rejections and hard work he experienced in building up a career, Berry prided himself for being on time, knowing his lines, "and not costing anybody any money," he said in a 2012 interview for the Television Academy Foundation.

In his Inaugural Address in 1989 he said, "We live in a peaceful, prosperous time, but we can make it better. For a new breeze is blowing, and a world refreshed by freedom seems reborn." It was partially a prescient statement: President George H.W. Bush (June 12, 1924-November 30, 2018) would soon watch as the Berlin Wall crumbled and the Soviet Union dissolved, ending a decades-long Cold War. But he also spearheaded an international military strike against Saddam Hussein after the Iraqi dictator invaded neighboring Kuwait.

Born in 1924, the second-oldest son of investment banker and future Connecticut Senator Prescott Bush, he served as the Navy's youngest pilot during World War II, and was shot down in the Pacific over the island of Chichi Jima. After marrying Barbara Pierce, he became an oil man in Texas before entering politics. A Congressman, RNC Chairman, United Nations Ambassador, Envoy to China and CIA Director, Bush would become Vice President under Ronald Reagan before succeeding him in office. [He would also become only the second U.S. president to see his own son become a president himself.]

Following the Gulf War, in 1991, President Bush's approval rating was nearly 90%. And yet, the following year he lost his re-election bid to Bill Clinton, owing to his having broken his 1988 campaign mantra: "Read my lips: no new taxes." In his concession speech he allowed that he would continue to find ways to serve the public, while also getting active in "the grandchild business."

Coming from a family that prized public service, Mr. Bush had heralded "a thousand points of light" as a marker of community and volunteerism, and promoted those efforts beyond the White House. He also worked with fellow former presidents to raise millions for hurricane disaster relief and recovery. And if age ever got the better of him, it was hard to tell: on his 75th, 80th, 85th and 90th birthdays he marked the occasion by skydiving.

He was as accepting about his 1992 election loss as his public demeanor suggested. In a 1996 interview for "Sunday Morning," Mr. Bush told Paula Zahn, "There wasn't any period of self pity or thinking, on the other side of it, thinking you were entitled to a grand lifestyle.  … There was no [more] decision-making. Went from one day making decisions, getting worried about getting a call that something was wrong, the next day nothing, nobody gives a damn about what I thought, cared. And that was the way it ought to be."

A former marine biology teacher with a talent for art, Stephen Hillenburg (August 21, 1961-November 26, 2018), who grew up in Oklahoma, far from an ocean, dreamed up the character SpongeBob SquarePants, a perennially-optimistic yellow sponge who lives in a pineapple under the sea in Bikini Bottom. Utterly clueless and devil-may-care, the ridiculously gleeful SpongeBob, his starfish sidekick Patrick, and a vast cast of oceanic creatures quickly became a television hit on Nickelodeon, appealing to college kids and parents as well as children.

Over the course of 20 years the absurdist cartoon won four Emmys and 15 Kids Choice Awards. 2004 saw a big-screen movie (complete with singing and dancing pirates), and in 2015 a sequel, "The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water," was released.

The characters even made their way to Broadway in a musical (look, a tap-dancing squid!) that hooked a dozen Tony nominations.

In 2004 Hillenburg told David Edelstein, writing for The New York Times, "The show is about watching an innocent character in this world that he lives in. And the movie is about embracing innocence. It's saying that the childlike mind is O.K. It's saying that dorks can be really important."

His early ambition was to be a poet, like his father. Instead, Bernardo Bertolucci (March 16, 1941-November 26, 2018) would establish himself as a major name in international cinema, uncowed in dramatizing stories involving politics, class warfare, spirituality, eroticism and incest. Beginning his career as an assistant director for Pier Paolo Pasolini, he made his first film, "The Grim Reaper," about the murder of a prostitute, in 1962. By the early 1970s, he had already directed several acclaimed features, including "Before the Revolution," "The Spider's Strategem," and "The Conformist," a visually astonishing tale of a bureaucrat (Jean-Louis Trintignant) subsuming himself to the orders of Mussolini's secret police.

It was his bold and improvisational 1973 feature "Last Tango in Paris," starring Marlon Brando and Maria Schneider as a middle-aged man and younger woman engaged in a brutal sexual relationship, that earned Berlotucci both critical kudos and censorship. (The movie was banned in Italy.) He would later win two Academy Awards for writing and directing the sumptuous 1987 biopic "The Last Emperor" (pictured), the first Western production to be shot in Beijing's Forbidden City.

Bertolucci's other films include the five-hour epic "1900," about Italy during the rise of fascism, starring Robert De Niro, Gerard Depardieu and Dominique Sanda; "The Sheltering Sky," based on the Paul Bowles novel of an American couple's disintegrating relationship during a trip to Africa; "Little Buddha," about Siddharta; and "The Dreamers," an erotic drama set against the 1968 student riots in Paris.

In 2014 Bertolucci talked with Film Comment magazine about "Last Tango," his most talked-about film. (Schneider complained that Bertolucci had not properly warned her about the improvisational sex scenes.)

"When I started, I didn't know where I could go with Marlon Brando and Maria. Because there is something that you can't tell in the screenplays – and it's exactly what's missing from screenplays, which is the flesh and blood of the real people in front of the camera. The script describes the characters, but when you go to shoot, you try to invent life in front of the camera."

Introduced to magic by his grandfather, Ricky Jay (June 26, 1946-November 24, 2018), a true master of the craft, became both a student and guru of prestidigitation and memory tricks. Performing magic on TV as early as age 7, he would eventually open for rock bands in New York, and became a familiar presence on late night TV, when jaws would drop and minds would reel from his performances. His deftness with cards would earn him the honor, in the eyes of The New Yorker magazine, of "the most gifted sleight-of-hand artist alive."

Praised for his "closeup magic that flouts reality," Jay told expansive, entertaining stories while dealing cards, plucking the one card out of 52 that you just knew couldn't have possibly been plucked. How'd he do it? Magic!

He collected and researched the history and lore of magicians and illusionists, and was author of such books as "Cards as Weapons," "Learned Pigs & Fireproof Women" and "Celebrations of Curious Characters."

His expertise at illusions was also enlisted for the production of movies like "The Escape Artist," "The Prestige" and "Forrest Gump." He also acted in films and TV shows, including "Boogie Nights," "The Spanish Prisoner," "House of Games," "Deadwood" (as card sharp Eddie Sawyer), and the James Bond film "Tomorrow Never Dies," as a terrorist.

Magic, Jay told The New Yorker, "gives me more pleasure and more pain than anything else I've ever dealt with. The pain is bad magicians ripping off good ones, doing magic badly, and making a mockery of the art."

Nicolas Roeg (August 15, 1928-November 23, 2018) had already written himself into the film history books when he shot second-unit footage for David Lean's epic "Lawrence of Arabia," and was cinematographer on "The Masque of the Red Death," "Fahrenheit 451" and "Petulia." But by 1970 he had turned to directing himself, with the Mick Jagger film "Performance." He would later direct David Bowie in the sci-fi classic "The Man Who Fell to Earth."

Known for provocative stories, he was perhaps best known for the 1973 thriller "Don't Look Now," based on the Daphne Du Maurier tale, about a couple (Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie) mourning their daughter's death, who encounter strange goings-on with a psychic in Venice. Other notable credits include "Walkabout," set in the Australian outback; "Bad Timing: A Sensual Obsession"; "Insignificance"; and Roald Dahl's "The Witches."

Much of Roeg's acclaim for his work, from critics, other filmmakers, or ticket buyers, came after-the-fact, long after his films first hit screens, a fact that did not strike him with pleasure in a 2011 Guardian interview, when it was suggested he was "ahead of his time." 

"I hate that expression," Roeg said. "I don't want to be ahead of my time. This is my time. It's Marmite, isn't it? You like it or you don't."

During his 28 years as Librarian of Congress, James Billington (June 1, 1929-November 20, 2018), who grew up in a house filled with "used books," would bring the world's largest library into the digital age. An expert on Russian history when he was appointed by President Reagan, he is credited with creating a massive new Library of Congress online, at loc.gov, making research and legislative databases more easily accessible, and improving the Library's preservation efforts. Among them: The American Memory National Digital Library program, which features digital copies of more than 24 million books, documents, photographs and other cultural and historical assets.

He oversaw the institution of the National Film Registry and the National Recording Registry, and built the National Audio-Visual Conservation Center in Culpeper, Va., which stores six million films, TV broadcasts and audio recordings. And in 2010 he added to the Library's archive the entire collection of tweets, in the billions, sent via Twitter since the company was founded in 2006, and which it continued to archive until the end of 2017.

Always a research collection, the library's traditional analog collections were doubled during Billington's tenure, from 85.5 million items in 1987 to more than 160 million items. Among his notable acquisitions: the only copy of the 1507 Waldseemüller world map ("America's birth certificate") for permanent display, and hundreds of collections from notable Americans, including Thurgood Marshall, Irving Berlin and Jackie Robinson. He also co-founded (with Laura Bush) the National Book Festival in Washington.

"It's the closest thing we have to the national patrimony of intellectual and cultural creativity of the people of the United States," Billington said of the Library to McClatchy newspapers in 2014. 

"Nobody knows anything." That was the sage advice of Oscar-winning screenwriter William Goldman (August 12, 1931-November 16, 2018) when asked for the secret of what made a successful film.

He should have known; Goldman won Academy Awards for writing "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" and "All the President's Men" (for which he coined the immortal phrase "Follow the money"). He also wrote the screenplays for "The Princess Bride," "Marathon Man" and "Magic" (each adapted from his own novels), "Harper," "The Hot Rock," "The Stepford Wives," "The Great Waldo Pepper," "Misery" and "The Ghost and the Darkness," among others.

After the Chicago-born Goldman received his master's degree from Columbia University in 1956, he penned a novel, "The Temple of Gold," in under two weeks, and sold it to Knopf. More than 20 novels followed (some published under pen names), including "Soldier in the Rain" and "No Way to Treat a Lady," both of which became films. Goldman found work in movies himself (as did his older brother, James Goldman, who would win the Oscar for adapting his historical play, "The Lion in Winter"). In addition to his own screenplays, he also found service as a highly sought-after script doctor on such films as "A Few Good Men," "Twins," "Dolores Claiborne," "Malice" and "Indecent Proposal."

In 1983 as his career was beginning to cool (a screenplay he'd written for "The Right Stuff" was rejected), he wrote a memoir of his years in Hollywood, "Adventures in the Screen Trade," an invaluable treatise on the business and art of filmmaking. Other non-fiction books included "Wait Till Next Year," a collection of sports writing; and "Hype and Glory," about his experience judging the Cannes Film Festival.

Goldman always wanted to write, but his early aspiration was to be a sports writer, and he did not seem to take the results of his Hollywood labors too seriously. In "William Goldman: The Reluctant Storyteller," he rejected analysis of his work. "I'm just trying to tell a story," he said. "I wrote a movie called 'Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid' and I wrote a novel called "The Princess Bride,' and those are the only two things I've ever written, not that I'm proud of, but that I can look at without humiliation." 

Country star Roy Clark (April 15, 1933-November 15, 2018) was a guitar virtuoso and singer known for such hits as "Yesterday When I Was Young," "Honeymoon Feeling," "The Tips of My Fingers," "Come Live With Me," and instrumental versions of "Malaguena" and "Ghost Riders in the Sky."

Clark played the guitar, banjo, fiddle, mandolin, harmonica and other instruments – skills that brought him gigs as a guest performer with orchestras, including the Boston Pops. In 1976 he headlined a tour of the Soviet Union.

But his fame extended far beyond country radio, as host of "Hee Haw." The country music variety show aired on CBS for two years beginning in 1969, before continuing for another 22 years in syndication, and for years after in reruns.

Play an excerpt of Roy Clark performing "Foggy Mountain Breakdown"

In his 1994 autobiography, "My Life in Spite of Myself," the future Country Music Hall of Famer wrote that "Yesterday, When I Was Young" had "opened a lot of people's eyes not only to what I could do but to the whole fertile and still largely untapped field of country music, from the Glen Campbells and the Kenny Rogerses, right on through to the Garth Brookses and Vince Gills."

"I saw a fly crawling on a wall, and I thought, 'Gee, what if a guy could stick to walls like an insect?" recalled Stan Lee (December 28, 1922-November 12, 2018) to CBS' "Sunday Morning" in 2016. "That sounds good. So I started trying to think of some names. Insect-man? Nah. Mosquito-man? Nah. And then I got to Spider-man. Spider-man, ooh, that sounds dramatic!  And if he has spider power, he can shoot a web also. And he could swing ... oh man! And then I figured I'd make him a teenager, and I figured I would do the unthinkable: I'd give him personal problems.

"I ran into my publisher and I said, 'Have I got an idea for you! His name is Spider-man ...' And I couldn't get any further. He said, 'Stan, that is the worst idea I have ever heard!'"

The rest, of course, is the stuff of comic book lore, one of the premier characters Lee helped create at Marvel. He was the comic book company's top writer, and later its publisher. Working with artists such as Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko, Lee's wild ideas helped bring Iron Man, Hulk, Thor, the X-Men, the Avengers, Black Panther, and the Fantastic Four to life, making Lee a God of the Marvel Universe.

But it wasn't just his childhood fascination with Errol Flynn that inspired his comic books' derring-do. His superheroes had super powers, but also flaws, arguing amongst themselves and dealing with hang-ups – all key ingredients that went into his most famous character of all: Spider-man. His characters could also offer social commentary, refusing to shy away from the issues of the day, like war, race relations and drug abuse.

Lee's genius for vivid characters and stories left a mark on the popular imagination of generations of comic book fans, which translated to theatergoers when Marvel movies (in which he habitually appeared in cameos, with a nod and a wink) became box office powerhouses.

In a 2006 Associated Press interview Lee said of his comic book stories, "I think everybody loves things that are bigger than life. ... I think of them as fairy tales for grown-ups."

"I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do."

The voice of HAL 9000, the murderous computer at the heart of the spacecraft Discovery in Stanley Kubrick's landmark "2001: A Space Odyssey," was provided by Canadian actor Douglas Rain (March 13, 1928-November 11, 2018). A former student at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in London, he was head of the English acting section of the National Theatre School of Canada and a founding member of the Stratford Festival, in Ontario, where he spent 32 seasons performing Shakespeare. He was nominated for a Tony Award in 1972 for his role as William Cecil in "Vivat! Vivat! Regina!"

But his most indelible role came as a result of narrating a 1960 National Film Board of Canada short, "Universe," the visual effects of which had inspired Kubrick. The director turned to Rain to voice his on-board computer, after deciding the recorded performance by Martin Balsam was too emotional.

A supposedly perfect artificial intelligence who covers up a mistake by attributing it to "human error," and whose dialogue drips with irony, Hal murders the ship's crew members before he is "lobotomized" by the mission's sole survivor, David Bowman (played by Keir Dullea). Rain was chillingly neutral, whether talking about chess or locking an astronaut outside the ship. When asked by Bowman to let him back inside, Hal flatly responds, "I'm sorry, Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that."

Excerpt: Douglas Rain as Hal in "2001: A Space Odyssey"

Rain would return as Hal in the 1984 sequel, "2010," and was heard in an uncredited performance as a computer in Woody Allen's "Sleeper." He also narrated the Oscar-winning 1975 documentary, "The Man Who Skied Down Everest." And Hal's flat delivery would inspire Anthony Hopkins' performance as serial killer Hannibal Lecter.

Given his half-century career as a stage, radio and TV actor, Rain was dismissive of his immortal performance in "2001," which encompassed two days in a sound booth being fed lines by Kubrick. "If you could have been a ghost at the recording session," Rain recalled for the "2010 Odyssey Archive" blog, "you would have thought it was a load of rubbish."

Many of his peers regarded him as the greatest trumpeter of his generation. Two-time Grammy-winner Roy Hargrove (October 16, 1969-November 2, 2018) provided his jazz sound across a vast range of styles, through his own bands and as a sideman.

Hargrove brewed his jazz with African and Latin sounds, R&B, soul, pop, funk and hip-hop. He led the progressive, genre-melding group The RH Factor; played in sessions for Common, D'Angelo and Erykah Badu; and collaborated with jazz giants, including Herbie Hancock and Wynton Marsalis.

A native of Waco, Texas, Hargrove was discovered by Marsalis while playing at a performing-arts high school in Dallas. He went on to the Berklee College of Music in Boston and then transferred to the New School in New York, where he joined in jam sessions at jazz clubs in the evening, including at the Blue Note.

Hargrove released his first solo album, "Diamond in the Rough," when he was only 20 years old. He won his first Grammy in 1998 with his Afro-Cuban band Crisol for its album "Habana," then won another in 2002 for "Directions in Music: Live at Massey Hall," featuring a band he led with Hancock and saxophonist Michael Brecker.

Play excerpt: Roy Hargrove performing "Ms. Garvey, Ms. Garvey"

Play excerpt: Roy Hargrove performing "Mambo For Roy" from the album "Habana"

In 2012 Hargrove told the San Jose Mercury News, "If you have the tools to play jazz, you can do anything, because you have what it takes to make spontaneous music. It's about being able to come up with a melody and a rhythm on the spot, something that comes out of your heart.

"If truth be told, there were a lot of musicians back in the day who didn't read or write, but they were just able to make music. And if you had that in your heart, and in your ear, you had a lot more to grab from than people who are more technical. Not that the technical part is not important, because it is; you have to have dexterity. It's kind of like a perfect marriage, having that balance between that dexterity and what you have in your heart."

A first baseman and left fielder, Hall of Famer Willie McCovey (January 10, 1938-October 31, 2018) was nicknamed "Stretch" for his 6'4" frame, and his long arms, which helped propel 521 home runs during his 22 major league seasons, 19 of them with the San Francisco Giants. (He also played for the A's and Padres.)

A native of Mobile, Ala., McCovey made his major league debut at age 21 on July 30, 1959. He won that year's National League Rookie of the Year Award for batting.354, with 13 homers and 38 RBIs.

The six-time All-Star was the NL's Most Valuable Player in 1969, while playing alongside the Giants'  other Willie (Willie Mays), also a Mobile native.

"I'm not afraid of any pitcher," McCovey once stated. "I've been pitched almost every way, and I've hit every kind of pitch. There wasn't much else to do in Mobile."

"i will raise my voice / 
& scream & holler / 
& break things & race the engine / 
& tell all yr secrets bout yrself to yr face."

"For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow is Enuf," which debuted in 1976, was only the second play by an African-American woman to open on Broadway (after "A Raisin in the Sun"). Written by Ntozake Shange (October 18, 1948-October 27, 2018), "For Colored Girls" is a musical "choreopoem" performed by African-American women, each identified only by the color that she wears. The play describes the traumas of racism, sexism, violence and rape.

The show (in which Shange also appeared) won her an Obie Award, and when it transferred to Broadway was nominated for a Tony for Best Play, [It won for Best Featured Actress, Trazana Beverley.] An extremely influential work, it was made into a 2010 film featuring Thandie Newton, Tessa Thomspon, Whoopi Goldberg, Kerry Washington and Janet Jackson.

Shange won her second Obie in 1981 for an adaptation of Brecht's "Mother Courage and Her Children," and she penned several other plays, essays, poetry collections, novels and children's books.

In 2017, as she recovered from health problems, including two strokes, Shange told the website Shondaland that while she could not dance anymore, which she found inhibiting, she nonetheless could still cut loose: "I found that I can dance with my upper body, so I do that a lot. I have all my taxi drivers turn on the Latin stations, so I can dance in the backseat. I have them turn the music up real loud and have a big time in the backseat dancing."

He was a prolific and beloved character actor, whose most popular appearances included a shady real estate developer in "Poltergeist" (who didn't bother removing the bodies when he displaced a cemetery's headstones), a TV news producer in "The China Syndrome," and a foreman who becomes a zombie in the horror-comedy "The Return of the Living Dead." James Karen (November 28, 1923-October 23, 2018) was everywhere, from stage to TV, including a long run as a commercial spokesman for the supermarket chain Pathmark.

Born Jacob Karnovsky in Wilkes-Barres, Pa., he was interested in theater from an early age and, according to friend Leonard Maltin, turned down a contract with MGM because he wanted to work on the stage. His resume included Elia Kazan's 1940s stage production of "A Streetcar Named Desire" and Edward Albee's "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?"; appearing in Buster Keaton's "Film" (an experimental short written by Samuel Beckett); and being directed on screen by Alan J. Pakula ("All the President's Men"), Oliver Stone ("Wall Street," "Nixon"), and David Lynch ("Mulholland Drive"). His TV credits ranged from "Dallas" and "The Waltons" to "Seinfeld" and "The Larry Sanders Show."

In a 2016 interview at the New York Film Academy, Karen described his displeasure when Lee Strasberg became head of the Actors' Studio ["He took all the joy out of acting"], and recounted his discussion with his "Any Given Sunday" costar Al Pacino, who idolized Strasberg: "Pacino said, 'I don't understand why you didn't like him.' 'I just hated working with him, joyless.' He said, 'Oh, well, I like to suffer.' Which I didn't!

"I always thought acting in the theatre and movies should be a joyous experience!"

In February 1943 World War II saboteur Joachim Roenneberg (August 30, 1919-October 21, 2018) headed a five-man team that daringly blew up a plant producing heavy water, depriving Nazi Germany of a key ingredient it could have used to make nuclear weapons. Roenneberg, then 23, was tapped by the Special Operations Executive, or SOE (Britain's wartime intelligence gathering and sabotage unit) to destroy key parts of the heavily-guarded plant in Telemark, in southern Norway.

Parachuting onto snow-covered mountains, the group was joined by a handful of other commando soldiers before skiing to their destination. They then penetrated the fortress-like heavy-water plant to blow up its production line. Roenneberg said he made a last-minute decision to cut the length of his fuse from several minutes to seconds, ensuring that the explosion would take place but making it more difficult to escape. The group skied hundreds of miles across the mountains to escape, and Roenneberg (wearing a British uniform) ended up in neighboring neutral Sweden.

For this and other operations as part of the resistance movement, Roenneberg received Norway's highest military decoration, and was honored by the U.S., British and French governments as well.

In a 2014 Norwegian documentary about Operation Gunnerside, Roenneberg said the daring operation went "like a dream" – a reference to the fact that not a single shot was fired.

Dorcas Reilly (July 22, 1926-Oct. 15, 2018) was a Campbell Soup kitchen supervisor in 1955 when she combined the ingredients of the now-legendary green bean casserole for an Associated Press feature. The popular dish, made with green beans and cream of mushroom soup and topped with crunchy fried onions, is the most popular recipe ever to come out of Campbell's corporate kitchen.

In a 2005 AP interview marking the recipe's 50th anniversary, Reilly said she didn't remember having a hand in it because the dish was among hundreds that were created during her decades at Campbell's. [She also helped create a tomato soup meatloaf, a tuna noodle casserole, and Sloppy Joe-like "souperburgers.'']

The recipe is still a fixture on soup-can labels and television commercials. And Reilly said she always kept the ingredients for the casserole on hand in her home, just in case someone asked her to whip one up.

The recipe's website got 2.7 million visits during last year's holidays, the company said.

As teenagers in Seattle, Paul Allen (January 21, 1953-October 15, 2018) and Bill Gates were passionate about the workings of computers and coding. Their idea to take computers out of university and research labs and put them in people's hands was sparked in 1974, in Boston (Gates was then attending Harvard, Allen was a college dropout), when they came across a notice for a new small computer sold to hobbyists, the Altair. In eight weeks Allen and Gates wrote code that could run on the Altair and pitched it to the company. It was the birth of Microsoft, a giant in personal and business computing.

After creating the code MS-Basic, Microsoft developed and refined the operating system for IBM computers, which became the core of IBM PCs and clones. By 1991, Microsoft's operating systems (and such programs as Word and Excel) were used by 93 percent of the world's personal computers. Allen was Microsoft's executive vice president of research and new product development until 1983, when he resigned after being diagnosed with cancer – and he pursued a wide range of interests with the passion of a cancer survivor. "To be 30 years old and have that kind of shock – to face your mortality – really makes you feel like you should do some of the things that you haven't done yet," Allen said in a 2000 book, "Inside Out: Microsoft in Our Own Words."

One of the world's richest men, he devoted more than $2 billion of his wealth to philanthropy (including founding the Allen Institute for Brain Science). He also spent on such interests as music (he played in his own rock 'n' roll band, and built Seattle's Museum of Pop Culture), sports (he bought the Seattle Seahawks and the Portland Trail Blazers), science (he funded an antenna farm listening for signals from outer space, and built the aerospace firm Stratolaunch), movies (he invested in DreamWorks), and travel (he built a yacht longer than a football field, equipped with its own submarine).

"Look, in the Microsoft days, you had some great ideas and some great execution between me and Bill and many other people," he told "60 Minutes" correspondent Lesley Stahl in 2011. "In technology most things fail. Most companies fail. But I had some whoppers!"

Jim Taylor (September 20, 1935-October 13, 2018), the ferocious Hall of Fame fullback who embodied the Green Bay Packers' unstoppable ground game during the Vince Lombardi era, helped the team win four NFL titles and the first Super Bowl (and scored the first rushing touchdown in Super Bowl history). Taylor was the league's MVP in 1962. During his 10 seasons in the NFL (including one with the New Orleans Saints), he rushed for 8,597 yards.

Taylor was often compared to his contemporary, Cleveland's Jim Brown, but Vince Lombardi had different views on two of the most punishing running backs in the league at the time: "Jim Brown will give you that leg (to tackle) and then take it away from you," he said. "Jim Taylor will give it to you and then ram it through your chest."

Veteran character actor Scott Wilson (March 29, 1942-October 6, 2018) played a murderer in 1967's "In Cold Blood" and a murder suspect in "In the Heat of the Night." Wilson's other film credits included 1974's "The Great Gatsby," "The Right Stuff," "Dead Man Walking," "Monster," "Junebug," "Pearl Harbor," and "The Ninth Configuration," for which he earned a Golden Globe nomination. He also had a recurring role on the series "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation."

But he was best known for playing veterinarian Hershel Greene on the AMC series "The Walking Dead," a character the network called "the emotional core of the show."

An Atlanta native who hitchhiked to L.A. as a teenager, took an acting class, liked it, and stayed, Wilson told the Journal-Constitution in 2011 that his career had always been "up and down. … You have dry spells. At different times, you are starting over. If you love it, you stay with it. That's what I'm doing."

And he remained a familiar face. "I have people who come up to me who think we went to high school in places I've never been," Wilson said. 

When Robert F. Kennedy decided to duck through the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles after declaring victory in the 1968 Democratic presidential primary, an 18-year-old busboy reveled at his good fortune – he might get to shake hands with the next President of the United States. But after gunfire rang out and Kennedy fell, Juan Romero (1950-October 1, 2018) cradled the Senator's bleeding head.

"Is everybody OK?" Kennedy asked. Romero said yes.

"Everything will be OK," the senator replied shortly before losing consciousness.

As they talked, Romero pressed a set of Rosary beads into Kennedy's hand as photographers frantically took pictures. Because of the beads, his white busboy smock and the beatific look on his face, Romero was misidentified in some early news reports as a priest.

Josefina Guerra said her father felt guilty for years about the shooting, which she said broke his heart. Visiting Kennedy's gravesite a few years ago, Romero spoke to the Senator, asking him for forgiveness for the fact that he didn't react quickly enough to possibly take the bullet for him, or push him out of the way of danger.

Only recently, he said during rare interviews this year, did he finally come to terms with that struggle. He also said he still carried the example Kennedy had set as he campaigned for equality and civil rights. "I still have the fire burning inside of me," Romero said.

Animator Will Vinton (November 17, 1947-October 4, 2018) invented Claymation, a style of stop-motion animation using putty or clay instead of models. The technique was featured in his Oscar-winning 1974 short, "Closed Mondays."

His animation studio would become best-known for a series of TV commercials for the California Raisin Advisory Board, starting in 1986, that starred the California Raisins. His Claymation fruit danced and sang the Motown hit, "I Heard It Through the Grapevine." Vinton's Raisins would also appear (as cel animation) in a 1989 series, "The California Raisin Show," which ran for 13 episodes on CBS, which later sparked a sequel. Vinton also created Claymation TV specials, including the Emmy-winning "A Claymation Christmas Celebration" (1988).

In addition to other commercials (including those starring Domino's "Pizza Zoid"), Vinton created animation effects for the Michael Jackson music video "Speed Demon," and the film "Return to Oz." He also directed a feature-length Claymation film, "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer."

Vinton once described the quality of bringing clay to life, one frame at a time, to CBS' "48 Hours": "You see the material move, you see the stuff kind of come to life the way flesh comes to life."

But even an animator's hands-on touch can't guarantee popularity like that of the Raisins: "You can't create a phenomenon," he said. "It just sort of happens."

Recording engineer Geoff Emerick (December 5, 1945-October 2, 2018) worked with innumerable artists during his career, from Judy Garland to Cheap Trick, Supertramp, Elvis Costello and Jeff Beck. But his greatest success came through his monumental work with The Beatles on such landmark albums as "Revolver" and "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band."

A London native fascinated by music and technology from an early age, Emerick was an invaluable part of the Beatles' legacy as they became increasingly ambitious and experimental in the studio (including the embrace of effects like backward tape loops and double tracking). He was on hand as an assistant during the Beatles' early EMI sessions in 1962, and was promoted in the mid-1960s.

Producer George Martin recalled in a 1990s documentary that Emerick was unconventional: "He used to do really weird things [with microphones] that were slightly illegitimate, with our support and approval." His innovations on "Sgt. Pepper" included enhancing the sound of Ringo Starr's drums on "A Day in the Life" by loosening the skins and wrapping a microphone in a tea cloth and placing it in a glass container. McCartney also recorded bass lines after the rest of a given track was done – an unusual practice at the time.

Emerick became frustrated during the recording of the "White Album" and briefly quit, but returned for "Abbey Road," and worked with Paul McCartney on his solo "Band On the Run" album. He won three Grammys for engineering, and received a lifetime achievement award in 2004.

Play excerpt from The Beatles' "A Day in the Life"

Over eight decades, the French singer and actor Charles Aznavour (May 22, 1924-October 1, 2018) endeared himself to fans around the world with his versatile tenor, lush lyrics and kinetic stage presence, selling more than 180 million records. Often compared to Frank Sinatra, Aznavour started his career as a songwriter for Edith Piaf. He would write upwards of 1,000 songs by his own estimate, including the classic "La Boheme."

Play excerpt of Charles Aznavour singing "La Boheme"

He resisted description as a crooner, preferring instead " a songwriter who sometimes performs his own songs."

"What were my faults? My voice, my size, my gestures, my lack of culture and education, my honesty, or my lack of personality," the 5' 3" inch performer wrote in his autobiography. "My voice? I cannot change it. The teachers I consulted all agreed I shouldn't sing, but nevertheless I continued to sing until my throat was sore."

He also performed occasionally an an actor, appearing in Francois Truffaut's classic "Shoot the Piano Player" (1960), "The Tin Drum" (1979), and "Ararat" (2002). Of Armenian descent, Aznavour campaigned internationally to get the 1915 massacres of up to 1.5 million Armenians under the Ottoman Empire formally deemed a genocide. He also founded the nonprofit Aznavour and Armenia to aid victims of the 1988 earthquake. He also served in several ambassadorial roles, and in 2001 was awarded France's prestigious National Order of Merit.

"I am not trying to boast, but I have to admit that for an uneducated son of an immigrant I could have done far worse," Aznavour said.

Folk musician Marty Balin (January 30, 1942-September 27, 2018), pictured far left, both founded the San Francisco rock band Jefferson Airplane and co-owned the Matrix, the Bay Area club where the group performed as house band and which served as a stage for such local artists as the Grateful Dead and Janis Joplin.

Their "San Francisco sound" was a psychedelic blend of blues, folk, rock and jazz. Balin's yearning tenor could be heard on the songs "Today," "It's No Secret," and "Volunteers."

Excerpt: "Volunteers" by Jefferson Airplane

"I remember it was really pretty and beautiful for a year or two," Balin told Relix magazine in 1993. "And then Time magazine came out and they were interviewing me. I told the guy, 'It's great that you're publicizing this beautiful-feeling scene out here,' and he looked me right in the eye and said, 'Fastest way to kill it.'"

The Airplane would break up, in part owing to Balin's acknowledged jealousy of Grace Slick, who'd joined the group in the fall of 1966, soon before their second album, "Surrealistic Pillow." (Slick displaced Balin as lead singer on the Airplane's best-known songs, "Somebody to Love" and "White Rabbit.")

Excerpt: "Somebody to Love" by Jefferson Airplane

In the mid-1970s, members regrouped as Jefferson Starship, and Balin sang lead on such hits as "Miracles" (which he co-wrote), "With Your Love" and "Count On Me." He later had solo success with "Hearts" and "Atlanta Lady" – and he returned to his folk roots, playing as part of an acoustic trio.

NFL Hall of Famer Tommy McDonald (July 26, 1934-September 24, 2018) was a two-time All-American from Oklahoma who played 12 NFL seasons for five teams and was a six-time Pro Bowl selection. Amid rumblings that the 5-foot-7, 175-pound McDonald was too small to play in the NFL, the Eagles drafted him in the third round in 1957. The small, speedy and sure-handed receiver teamed with quarterback Norm Van Brocklin to help the Philadelphia Eagles win the NFL championship three years later.

When he retired in 1968, he ranked second in league history in touchdown catches, fourth in yards receiving, and sixth in receptions.

But McDonald had to wait 30 years before becoming the smallest player inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. "Oh, baby!" McDonald shouted in Canton, Ohio on Aug. 1, 1998. His induction speech was equal parts hysterics and histrionics, as McDonald told jokes and tossed his 25-pound bronze bust in the air. He even pulled out a radio and danced to disco music, all on the steps of the hallowed hall.

"Do I look excited, like I just won the lottery or the jackpot? Yes! I'm in the Hall of Fame!"

His early Hollywood resume as an assistant director, production manager and editor allowed him to cross paths with such cultish figures as Jack Nicholson, Dennis Hopper and Warren Oates, even if the films ("Voyage to the Prehistoric Planet") were considerably less stellar. But after serving as a Marine in Vietnam, Gary Kurtz (July 27, 1940-September 23, 2018) paired up with director George Lucas on "American Graffiti," which Kurtz produced (with Francis Ford Coppola), earning him a Best Picture Oscar nomination.

According to a family statement, Kurtz's religious studies would inspire a universal religion for Lucas' fantasy film, "Star Wars." Kurtz produced that blockbuster and its sequel, "The Empire Strikes Back," before branching off to tackle the Jim Henson fantasy "The Dark Crystal" and "Return to Oz." Later credits included "Slipstream" (starring Mark Hamill), "The Steal," "5-25-77," and the TV series "Friends and Heroes."

In 2014 Kurtz explained the origin of the Force to the website Mashable: "When you're out in the real world, religion is identified by handles. You're either a Christian or a Muslim or a Jew or a Buddhist or Hindu. As soon as you say one of those words, you know what's behind that, even if you haven't studied any of those religions. … We wanted something like that with a religion that nobody's ever heard of. …

"[George and I] did have long discussions about various religious philosophies, and how people related to them, and how we could simplify it. 'May the Force be with you' came out of medieval Christianity, where 'May God go with you' was a symbol that you would be safe. We wanted something as simple as that, an everyday expression that linked to the power of the Force that wasn't overbearing."

In 1986 Arthur Mitchell (March 27, 1934–September 19, 2018) told "60 Minutes" correspondent Ed Bradley that, when he was a teenager, people did not encourage his pursuit of dance: "Friends, people that you know in the business, they kept saying, 'Why are you studying ballet? There will never be a black man in the ballet until the year 2000.' And the minute they told me I could not become a dancer, that's when that something inside me said, 'Oh, really? I'll show you!'"

Born in Harlem, the son of a building superintendent, Mitchell rose to become a star performer with the New York City Ballet under George Balanchine, whose pairing of Mitchell with a white dancer in the late '50s was deemed audacious.

Mitchell also choreographed his own works, performed on Broadway, and worked with dance companies in other countries. In 1968, committed to living up to the legacy of murdered civil rights pioneer Martin Luther King Jr., Mitchell started a school for classical dance at a time when few people of color were performing classical ballet (and even fewer were teaching it). It would grow into the Dance Theatre of Harlem, the country's first major African-American dance company.

Mitchell would also introduce inner-city children to the arts via Dancing Through Barriers, a program that taught tens of thousands of kids every year in cities from New York to Miami to London.

Often referred to as the father of postmodernism, architect Robert Venturi (June 25, 1925–September 18, 2018) shunned the title, despite having broken with the Modernist school principle that "less is more" … insisting to the contrary that (as he put it) "less is a bore!" He would reject the austere designs and spare aesthetics of modernists like Mies van der Rohe, and produce buildings that celebrated complexity and even inconsistency in design.

Venturi designed buildings bursting with ornamentation and flourishes, and encouraged architects and consumers to enjoy "messy vitality" in architecture, whether whimsical, sarcastic, humorous or honky-tonk. His first notable building was a house he designed for his mother in Philadelphia's Chestnut Hill neighborhood in 1961. It broke from the established architectural thinking of the time, that a modern house should contain no historical elements. Architect Frederick Schwartz referred to the Vanna Venturi House (pictured) as "the first postmodern anything."

"A while back, when it was considered very daring, we did very simple things," Venturi said in 1991. "We did buildings that looked ordinary, that were not trying to be revolutionary the way modern architecture was going to go. That horrified people. We did houses that looked like houses, elemental concepts of houses. We did fire stations that looked like fire stations."

In 1991, Venturi was awarded the prestigious Pritzker Prize, for "expanding and redefining the limits of architecture in this century, as perhaps no other has."

Rap artist Mac Miller (January 19, 1992-September 7, 2018) was "known for his canny wordplay and artistic reinvention" and his "refusal to fit in an artistic box," wrote Rolling Stone. 

Born Malcolm James McCormick in Pittsburgh, he got his start in the music industry with the local independent label Rostrum Records, where he frequently collaborated with rapper Wiz Khalifa. His debut solo album "Blue Slide Park" debuted at the No. 1 spot on the Billboard album chart in 2011.

In a 2016 Rolling Stone interview, Miller was asked to explain his neck tattoo of a lotus flower. He offered: "A lotus flower shines most beautiful in the murkiest of waters."

Actor Burt Reynolds (February 11, 1936-September 6, 2018) rose to stardom with action films and raucous comedies like "Deliverance," "The Longest Yard," "Smokey and the Bandit" and "The Cannonball Run." He reveled in his persona as a 1970s sex symbol (and even winked at it with a nude photo shoot for Cosmopolitan magazine), and later found a new generation of fame with "Boogie Nights" in the late '90s, earning an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe. He also won an Emmy Award for the CBS sitcom "Evening Shade."

"My career is not like a regular chart; mine looks like a heart attack," he told The Associated Press in 2001. "I've done over 100 films, and I'm the only actor who has been canned by all three networks. I epitomize longevity."

Actor Bill Daily (August 30, 1927-September 4, 2018) was an affable second-banana to astronaut Larry Hagman on the 1960s sitcom "I Dream of Jeannie." A jazz musician and improv comic who had dyslexia, Daily had been in the background of a reading for the "Jeannie" pilot when producer Sidney Sheldon noticed him, and created the role of Roger Healey for Daily.

He later played the next-door neighbor of Bob Newhart on the comedian's 1970s series, and psychiatrist Larry Dykstra on "Alf." He also directed theater, and was a frequent panelist on "Match Game."

In a 2003 interview for the Television Academy Foundation, Daily said reading scripts was always difficult (no one knew he was dyslexic), and that he had trouble going up for commercial or movie auditions because he wouldn't be allowed to do improvs instead, and had to find other ways to impress others with humor. "I'm incredibly lazy, and if I could read, I wouldn't have used that part of my brain that I have to use … if things were easy for me, I would never have gotten anywhere, I wouldn't have done anything."

Growing up, Randy Weston (April 6, 1926-September 1, 2018) was exposed to all genres of music by his parents – everything from jazz, gospel and calypso to classical and opera. Returning home from World War II, the Army vet worked at his father's Caribbean-style restaurant, Trios, in Brooklyn. There he befriended such music greats as Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, and Igor Stravinsky. He would eventually become a musician and composer whose work fused American jazz and blues with African rhythms, melding such influences as Max Roach, Count Basie, Art Tatum, Thelonious Monk and Duke Ellington.

His first album, in 1954, reinterpreted Cole Porter standards, and he would collaborate with poet Langston Hughes on "Uhuru Afrika." His subsequent releases showed an increasing reliance on the music of Africa, and he traveled extensively on the continent, exploring his musical roots. A tour for the State Department in the 1960s landed him in Morocco, where he settled for five years, running the African Rhythms Club in Tangiers.

Over the years Weston would record 50 albums, including 1992's "The Spirit of Our Ancestors."

Play Excerpt: "African Village Bedford Stuyvesant 1" by Randy Weston

In 2014 Weston told the Telegraph newspaper, "The great thing about African music is it's not music for the young, or the old, it's music for everybody."

An iconic figure in the world of dance, Paul Taylor (July 29, 1930-August 29, 2018) conjured works that reflected the heights and depths of the human condition with scintillating athleticism and humor. A year after graduating Juilliard in 1953, at age 24, Taylor founded his own company, collaborating with artist Robert Rauschenberg on his first production. A year later he became a soloist for Martha Graham, while continuing to shape his own company into one of the world's most successful contemporary troupes.

The pairing of classical music (particularly 18th-century Baroque) with modern dance was one of Taylor's hallmarks. His signature work was 1975's "Esplanade" (center), a joyful scene of dancers hurtling themselves at each other, set to concertos by Bach. Taylor also created dances for such noted artists as Mikhail Baryshnikov (right top) and Rudolf Nureyev.

Taylor kept working well into his 80s, venturing to his company's Manhattan studios from his Long Island home to choreograph two new pieces a year; he created 147 in all during his 64-year career.

In the 2014 documentary "Paul Taylor: Creative Domain," the choreographer said, "Dance, I've always thought it's like poetry. Poems don't always spell everything out, you know. They need room between the lines."

Although he was known for memorable comedic moments, prolific playwright and screenwriter Neil Simon (July 4, 1927-August 26, 2018) had a difficult childhood growing up in the Bronx, as his father frequently left the family. Humor helped get him through the difficult times. "Well, it explained things to me anyway," he told "Sunday Morning" in 2006. "It made it easier to deal with if you were able to laugh at it."

Simon often used his own experiences for comic material, from "Biloxi Blues" to "Brighton Beach Memoirs" and "Broadway Bound." Writing gags for TV, especially Sid Caesar's "Your Show of Shows," would also inspire his play "Laughter on the 23rd Floor."

Many of his biggest Broadway hits, including "Barefoot in the Park," "The Odd Couple," "Last of the Red Hot Lovers," "Sweet Charity," "The Prisoner of Second Avenue," "Plaza Suite," "The Sunshine Boys" and "Chapter Two," would be adapted for films and TV.  He also wrote original screenplays, including "After the Fox," "The Heartbreak Kid," "The Out-of-Towners" and "The Goodbye Girl."

In all, Simon earned four Oscar nominations, won three Tony Awards and a Golden Globe, and received the Pulitzer Prize (for "Lost in Yonkers").

Being the toast of Broadway meant something quite personal for Simon. As he told "Sunday Morning," "Many times I would go to the theatre and stand in the back and people would come up and they say, 'How do you know my father?' 'How do you know my cousin?' I seem to have touched that aspect of their lives that's familiar with them as familiar with me … Making a connection with millions of people is pretty good!"

He was an American hero and a maverick. By most standards, Arizona Senator John McCain (August 29, 1936-August 25, 2018) was a man of courage and zealously-guarded ideals. The son and grandson of four-star Navy admirals, McCain was a rebellious student who, by his own volition, "didn't conform to the rules and regulations of either high school or the Naval Academy." Nevertheless, he volunteered for combat duty during the Vietnam War, and was shot down during a bombing mission. Severely injured, McCain was captured and held at the so-called "Hanoi Hilton," enduring torture and frequent beatings. He remained in captivity for five-and-a-half years, rejecting an early release when he refused to leave his fellow POWs behind.

In 1982, he took his fighting spirit to Washington, as a Congressman and later Senator, standing out for his "straight talk," especially on subjects like campaign finance and climate change. He ran for president in 2000, and again in 2008, when he won the Republican nomination to run against Senator Barack Obama.

One of the most forceful voices in the Senate, where he led the Armed Services Committee, he wasn't afraid to buck his own party, voting last year against the Republicans' attempt to kill Obamacare.

"I was raised in the con