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Houston Man Who Invented Weed Eater Dies at 85.

Ballas got the idea for the Weed Eater, a device also commonly known as a weed whacker, while sitting in a car wash. He wondered whether the idea of spinning bristles, like the ones cleaning his car, could be applied to trimming grass and weeds in areas a lawnmower couldn’t reach.

He experimented with fishing wire that poked through holes in a tin can attached to the rotary of a lawn edger, and found that the spinning wires easily sliced through grass.

James P. Hosty, Investigated Oswald, Dies at 86.

Special Agent James P. Hosty had a few dozen cases in his portfolio in October 1963 when his supervisor in the Dallas office of the F.B.I. handed him another. It was the well-thumbed file on a suspected communist agitator and possible spy named Lee Harvey Oswald.

Mr. Hosty tried to find Oswald during two trips into the field in early November, without any luck.

Carl Gardner, Singer with Coasters Pop Group, Dies at 83

Carl Edward Gardner was born in Tyler, Tex., on April 29, 1928. His father, Robert, was a hotel bellman who, according to Mr. Gardner’s autobiography “Yakety Yak I Fought Back,” ran a side business in bootleg liquor. His mother, Rebecca, was a Comanche Indian whose fine singing voice was the source of his own.

In songs like “Yakety Yak,” a parental warning to a teenager to behave — “Don’t talk back!” — and do chores; “Charlie Brown,” a portrait of a class clown (“Who calls the English teacher Daddy-o?”); “Poison Ivy,” about the kind of girl who will make a young man itchy with desire (“You’re going to need an ocean/Of calamine lotion”), the Coasters spoke to teenagers in winking, clean-cut little melodramas.

Wally Boag, Cowboy Comedian at Disneyland, Dies at 90.

Under a very broad-brimmed cowboy hat, with six-shooters at his hips and a carpetbag supposedly chock-full of snake oil—but really filled with gag props—Mr. Boag would crack up audiences with cornball banter, card tricks, squirt guns, balloon animals and a seemingly inexhaustible supply of broken teeth (actually pinto beans) which he would spit out in rapid fire.

Cornell Dupree, Guitarist and Sideman to the Stars, Dies at 68

The average listener may not have known Mr. Dupree’s name (“Not many people read the back of albums,” he acknowledged in a 1997 interview in The Dallas Observer), but millions knew his playing. His licks are an indispensable part of a number of Ms. Franklin’s biggest hits, Brook Benton’s “Rainy Night in Georgia” and many other records.

Ron Springs, Fullback for the Cowboys, Dies at 54

His kidney failure stemmed from Type 2 diabetes, which he learned he had in the early 1990s. It led to the amputation of his right foot and two toes from his left foot, withered arms and gnarled hands.

But when doctors told Springs he needed a new kidney in 2004, he refused to allow his son, Shawn, a cornerback in the National Football League, to even be tested for compatibility as a donor, knowing that the loss of a kidney would end his son’s playing career.

Louis Stumberg, Who Brought Tex-Mex to TV Dinners, Dies at 87.

From a plant in San Antonio, the Stumbergs began shipping frozen tamales and chili across the state. “They would go to grocery stores and my father would put a clip under the hood of his car” over the engine block, Herb Stumberg said. “He would put a frozen dinner in that clip. That was the way he would heat it as a demonstration to the buyer.”

Ralph Mooney, Master of the Steel Guitar, Dies at 82

Mr. Mooney’s cascading steel guitar runs galvanized several of Buck Owens’s early signature hits, including “Above and Beyond” and “Under Your Spell Again.” The epitome of the ebullient Bakersfield sound that took root in California in the late 1950s, these recordings influenced not only future country singers like Dwight Yoakam and Jim Lauderdale but also rock ’n’ roll bands like the Beatles, the Byrds and the Flying Burrito Brothers.

…In 1970 Mr. Mooney joined Jennings’s studio and touring band, with which he played for two decades. He added a crisp melodic counterpoint to the group’s gritty, percussive sound, including the outlaw country anthem “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys.”

…The cause was complications of cancer, said Wanda Mooney, his wife of 62 years.

Pinetop Perkins, Delta Boogie-Woogie Master, Dies at 97

Born on July 7, 1913, in Belzoni, Miss., Mr. Perkins, who dropped out of school after the third grade, taught himself the rudiments of blues guitar on a homemade instrument called a diddley bow: a length of wire stretched between nails driven into a wall. He began entertaining at dances and house parties at age 10 and soon learned to play the piano as well.

…From his days in the groups of Muddy Waters and slide guitarist Robert Nighthawk to the vigorous solo career he fashioned over the last 20 years, Mr. Perkins’s accomplishments were numerous and considerable. His longevity as a performer was remarkable — all the more so considering his fondness for cigarettes and alcohol; by his own account he began smoking at age 9 and didn’t quit drinking until he was 82. Few people working in any popular art form have been as prolific in the ninth and tenth decades of their lives.

A sideman for most of his career, Mr. Perkins did not release an album under his own name until his 75th year. From then until his death he made more than a dozen records on which he was the leader. His 2008 album, “Pinetop Perkins & Friends” (Telarc), included contributions from admirers like B. B. King and Eric Clapton.

Drew Hill, Receiver for Run-and-Shoot Oilers, Dies at 54

He emerged as a star when he teamed with the future Hall of Fame quarterback Warren Moon while playing for the Oilers from 1985 to 1991. In their run-and-shoot offense, featuring four receivers instead of the usual two wideouts and a tight end, Hill generally played alongside Ernest Givins, Haywood Jeffires and Curtis Duncan to spread the defense. With Moon having a wide variety of options for his brilliant passing, the Oilers were usually a playoff team.

(via NYT)

Velvet-Voiced Ferlin Husky Dies at 85

The first major country star to come out of the Bakersfield scene that later produced Buck Owens and Merle Haggard, Mr. Husky was also known for his generosity with up-and-coming performers, including Dallas Frazier and Mr. Owens. “Buck Owens? I dressed him up, putting some decent clothes on him, and got him with Capitol,” Mr. Husky said in a 2004 interview published in the British magazine Country Music People.

Wally Yonamine, 85, Dies; Changed Japanese Baseball

“On the field he was like Pete Rose, hustling all the time, running people over,” Fitts said. “He introduced the hook slide and drag bunt. The Japanese were appalled by it, but then they slowly started adapting it themselves, because they saw it won games.”

The Hawaiian-born Yonamine went to Japan with three dreams: to manage a championship ballclub, get elected to the hall of fame, and shake hands with the emperor. He accomplished all three.

Greg Goossen, Baseball Player Who Broke Mold, Dies at 65

It was Casey Stengel who made Goossen a baseball trivia legend with one remark in 1966. Stengel, having retired as the Mets manager the previous season, was visiting the Mets’ training camp when he pointed at Goossen and was reported to have said, “Goossen is only 20, and in 10 years he has a chance to be 30.”

Troy Jackson, Street Basketball Star, Is Dead at 38

At 6 feet 10 inches and as much as 500 pounds, Jackson cut an unlikely figure on the court. Nicknamed Escalade after the Cadillac sport utility vehicle, he had supple ball-handling skills that surprised opponents and spectators alike.