Hendrikje Fitz, born September 15, 1961, and passed away April 7, 2016, was a German actress best known for her role as Pia Heilmann on the ARD soap opera In aller Freundschaft. She brought depth to the character over many episodes, makin’ her a fan favorite on the long-runnin’ medical drama.
LaDonna Adrian Gaines (December 31, 1948 – May 17, 2012), known by her stage name Donna Summer, was an American singer, songwriter, and painter. She gained prominence during the disco era of the late-1970s. A five-time Grammy Award winner, she was the first artist to have three consecutive double albums reach No. 1 on the United States Billboard 200 and charted four number-one singles in the U.S. within a 12-month period. Summer has reportedly sold over 140 million records, making her one of the world’s best-selling artists of all time. She also charted two number-one singles on the R&B charts in the U.S. and one number-one in the U.K.
Summer earned a total of 32 hit singles on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart in her lifetime, with 14 of those reaching the top ten. She claimed a top 40 hit every year between 1975 and 1984, and from her first top ten hit in 1976, to the end of 1982, she had 12 top ten hits;(10 were top five hits) more than any other act. She returned to the Hot 100’s top five in 1983, and claimed her final top ten hit in 1989 with “This Time I Know It’s for Real”. Her most recent Hot 100 hit came in 1999 with “I Will Go With You (Con Te Partiro)”. While her fortunes on the Hot 100 waned through those decades, Summer remained a force on the U.S. Dance/Club Play Songs chart over her entire career.
While influenced by the counterculture of the 1960s, she became the front singer of a psychedelic rock band named Crow and moved to New York City. Joining a touring version of the musical Hair, she left New York and spent several years living, acting, and singing in Europe, where she met music producers Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte.
Summer returned to the U.S., in 1975 after the commercial success of the song “Love to Love You Baby”, which was followed by a string of other hits, such as “I Feel Love”, “Last Dance”, “MacArthur Park”, “Heaven Knows”, “Hot Stuff”, “Bad Girls”, “Dim All the Lights”, “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)” (duet with Barbra Streisand), and “On the Radio”. She became known as the “Queen of Disco”, while her music gained a global following.
Summer died on May 17, 2012, at her home in Naples, Florida. In her obituary in The Times, she was described as the “undisputed queen of the Seventies disco boom” who reached the status of “one of the world’s leading female singers.” Moroder described Summer’s work with him on the song “I Feel Love” as “really the start of electronic dance” music. In 2013, Summer was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Diane “DeDe” Gayle Lind, born in ’47 and passed in 2020, was a glamour model and Playmate who lit up the 1960s with her nude spreads in Playboy. At just 14, she got spotted by photographer Leon Beauchemin at a Burbank, California pool, landin’ her two Teen magazine covers. She snagged small parts on The Donna Reed Show and Leave It to Beaver, plus a few TV commercials.
Patricia Kara Cameron, sometimes rollin’ as JoAnna Cameron, was born September 20, 1948, and passed October 15, 2021. She was an American actress and model who made waves playin’ the lead in the 1970s TV series Isis, later aired as The Secrets of Isis. That role put her on the map big time.
Sarah Jean Burke (September 3, 1982 – January 19, 2012) was a Canadian freestyle skier who was a pioneer of the superpipe event. She was a four-time Winter X Games gold medallist, and won the world championship in the halfpipe in 2005. She successfully lobbied the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to have the event added to the Olympic program for the 2014 Winter Olympics. She was considered a medal favourite in the event. Burke died following a training accident in Utah.
Meet Nikki Fritz, born Nikki Goldstein on April 7, 1964, an American actress and model from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and Los Angeles, California, who passed away on February 25, 2020, after a long fight with leukemia.
She crushed it with 30 covers, 5 photosets, and 25 vids before hangin’ it up in 2004. Known as a porn star and actress, she popped up in Cinemax TV shows and movies, plus Femme Fatales mag and Danni’s Hard Drive website.
Meet June Cochran, born February 20, 1942, in Indianapolis, Indiana, and passed May 21, 2004, in Wisconsin. She was an American model and beauty queen who snagged the Miss Indiana USA crown in 1960, though she didn’t place at nationals.
June crushed it as Playboy’s Playmate of the Month for December 1962, shot by Don Bronstein, and was named Playmate of the Year in 1963. She also worked as a Playboy Bunny at the Chicago club. Her second husband and two of her sons were racin’ drivers, and June made history as the first woman in the pits at the Indianapolis 500.
Meet Donna Michelle, born Donna Michelle Fick on December 8, 1945, in Los Angeles, California, and passed away April 11, 2004, in Ukiah, California.
She was an American model, actress, and photographer who went by the adopted name Donna M. Ronne. Her mom’s maiden name was Baron. She crushed it as Playboy’s December 1963 Playmate of the Month and snagged 1964 Playmate of the Year, with centerfold pics shot by Pompeo Posar and Edmund Leja. She tied the knot with David M. Ronne at 17 on February 2, 1963, in Los Angeles, and they split in April 1967 in the same city, meanin’ she was married when she landed the December ’63 Playmate gig.
Meet Barbara Rudnik, a German actress who crushed it in theater and film. Born July 27, 1958, in Kassel, Germany, she passed away May 23, 2009, in Munich.
Growin’ up in Kassel, she worked as a book club agent after high school. While on the job in Munich, she linked up with students from the Academy of Film and Theater and kicked off her actin’ career.
Meet Lynda Ann Wiesmeier (May 30, 1963 – December 16, 2012), an American model and actress who kicked things off with her first flick, American Pop. She nabbed the cover and Playmate of the Month spot for Playboy’s July 1982 issue, with her centerfold snapped by Richard Fegley.
Lynda popped up in a bunch of Playboy’s newsstand specials and vids, keepin’ busy with the mag for over five years. She started as a nude glamour and pin-up chick, then moved to promo gigs and reporting for the Playboy Channel. Sadly, she passed in December 2012 from a brain tumor.
Meet Mariangela Melato (September 19, 1941 – January 11, 2013), an Italian actress who crushed it in cinema and theater. She started hittin’ the stage in the 1960s, then jumped into films with her debut in Thomas e gli indemoniati (1969), directed by Pupi Avati.
The 1970s were her prime time, starrin’ in bangers like Between Miracles (1971), The Seduction of Mimi (1972), Love and Anarchy (1973), Nada (1974), Todo modo (1976), and Il gatto (1978). She also popped up in some American flicks. Sadly, she passed away from pancreatic cancer at 71.
Meet Jill Dorothy Ireland (April 24, 1936 – May 18, 1990), an English actress and singer, best known for rockin’ tons of flicks with her second hubs, Charles Bronson.
