NEWSMAKERS

September 7, 2010 at 12:00a.m.

NEWSMAKERS

Lennon still helping me, Yoko Ono says

LONDON

Yoko Ono said John Lennon is still helping her in her endeavours as an artist and peace activist as she paidtribute to her late husband before what would have been his 70th birthday.

Ono visited Lennon’s childhood home and school in northern England’s Liverpool on Friday. She was welcomed by hundreds of students at Dovedale School, before she went to the semi-detached family home that Lennon shared with his aunt from 1945 to 1963.

The musician was shot outside his New York home in 1980, when he was 40. He would have been 70 on Oct. 9.

Ono will travel from her home in New York to Iceland on Lennon’s birthday to light the Imagine Peace Tower, an illuminated memorial.

Ex-ELO cellist killed in collision with hay bale

LONDON

Police in southwestern England say a former member of the Electric Light Orchestra was killed in a freak collision with a huge hay bale that rolled down a steep hill.

The victim was identified on Monday as 62-year-old Mike Edwards, who played cello in the British rock band between 1972 and 1975.

Sgt. Steve Walker of the Devon and Cornwall Police said Edwards was driving a van Friday when he collided with a 1,300-pound hay bale that had rolled down a hill to the road.

Founder of grief support group dies

LOS ANGELES

Overwhelmed by the grief of widowhood in the early 1980s, Helen Krogh placed an advertisement in a newspaper seeking others in the same situation in Sacramento, Calif., who might want to gather to talk.

Six days later, she was exhausted from answering the phone but had knit together a core group of “founding mothers” of what became a statewide support group, Widowed Persons Association of California, her family said.

Krogh died Aug. 20 of a cerebral hemorrhage at her Sacramento home, said her son, Randy Atkinson. She was 78.

Twice divorced, she married Donald Krogh — pronounced “crow” — in 1978. Theirs was a “great romance,” she later said, that ended when he died ofcancer at 57 in 1982.

She got counselors trained and set up informal get-togethers called “chat and chews,” which were held at restaurants. Krogh made public appearances to speak about grief and organized classes to teach independent living skills.

“The story she always liked to tell was that, in her generation, the men didn’t know how to do laundry or cook, and the women didn’t know how to pay the bills,” her son said.

For about 12 years, Krogh ran or was deeply involved in the organization, which has almost two dozen California chapters.

She was born Jan. 8, 1932, in Rochester, N.Y., and lived in Washington, D.C., during World War II when her father, an Army colonel, worked at the Pentagon.

After earning her bachelor’s degree from Hood College in Maryland, she became a reporter at a Rochester newspaper and taught school in New York and Florida.

She held two master’s degrees, one in journalism from the University of Florida and the other in sociology from the University of California-Riverside, her son said.

Comedian Robert Schimmel dies at 60

LOS ANGELES

Robert Schimmel, a critically acclaimed comedian who made audiences squirm and then laugh with X-rated explorations of sexuality and vulnerability usually drawn from his own life, has died. He was 60.

Schimmel died Friday at a Phoenix hospice from injuries sustained in an Aug. 26 car accident, said his brother Jeff Schimmel. He had suffered serious head and internal injuries, and treatment was complicated by liver disease. The Scottsdale, Ariz., resident was waiting for a liver transplant at the time of his death, his brother said.

Schimmel made regular appearances on Howard Stern’s radio show and was a frequent guest on “Late Night with Conan O’Brien.” He starred in comedy specials for Showtime and HBO, shot a sitcom pilot for Fox and made several well-received comedy CDs. But his frank, sexually explicit routines were too provocative for the mainstream network audiences of David Letterman and Jay Leno.

Instead, Schimmel forged a 30-year career touring the nation’s top comedy clubs establishing himself as an heir to three of his idols, Lenny Bruce, George Carlin and Richard Pryor, controversial comedians whose raunchy humor probed the vagaries of life.

Lewis MDA Telethon raises $58.9 million

LAS VEGAS

Despite the struggling economy, officials with the Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon say contributions and pledges from this year’s Labor Day event totaled $58.9 million.

The amount was down from nearly $60.5 million last year and a record $65 million in 2008. But Lewis says he’s heartened by Americans’ ability to help others in need even when they’re struggling financially.

Lewis, national chairman of the Tucson, Ariz.-based Muscular Dystrophy Association, praised the progress the organization is making for people living with muscle diseases.

The 45th annual telethon originated for the fifth consecutive year from the South Point Hotel in Las Vegas and reached some 40 million viewers through 170 television stations.

Dozens of performers joined the 211/2-hour event, including Barry Manilow, Michael Feinstein, Carrot Top and Norm Crosby.

Wire reports