Departures: Disney crooner dead at 75

Peabo Bryson

A crooner with a special talent for duets who lent his voice to some of the best-known movie scores, Bryson died June 2. He was 75. While still a teenager, Bryson left home to sing background vocals for a variety of groups performing the southern Chitlin’ Circuit in the late 1960s. Eventually, Bryson made it as a songwriter and solo artist, cutting a dozen soul albums in the 1970s and ’80s. He also recorded albums with Natalie Cole and Roberta Flack but found his greatest success singing for Disney movie sound­tracks. He won a pair of Grammy Awards in 1991 and 1992 for duets recorded for showstoppers in Beauty and the Beast (performed with Celine Dion) and Aladdin.

Claude Lemieux

A bruising right winger who forged a 21-year career, Lemieux died May 28. He was 60. The Quebec native entered the National Hockey League in 1983 with the Montreal Canadiens. He won his first of four Stanley Cup championships in 1986 before moving on to the New Jersey Devils ahead of the 1990–1991 season. Lemieux garnered the reputation of a fierce competitor who sometimes pushed boundaries. While playing for Colorado in 1996, he checked an opponent into the boards hard enough to break his jaw, nose, and cheekbone. But Lemieux also built a reputation as one of the sport’s best playoff performers. He won the league’s Conn Smythe Trophy for best playoff performance after the Devils won the Stanley Cup in 1995.

Kyle Busch

A stock car racing legend whose 63 NASCAR Cup Series wins placed him in the racing series’ top 10, Busch died May 21. He was 41. The Las Vegas–born Busch grew up around racing, working the pit for his older brother, Kurt Busch. By the time he was 16, Kyle Busch had notched a top 10 finish in a NASCAR truck series event. By 2005, Busch signed with Hendrick Motorsports and began competing in NASCAR’s premier series full time. In both 2015 and 2019, he bested all other NASCAR drivers with a Cup Series Championship. Busch fell ill during a May 10 Watkins Glen NASCAR event with sinus and respiratory symptoms and died of a related infection less than two weeks later.

Barney Frank

A 16-term Democratic congressman who tackled banking policy and was known as a gay rights icon, Frank died May 19. He was 86. Voters outside Boston first elected Frank in 1980. After news reports outed several congressmen as homosexual, Frank came out publicly as gay in 1987. He rose to legislative prominence through his position on the influential House Financial Services Committee and used his perch as chairman to cut deals with Republicans following the 2008 financial crisis. Once Democrats won back the White House, Frank and Sen. Chris Dodd lent their names to a landmark banking reform bill enacted in 2010 meant to tighten regulations on housing and banking policy.

Mark Fuhrman

A detective for the Los Angeles Police Depart­ment who became a household name during the O.J. Simpson murder trial, Fuhrman died May 12 at age 74. Fuhrman joined the LAPD in 1975 and had made detective by the time Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman were murdered in 1994. Police charged Simpson, a world-­famous celebrity athlete and actor, and prosecutors called Fuhrman to testify. Simpson’s attorneys leveraged Fuhrman’s past use of racially-charged language to taint police and the state’s case against Simpson. Eventually, the jury found Simpson not guilty. After the case, Fuhrman became a nonfiction author writing about famous murder cases, a frequent Fox News guest, and a talk radio host.