Departures: Gospel star and musical matriarch

Cissy Houston

A background vocalist for some of America’s biggest musical stars and matriarch of a brilliantly talented family, Houston died Oct. 7. She was 91. Houston grew up singing in her New Jersey church, joined a family gospel group as a young girl, and performed at Carnegie Hall while still a teen. During her time with the Sweet Inspirations, the background vocal group was one of the busiest in the industry, recording and touring with Elvis Presley and singing with Aretha Franklin, among others. Houston won two Grammy awards in 1997 and 1999 for her solo gospel albums. Her daughter, Whitney Houston, and her niece, Dionne Warwick, also became iconic 20th-­century singers.

Pete Rose

Baseball’s hit king who defiled his reputation by gambling on the game, Rose died Sept. 30 at age 83. In 24 big league seasons as a player, Rose amassed 4,256 hits—the most in major league history. At the time of his retirement from playing in 1986, Rose was also baseball’s all-time leader in games played and at-bats. The perennial All-Star helped anchor the Cincinnati Reds “Big Red Machine” to two World Series championships and led the Philadelphia Phillies to another in 1980. An internal investigation initiated by Major League Baseball found Rose bet on Reds games while managing the team, leading to a lifetime ban from the game. Rose denied the allegations until confessing in his 2004 autobiography.

Dikembe Mutombo

A towering basketball giant who, despite his dominance, may be best remembered for his life off the court, Mutombo died Sept. 30. He was 58. As a poor youth living in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mutombo aspired to be a doctor. His dazzling athleticism and 7-foot-2 height earned him a ticket to play basketball for Georgetown University. Before long, Mutombo reasoned he could help more by playing basketball than by practicing medicine. He became a star for the Denver Nuggets and also won four Defensive Player of the Year awards. Later his philanthropy became as well known as his finger wag. Mutombo’s donations funded half the cost of a new hospital in Congo’s capital that opened in 2007.

Kris Kristofferson

A Renaissance man known for acting and songwriting, Kristofferson died Sept. 28. He was 88. At first, the country star seemed destined for academia, publishing short stories in The Atlantic Monthly at age 18 and becoming a Rhodes scholar. But as a country musician, the brainy Kristofferson had to unlearn English grammar to create twangy tunes. He wrote a string of hits popularized by other artists, including “Me and Bobby McGee” (Janis Joplin), “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down” (Johnny Cash), and “For the Good Times” (Ray Price). In the 1970s, Kristofferson became an A-list actor, winning a Golden Globe for his role in A Star Is Born, and later formed the country super group the Highwaymen.

John Warwick Montgomery

A historian, theologian, and lawyer best known for his fierce apologetics, Montgomery died Sept. 25 at age 92. For a decade beginning in 1964, Montgomery taught church history at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Illinois where he became a loud critic of liberal reform movements within the Lutheran Church. He clashed with renowned atheist Madalyn Murray O’Hair on a Chicago radio show in 1967 and debated situational ethics with Joseph Fletcher in 1971. To sharpen his apologetic writings and debates, he went to law school where he earned one of his 12 academic degrees. He penned more than 70 books, wrote more than 250 articles, published academic journals, and led two expeditions to find Noah’s Ark.