VSBfromH

And now... someone else does. Eunice Sanborn of the USA born July 20, 1896, to be specific. Eunice Sanborn dead aged 114 years, 195 days. Besse Cooper, born August 26 1896, takes on the mantle. As always, we get to hear to what Besse credits her longevity: "minding her own business and not eating junk food".

This is one of the few links which confirm the news, though Wikipedia already has him as dead. An amazing catalogue of wonderful tunes: all those Bond themes, "The Magnificent Seven", "The Beyondness of Things", "Theme From 'The Persuaders'", "Midnight Cowboy" to name but a few.

Dame Margaret Price The renowned Welsh soprano has died aged 69.

Gladys Horton has died aged 66. She was a co-founder of "The Marvelettes" who had a hit in 1961 with the original version of "Please Mr. Postman" which was "notable as the first Motown song to reach the number-one position on the Billboard Hot 100 pop singles chart". She was just 15 when the record was released.

Martins Freimanis Dead aged 33 "following complications of a flu". Who could forget his appearance for Latvia with F. L. Y. back in 2003?

... and not forgetting

... closely followed by Bruce Gordon who appeared as mobster Frank Nitti in 27 episodes of "The Untouchables". He has died 12 days before his 95th birthday.

German producer / director Bernd Eichinger dead at 61. Among his credits are "The Name of the Rose", "Fantastic Four" and the "Resident Evil" series.

Actor Paul Picerni has died aged 88. I have to confess I've never heard of him, but he had a number of notable supporting roles which included Agent Lee Hobson in 83 episodes of "The Untouchables" and the Vincent Price film "House of Wax".

Alex Kirst Drummer with Iggy Pop's "Trolls" and "The Nymphs" has died in an apparent hit and run in California.

Not looking good for Sargent Shriver.

Mississippi Winn Was the world's 7th oldest person until her death yesterday aged 113 years, 289 days.

Mmm, you don't exactly conquer Kilimanjaro. You just walk up it. It's a stiff walk to be sure but I doubt if anyone who had been up it would then describe themselves as a mountaineer. Still it made the journo's ironic line and got him a little spread. Yes, I did think about making that point when I posted. However, as I've never done it myself, I didn't want to appear disparaging. It doesn't mention which other peaks he's scaled. If they're only talking about Snowdon and Helvellyn, I could match him there, but I suspect not!

Mountaineer who had "scaled peaks all over the world" dies in accident on climbing wall in Stockport

Monty the sheepdog has died aged 14. He gained notoriety when as a puppy he broke free from his leash and joined a televised horse race at Fakenham, even jumping a fence.

His brother was the singer Ricky Nelson, who also appeared in that show. He perished in a plane crash near Dallas in 1985.

Major Richard "Dick" Winters "The former World War II commander whose war story was told in the book and miniseries “Band of Brothers,” has died" aged 92. He was played on TV by Damian Lewis.

Joey Carew The cricketer who played 19 Tests for West Indies between 1963 and 1972 has died aged 73. He later became a selector and was very influential in the career of Brian Lara.

Thorbjorn Svenssen Norway's most capped player has died aged 86. He won 104 caps and captained Norway 93 times.

Enough of that nonsense! Y&T bassist Phil Kennemore, 57, is no more. Oh, and we might like to keep Stratovarius drummer Jorg Michael , Beastie Boys rapper Adam Yauch* and Todd Rundgren’s Utopia keyboardist Mark "Moogy" Klingman on our radar from the looks of it! * I believe he may be already mentioned elsewhere.

Confirmed (and in the main thread too)

Trapattoni suffers mild stroke "The 71-year-old Italian was having a routine operation on a carotid artery at the San Raffaele Hospital in Milan on December 29 when he suffered the stroke, which caused partial paralysis down the right side of his body. Trapattoni was immediately moved to intensive care, but amazed doctors with his quick recovery and has since been discharged. He is now continuing his recovery at his home in Cusino Milanino near Milan."

What a Pahlaver! Ali-reza Pahlavi, 44, the youngest son of the former Shah of Iran has shot himself. The Shah's youngest daughter, Leila also took her own life in 2001. Edit: Apologies, I see it has already been reported under "Suicidal Celebs". I did the search with "Pahlavi".

Coen Moulijn dead

Not as many as the answer to the question "how many pointless threads".