Ron Basford - (72) former federal Canadian Cabinet minister who led the campaign to convert Vancouver's Granville Island from a rundown industrial area into a thriving tourist mecca; a native of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Basford earned his law degree from the U of BC; held several Cabinet posts, handling consumer and corporate affairs, and was minister of justice and AG, minister for urban affairs, and acting solicitor general; was responsible for bringing the metric system into use in Canada and eliminating capital punishment; sponsored legislation to place more nutritional information on food packages and worked to get equal pay for equal work; died of a heart attack in Sechelt, BC January 31, 2005.

Martyn Bennett - (34) musician responsible for mixing traditional Scottish folk with techno; Bennett's albums Bothy Culture and Hardland demonstrated the possibilities of combining his own virtuoso performances on the pipes and fiddle with the thumping beats of club rhythms; debilitated by cancer in recent years, he was unable to play on his recently completed album Grit, but it showed a continuing interest in the combination of diverse styles. Bennett progressed to the Royal Scottish Academy of Music & Drama in Glasgow, where he studied violin (under Miles Baster) and piano. Bennett also began to compose for stage productions, including Tom McGrath's adaptation of Kidnapped, and to produce scores for. Bennett was diagnosed with testicular cancer, and was to be troubled by illness for much of his remaining years died on January 31, 2005.

George & Germaine Briant - (103, 101) oldest married couple in Louisiana, inseparable almost from the night they met; the Catholic Diocese of Baton Rouge and the Louisiana Family Forum had recognized the Briants, formerly of New Orleans, as the state's oldest married couple; they met on a blind date˜even though Germaine was engaged to someone else, she said during celebration of their 83rd wedding anniversary in 2004; George proposed that night; Germaine broke her engagement and they were married three months later on July 20, 1921. The Briants died within days of each other; George died at Belle Maison Nursing Home in New Orleans, where Germaine had died three days earlier January 29 & 31, 2005.

Philip DeGuere Jr. - (60) writer and producer best known as the creator and original executive producer and writer of the TV series Simon & Simon. Writer for Alias Smith & Jones, Baretta, City of Angels, and Magnum, PI and moved into production as an associate producer on the 1971 TV movie How to Steal an Airplane and the '76 series Baa Baa Black Sheep. Executive producer of '80s revivals of Whiz Kids and The Twilight Zone and of the 1987 series Max Headroom; more recently, he was creator and executive producer of the 1998 series Air America starring Lorenzo Lamas, and was a writer for JAG, The Dead Zone, and Navy NCIS: Naval Criminal Investigative Service; DeGuere died of cancer in LA January 24, 2005.

David Graham DuBois - (79) former editor-in-chief of the Black Panther Party's weekly newspaper and stepson of the late civil rights activist W.E.B. DuBois was appointed a visiting professor of black studies and journalism at the U of Massachusetts at Amherst, where he taught for 18 years. DuBois and soon after he legally changed his surname; died in Northampton, Mass. January 28, 2005.

Eric Griffiths - (64) guitarist for the Quarrymen, the rock and skiffle band led by John Lennon that eventually evolved into the Beatles. Griffiths (pictured far right) died of pancreatic cancer in Edinburgh, Scotland January 29, 2005.

Malcolm Hardee - (55) British former jail-bird, stand-up comedian, and impresario instrumental in launching the careers of the likes of Paul Merton, Jo Brand, Vic Reeves, Harry Enfield, and Jerry Sadowitz; a Hardee performance usually involved the flourishing of genitalia and was not for the faint-hearted; was famous as part of "The Greatest Show on Legs," In 2001 he bought a floating pub, the Wibbly Wobbly Boat at Surrey Quays; it is thought that he fell, probably on February 1, from the rubber dinghy in which he traveled from the pub to his houseboat, moored nearby; his body was found in the Thames the next day February 2, 2005.

Keith Knudsen - (56) The longtime Doobie Brothers drummer who was part of the band during a string of hits that included "Taking it to the Streets" and "Black Water. Knudsen had been hospitalized for more than a month, according to the band's longtime manager Bruce Cohn. Knudsen began drumming in eighth grade and joined the Doobie Brothers in 1974. "After a week's rehearsal, I went on the road with the band. The Doobies were known for incorporating gospel and jazz stylings into popular hit songs. They also were well-regarded for their live performances. Their other hits included "China Grove" and "Jesus is Just Alright." Knudsen played with the Doobies until the band's 1982 farewell tour. During the band's hiatus, Knudsen and bandmate John McFee formed the country rock group Southern Pacific, which released four albums and had several hits. He rejoined the band full-time in 1993. Knudsen, who lived in Sonoma County's wine country, had cancer in 1995 which left him weak and he never fully regained all his strength. Knudsen died of pneumonia Tuesday. Feb 8th.

Vicki LaMotta - (née Beverly Thailer) (75) woman whose marriage to boxer Jake LaMotta was portrayed in the film Raging Bull. Vicki LaMotta posed nude for Playboy in November 1981 when she was 51; at the time, she told the St. Louis Post Dispatch that she posed nude to show that life doesn‚t end at 30; later lent her name to a cosmetics line, made commercials, and appeared on TV and at fight arenas. Vicki died in Boca Raton, Fla. about six months after having open-heart surgery and two days after her 75th birthday January 25, 2005.

Dan Lee - (35) lead animator at Pixar Animation Studios who contributed to some of the most successful animated films ever, including Finding Nemo and Monsters Inc. Lee also worked on A Bug's Life and Toy Story 2, before working at Pixar, Lee worked on TV cartoons and commercials for several studios, including Kennedy Cartoons in Toronto and Colossal Pictures in San Francisco, California; had fought his illness for 17 months; died of lung cancer in Berkeley, California January 15, 2005.

Naomi Leff - (65) interior designer whose clients included Hollywood moguls, fashion giants, and corporate kingpins; Leff was repeatedly listed among the top names in her field by leading magazines such as Architectural Digest and Interior Design. Leff created residential interiors for actors Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman and director Mike Nichols and TV newswoman Diane Sawyer; also was unofficial designer for the founders of the DreamWorks SKG production company˜Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and David Geffen; also designed interiors for commercial enterprises, including the Giorgio Armani boutique, a modern steel and glass store in SF, and the Beaver Creek Resort, a "cowboy-and-Indian"-inspired lodge in Telluride, Colo.; known for her contemporary reworking of traditional designs. Born in the Bronx, NY, Leff graduated from the State U of NY at Cortland with a BS degree; earned a master's degree in sociology at the U of Wisconsin and a master's degree in environmental design at Pratt Institute in NYC; Leff died of congestive liver disease after being hospitalized in NYC January 30, 2005.

Ivan Noble - (37) BBC journalist who chronicled his battle with brain cancer in an online diary; the BBC's online science and technology correspondent, Noble had written a "tumor diary" for the BBC News Web site since shortly after he was diagnosed with cancer in 2002. Noble died in London January 31, 2005.

Kate Peyton - (39) BBC Journalist Kate Peyton was shot while accompaning another BBC journalist in Somalia. Witnesses said a militiaman shot her outside the Sahafi Hotel in Mogadishu. Peyton underwent surgery at a Mogadishu hospital. Peyton had arrived in Mogadishu Wednesday morning on assignment from South Africa, Kate had worked for the BBC since 1993 and was dedicated to covering news across the African continent. She died from internal bleeding on Thursday Feb. 10th 2005.

John Vernon - (72) stage-trained character actor who played cunning villains in film and on TV and made his comedy mark as Dean Wormer in National Lampoon's Animal House; the Canadian-born actor found satisfaction in his varied career. Movie fans may know Vernon best for his role as Wormer, bent on expelling the hard-partying Delta fraternity house. Vernon studied at the RADA in London; did repertory work in England and was heard off-screen as the voice of Big Brother in the 1956 film 1984; returned to Canada to appear on stage and on TV, including the starring role in the '60s drama Wojeck, in which he played a coroner. Vernon became a steady player in US films, making his debut in Point Blank (1967), he also in Alfred Hitchcock's (Topaz [1969]), Don Siegel's (Dirty Harry [1971]), and Clint Eastwood's (The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976).Vernon's TV roles included spinoff Delta House (1979) including the part of Mr. Big in the film I‚m Gonna Git You Sucka (1988); Vernon appeared in a DVD edition of Animal House as part of a satiric update on the characters; Wormer was portrayed as a curmudgeonly old man in a wheelchair; Vernon died in his sleep in LA of complications from January 16 heart surgery February 1, 2005.