Her Daily News

Tonight brings the unfortunate news that actress Natasha Richardson has died suddenly at the age of 45, following a head injury sustained on Monday while skiing in Quebec. The Tony Award-winning actress, whose career spanned decades and both stage and screen, had been on a ski outing at Mount Tremblant Ski Resort with her sons Michael and Daniel when she fell, and while she did not initially appear to be injured, her condition rapidly worsened, and she was soon hospitalized and eventually pronounced brain dead.

Her family has released the following statement, according to CNN:

Liam Neeson, his sons, and the entire family are shocked and devastated by the tragic death of their beloved Natasha. They are profoundly grateful for the support, love and prayers of everyone, and ask for privacy during this very difficult time.

She is survived by her husband, actor Liam Neeson, as well as sons Michael and Daniel and her mother, actress Vanessa Redgrave. It is reported via E! Online that her family is planning a small, private funeral. I would like to wish her family the privacy that they need to come to grips with this terribly unexpected tragedy.

U.S. Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones, an Ohio Democrat died yesterday at the age of 58 from a brain aneurysm she suffered while driving in Cleveland Heights, Ohio.

Most recently she is known for her outspoken voice in Congress during the 2003 invasion of Iraq. She was one of only 11 Democrats who voted against the war in the 435-member House of Representatives. She also registered a complaint after the 2004 presidential election suspecting voting irregularities that cost John Kerry a win in her state of Ohio. She had a solidly liberal voting record.

Her death will not alter the partisan balance of power in Congress because the Democrats hold a wide majority.

When she was first elected in 1998, Tubbs Jones headed the House Ethics Committee and was the first black woman to serve on the tax-writing Ways and Means committee.

A brain aneurysm is the abnormal bulging of a blood vessel in the brain. Sadly, they are most often discovered only after they rupture which causes bleeding into the brain or the space surrounding the brain. This type of hemorrhage leads to stroke, brain damage and death. Treatment functions to stop the bleeding, reduce permanent damage and reduce the risk of recurrence.

“The annual incidence of aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage in the U.S. exceeds 30,000 people. Ten to 15 percent of these patients will die before reaching the hospital and over 50 percent will die within the first thirty days after rupture. Of those who survive, about half suffer some permanent neurological deficit. Brain aneurysms can occur in people of all ages, but are most commonly detected in those ages 35 to 60. Women are actually more likely to get a brain aneurysm than men, with a ratio of 3:2.”
Find more information at Brain Aneurysm.com

You can read more about Tubbs Jones and her work as a Congreswomen by visiting her site.

A great baseball player has died. Dottie Collins played for the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League which was created in 1943 to entertain the Americans at home while World War II took young men away overseas and Major League Baseball was on hiatus. Collins joined the league in 1944.

A New York Times article published on August 15 said, “She pitched underhand, sidearm and overhand; she threw curveballs, fastballs and changeups; and in the summer of 1948, she pitched until she was four months pregnant. She won more than 20 games in each of her first four seasons. She threw 17 shutouts and had a league-leading 293 strikeouts in 1945 for the Fort Wayne Daisies, when the women’s game resembled fast-pitch softball. … The All-American league went out of business after the 1954 season, and the images of the young women in their one-piece tuniclike dresses, skirt above the knees, playing before enthusiastic crowds in cities like Fort Wayne and South Bend, Ind.; Rockford, Ill.; and Kenosha and Racine, Wis., faded.”

The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League has it’s own website and an exhibit at the Cooperstown Baseball Hall of Fame which Collins helped create. She worked with curators and used her contacts to get materials donated for exhibition.

The 1992 Penny Marshall directed movie, A League of Their Own brought national attention to this great league of women who patriotically played ball when their country called on them. Unfortunately for the women who had grown fond of their league and each other, the war ended and men came back home, the women were told in no uncertain terms that they were no longer needed.

She died of a stroke. She was 84.

Library, National Baseball Hall of Fame