http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/p...actor/1790203/
"LOS ANGELES ? Charles Durning, the two-time Oscar nominee who was dubbed the king of the character actors for his skill in playing everything from a Nazi colonel to the pope, died Monday in New York City. He was 89."
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001164/bio
"Chalres Durning was one of a few survivors to the infamous massacre of American POWs by German SS troops at Malmedy, Belgium, during World War II. The surrendering engineering battalion, captured behind enemy lines when the main American forces retreated, were gathered together and brought to a large field. As the German guards backed away from the prisoners, machine guns that were hidden in trucks opened fire on them. Approximately 88 US soldiers died, a good number of them by a single shot at close range through the head, indicating that those who survived the initial volley were subsequently executed. Only about 20 of the group of approximately 100 managed to escape the massacre and make their way to American lines."
Jack Klugman:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...saving-legacy/
"The actor Jack Klugman died on Christmas Eve at age 90. Klugman was best known for his roles as the unkempt sportswriter in ?The Odd Couple? and as the crusading medical examiner on ?Quincy, M.E.? the wildly popular 1980s medical drama. Few people remember it today, but he also played an instrumental role in passing critical health-care legislation, the Orphan Drug Act, through Congress in the early 1980s, using ?Quincy? and his own celebrity to roll Sen. Orrin Hatch (R), who was blocking the bill."
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001430/
