Good obituary
writers certainly have tact and a healthy sense of understatement. Raging
alcoholics who puked on themselves in public and berated everyone in their
path become "difficult" people with "strained" relations.
Vicious capitalists who spent their lives building companies that flouted
environmental and worker safety laws are suddenly "combative leaders"
and "litigious personalities".
I think you'll agree that the unbylined writer who described John Houston's
$100 million lawsuit against his daughter as "an especially awkward turn"
in their relationship really does take the tact cake for today. |
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John
Houston, 82, Manager, Father of Whitney Houston
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
February 4, 2003 Newark
John Houston, the father of
singer Whitney Houston and a theatrical manager since the
early days of rhythm and blues, died Sunday after a long battle with
diabetes
and heart disease. He was 82.
Houston died at a New York hospital, family spokeswoman Nancy
Seltzer said yesterday. She said his health had been deteriorating
for several years.
Well before his daughter's rise
to fame, Houston managed the
career of her mother and his ex-wife, Cissy
Houston. She sang with The
Sweet Inspirations, a backing vocal group to artists including Aretha
Franklin.
Relations between Houston and his daughter, who
has acknowledged having drug problems, took an especially awkward
turn recently when his company, John Houston
Entertainment Llc, sued her company for $100 million. The suit sought compensation
for helping to get a marijuana
charge against Witney Houston dismissed and for getting her a new record
contract.
Houston even made a public appeal to his daughter in an interview with the
syndicated news magazine "Celebrity
Justice" in December: "You get your act
together, honey, and you pay me the money
that you owe me."
Houston was born Sept. 13, 1920, in Trenton. His theatrical management agency
was based in Newark,
where his daughter was born. In addition to his daughter and wife, Peggy,
Houston is survived by three
sons.
Copyright © 2003, Newsday, Inc. |
10:58:26 PM 
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