Talk:Spanky and Our Gang

Cause of Malcolm Hale's Death

The Cook county coroner ruled that the cause of my brother Malcolm's death was bronchopneumonia. Another brother Brad, who is a physician, spoke to the coroner on the phone, and felt that the coroner had actually been unable to determine the cause of death.

There are two pieces of evidence that suggest that the cause was carbon monoxide poisoning. I made the identification of Malcolm's remains at the morgue in Chicago and at that time I noticed that he had an unusual red skin color. I was unaware of how this might have arisen but it was so striking that I mentioned it to a number of friends. I learned later that this skin color is a classic sign of fatal carbon monoxide poisoning. In addition, the person in whose apartment Malcolm was sleeping that night was told that dangerous gas released from the space heater in the apartment had been discovered on the morning after Malcolm's death; that the gas company had been called and the heater turned off until the problem could be fixed. Emhale (talk) 15:24, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

It seems acceptable to leave this as it currently is in the article. Offering the official cause along with the possibility that another cause exists does not seem inappropriate for this wiki. This way the reader has the "whole story" so to speak. I think this is especially appropriate since there will possibly be no further developments on this subject.THX1136 (talk) 14:16, 4 April 2014 (UTC)

If the cause was bronchopneumonia, as stated in the newspapers of the day, why did it take almost 39 years for the publication of a book stating that the cause was actually carbon monoxide poisoning? The day before he died in Chicago, Malcolm stopped overnight in his Old Town neighborhood of that city, on his way to a performance on the East Coast. Friends who interacted with him there later told me they were very skeptical of the bronchopneumonia cause, as he had seemed to be in perfect health.

It was several months after Malcolm’s death that I became convinced that the cause was carbon monoxide poisoning (by then I had learned the meaning of the red skin discoloration, and I remembered that carbon monoxide had been found in the apartment). At this time, the carbon monoxide possibility was known only to family and friends. The 39 year time gap mentioned above was due to the length of time between Malcolm’s death and the opportunity to easily make the information available to others — it depended on the invention of Wikipedia over thirty years later.

Time Line:

10/31/68 Malcolm’s death.

1/15/01 33 years later, Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia is launched,

3/7/05 The Spanky and Our Gang article first appears in Wikipedia.

9/1/06. My edit appears in the Spanky and Our Gang article, indicating that carbon monoxide was the likely cause of death, not bronchopneumonia,

9/7/07 Almost 39 years after Malcolm's death, Michael Largo’s book, The Portable Obituary: How the Famous, Rich, and Powerful Really Died, stating that the cause of death was carbon monoxide poisoning, is published. The citation of this book has been added to the article.

To me, the evidence for carbon monoxide as the cause of death is very strong, although circumstantial. My statements here in the Talk page of the article describe this evidence for people to consider.Emhale (talk) 17:57, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Spoken word sections on the album

The article mentions two songs that begin with humorous conversation. I have changed the title "Sunday Mornin'" to "Like To Get To Know You" (for a second time) because I purchased the original Mercury Records vinyl LP (not a re-issue) in a second-hand record shop a number of years ago. The album has a solid red label with black lettering that spirals so that the listener can read it as the record revolves. On the LP, the song preceding "Sunday Mornin'" is "My Bill", which ends with Spanky being told "I have to show something on my books" and she replies, "But Mr. Tate, I don't have a job!" I respectfully submit that unemployment is not a humorous subject. "Like To Get To Know You", however, begins with a party scene where Malcolm (?) asks Elaine if a pink slipper belongs to her. When he asks for her phone number, she tells him "I'm here with a date" to which he replies, "Well, maybe it's HIS slipper!"Jwebber300 (talk) 05:55, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

The line is "But Mr. Tait, I don't have a job." Curley Tait was a concert promoter and restauranteur in Chicago, Illinois and this line in the song refers to him. The audio quality on this Youtube [1] needs work, but you can see Spanky and Curley chatting about old days. Ellin Beltz (talk) 21:32, 8 August 2015 (UTC)

"Everybody's Talking At Me"...

... isn't a non-album track: it's the same song (in fact, same recording) as "Echoes". Andrew G. Doe (talk) 22:41, 2 September 2015 (UTC)