This tribute originally debuted on the front home page of my site on May 22, 2003,
created more than a week after the death of Robert Stack. Originally, only Stack was to be featured on the main page
tribute but the following month on June 11, 2003 was to be the 4th anniversary of DeForest Kelley's passing and
three days after that date would be exactly a month since Stack died. I decided to feature both actors on the tribute,
which was up from May 22 to June 30, 2003. After that, I relocated the main page tribute as an intro page to the
two memoriams seen above.
Where were you on June 11, 1999 and May 14, 2003?
To this day, I can still remember where I was at those times.
Around June 11, 1999, I was a 16-year-old sophomore in high school finishing the last of my final exams. Little did I know
that something tragic happened nearly that same time. Two weeks later, the late June issue of People magazine mentioned it:
DeForest Kelley (Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy, Classic Star Trek and Star Trek movies I-VI) had died. I watched Classic Trek
in reruns when I was 11 and though my interest in Trek comes and goes, I still have a love for it, particularly the first
series. To this day, Dr. McCoy is still one of my favorite characters from the original series.
With Kelley gone, the original Star Trek and Trek in general will never be the same.
The actor who portrayed him may be gone but McCoy lives on in the reruns, the
movies, the books, and fanfics.
History seemed to repeat itself four years later on May 14, 2003 when I was 20 and in my second year in college. On that day, I had flunked my
Japanese language test. If that day couldn't get any worse, the next morning, I went online and found out on the
same day I failed my test, Robert Stack (host of tv's "Unsolved Mysteries"; Eliot Ness, tv's "The Untouchables") had died.
Next to Kelley, this was the most shocking announcement of a passing. I've been watching "Unsolved Mysteries" for several
months at the time (I still watch it when I can and it's the only reality show that I ever care to watch) and Robert's
death left me emotionally wracked for the rest of the week.
This year, it's hard to believe that Kelley died five years ago while Stack died last year. I couldn't believe it's been
that long ago for them both. It seemed like it happened just yesterday. The more I think about them, the more it
seemed they occurred just hours ago, almost at the same time.
