NAMES IN THE NEWS
Bay City Rollers bassist dies at 70
LONDON — Alan Longmuir, a founding member of the Bay City Rollers who played multiple instruments, including bass guitar and keyboards, has died in Scotland. He was 70.
His family said in a Twitter statement that he died peacefully surrounded by loved ones. No other details were given. He had been receiving medical treatment in Edinburgh.
“He was an extraordinary man with an extraordinary heart,” Longmuir’s family said. “He brought so much love and kindness to everyone he met, and he leaves a huge hole in our family.”
The Bay City Rollers were formed at the end of the 1960s and enjoyed substantial commercial success. They were known for their tartan outfits and upbeat, catchy tunes like “Saturday Night,” “Bye Bye Baby” and “Shang-a-Lang.”
The band had a fanatical teen following and sold more than 100 million records. They split up in 1978 and reunited in 2015 for a string of soldout performances.
Trump declines half-staff for Md.
ANNAPOLIS, Md. — President Donald Trump has declined a request from Annapolis Mayor Gavin Buckley to lower American flags in honor of the fatal shooting of five employees of The Capital Gazette newspaper last week.
“Obviously, I’m disappointed, you know? Is there a cutoff for tragedy?” Buckley said Monday afternoon. “This was an attack on the press. It was an attack on freedom of speech. It’s just as important as any other tragedy.” Gov. Larry Hogan ordered Maryland state flags to be lowered to half-staff from Friday through sunset on Monday.
Through Maryland’s congressional delegation, Buckley put in a request to the White House over the weekend to lower the American flags.
Trump has ordered flags lowered for previous mass shootings, including in May after the deaths of 10 people at Santa Fe High School, and the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., in February that left 17 dead. Panel: Remove Davis statue
RICHMOND, Va. — As the onetime capital of the Confederacy wrestles with its Civil War heritage, a commission recommended Monday removing a statue of Confederate President Jefferson Davis but leaving in place four others, including a soaring tribute to Gen. Robert E. Lee.
The panel of historians, academics, local officials and others spent nearly a year studying the issue and taking input from a sometimes-angry public before unveiling the proposals Monday in a more than 100-page report.
The recommended changes would reshape one of the nation’s largest displays of Confederate symbolism along Richmond’s famed Monument Avenue and in some ways re-envision how the city presents its history in the public square. In addition to removing the Davis statue, the commission advised adding historical context to the statues and erecting new monuments that would reflect a “more inclusive” story of the city’s history.