An iconic game show host.
A Supreme Court justice.
A pioneering astronaut.
These are just a few of the famous people who were in the spotlight for decades as they
made it all the way to the big 8-0.
Keep watching for the full list!
Paul Newman is probably primarily remembered for his performances in such classic films
as Cool Hand Luke, The Hustler, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
He was also a veteran of the Pacific Theater in World War II, as well as an accomplished
director, businessman, philanthropist, and race car driver.
Above all else, he was a devoted family man at his Connecticut home alongside his wife,
actress Joanne Woodward.
He was also involved in politics, and he was reportedly thrilled when he found out that
he was on Richard Nixon's enemies list.
In the 1980s, Newman co-founded Newman's Own, which is known for its salad dressings and
spaghetti sauces.
Over the following decades, he donated over $245 million of the company's profits to charities.
All the while, he continued to act, as he earned an Oscar nomination for 2002's Road
to Perdition and won an Emmy in 2005 for the HBO miniseries Empire Falls.
Then in 2007, he announced that he was officially retiring from acting.
Privately, Newman was battling lung cancer.
The following year, he died at the age of 83.
There weren't too many game show hosts as iconic and beloved as Alex Trebek.
Spending over five decades in the business, he was a familiar nightly guest in many living
rooms over the years.
His credits included the likes of the Canadian quiz show Reach for the Top and his first
American program, The Wizard of Odds.
But it was in 1984 that he truly met his destiny, as that was the year he started hosting Jeopardy!
Soon enough, he was a pop culture icon who would go on to win numerous Emmys.
On the March 6, 2019 episode of Jeopardy!, Trebek opened the show with a personal message
as he spoke directly to his audience.
He'd been diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer, but he was determined to fight it,
and he also planned to continue his hosting duties as he received his treatments.
In his autobiography The Answer Is…: Reflections on My Life, he noted how he was generally
a private person but announced his diagnosis to get out ahead of any reporting from the
tabloids.
As he promised, he continued to host Jeopardy! with incredible energy right up until weeks
before his death.
He ultimately succumbed to his cancer on November 8, 2020 at the age of 80.
"We're trying to build a gentler, kinder society, and if we all pitch in just a little bit,
we're gonna get there."
Richard Penniman, better known as Little Richard, was a musician notorious for his electric
stage presence while singing hit songs like "Tutti Frutti" and "Good Golly Miss Molly."
Upon his passing in 2020, The New Yorker called him the "great innovator of rock and roll
music."
The likes of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, David Bowie, Mick Jagger, Bob Dylan, and Elton
John have all reportedly described him as one of their most significant influences.
Richard's career spans all of the way back to 1951 when a radio performance he gave led
to a contract with RCA Records.
Over the years, he had his ups and down, including a period when he quit music to become an evangelical
preacher.
But the admiration and respect he received from the music community always remained.
He was one of the 10 initial inductees into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1986, and
he received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1993.
In 2013, he retired from performing after years of declining health.
He died on May 9, 2020 at the age of 87 from complications related to bone cancer.
Comedian Joan Rivers had an unconventional path to getting the laughs.
She first worked on stage as an actress before transitioning to small clubs, showrooms, and
cabarets.
She finally earned her big break in the late 60s when she appeared on The Tonight Show
with Johnny Carson, where she would go on to appear over 100 times.
In the ensuing years, Rivers became known for her often shocking jokes, but that edge
didn't keep her out of the mainstream.
Over the course of her career, she won Grammy and Emmy awards and also hosted both her own
daytime talk show and late night talk show.
Rivers continued to work on a variety of TV projects over the decades, evolving and adjusting
her comedy for the times.
Then in 2014, what was supposed to be a routine endoscopy led to her going into cardiac arrest
and being put on life support.
She died September 4 that year at the age of 81.
Her daughter Melissa sued the following year, alleging that doctors took selfies with Rivers
when she was unconscious and performed a laryngoscopy instead of an endoscopy without consent and
against the warnings of the anesthesiologist.
The family ultimately settled with the hospital.
"In my opinion, it was 100% preventable."
After World War II, a young Mary Tyler Moore and her parents relocated from New York City
to Los Angeles, which opened the door for Moore to begin auditioning for commercials
as a teenager.
Thus began a long and illustrious showbiz career, as she took bit parts in TV dramas
and variety shows before her big break in 1961 when she was cast on The Dick Van Dyke
Show.
She then went on to create The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and that ran for seven seasons
and earned 29 Emmy wins, including three for the star herself.
Moore then continued to work in TV as well as on stage and in film, and she even nabbed
an Academy Award nomination for the 1980 drama Ordinary People.
Over her long career, she struggled with various health issues, including alcoholism, type
1 diabetes, and a brain tumor.
When she was in her 70s, her health began to seriously decline.
She ultimately passed away in 2017 at the age of 80.
Few actors in Hollywood history have reached the iconic status of James Stewart.
With five Academy Award nominations and one win, he's one of the most celebrated actors
of all time.
Born in the small town of Indiana, Pennsylvania in 1908, Stewart grew up thinking that he
was going to inherit his family's hardware store.
Instead, while at Princeton University studying architecture, he performed in a few stage
shows and became hooked.
Within a year of graduating, he made his Broadway debut, and by 1935, he signed his first contract
with MGM Studios and was headed to Hollywood, where he would go on to lead such classic
films as It's a Wonderful Life, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, and Rear Window.
Over the next five decades, Stewart made countless films, taking a break only during World War
II when he joined the Army Air Corps, flying combat missions in the European Theater against
Nazi Germany.
Afterwards, he continued churning out dozens of movies.
But by the 80s, his pace slowed down, and when his wife passed away in 1994, he never
quite recovered from the grief of her loss.
He died on July 2, 1997 at the age of 89, with Variety eulogizing him, in their words,
as a "movie star, war hero, good citizen and just plain nice guy."
"A toast!
To my big brother George, the richest man in town."
If you're the first person to accomplish a major feat, chances are you're going to be
remembered.
So no wonder we're still talking about Neil Armstrong decades after he was the first person
to set foot on the moon, as he delivered the iconic proclamation:
"That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind."
"When you actually lift off, it's really a big surprise."
From a young age, it was clear that Armstrong was destined for great things.
He earned his pilot's license at age 16, studied aeronautical engineering at Purdue University,
and served as a U.S. Navy pilot during the Korean War.
It was in 1962 that he began training as an astronaut.
And then seven years later, he finally arrived on the lunar surface.
Armstrong resigned from NASA in 1971 and subsequently spent many years trying to stay out of the
limelight.
He served as a professor of aeronautical science and later worked in the private sector overseeing
the manufacturing of aviation equipment.
In 2012, he passed away at the age of 82 from complications during heart surgery.
His sons then alleged that the hospital was at fault, and they hired an independent heart
specialist who reviewed medical records and concluded that the hospital made preventable
fatal mistakes.
Armstrong's sons eventually settled with the hospital.
When you think of a celebrity, the words "Supreme Court Justice" don't often come to mind.
But it's hard to deny that Ruth Bader Ginsburg did in fact reach celebrity status during
her lifetime.
If you somehow doubt that, just google "Ruth Bader Ginsburg swag" and witness everything
that comes up.
Ginsburg was one of only eight women out of 500 enrolled at Harvard Law School when she
attended, and she even faced the wrath of the school's dean for taking a spot that could
have gone to a man.
But she proved more than capable, eventually transferring to Columbia Law School, where
she graduated at the top of her class in 1959.
Ginsburg went on to work her way up the legal ranks, which included working as a professor,
advising the American Civil Liberties Union, and joining numerous boards and councils.
Then in 1980, she was appointed a federal judge.
After Bill Clinton was elected president in 1992, she was then appointed to the Supreme
Court and officially joined the bench the following year.
She quickly made a name for herself for her well-written and strongly worded dissents
to majority opinions.
In 2009, she was diagnosed with early stage pancreatic cancer but managed to receive successful
treatments.
Over the next decade, she continued her work on the court, even after the cancer came back
with a terminal diagnosis.
She passed away on September 18, 2020 at the age of 87.
"Oyez!
Oyez!
The court is now sitting."
Growing up in segregated Mobile, Alabama, Hank Aaron was one of eight children, and
he demonstrated a passion for baseball from an early age.
While still in high school, he played for numerous independent segregated teams before
finally playing professionally in 1952.
He didn't stay there for very long, as he soon signed a contract with the Major Leagues
to play for the Milwaukee Braves.
Aaron ultimately played 23 seasons, breaking multiple batting records along the way and
winning a World Series in 1957.
As of 2022, Aaron still holds the record for most career runs batted in, and he's currently
second on the all-time home run list, with 755.
After his playing days ended, he went on to work behind the scenes in baseball operations.
On January 22, 2021, he passed away in his sleep of natural causes at the age of 86.
Frank Sinatra's iconic baritone made him one of the most recognizable musicians of the
20th century.
Born in 1915 in New Jersey to Sicilian immigrants, his father owned a bar and boxed professionally
while his mother was influential in local politics.
Young Frank reportedly decided that he wanted to become a professional singer when he saw
Bing Crosby perform live in the 1930s.
Soon enough, he was in front of the microphone himself at local nightclubs.
By 1943, his solo career had taken off, and he starred in his first Hollywood film.
His fame really exploded from there, as his concerts would be packed with young women
who screamed at the top of their lungs in excitement.
Sinatra's career would ultimately span five decades.
In addition to his musical accomplishments, he starred in nearly 60 films and won an Academy
Award for Best Supporting Actor.
On May 14, 1998, he died at the age of 82 of a heart attack.
The New York Times described him as "the greatest singer in American pop history" and cited
him as single handedly making swing music cool again.
Today, his influence on the culture is still clear.
After all, he sold over 150 million records in his lifetime and is still selling them
more than two decades after his death.
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