Free Republic

A few of us on the fifth floor here at the Register remember Dick Clark from the earliest days of his black and white American Bandstand telecasts. Television was young, so was he and so were we. Now TV is old hat, probably destined to fade into some amorphous merger with the Internet. Yours truly is of an age that it probably would be risky to revisit even the Stroll, which required minimal footwork, but a bit of rhythm and was just one of his priceless innovations. But Dick Clark . . .

Access Hollywood didn't report Clark's condition or where he had the stroke. Last April, Clark announced he had type 2 diabetes, formerly called adult-onset diabetes, since 1994, but kept it a secret from everyone except close friends and family. Clark is now a spokesman for the American Association of Diabetes Educators and the pharmaceutical maker Merck & Co. Clark, 75, was a Philadelphia radio disc jockey in the early 1950s, when he took over a local show, American Bandstand, on WFIL-TV. Clark's show was later syndicated nationally and he moved to Los Angeles as his entertainment empire expanded. In 1973,...