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Earl Hamner Jr., the versatile and prolific writer who drew upon his Depression-era upbringing in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia to create one of television's most beloved family shows, "The Waltons," has died at age 92. Hamner's friend Ray Castro Jr., who produced a documentary about Hamner, says the writer died Thursday in Los Angeles and had recently been battling pneumonia. Although best remembered for "The Waltons," which aired for nine seasons and won more than a dozen Emmys, that show barely scratched the surface of Hamner's literary accomplishments. He was a best-selling novelist ("Spencer's Mountain"), the author of...

An Italian actor has been left in a coma after a scene that involved his character being lynched went horribly wrong in front of a live audience. According to a report on The Times, Raphael Schumacher, 27, was accidentally strangled by the rope around his neck and lost consciousness while appearing in the play 'Mirages' at the Teatro Lux in Pisa. He's said to be "seriously ill". Police sealed off the theatre and have launched an investigation into how the stunt went wrong. Schumacher should have been stood on a box and wearing a body harness to ensure he was...

A 5-year-old boy from Chattanooga, Tenn., made a heartbreaking call to the police on Sunday telling the dispatcher that "my daddy and my mama got shot." The boy, who seemed too young to know his address, calmly tells the dispatcher that "this dude shot ’em" and asks her to "tell the police officers to come." The police found George Dillard, 24, and Lakita Hicks, 25, dead in the house, according to News Channel 9. They say the child, who remains unnamed, is unharmed and is currently with extended family. The boy remained on the phone with the dispatcher for more...

Three teenagers who were arrested Monday in the shooting deaths of two people at a Seattle homeless encampment called the Jungle are homeless brothers who live in another camp under an overpass. On Tuesday, a King County Juvenile Court judge ordered that the three, ages 13, 16 and 17, remain in custody while prosecutors decide on charges against them. The brothers were each being held on investigation of two counts of felony murder, three counts of first-degree assault and several firearms violations, the county prosecutor’s office said. Jeannine L. Zapata, 45, and James Q. Tran, 33, were killed and three...

It's rare that game shows get away with not forking out at least some cash, but that's what happened on Jeopardy! when the final clue bamboozled gambling contestants. The popular US programme has been on the air since the 1960s and sees contestants answer questions based on a range of subjects, like history, current affairs, art, and literature. But on Monday the show's three contestants were not so lucky, or capable, as they bet a total of $33,600 only to lose out on a question involving school segregation. The offending clue was: "A 1957 event led to the creation of...

McDonalds is testing a spin on it's classic French fries, drizzling them with chocolate and calling them McChoco Potato. You can have your fries with two types of chocolate sauces: chocolate with cacao flavor and white milk chocolate. McDonald's hopes this combination will give customers a salty and sweet harmonious taste, so the customer can eat them as a side to a burger, or as a dessert.

This is to such a great extent that the city has come to be known by some as 'Catstantinople'. While they may be pleasant to look at, the cats don't always have a saucer of food and a warm place to sleep. A kind Imam has decided to remedy this by opening up his mosque to the stray cats and kittens, so they can eat and safely rest their heads away from the perils of the outdoors. Imam Mustafa Efe calls the cats "guests" of the mosque, and they've made themselves quite at home. They sit down on the plush...

WASHINGTON — Officials in Washington say they've arrested a North Dakota man who allegedly traveled to the nation's capital to kidnap a dog belonging to President Barack Obama. D.C. Superior Court documents say Secret Service agents interviewed Scott D. Stockert of Dickinson, North Dakota, at a Washington hotel after receiving information that he was on his way to the capital to kidnap a 'pet' owned by the first family. A court document says that Secret Service agents interviewed Stockert on Wednesday after they received information from a Secret Service office in Minnesota that Stockert 'was on his way to Washington,...

'The situation was one of sheer hopelessness,' says Sajjad Shah from Pakistan. 'Those who could afford to stay and search for their dead loved ones did so. The others just had to go home.' Almost three months after the deadliest Hajj crush in 25 years, the Saudi government’s official death toll still stands at 769, but most sources put the figure closer to 2,000. Shah, a hotel-owner from Mirpur, spent a month searching for his dead sister, but claims he met resistance from Saudi officials who covered up the full extent of the tragedy. Just before 9am on 24 September,...

A woman who refused to leave a hospital when doctors discharged her died after she was forcibly removed by police, authorities said Tuesday. Barbara Dawson, 57, collapsed Monday while being escorted in handcuffs from the Liberty Calhoun Hospital, where she went to seek treatment for breathing difficulties, said Blountstown Police Department chief Mark Mallory. Mallory said an officer had arrested Dawson for disorderly conduct and trespassing. An autopsy on Dawson has been performed and the results should be released Wednesday, Mallory said. Florida Department of Law Enforcement officials have been called in to investigate, department spokesman Steve Arthur said. He...

A cafe in Greece is letting stray dogs sleep inside the premises at night to take shelter from the winter cold. The Hott Spott cafe on the island of Lesbos has opened its doors to the animals who have nowhere else to sleep. An image of dogs sleeping inside the cafe was posted on Facebook earlier this month and has almost 1,500 likes. It was posted by Eustratios Papanis, assistant professor of sociology at the University of the Aegean. He wrote: This picture was taken at a coffee shop in the island of Lesvos, North Aegean Sea, Greece. The country...

A female officer in the Air Force who was one of the first openly gay service members to marry was identified on Tuesday as among the six U.S. troops killed by a suicide bomber near Bagram air base in Afghanistan. Facebook postings on Tuesday by friends and family of Air Force Major Adrianna Vorderbruggen mourned her death on Monday and sent condolences to her wife Heather and son Jacob, who live near Washington, D.C. "We do find comfort in knowing that Heather and Jacob are no longer in the shadows and will be extended the rights and protections due any...

Honolulu, Hawaii (CNN)—A Secret Service agent's gun, badge, radio, handcuffs and flash drive were stolen in broad daylight Monday near the agency's headquarters in Washington, according to a police report and sources briefed on the incident. The agent's belongings were taken from his personal vehicle while it was parked on G Place in downtown Washington around 4 p.m. ET. A report filed with the Metropolitan Police Department several hours later describes the agent returning to his car and noticing the back rear window of his car had been "unzipped." The report says the agent noticed "a bag with the listed...

A military K-9 injured in a bomb explosion in Afghanistan along with his military police officer partner now has a lot of support after a photo of the dog wearing a Purple Heart Medal in a hospital in Germany has gone viral, the Killeen Daily Herald reports. Spc. Andrew Brown, 22, and his military dog, Rocky, were searching a structure for explosive materials in southern Afghanistan’s Helmand Province Dec. 3 when the bomb exploded, the Texas newspaper reported Friday. ADVERTISEMENT “They were working with Special Operations Forces in an effort to identify explosive materials,” Army spokesman Sgt. Michal Garrett told...

Marjorie Lord, best known for playing Kathy “Clancy” Williams opposite Danny Thomas on the 1950s and 60s sitcom Make Room For Daddy and later the revival Make Room For Granddaddy died November 28 from natural causes, the LA Times reported. She was 97. Lord made the jump to television in the 1950s and would join Make Room For Daddy, later renamed The Danny Thomas Show, during the show’s fourth season, in 1957. She played the second wife of Danny Thomas’ character, staying with the show until it was canceled in 1964. She returned along with the rest of the cast...

CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCIV) -- After photos surfaced on social media showing Citadel cadets in white Klan hoods and reportedly singing Christmas carols, a source close to the school said all of the members of the group have been identified. In a statement from The Citadel's Lt. Gen. John Rosa, the cadets "were singing Christmas carols as part of a 'Ghosts of Christmas Past' skit. These images are not consistent with our core values of honor, duty and respect." Rosa goes on to identify the student in blue as an upperclassmen. Rosa said suspension proceedings had begun for the students involved,...

ANNVILLE, Pa. – Students at a small Pennsylvania college are demanding that administrators rename a building called "Lynch Memorial Hall" because of the racial overtones of the word "lynch." The building is named after Clyde A. Lynch, who was president of Lebanon Valley College from 1932 until his death in 1950. Students want administrators to either rename the building entirely or add Lynch's first name. It was included on a list of demands that students presented on Friday. Others include a more diverse curriculum and more sensitivity training for staff. School spokesman Marty Parkes said Tuesday that officials are considering...

KANSAS CITY, Kan. — A Detroit brother and sister vanished more than two years before they were found dead in a freezer in their home, and an 11-year-old Florida girl disappeared more than a year before she, too, turned up in a family freezer. And a 7-year-old Kansas boy hadn't been seen for more than a month before authorities found the gruesome remains of a child in a pigsty inside his family's barn. All of them were home-schooled, but despite their disappearances going unnoticed for so long, opposition from the government-wary home-schooling community means it's unlikely these states will start...

The debut of “A Charlie Brown Christmas” would capture not only the Emmy and Peabody awards, but also roughly half the people watching television across America. And its place in the nation’s holiday hearth has remained fixed ever since. As the special celebrates its 49th anniversary this week — and the strip enjoys its 64th year — ABC airs the “Peanuts” special tonight (the first time of the season for the full, not-edited-for-commercial-constraints version). As viewers tune in to see a sparse and wilting “Charlie Brown Christmas tree” — a conifer embodiment of “Chuck’s” hard-luck seasonal mood that soon entered...

Berlin (AFP) - Clashes broke out Sunday between hundreds of asylum seekers at a shelter in Berlin, in the second mass brawl to erupt over the weekend in Germany's crowded migrant accommodations. Several people were arrested at the fight that started in the food distribution queues at the former airport of Tempelhof, which has been turned into a temporary accommodation for 1,200 refugees, an AFP photographer witnessed. The brawl came just hours after another mass fight at a refugee shelter in the Berlin suburb of Spandau, where migrants went at each other with fire extinguishers, a police spokesman said. Windows...