LEHIGH ACRES FGCU softball team helps Habitat for Humanity build three homes The Florida Gulf Coast University softball team helped Habitat for Humanity build three homes Saturday.
ESTERO Home Base Golf Tournament helps SWFL Veterans Veterans hit the green at the Copperleaf Golf Course on Saturday. This was part of the Home Base golf tournament.
FORT MYERS At least one person dead after propane truck collides with golf cart Florida Highway Patrol is investigating a crash that has left one person dead and another injured Saturday morning.
Scattered storms ahead for your Saturday plans The Weather Authority is tracking weekend temperatures in the low to mid-90s this weekend with a chance for scattered storms this afternoon.
WINK NEWS SWFL Scoreboard: High School Football Week 3 Thunderstorms tried to put a stop to week three of high school football on Friday Night, but gridiron action prevailed.
Man accused of plotting murder-for-hire denied bond A man suspected of being involved with a murder-for-hire plot will stay behind bars. Ryan Toranzo had his renewed motion to set bond denied today in Collier County Court.
LABELLE Two dead after crash on State Road 80 According to the Florida Highway Patrol, there was a crash on State Road 80 that has left at least one person dead Friday evening.
DeSoto County looks to recruit more teachers While it can sometimes be easy to fill a classroom with students, it is not so easy for teachers. Schools across the nation and locally in Southwest Florida are still dealing with the challenges of teacher shortages. With class back in session, so is teacher recruiting for DeSoto County schools. The assistant superintendent, Jake Reynolds, […]
IMMOKALEE ROAD Push for change after deadly crash on Immokalee Rd. We’re told the woman was driving with two kids in the car when a semi ran a red light and hit her Thursday morning.
FORT MYERS BEACH Mobi-Mats deployed on Fort Myers Beach A walkway to paradise! Brand new and blue, the Mobi-Mat is making things easier for Fort Myers Beachgoers.
NAPLES Women of Steel business conference inspiring and empowering women Focused, hardworking, empowered. These women have made a name for themselves as Women of Steel.
NAPLES Beloved Collier County bus driver retires after 20 years After 20 years of getting kids to school safely, a beloved Collier County bus driver is retiring.
Wade Wilson has new death row mugshot Convicted double-killer Wade Wilson has a new death row mugshot.
SOUTHWEST FLORIDA Sizzle Dining is back in SWFL It’s Sizzle Season! Local restaurants are ready to welcome new faces by offering exclusive menu deals to attract new customers.
LEHIGH ACRES FGCU softball team helps Habitat for Humanity build three homes The Florida Gulf Coast University softball team helped Habitat for Humanity build three homes Saturday.
ESTERO Home Base Golf Tournament helps SWFL Veterans Veterans hit the green at the Copperleaf Golf Course on Saturday. This was part of the Home Base golf tournament.
FORT MYERS At least one person dead after propane truck collides with golf cart Florida Highway Patrol is investigating a crash that has left one person dead and another injured Saturday morning.
Scattered storms ahead for your Saturday plans The Weather Authority is tracking weekend temperatures in the low to mid-90s this weekend with a chance for scattered storms this afternoon.
WINK NEWS SWFL Scoreboard: High School Football Week 3 Thunderstorms tried to put a stop to week three of high school football on Friday Night, but gridiron action prevailed.
Man accused of plotting murder-for-hire denied bond A man suspected of being involved with a murder-for-hire plot will stay behind bars. Ryan Toranzo had his renewed motion to set bond denied today in Collier County Court.
LABELLE Two dead after crash on State Road 80 According to the Florida Highway Patrol, there was a crash on State Road 80 that has left at least one person dead Friday evening.
DeSoto County looks to recruit more teachers While it can sometimes be easy to fill a classroom with students, it is not so easy for teachers. Schools across the nation and locally in Southwest Florida are still dealing with the challenges of teacher shortages. With class back in session, so is teacher recruiting for DeSoto County schools. The assistant superintendent, Jake Reynolds, […]
IMMOKALEE ROAD Push for change after deadly crash on Immokalee Rd. We’re told the woman was driving with two kids in the car when a semi ran a red light and hit her Thursday morning.
FORT MYERS BEACH Mobi-Mats deployed on Fort Myers Beach A walkway to paradise! Brand new and blue, the Mobi-Mat is making things easier for Fort Myers Beachgoers.
NAPLES Women of Steel business conference inspiring and empowering women Focused, hardworking, empowered. These women have made a name for themselves as Women of Steel.
NAPLES Beloved Collier County bus driver retires after 20 years After 20 years of getting kids to school safely, a beloved Collier County bus driver is retiring.
Wade Wilson has new death row mugshot Convicted double-killer Wade Wilson has a new death row mugshot.
SOUTHWEST FLORIDA Sizzle Dining is back in SWFL It’s Sizzle Season! Local restaurants are ready to welcome new faces by offering exclusive menu deals to attract new customers.
FILE – In this Sept. 4, 1991 file photo, actor Robert Guillaume poses for a portrait in Los Angeles. Guillaume, who won Emmy Awards for his roles on “Soap” and “Benson,” died Tuesday, Oct. 24, 2017 in Los Angeles at age 89. Guillaume’s widow Donna Brown Guillaume says he had been battling prostate cancer. (AP Photo/Chris Martinez, File) NEW YORK (AP) Robert Guillaume, who rose from squalid beginnings in St. Louis slums to become a star in stage musicals and win Emmy Awards for his portrayal of the sharp-tongued butler in the TV sitcoms “Soap” and “Benson,” has died at age 89. Guillaume died at home Tuesday in Los Angeles, according to his widow, Donna Brown Guillaume. He had been battling prostate cancer, she told The Associated Press. Among Guillaume’s achievements was playing Nathan Detroit in the first all-black version of “Guys and Dolls,” earning a Tony nomination in 1977. He became the first African-American to sing the title role of “Phantom of the Opera,” appearing with an all-white cast in Los Angeles. MORE: Steely Dan co-founder Walter Becker dead at 67 While playing in “Guys and Dolls, he was asked to test for the role of an acerbic butler of a governor’s mansion in “Soap,” a primetime TV sitcom that satirized soap operas. “The minute I saw the script, I knew I had a live one,” he recalled in 2001. “Every role was written against type, especially Benson, who wasn’t subservient to anyone. To me, Benson was the revenge for all those stereotyped guys who looked like Benson in the ’40s and ’50s (movies) and had to keep their mouths shut.” The character became so popular that ABC was persuaded to launch a spinoff, simply called “Benson,” which lasted from 1979 to 1986. The series made Guillaume wealthy and famous, but he regretted that Benson’s wit had to be toned down to make him more appealing as the lead star. The career of Robert Guillaume (pronounced with a hard “g”: gee-yome) almost ended in January 1999 at Walt Disney Studio. He was appearing in the TV series “Sports Night” as Isaac Jaffee, executive producer of a sports highlight show. Returning to his dressing room after a meal away from the studio, he suddenly collapsed. “I fell on the floor, and I couldn’t get up,” he told an interviewer in 2001. “I kept floundering about on the floor and I didn’t know why I couldn’t do it. I didn’t know it was it was caused by my left side being weaker than the other.” Fortunately, St. Joseph Hospital was directly across from the studio. The 71-year-old actor was taken there and treated for a stroke- the result of a blood clot that blocked circulation of blood to the brain. They are fatal in 15 percent of the cases. Guillaume’s stroke was minor, causing relatively slight damage and little effect on his speech. After six weeks in the hospital, he underwent a therapy of walks and sessions in the gym. He returned to the second season of “Sports Talk,” and it was written into the script that Isaac Jaffee was recovering from a stroke. Because of slim ratings, the second season proved to be the last for the much-praised show. MORE: Former ‘Let’s Make a Deal’ host Monty Hall dies at 96 Guillaume resumed his career and traveled as a new spokesman for the American Stroke Association. He also made appearance for the American Heart Association. “I’m a bastard, a Catholic, the son of a prostitute, and a product of the poorest slums of St. Louis.” This was the opening of “Guillaume: A Life,” his 2002 autobiography in which he laid bare his troubled life. He was born fatherless on Nov. 30, 1927, in St. Louis, one of four children. His mother named him Robert Peter Williams; when he became a performer he adopted Guillaume, a French version of Williams, believing the change would give him distinction. His early years were spent in a back-alley apartment without plumbing or electricity; an outhouse was shared with two dozen people. His alcoholic mother hated him because of his dark skin, and his grandmother rescued him, taught him to read and enrolled him in a Catholic school. Seeking but denied his mother’s love and scorned by nuns and students because of his dark skin, the boy became a rebel, and that carried into his adult life. He was expelled from school and then the Army, though he was granted an honorable discharge. He fathered a daughter and abandoned the child and her mother. He did the same to his first wife and two sons and to another woman and a daughter. He worked in a department store, the post office and as St. Louis’s first black streetcar motorman. Seeking something better, he enrolled at St. Louis University, excelling in philosophy and Shakespeare, and then at Washington University (St. Louis) where a music professor trained the young man’s superb tenor singing voice. After serving as an apprentice at theaters in Aspen, Colo., and Cleveland, the newly named Guillaume toured with Broadway shows “Finian’s Rainbow,” ”Golden Boy,” ”Porgy and Bess” and “Purlie,” and began appearing on sitcoms such as “The Jeffersons” and “Sanford and Son.” Then came “Soap” and “Benson.” His period of greatest success was marred by tragedy when his 33-year-old son Jacques died of AIDS. Guillaume’s first stable relationship came when he married TV producer Donna Brown in the mid-1980s and fathered a daughter, Rachel. At last he was able to shrug off the bitterness he had felt throughout his life. “To assuage bitterness requires more than human effort,” he wrote at the end of his autobiography. “Relief comes from a source we cannot see but can only feel. I am content to call that source love.”