Deaths from pneumonia in California

Cornelius Cooper "Corny" Johnson (August 28, 1913 – February 15, 1946) was an American athlete in the high jump. Born in Los Angeles in 1913, Johnson first competed in organized track and field events at Berendo Junior High School. He achieved greater athletic success as a student at Los Angeles High School, competing in the sprint and in the high jump. Before going to the Olympics as a junior, he won the CIF California State Meet in 1932. He had been second the year before. In 2016, the 1936 Olympic journey of the eighteen Black American athletes, including Johnson, was documented in the film Olympic Pride, American Prejudice.

Garry Kent Marshall (November 13, 1934 – July 19, 2016) was an American screenwriter, film director, producer and actor. Marshall began his career in the 1960s as a writer for The Lucy Show and Dick Van Dyke Show until he developed the television adaptation of Neil Simon's play The Odd Couple. He rose to fame in the 1970s for creating four ABC sitcoms including Happy Days (1974–1984), Laverne & Shirley (1976–1983), Blansky's Beauties (1977), and Mork & Mindy (1978–1982).
Marshall went on to direct the numerous films including Young Doctors in Love (1982), The Flamingo Kid (1984), Nothing in Common (1986), Overboard (1987), Beaches (1988), Pretty Woman (1990), Frankie and Johnny (1991), Exit to Eden (1994), Dear God (1996), The Other Sister and Runaway Bride (Both in 1999), The Princess Diaries 1 and 2 (2001 and 2004), Raising Helen (2004), Georgia Rule (2007), Valentine's Day (2010), New Year's Eve (2011), and Mother's Day (2016). As an actor, he also appeared in many films including Soapdish (1991), A League of Their Own (1992), With Friends Like These... (1998), Orange County (2002), Keeping Up with the Steins (2006), Race to Witch Mountain (2009), and Life After Beth (2014), as well as voiced as Studio Executive in The Majestic (2001) and as Buck Cluck in Chicken Little (2005).

Edwin Lee Mathews (October 13, 1931 – February 18, 2001) was an American professional baseball third baseman. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB) for 17 seasons for the Boston / Milwaukee / Atlanta Braves (1952–1966); Houston Astros (1967) and Detroit Tigers (1967–68). Inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1978, he is the only player to have represented the Braves in the three cities they have called home. He played 1,944 games for the Braves during their 13-season tenure in Milwaukee—the prime of Mathews' career.
Mathews is regarded as one of the best third basemen ever to play the game. He was an All-Star for nine seasons. He won the National League (NL) home run title in 1953 and 1959 and was the NL Most Valuable Player runner-up both of those seasons. He hit 512 home runs during his major league career. Mathews coached for the Atlanta Braves in 1971, and he was the team's manager from 1972 to 1974. Later, he was a scout and coach for the Texas Rangers, Milwaukee Brewers, and Oakland Athletics.

Helen Margarite Burgess (April 26, 1916 – April 7, 1937) was an American film and stage actress. Discovered by Cecil B. DeMille, she began her acting career in 1936 at age nineteen, playing Louisa Cody in DeMille's Western biopic The Plainsman. She would appear in four films as a contract player for Paramount Pictures before dying at age twenty from pneumonia.

Richard Lawrence "Larry" Stevenson (December 22, 1930 – March 25, 2012) was the inventor of the kicktail, the bent-upwards end of a skateboard, which made most of today's skateboarding tricks possible and essentially revolutionized the sport.

Nanette June Leslie (June 4, 1926 – July 30, 2000) was an American actress. She was known for playing Martha McGivern in the American western television series The Californians.

Betty Lasky (October 11, 1922 – January 7, 2017) was an American film historian and author.

Marcia Mae Jones (August 1, 1924 – September 2, 2007) was an American film and television actress whose prolific career spanned 57 years.

Harold Eugene Roach Jr. (June 15, 1918 – March 29, 1972) was an American film and television producer.

Gladys Alberta Bentley (August 12, 1907 – January 18, 1960) was an American blues singer, pianist, and entertainer during the Harlem Renaissance.
Her career skyrocketed when she appeared at Harry Hansberry's Clam House, a well-known gay speakeasy in New York in the 1920s, as a black, lesbian, cross-dressing performer. She headlined in the early 1930s at Harlem's Ubangi Club, where she was backed up by a chorus line of drag queens. She dressed in men's clothes (including a signature tail coat and top hat), played piano, and sang her own raunchy lyrics to popular tunes of the day in a deep, growling voice while flirting with women in the audience.
On the decline of the Harlem speakeasies with the repeal of Prohibition, she relocated to southern California, where she was billed as "America's Greatest Sepia Piano Player" and the "Brown Bomber of Sophisticated Songs". She was frequently harassed for wearing men's clothing. She tried to continue her musical career but did not achieve as much success as she had had in the past. Bentley was openly lesbian early in her career, but during the McCarthy Era she started wearing dresses and married, claiming to have been "cured" by taking female hormones.