Comedian severely burned
An explosion rocked his bedroom, and black Comedian Richard Pryor was engulfed in flames. Hearing his screams, his maid summoned his aunt Jenny, who rushed to his room and smothered the blaze with bedclothes. In shock, Pryor bolted from the house in the Los Angeles suburb of Northridge and rushed into the street. When police arrived with an ambulance, he was still running. "I can't stop!" he shouted. "I'll die if I stop!" His polyester shirt had melted onto his arms and chest, and he suffered third-degree burns from the waist up. At week's end he was still...