Dave Freeman, co-author of '100 Things To Do Before You Die', dies
Dave Freeman, co-author of '100 Things To Do Before You Die', dies
Dave Freeman, author of "100 Things To Do Before You Die", has died. The 47-year old died after falling and hitting his head at his home in Venice, Los Angeles. Freeman's relatives say that he managed to visit around half of the places in the book before his death.
The travel guide
"100 Things To Do Before You Die" encouraged travellers to treat each day as if it were their last, writes The Los Angeles Times. His father Roy said yesterday that Freeman died following an accident at his home in
California on August 17th.
The guide's co-author Neil Teplica said that the book was adventure-based but "it wasn't just physical adventure, it was cultural and spiritual adventure", with events such as a
voodoo pilgrimage in Haiti. Between them Freeman and Teplica had visited almost all of the events in the guide and Freeman had planned to visit them all before he became too old to travel.
The recommendations in the book ranged from attending the
Academy Awards, and
running with the bulls in Pamplona,
Spain, to obscure events such as
Australia's annual
Nude Night Surfing contest and what Freeman termed "the original bungee-jumping";
Land Diving on the Pacific island of Vanuatu.
Each entry in the guide book was placed in categories such as "potential to see blood", "religious fervour" and "down and dirty". Activities were accompanied with irreverent logos; "The icons gave the book a lot of life, and people really reacted to the categories, which are a kind of snapshot into Dave's brain," Teplica said.
"100 Things To Do Before You Die" was first published in 1999 and the "100 Things" approach swept the publishing industry, Teplica added. The title "meant you should live every day like it would be your last, and there's not many people who do", Freeman's co-author explained.
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