Here Today... Gone To Hell!

TAMPA, Fla. ? Billy Mays, the burly, bearded television pitchman whose boisterous hawking of products such as Orange Glo and OxiClean made him a pop-culture icon, has died. He was 50.

Tampa police said Mays' wife found him unresponsive Sunday morning. A fire rescue crew pronounced him dead at 7:45 a.m. It was not immediately clear how he died. He said he was hit on the head when an airplane he was on made a rough landing Saturday, and his wife, Deborah Mays, told investigators he didn't feel well before he went to bed about 10 p.m. that night.

There were no signs of a break-in at the home, and investigators do not suspect foul play, said Lt. Brian Dugan of the Tampa Police Department, who wouldn't answer questions about how Mays' body was found because of the ongoing investigation. The coroner's office expects to have an autopsy done by Monday afternoon.

"Although Billy lived a public life, we don't anticipate making any public statements over the next couple of days," Deborah Mays said in a statement Sunday. "Our family asks that you respect our privacy during these difficult times."

U.S. Airways confirmed that Mays was among the passengers on a flight that made a rough landing on Saturday afternoon at Tampa International Airport, leaving debris on the runway after apparently blowing its front tires.

Tampa Bay's Fox television affiliate interviewed Mays afterward.

"All of a sudden as we hit you know it was just the hardest hit, all the things from the ceiling started dropping," MyFox Tampa Bay quoted him as saying. "It hit me on the head, but I got a hard head."

Tampa police spokeswoman Laura McElroy said linking Mays' death to the landing would "purely be speculation." She said Mays' family members didn't report any health issues with the pitchman, but said he was due to have hip replacement surgery in the coming weeks.

Laura Brown, spokeswoman for the Federal Aviation Administration, said she did not know if Mays was wearing his seat belt on the flight because the FAA is not investigating his death.

U.S. Airways spokesman Jim Olson said there were no reports of serious injury due to the landing.

"If local authorities have any questions for us about yesterday's flight, we'll cooperate fully with them," he said.

Born William Mays in McKees Rocks, Pa., on July 20, 1958, Mays developed his style demonstrating knives, mops and other "As Seen on TV" gadgets on Atlantic City's boardwalk. For years he worked as a hired gun on the state fair and home show circuits, attracting crowds with his booming voice and genial manner.

AJ Khubani, founder and CEO of "As Seen on TV," said he first met Mays in the early 1990s when Mays was still pitching one of his early products, the Shammy absorbent cloth, at a trade fair. He said he most recently worked with Mays on the reality TV show "Pitchmen" on the Discovery Channel, which follows Mays and Anthony Sullivan in their marketing jobs.

"His innovative role and impact on the growth and wide acceptance of direct response television cannot be overestimated or easily replaced; he was truly one of a kind," Khubani said of Mays in a statement.

After meeting Orange Glo International founder Max Appel at a home show in Pittsburgh in the mid-1990s, Mays was recruited to demonstrate the environmentally friendly line of cleaning products on the St. Petersburg-based Home Shopping Network.

Commercials and informercials followed, anchored by the high-energy Mays showing how it's done while tossing out kitschy phrases like, "Long live your laundry!"

Sarah Ellerstein worked closely with Mays when she was a buyer for the Home Shopping Network in the 1990s and he was pitching Orange Glo products.

"Billy was such a sweet guy, very lovable, very nice, always smiling, just a great, great guy," she said, adding that Mays met his future wife at the network. "Everybody thinks because he's loud and boisterous on the air that that's the way he is, but I always found him to be a quiet, down-to-earth person."

His ubiquitousness and thumbs-up, in-your-face pitches won Mays plenty of fans for his commercials on a wide variety of products. People lined up at his personal appearances for autographed color glossies, and strangers stopped him in airports to chat about the products.

"I enjoy what I do," Mays told The Associated Press in a 2002 interview. "I think it shows."

Mays liked to tell the story of giving bottles of OxiClean to the 300 guests at his wedding, and doing his ad spiel ("powered by the air we breathe!") on the dance floor at the reception. Visitors to his house typically got bottles of cleaner and housekeeping tips.

As part of "Pitchmen," Mays and Sullivan showed viewers new gadgets such as the Impact Gel shoe insert; the Tool Band-it, a magnetized armband that holds tools; and the Soft Buns portable seat cushion.

"One of the things that we hope to do with 'Pitchmen' is to give people an appreciation of what we do," Mays told The Tampa Tribune in an April interview. "I don't take on a product unless I believe in it. I use everything that I sell."

His former wife, Dolores "Dee Dee" Mays, of McKees Rocks, Pa., recalled that the first product he sold was the Wash-matik, a device for pumping water from a bucket to wash cars.

"I knew him since he was 15, and I always knew he had it in him," she said of Mays' success. "He'll live on forever because he always had the biggest heart in the world. He loved his friends and family and would do anything for them. He was a generous soul and a great father."




I liked the show.

This is madness.

I loved Billy Mays!  I think we even had a thread about him, or we hijacked a thread and turned it about him.

A man who sold products on television brought so much joy into my life.  I never used any of his products, but I would never flip the channel when he came on.

He was on Conan just this past week! 

4 stars gone in less than a week.  What a shame.

damnit why Billy Mays? WHY?

i want some of that FIX IT shit, i got some scratches that need tended to


RIP

damn, everybody is dropping like flies  RIP Billy Mays

I bet the sham-wow guy had something to do with it.  :P

Even though Billy drove me nuts, he has been a household staple for awhile, as much as I wanted to change the channel in the beginning, I learned to adore his commercials and yelling, and I have to admit, I own a few of those great products, such as Sham Wow's, the putty that fixes anything, always Oxy clean, hell I even have the Orange Glow, and possibly more, they all stand up to what Billy has said they would.  I never thought I would soon be missing his products and commercials, this is crazy.  Rest in Peace now Billy Mays.

He said he never endorsed a product he didn't believe in.

Absolutely true, watched a show about how he and his partner went about their work and made many millions.

Mays Had Heart Disease

  By MITCH STACY, Associated Press Writer Mitch Stacy, Associated Press Writer   ? 59 mins ago

TAMPA, Fla. ? Television pitchman Billy Mays likely died of a heart attack in his sleep, but further tests are needed to be sure of the cause of death, a medical examiner said Monday.

Hillsborough County Medical Examiner Vernard Adams said Mays suffered from hypertensive heart disease, and the wall of the left ventricle of Mays' heart and the wall of one of his arteries were enlarged. The boisterous, bearded 50-year-old known for hawking OxiClean and other products on national commercials was found dead Sunday by his wife in their Tampa condominium.

"The heart disease is perfectly consistent with sudden death," Adams said.

An official cause of death will be issued after toxicology and other tests are completed in eight to 10 weeks.

"While it provides some closure to learn that heart disease took Billy from us, it certainly doesn't ease the enormous void that his death has created in our lives," his wife, Deborah, said in a statement. "As you can imagine, we are all devastated."

Adams said Mays was taking the prescription painkillers Tramadol and hydrocodone for hip pain, but there was no indication of drug abuse. Mays had planned to have hip-replacement surgery Monday.

Mays told his wife he didn't feel well when he went to bed sometime after 10 p.m. Saturday. Earlier in the day, he said he was hit on the head when his flight from Philadelphia had a rough landing at Tampa International Airport. The airline said no passengers reported serious injuries.

Adams said the autopsy showed no evidence of head trauma.

In a 911 tape released Monday, a frantic woman tells emergency operators she found Mays cold and unresponsive. The woman isn't identified, but police have said Deborah Mays found her husband dead.

When asked what had happened, the caller says she doesn't know.

A second person got on the phone as the operator encourages them to get Mays on the floor to start CPR.

"We can't get him up, ma'am," the woman says. "He's gone."

Born William Mays in McKees Rocks, Pa., on July 20, 1958, Mays developed his style demonstrating knives, mops and other "As Seen on TV" gadgets on Atlantic City's boardwalk. For years he worked as a hired gun on the state fair and home show circuits, attracting crowds with his booming voice and genial manner.

After meeting Orange Glo International founder Max Appel at a home show in Pittsburgh in the mid-1990s, Mays was recruited to demonstrate the environmentally friendly line of cleaning products on the St. Petersburg-based Home Shopping Network, now known as HSN.

Commercials and informercials followed, anchored by the high-energy Mays using them while tossing out kitschy phrases like, "Long live your laundry!"

HSN released a statement Monday morning, praising Mays as a "legend in the electronic retail history whose personality, entrepreneurial spirit and thoughtfulness for others have always been larger than life."

His ubiquitousness and thumbs-up, in-your-face pitches won Mays plenty of fans for his commercials on a wide variety of products. People lined up at his personal appearances for autographed color glossies, and strangers stopped him in airports to chat about the products.

"I enjoy what I do," Mays told The Associated Press in a 2002 interview. "I think it shows."

Mays liked to tell the story of giving bottles of OxiClean to the 300 guests at his wedding, and doing his ad spiel ("powered by the air we breathe!") on the dance floor at the reception. Visitors to his house typically got bottles of cleaner and housekeeping tips.

Besides his wife, Mays is survived by a 3-year-old daughter and a stepson in his 20s, police said.

God bless his soul.

RIP

They say celebrities die in threes.  Leave it to a guy like Billy Mays to ADD IN A FOURTH, ABSOLUTELY FREE!!!!

Anyone watch the "Pitchman" marathon on the Discovery Channel yesterday? Good stuff.

Yes I did... It was the first time I was able to catch the show(I was very interested when I first heard about it)

It seems like he was a good guy, who was good at what he did....

RIP

NO WONDER HE WAS SO HYPER!

Cocaine killed TV pitchman Billy Mays, autopsy finds

By Tracy Connor
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER


Hyperactive pitchman Billy Mays used cocaine days before his heart attack - and it killed him, officials said Friday.

Mays, 50, suffered from heart disease but his drug use contributed to his June 28 death, the Hillsborough County medical examiner said.

The TV salesman - who hawked OxiClean, Orange Glo, Mighty Putty and dozens of other products - was found dead by his wife in their Tampa, Fla., condo.

Initial autopsy results did not turn up evidence of drug abuse, but toxicology tests uncovered the coke in his system.

Mays got his start peddling products on the Atlantic City Boardwalk hustled his way into becoming a household name, recognizable by his blue shirt and thick beard.

Did you read any of the other articles that said all the other shit he was on?  Wow. It said they were low amounts, but it seemed he liked to party!

how about john hughes

If I knew that I had heart disease, the last thing I would have done was fueled the fire with "Cocaine", doesn't make him look so brilliant now!!

That explains alot. ;)

See: Kevin Dubrow

I would have totally partied with Billy Mays.  Dude knew how to have fun.

And the Ronco Rotisserie Grill dude would have catered the shindig.

" HI BILLY MASE HERE FOR COKE (short) shfffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff. NEVER BE TIRED AGAIN.

SICK OF NOT BEING ABLE TO DO ALL YOU WANT TO DO IN ONE DAY? WANT TO DO MORE? WANT MORE ENERGY? THEN LOOK NO FURTHER THAN COKE.

COKE IS PERFECT FOR TRUCKERS FUCKERS SUCKERS AND ANDY DICK.

CALL RIGHT NOW AND GET AN OUNCE FOR ONLY $99.99 BUT CALL WITHIN THE NEXT 20 MINUTES AND GET 2 BAGS FOR $299.95. THATS A SAVINGS YOU CAN'T DENY CALL NOW"

its all in caps cause thats the way he talks.


RIP Billy. i love'd your comersials
:peace:

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: I could see him do that if it was legal :rofl: