Jon-Erik Hexum was a good-looking but stupid actor who, in 1984, starred in the CBS drama 'Cover-Up'. If you can imagine it, this program followed a pair of fashion photographers/models who were actually secret agents.
On October 12, 1984, after finishing a scene in which he fired several blank rounds from a revolver, Hexum considered the .44 Magnum he held in his hands and he came up with a joke. Unfortunately for Mr. Hexum, it was a stupid joke. Hexum put the cannon up to his temple, joke-suicide style and spoke his final words, reprinted here in their entirety:
"Let's see if I've got one for me."
In the split-second between Hexum's pulling the trigger and the abrupt cessation of all cerebral activity, he might have enjoyed a moment of satori-like insight - that 'blank' doesn't mean 'empty', and a jet of hot gas, burning powder, and flaming wadding, travelling at several times the speed of sound, can really cause some damage if you put it right up against something and fire.
Hexum was dissected for organ transplants and his name is synonymous for many with On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or at least The Darwin Awards.