Amos Kenan (82) member of Israel’s founding generation whose writing and art helped to define modern Israeli culture. Kenan was known for his newspaper columns, plays, and books, many of which satirized the Israeli government and organized religion, and as a prolific painter, sculptor, and movie director. Shown above is his sculpture Messiah. He died in Tel Aviv, Israel on August 4, 2009.

Jimmy Bedford (69) former master distiller of Jack Daniel’s whiskey during a 40-year career with the company. Bedford retired in March 2008 after 20 years of supervising the entire operation at the 143-year-old distillery, the oldest registered one in the US. His body was found outside a barn at his farm, apparently the victim of a heart attack, in Lynchburg, Tennessee on August 7, 2009.

Charles Gwathmey (71) architect known for his influential modernist home designs and famous clients like director Steven Spielberg, comedian Jerry Seinfeld, and Hollywood mogul David Geffen. Gwathmey’s projects also included a controversial overhaul and addition to New York’s Guggenheim Museum and other museum designs. He died of cancer in New York City on August 3, 2009.

Carleen Hutchins (98) violin maker who also conducted acoustic research to facilitate the modern-day design of instruments that rival the work of 17th- and 18th-century masters. Hutchins designed and built an entire family of violins, eight instruments proportional in size and pitch known collectively as the new violin family, or the violin octet. She died in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire on August 7, 2009.

Eli Mason (88) independent New York accountant who criticized some of the practices of large accounting firms. Mason was a traditionalist in a profession that has slowly come to be dominated by huge firms. Many of his fears were justified when the accounting scandals of Enron and WorldCom exposed the cozy relationship between some of the world’s top accounting firms and the companies they were supposed to audit. Mason died in New York City on August 3, 2009.

Andreas Oscarsson (36) Swedish entrepreneur and a pioneer within the online poker industry who cofounded PokerListings.com, a highly regarded poker web site from a leading online gambling company. Oscarsson was found shot to death by unknown assailants at his father’s home in Trollhattan, Sweden on August 3, 2009.

Wallace L. Pannier (81) germ warfare scientist whose top-secret projects included a mock attack on the New York subway with powdered bacteria in 1966. Pannier worked at Fort Detrick, a US Army installation that tested biological weapons during the Cold War and is now a center for biodefense research. He died of respiratory failure in Frederick, Maryland on August 6, 2009.

Sándor Püski (99) Hungarian book publisher who in 1939 founded the Magyar Elet (Hungarian Life) Publishing House in Budapest, which mainly issued works by Hungarian populist writers. Püski’s business was nationalized during the Communist rule in 1950, and in ‘62 he was imprisoned for a year under trumped-up charges. He and his wife emigrated to the US in 1970 and founded a publishing house in New York in ‘75 but returned to Hungary in ‘89. Püski had been hospitalized with bronchitis shortly before he died in Budapest, Hungary on August 2, 2009.

Michael Viner (65) publisher who helped to popularize audio books and issued a line of tabloid tell-all books that included O. J. Simpson trial figure Faye Resnick and disgraced former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich. In 2005, Viner founded Phoenix Books, whose current list includes a book about Bernard Madoff, a Larry Flynt autobiography, and “a historical and personal perspective” of prostitution by Kiss singer Gene Simmons. Viner died of cancer in Beverly Hills, California on August 8, 2009.

Jack Temple Kirby (70) historian who denounced the stereotypes of the American South and in his books showed the ways its people and landscapes have influenced each other. Kirby, whose roots in the South went back to the 1600s, was a professor of history at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio (1965-2002). He died of heart failure in St. Augustine, Florida on August 6, 2009.

Willy DeVille (58) founder of the punk group Mink DeVille and known for his blend of R&B, blues, Dixieland, and traditional French Cajun ballads. Mink DeVille, for which DeVille was the principal songwriter, was billed as one of the most original groups on the New York punk scene after an appearance at the CBGB club in Greenwich Village in the ‘70s. DeVille died of pancreatic cancer in New York City on August 6, 2009.

John Hughes (59) writer-director, Hollywood’s youth impresario of the ‘80s and ‘90s who captured the teen and preteen market with such favorites as The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, and Home Alone. Hughes’s ensemble comedies helped to make stars of Molly Ringwald, Anthony Michael Hall, Ally Sheedy, and many other young performers. He died of a heart attack during a morning walk in New York City, where he had gone to visit family, on August 6, 2009.

Rory Marshall (54) editor on the Associated Press’s West regional desk. Marshall went to work for the AP in Seattle in 1982 after nearly five years at the Bellingham (Wash.) Herald, where he covered the courts and police, became known for a folksy writing style, and eventually was named assistant city editor. He died of lung cancer in Phoenix, Arizona on August 2, 2009.

Jeff Prugh (69) former Los Angeles Times sportswriter and national correspondent, a coauthor of books on UCLA’s basketball dynasty and a controversial murder case in Atlanta. Prugh died of cancer in Chattanooga, Tennessee on August 8, 2009.

Billy Lee Riley (75) one of the early singers and studio musicians who recorded at Memphis’s legendary Sun Records but was overshadowed by Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis. Riley’s singles included “Red Hot” and “Flyin’ Saucers Rock & Roll." His band played on the original Sun recording of Lewis’s “Great Balls of Fire." Riley had been suffering from colon cancer, and it had moved to his bones. He died in Jonesboro, Arkansas on Aug. 2, 2009.

Budd Schulberg (95) screenwriter who wrote the Oscar-winning screenplay for the Marlon Brando classic On the Waterfront (1954). Schulberg was the son of onetime Paramount Pictures chief B. P. Schulberg and earlier had exposed the Hollywood hustle with the novel What Makes Sammy Run? (1941). His other screenplays included A Face in the Crowd (1957), Andy Griffith’s first film. Schulberg died in Westhampton Beach, Long Island, New York on August 5, 2009.

Mike Seeger (75) singer and multi-instrumentalist who played an important part in the folk revival of the ‘50s and ’60s. A younger half-brother of folk singer Pete Seeger, Mike played several instruments, including banjo, fiddle, and guitar. In 1958 he helped to found the New Lost City Ramblers, whose repertory came from the ‘20s and ’30s. He died of multiple myeloma, a form of blood cancer, in Lexington, Virginia on August 7, 2009.

Michael A. Wiener (71) founder of the Infinity Broadcasting chain of radio stations who in retirement focused more on philanthropic work supporting the performing arts and research on heart disease. Wiener and his business partner Gerald Carrus sold their 44 radio stations to the Westinghouse Corp. in 1996 for about $4 billion. He died of cancer in New York City on August 2, 2009.

Otha Young (66) songwriter who wrote the ‘80s hit “The Sweetest Thing (I’ve Ever Known)” for Grammy-winning singer Juice Newton during their long musical partnership. Young played guitar with Newton since the ‘70s, appearing on all her albums. He died of cancer in Los Angeles, California on August 6, 2009.

Sidney Zion (75) journalist and author who turned his 18-year-old daughter’s death at New York Hospital in 1984 into a crusade that led to national reforms in the training, workload, and supervision of young doctors. Zion died of bladder cancer in Brooklyn, New York on August 2, 2009.

Harold W. (Bud) Arberg (90) musician who adapted the “Caisson” into the official song of the US Army. Contrary to popular perception, “The Caissons Go Rolling Along,” written in 1908 by then-1st Lt. Edmund (“Snitz”) Gruber, never received official status. In 1956, new Army Secretary Wilbur Brucker decided the Army should adopt the old standard. Arberg wrote new lyrics (“First to fight for the right, and to build the nation’s might, and the army goes rolling along”) and a new musical introduction, and on Veterans Day 1956 Gruber’s “Caisson” song became “The Army Goes Rolling Along,” the official song of the US Army. Arberg died of pneumonia in Arlington, Virginia on August 4, 2009.

Adm. Ralph W. Cousins (94) retired US Navy admiral who directed naval air operations during the Vietnam War and later became the Navy’s second-highest-ranking officer and top commander of NATO forces. Cousins died of complications from a fall, in Newport News, Virginia on August 5, 2009.

Adrian W. DeWind (95) adviser to US Presidents and governors on tax law and an advocate in the human rights and nuclear nonproliferation movements. DeWind died in New York City on August 7, 2009.

Shafik Hout (77) close aide to Yasser Arafat (d. 2004) who fell out with the late Palestinian leader over the 1993 peace accords with Israel. A founding member of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Hout resigned that year in protest against the Palestinian-Israeli agreements. He died of cancer in Beirut, Lebanon on August 2, 2009.

Nikolaos Makarezos (90) one of the leaders of the military dictatorship that ruled Greece (1967-74). Makarezos was the junta’s chief economic policymaker and later deputy prime minister and minister for coordination under dictator George Papadopoulos (d. 1999). He died in Athens, Greece on August 3, 2009.

Taha Mohieddin Marouf (80) one of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s vice presidents, from 1975 until the March 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq that toppled Saddam. US forces arrested Marouf in May 2003 but later released him after it was determined that he was largely a symbolic figure, a token Kurd appointed to appease his people. He died of cancer in Amman, Jordan on August 7, 2009.

Anne Wexler (79) former top aide in the Carter White House and later an influential Washington lobbyist who did just about everything in politics—from licking envelopes to running Democrat campaigns—except run for office. Wexler died of cancer in Washington, DC on August 7, 2009.

Lu Young (67) wife of US Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska), his state’s only congressman. The couple had been married for 46 years. Lu Young reportedly suffered a slight stroke in 2003. She died in Great Falls, Virginia on August 2, 2009.

Marilyn Clement (74) social activist who advocated for a national health care program and rallied for civil rights alongside Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Clement began her career in the ‘60s with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and for 50 years worked with civil rights groups including the Women’s International League for Peace & Freedom and the Center for Constitutional Rights. In 2004 she founded Healthcare-Now! She died of cancer in New York City on August 3, 2009.

Rev. John B. Coburn (94) former 13th bishop of Massachusetts (1976-86) who was for 10 years a nationally prominent leader of the Episcopal Church. Coburn died in Bedford, Massachusetts on August 8, 2009.

Jim Ingram (77) retired FBI agent who helped state and federal officials to reopen long-cold investigations of killings from Mississippi’s violent civil rights era. A 30-year FBI veteran, Ingram led bureau offices in Chicago and New York before retiring in 1982. He died of pancreatic cancer in Jackson, Mississippi on August 2, 2009.

Donald Marshall Jr. (55) Mi’kmaq Indian whose wrongful conviction for murder in the early ‘70s became a cause célèbre in Canada, leading to a sweeping reexamination of Nova Scotia’s legal system and changes in Canada’s evidence disclosure rules. Marshall suffered from kidney failure linked to antirejection drugs he had been taking since a double lung transplant in 2003. He died in Sydney, Nova Scotia on August 6, 2009.

Charles Martin (69) Ohio man sentenced to a mandatory 15-plus years in prison for the March 2006 shotgun slaying of his neighbor Larry Mugrage Jr. (15) for walking on the front lawn of Martin’s southwestern Ohio home. Prosecutors said Martin also threatened to harm the teen’s parents if he was acquitted but later began to show signs of remorse and apologized to the family. He was found dead in his cell, an apparent suicide by hanging, in Lebanon, Ohio on August 7, 2009.

George Sodini (48) unemployed systems analyst at a Pittsburgh-based law firm who entered a fitness center and opened fire, killing three women and critically wounding nine others in a violent rampage in an all-female aerobics class. Authorities said Sodini chronicled his experiences in an online diary over a nine-month period detailing his rejections by women and his severe sexual frustration before the deadly misogynist attacks. He committed suicide by a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head at the scene in Collier Township, Pennsylvania on August 4, 2009.

Robert M. Takasugi (78) US district judge sent to an internment camp with his family during World War II who overcame discrimination to become the first Japanese-American appointed to the federal bench. Takasugi died after suffering from several illnesses, in Los Angeles, California on August 4, 2009.

Riccardo Cassin (100) Italian mountaineering pioneer credited with 100 first ascents from the Himalayas to Alaska. Cassin died in Piani Resinelli, Italy, a hamlet north of Milan at the foot of the Alps, on August 6, 2009.

Hironoshin Furuhashi (80) one of Japan’s first great swimmers and vice president of FINA, the governing body of swimming. Known as “the Flying Fish,” Furuhashi set several world records in 1949. He later helped to organize the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo and became president of Japan’s Olympic committee and swimming federation. He was in Rome, Italy for the world championships when he died in his sleep on August 2, 2009.