Lionel Davidson (87) British thriller writer whose novels were less well known in the US than in Britain, where they were commercial and critical successes. Davidson wrote eight novels for adults, among them Night of Wenceslas (1961) and Kolymsky Heights (1994), and several novels for young people. He died of lung cancer in London, England on October 21, 2009.

Ruth Duckworth (90) sculptor whose work in clay and bronze included both monumental sculptures and murals and small-scale, intimate pieces. Duckworth died in Chicago, Illinois on October 18, 2009.

Amos Ferguson (89) folk artist known for his colorful Bible scenes and his depictions of the social rituals and the flora and fauna of the Bahamas. A house painter by trade, Ferguson did not turn to art until he was in his 40s. He died in Nassau, Bahamas on October 19, 2009.

Michael Kabotie (67) Hopi artist and jeweler, an innovator in the Native American fine arts movement. By creating colorful paintings reflecting traditional Hopi life in contemporary media, Kabotie broke new ground. He died of swine flu in Flagstaff, Arizona on October 23, 2009.

Don Ivan Punchatz (73) artist whose surreal work was featured on popular horror and sci-fi paperbacks, magazines, and the first Star Wars film poster, influencing a generation of illustrators. In the early days of video games Punchatz created the packaging for a new game, and when offered a flat fee or a percentage of the game’s profits, he opted for the fee; the game, Doom, became a runaway best-seller. Punchatz died of cardiac arrest after 11 days on life support in Arlington, Texas on October 22, 2009.

V. Douglas Snow (82) Utah artist and painter best known for his impressionist paintings whose murals have appeared in several public buildings across Utah, including public exhibitions at the Leonardo Museum, the University of Utah Graduate School of Social Work building, the Pioneer Theater, Salt Lake City International Airport, and behind the Utah Supreme Court bench at the Matheson Courthouse. Snow was killed in a car accident in Sigard, Utah on October 20, 2009.

Nancy Spero (83) American artist and feminist whose figurative art focused on political violence. Spero died of an infection leading to respiratory problems that in turn caused heart failure, in New York City on October 18, 2009.

Dr. Yvonne Carter (50) British general practitioner and dean of the Warwick Medical School, one of Great Britain’s first medical schools to accept applications only from graduate students, since 2004. Carter was also an active researcher while maintaining her clinical practice during a career that spanned more than 20 years. She died of breast cancer in Liverpool, England on October 20, 2009.

Edward Kimbell (93) electronics maven who played a major role in guiding the Associated Press into the computer age beginning half a century ago. Kimbell supervised the creation in 1963 of the AP’s first computer center, which initially replaced the tedious tasks of compiling stock exchange listings with pencil and paper and relaying them via Teletype. By the early ‘70s, computers at the news cooperative were being used to transmit stories. Kimbell, who had Parkinson’s disease, died in Rochester, New York on October 22, 2009.

Dr. Ignacio Ponseti (95) Spanish-born physician who developed a special treatment for clubfoot disease in children. The Ponseti method uses casts and gentle manipulation as an alternative to surgery to correct clubfoot, a condition in which the foot is turned in sharply; it can leave children crippled if left untreated or improperly treated. Ponseti arrived at the University of Iowa in the ‘40s and stayed. He retired from University Hospitals in 1984 but was there almost every day for 20 more years. He died five days after suffering a stroke, in Iowa City, Iowa on October 18, 2009.

Elmer Winter (97) cofounder with his law partner of Manpower, the worldwide temp agency, in 1948. Winter died in Mequon, Wisconsin on October 22, 2009.

Ray Browne (87) Ohio university professor credited with coining the phrase “popular culture” and pioneering the study of its artifacts such as bumper stickers and cartoons. Browne developed the first academic department devoted to studying what he called the “people’s culture” at Bowling Green State University in 1973 and wrote and edited more than 70 books. He died in Toledo, Ohio on October 22, 2009.

Dom Shambra (70) school district insider who sacrificed a distinguished career in Los Angeles to champion the Belmont Learning Complex, the US’s most notorious high school construction project. Shambra died of congestive heart failure in Pasadena, California on October 20, 2009.

Theodore Sizer (77) leader in education reform who led Ivy League education departments and progressive high schools. As headmaster of Phillips Academy in Andover, Mass. (1972-81), Sizer oversaw a successful merger of Phillips and Abbot academies and the introduction of innovative programs, including a summer outreach program to prepare minority students for careers in math and science. He suffered from colon cancer and died in Harvard, Massachusetts on October 21, 2009.

Maryanne Amacher (71) composer whose experimental sound installations and multimedia works sometimes required entire buildings to display their melding of electronic timbres and live, natural ambience. Amacher died of a stroke in Rhinebeck, New York on October 22, 2009.

Leona Atkins (85) widow of legendary guitarist Chet Atkins (d. 2001). Leona Atkins died in Nashville, Tennessee on October 22, 2009.

Betty Gallagher (93) widow of a former Associated Press general manager and president who helped him to run the Berlin bureau after World War II. Betty Kelley was a New York actress when she met her future husband, AP war correspondent Wes Gallagher (d. 1997), while he was recovering from injuries sustained in a car accident in North Africa. When Wes covered the Nuremberg trials in 1946, Betty kept a phone line open while he dashed down a hallway to report the sentences of 12 Nazi chiefs and beat the competition. Betty Gallagher, who suffered a stroke on Oct. 19, died three days later in Santa Barbara, California on October 22, 2009.

Lou Jacobi (95) scene-stealing Canadian-born actor and comedian who made a film and stage career playing comic ethnic characters but was praised for serious dramatic roles as well. Jacobi made his Broadway debut in 1955 in The Diary of Anne Frank. Over a 50-year career he appeared in 10 Broadway plays, 24 feature films, and in guest roles on countless TV sitcoms. He died in New York City on October 23, 2009.

John Kenley (103) theater producer who ran a legendary summer stock circuit in Ohio beginning in the ‘50s that attracted numerous Broadway and Hollywood stars. Kenley produced hundreds of plays and musicals; his Kenley Players began in Dayton in 1957 and spread to other Ohio cities. He died of pneumonia in Cleveland, Ohio on October 23, 2009.

Sir Ludovic Kennedy (89) British author, broadcaster, and investigative journalist who campaigned against miscarriages of justice and religious dogmatism and in support of euthanasia and independence for his native Scotland. Kennedy was the widower of British ballerina Moira Shearer (d. 2006), star of the classic film The Red Shoes (1948). Kennedy died in Salisbury, England on October 18, 2009.

Don Lane (75) American song-and-dance man who became an enduring TV celebrity in Australia known as “The Lanky Yank." Lane was one of the best-known figures on Australian TV for almost 20 years until in 1983 he retired the Tonight Show-style program that bore his name. He died of a dementia-related illness in Sydney, Australia on October 22, 2009.

Jack Nelson (80) Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter who covered the civil rights movement and the Watergate scandal for the Los Angeles Times and was the paper’s Washington bureau chief for 20 years. As a reporter with the Atlanta Constitution in 1960, Nelson won the Pulitzer for local reporting for exposing malpractice and other problems at a Georgia state mental hospital. He died of pancreatic cancer in Bethesda, Maryland on October 21, 2009.

Hanns Neuerbourg (88) roving Associated Press correspondent in eastern Europe who also covered the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and interviewed Elvis Presley when he was on US Army duty in the late ‘50s. After retiring in 1991, Neuerbourg moved to the northern Swiss city of Stein, where he died of lung cancer on October 24, 2009.

Al Rosensweet (99) longtime reporter (1949-86) with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Rosensweet also covered sports for the Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch, interviewed Jack Dempsey and Babe Ruth, and covered Winston Churchill’s “Iron Curtain” speech. He died in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on October 20, 2009.

Soupy Sales (83) rubber-faced comedian whose career was built on 20,000 pies in the face and 5,000 live TV appearances across 50 years of laughs. Born Milton Supman in North Carolina, Sales’s pie-throwing schtick became his trademark, and celebrities lined up to take one in the face alongside him. His greatest success came in the ‘60s in New York with The Soupy Sales Show—an apparent children’s show that also appealed to adults. He suffered from several ailments and died in the Bronx, New York on October 22, 2009.

Lars Schmidt (92) Swedish theater producer better known as the third and final husband (1958-75) of Sweden’s legendary screen actress Ingrid Bergman (d. 1982). Schmidt died in Fjällbacka, Västra Götalands län, Sweden on October 18, 2009.

Peter Shellem (49) journalist whose digging into dusty court records, erroneous crime-lab reports, and coerced confessions during his 23 years as a reporter for the Harrisburg (Pa.) Patriot-News led to the release of five wrongly convicted prisoners. Shellem reportedly committed suicide at his home in Gardners, Pennsylvania on October 24, 2009.

Steven Valadez (18) guitarist and bass player of the local punk rock band Rumor Has It. The band had performed in a handful of backyard shows at several high school venues, among other projects in the Los Angeles area, and was expected to release a CD later this year. Valadez was stabbed to death during a brawl at a party in Valinda, California on October 18, 2009.

Linda Day Varnum (71) former TV director nominated for an Emmy for an episode of the comedy series Archie Bunker’s Place in 1981. As Linda Day, she had many directing credits in the ‘80s and ‘90s, including the pilot of the comedy series Married with Children in 1987 and 32 more episodes of the show. Among the other series she directed were WKRP in Cincinnati, Who’s the Boss, Dallas, Gimme a Break!, Kate & Allie, and Sabrina, the Teenage Witch. Varnum died of leukemia and breast cancer in Georgetown, Texas on October 23, 2009.

Joseph Wiseman (91) longtime Canadian-born stage and screen actor best known for playing the villainous title character in Dr. No (1962), the first James Bond feature film. Wiseman’s other film credits include Detective Story (1951), Viva Zapata! (1952), The Night They Raided Minsky’s (1968), and The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz (1974). He had guest roles on many TV shows, among them Law & Order, The Streets of San Francisco, The Untouchables, and The Twilight Zone. In the late ‘80s, he had a recurring role as crime boss Manny Weisbord on the NBC drama Crime Story. Among his many Broadway credits are Antony & Cleopatra (1947), Detective Story (1949), The Lark (1955), and the title role in In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer (1969). Wiseman died in New York City on October 19, 2009.

Clifford Hansen (97) former Wyoming governor and US senator (R-Wyo., 1967-78), a rancher who used his agricultural background for political success in Cheyenne and Washington, DC. Hansen suffered from ailments including respiratory problems and had returned home Oct. 19 after hospitalization for a broken pelvis. He died four days after his 97th birthday, in Jackson, Wyoming on October 20, 2009.

John de J. Pemberton Jr. (90) former executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) during the turbulent ‘60s who helped to double its size and shift its focus to the criminal courts as an arena for issues like civil rights and Vietnam. Pemberton died of congestive heart failure in Monte Rio, California on October 21, 2009.

Gen. Noor Ali Shooshtari (??) senior deputy commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ ground force. The militant organization was established after the 1979 Islamic Revolution as an ideological and impenetrable wall to defend Iran’s clerical rule as the Sunni resistance group Jundallah waged a low-level insurgency, but had been at the center of several violent attacks over the past few years. Shooshtari was among six military officers killed in a suicide bomb attack in the Afghan-Pakistan border region of Sistan-Baluchistan on October 18, 2009.

John Harris Burt (91) retired bishop who advanced a tradition of social activism at Pasadena’s All Saints Episcopal Church with his bold support of the civil rights movement when he was rector in the ‘60s. Burt died on Lake Superior outside Marquette, Michigan on October 20, 2009.

Rudy De Leon (85) commander of the Los Angeles Police Department’s Hollenbeck Division when he started a boxing club for youths in the basement of the Boyle Heights police station in 1973. Greatly expanded by 1998, the center has been credited with helping thousands of at-risk youths with programs and activities. De Leon died of complications from Alzheimer’s disease, in Rancho Palos Verdes, California on October 19, 2009.

Shiloh Pepin (10) girl born with fused legs, a rare condition often called “mermaid syndrome,” who gained a wide following on the Internet and national TV. The condition, also known as sirenomelia, meant that Shiloh had only one partially working kidney, no lower colon or genital organs, and legs fused from the waist down. Her story was featured recently on The Oprah Winfrey Show. She died in Portland, Maine on October 23, 2009.

Ernie Sears (83) self-proclaimed UFO abductee and a member of the now-defunct Southampton UFO Group whose fascinating tales of alien abductions, little gray men, and UFOs flying through the night sky caught the imagination of fellow believers and skeptics across the UK. Sears claimed he had been abducted by extraterrestrials eight times during his lifetime, beginning in the ‘60s, and later spoke about his experiences in a 2006 interview. He died of a heart attack in Netley, Hampshire, England on October 18, 2009.

Christopher Skinner (27) openly gay Toronto man trying to hail a taxi when he was attacked and beaten by two to four unknown assailants, who then got back in their SUV and ran over him. Police said Skinner may have touched their vehicle, intentionally or not, but stopped short of declaring his murder a gay bashing or hate crime. He died in Toronto, Canada on October 18, 2009.

Somer Thompson (7) Florida girl reported missing on Oct. 19 while walking home from school. Authorities launched a countywide search involving helicopters, dogs, and volunteers walking arm-to-arm through wooded areas near northern Florida’s heavily populated residential neighborhood where the little girl was last seen after police had questioned more than 70 registered sex offenders in the area. Somer Thompson’s body was found partially covered in a nearby garbage landfill outside Orange Park, Florida on October 21, 2009.

Howard Unruh (88) World War II veteran who killed 13 people as he walked the streets of Camden, New Jersey in a psychotic 1949 shooting spree that was the US’s worst mass murder at the time. Unruh had been confined in a state psychiatric hospital since the killings, which became known as the “Walk of Death.” He was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. He confessed to the killings and was judged mentally competent but never tried for the Sept. 6, 1949 massacre. Unruh died in a nursing facility after an extended illness, in Trenton, New Jersey on October 19, 2009.

Grace Vincent (7 mos) British baby girl who made a miraculous recovery after her life-support machine was switched off while suffering from a rare form of meningitis. Baby Grace became known as "Amazing Grace." Her family made the decision to turn off the equipment, but hours later Grace was still breathing and was discharged from the hospital after four days in intensive care. She died of fluid in her lungs in North Shields, Tyne and Wear, England on October 18, 2009.

Bianca Wisniewski (44) Polish immigrant and a pioneering female hardhat at the center of a $20-million sexual harassment lawsuit against her JPMorgan Chase company’s construction site in New York City in 2007. The case in Manhattan Supreme Court was adjourned, but Wisniewski’s lawyer vowed to push for justice for his pioneering client and security for other female workers. She died in an apartment fire in Queens, New York on October 18, 2009.

G. Patrick Ziemann (68) former Roman Catholic bishop of Santa Rosa, Calif. who resigned in 1999 amid sexual and financial scandals. Ziemann died of pancreatic cancer at Holy Trinity Monastery near Tucson, Arizona on October 22, 2009.

Bill (Big Whistle) Chadwick (94) first US-born official in National Hockey League history and later a popular broadcaster for the New York Rangers. For 16 seasons (1939-55) Chadwick was one of the best officials in the NHL, despite being blind in one eye after a game injury as a player in 1935. He invented and perfected the system of hand signals to signify penalties that is now used throughout the world. He died in Cutchogue, New York on October 24, 2009.

Chris Hawk (58) surfer and board shaper recently inducted into the Surfers’ Hall of Fame in Huntington Beach, Calif. Hawk died of cancer in San Clemente, California on October 23, 2009.

Jasper Howard (20) University of Connecticut football player, the team’s starting cornerback. Howard had a career-high 11 tackles on Oct 17 against Louisville and made perhaps the game’s biggest play, forcing a fumble just as Louisville was about to score with UConn up 21-13 in the third quarter; UConn won 38-25. Howard was stabbed by an unknown assailant after an on-campus dance, just hours after helping his team to a homecoming victory, and died in a Hartford, Connecticut hospital on October 18, 2009.

Bill Poole (87) captain and pioneer of sportfishing in and beyond San Diego. Poole, who started with a barge he bought after World War II, built or had a hand in the construction of many top sportfishing vessels still operating, including the Royal Polaris, Royal Star, American Angler, and Spirit of Adventure. He died of lung cancer in San Diego, California on October 21, 2009.

Jack Poole (76) Vancouver businessman who brought the 2010 Winter Games to Vancouver. Poole was chairman of the Vancouver Olympic organizing committee’s board of directors and headed up the city’s bid for the Games. His death came one day after the flame for the Vancouver Games was lit in Greece. He died of pancreatic cancer in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada on October 23, 2009.

Yury Ryazanov (22) Russian gymnast and a member of his country’s national gymnastics team that won gold medals at the 2008 European Men’s Artistic Gymnastics Championships and at the ‘06 World Artistic Gymnastics Championships. Ryazanov recently became the 2009 World All-Around bronze medalist when he finished third to claim Russia’s first medal in the top individual event in 10 years and competed at the ‘08 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China, placing 17th in the preliminary round of the All-Around qualification match. He was killed in a car accident near Moscow, Russia on October 20, 2009.

Darvin Wallis (60): longtime NFL assistant coach with Cleveland and Kansas City. Wallis was an NFL coach for 26 seasons, including 19 with Kansas City as a defensive assistant/quality control coach before retiring in January 2008. He died in his sleep in Colorado on October 23, 2009.