Obituaries

Harold W. McGraw Jr., Publisher, Dies at 92

Harold W. McGraw Jr., who as leader of McGraw-Hill, his family’s publishing business, helped build it into a billion-dollar enterprise in the 1970s and ’80s, died on Wednesday at his home in Darien, Conn. He was 92 . His son Harold W. McGraw III, who is now chief executive of the company, announced his father’s death, attributing it to natural causes. Mr. McGraw’s leadership at McGraw-Hill was far from a simple matter of inheriting and minding the family store. He playe

Midge Costanza, a Top Assistant to Carter, Dies at 77

Midge Costanza, a top assistant to President Jimmy Carter whose habit of criticizing her boss and whose fractious relations with his inner circle of advisers led her to resign after less than two years on the job, died Tuesday in San Diego. She was 77. The cause was complications of cancer, said Doreen Mattingly, a professor of women’s studies at San Diego State University, who is writing her biography. Ms. Costanza, whose title was assistant to the president for public

Edmund Dinis, Prosecutor in Chappaquiddick Case, Dies at 85

Edmund Dinis, a former prosecutor who lost his bid for re-election in Massachusetts after his handling of the case against Senator Edward M. Kennedy in the accidental drowning of Mary Jo Kopechne on Chappaquiddick Island in 1969, died March 14 in Dartmouth, Mass. He was 85. Enlarge This Image Librado Romero/The New York Times His death was confirmed by Henry Arruda, the manager of WJFD-FM, the Portuguese-language radio station in New Bedford, Mass., that Mr. Dinis had

Robert J. Myers, Actuary Who Shaped Social Security Program, Dies at 97

Robert J. Myers, an actuary who helped to create the Social Security program and to set America’s official retirement age at 65, died Feb. 13 at his home in Silver Spring, Md. He was 97. The cause was respiratory failure, said his granddaughter Juliet Myers Wolfe. In 1934, in the depths of the Great Depression, Mr. Myers was unexpectedly offered a six-week stint on the Committee on Economic Security, a Roosevelt administration panel that was drawing up blueprints for Am

Alexander M. Haig Jr., 85, Forceful Aide to 2 Presidents, Dies

Alexander M. Haig Jr., the four-star general who served as a confrontational secretary of state under President Ronald Reagan and a commanding White House chief of staff as the Nixon administration crumbled, died Saturday at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, according to a hospital spokesman. He was 85. Mr. Haig was a rare American breed: a political general. His bids for the presidency quickly came undone. But his ambition to be president was thinly veiled, and that was his

Charlie Wilson, Texas Congressman Linked to Foreign Intrigue, Dies at 76

Charlie Wilson, a 12-term Texas congressman who was best known for his playboy ways until he masterminded a covert effort to funnel billions of dollars in arms to Afghan rebels fighting the Soviets in the 1980s, died Wednesday in Lufkin, Tex. He was 76. Jack Gorden Jr., the mayor of Lufkin, confirmed the death. Memorial Medical Center-Lufkin said the preliminary cause of death was cardiopulmonary arrest. Mr. Wilson had a heart transplant in 2007. Mr. Wilson’s exploits t

Representative John P. Murtha Dies at 77; Ex-Marine Was Iraq War Critic

Representative John P. Murtha of Pennsylvania, a gruff ex-Marine who used his immense power in military spending to funnel hundreds of millions of dollars to his hard-luck district and who became an outspoken critic of the Iraq war, died on Monday. He was 77. He died at the Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington, where he was being treated for complications of gallbladder surgery, his office said. Mr. Murtha’s death came two days after he became the longest-serving congressman in Pen

J. D. Salinger, Literary Recluse, Dies at 91

J. D. Salinger, who was thought at one time to be the most important American writer to emerge since World War II but who then turned his back on success and adulation, becoming the Garbo of letters, famous for not wanting to be famous, died on Wednesday at his home in Cornish, N.H., where he had lived in seclusion for more than 50 years. He was 91. Mr. Salinger’s literary representative, Harold Ober Associates, announced the death, saying it was of natural causes. “Despite having b

Edward Sanders dies at 87; advisor to President Carter on the Middle East

Edward Sanders, an attorney and leader in the Jewish community who served President Carter as a special advisor on Mideast policy, died Monday at his Los Angeles home. He was 87. The cause was cancer, according to his son-in-law, Stanley Witkow. Sanders gained prominence during the 1973 energy crisis when, as president of the Jewish Federation Council of Greater Los Angeles, he challenged a letter from Standard Oil Co. to 300,000 stockholders that appeared to support a

Attorney Who Raised the Bar on Drunk-Driving Defenses

"I hate drunk driving," Richard Essen once told The Wall Street Journal. Yet he was also one of the nation's leading defenders of those accused of it. Mr. Essen, who died Nov. 30 at age 70, was among a handful of lawyers who in the early 1980s developed what became a legal specialty with practitioners across the nation. "He was one of the first attorneys to recognize the need for aggressive defense for people charged with drunk driving," says Patrick

James F. Brown, Radio Free Europe Chief, Dies at 81

James F. Brown, who as the director of Radio Free Europe in the early 1980s played a seminal behind-the-scenes role in the rise of the Solidarity movement, which eventually toppled the Communist Party in Poland, died in Oxford, England, on Nov. 16. He was 81 and lived in Oxford. The cause was an infection after a broken leg, his wife, Margaret, said. Although he was a British citizen, Mr. Brown was named director of Radio Free Europe, a network financed by the American

Paula Hawkins, 82, Florida Ex-Senator, Dies

WASHINGTON — Paula Hawkins, a tart-tongued conservative Republican who served a single term as a senator from Florida, fighting to protect children and blazing a trail for women while shunning the label of “feminist,” died Friday in Orlando, Fla. She was 82 and lived in Winter Park, Fla. The cause was complications of a fall after several health problems, including a stroke, in recent years, her daughter Genean McKinnon said. In her 1980 campaign, Mrs. Hawkins described

'His Highness' Helped Put a Micronation on the Map

Giorgio Carbone ruled for four decades over the tiny realm of Seborga, a self-proclaimed ministate in the Ligurian hills of northwest Italy. Mr. Carbone, who died Nov. 25 at age 73, was first elected Prince of Seborga in 1963, and was henceforth properly addressed as "His Serene Highness Giorgio I," although local wags joking about his size and enthusiasm preferred "His Tremendousness." The former head of the local flower raisers' agricultural cooper

Actor who immortalised Soviet spy Stirlitz dies at 81

Russian actor Vyacheslav Tikhonov, who immortalised a fictional wartime spy called Stirlitz in a 1973 Soviet TV series, has died in Moscow at 81. Tikhonov, more familiar to Western audiences as Prince Andrei in an epic Soviet adaptation of War And Peace in the 1960s, had suffered a heart attack. As Stirlitz, he was as familiar to Soviets as James Bond in the West.

Tommy Henrich, Yankees Clutch Hitter, Dies at 96

Tommy Henrich, the right fielder known as Old Reliable who helped propel the Yankees to seven World Series championships, died on Tuesday in Dayton, Ohio. He was 96. His death was announced by the Yankees. Playing with the Yankees for 11 seasons, Henrich was a timely hitter, an outstanding defensive player and a leader who epitomized the image of the classy Yankee who nearly always won. He was part of a celebrated outfield, teaming with Joe DiMaggio in cent

Yang Xianyi, Translator of Chinese Works, Dies at 94

Yang Xianyi, a translator renowned for his skill at rendering both classic and contemporary Chinese literature into English, died on Monday in Beijing. He was 94. His death was announced by Xinhua, the official Chinese news agency. Mr. Yang, who was given a lifetime achievement award in September by the Translators’ Association of China, was widely regarded as the greatest translator of 20th-century China. Working for the Foreign Languages Press in Beijing and later for

Hugh Morgan Hill, the Storyteller Brother Blue, Dies at 88

Hugh Morgan Hill, who as the storyteller known as Brother Blue captivated passers-by on the streets of Boston and Cambridge, Mass., with his parables, life stories and idiosyncratic retellings of Shakespeare’s plays, and who became a fixture at storytelling conferences and gatherings in the United States and abroad, died on Nov. 3 at his home in Cambridge. He was 88. The death was confirmed by his wife, Ruth. Mr. Hill, a playwright by training, began attracting audience

Wizards owner helped transform D.C.

He arrived in Washington more than 75 years ago, the gangly son of a Russian metal worker named Morris Pollinovsky who came to America a poor man speaking no English. Through decades of hard work and a seemingly unstoppable will, Abe Pollin rose to the top of the worlds of business, philanthropy and professional sports. In the process, he transformed his adopted home town by bringing professional basketball and hockey franchises here and spending $220 million to build a massive sports and entert

H. C. Robbins Landon, Haydn and Mozart Scholar, Dies at 83

H. C. Robbins Landon, an American musicologist whose research helped to restore many of Haydn’s works to the active repertory after more than a century of neglect, and whose popular books about Mozart countered many popular myths about that composer’s life, died on Friday at Rabastens, near Toulouse, France. He was 83. Rabastens town officials confirmed his death but did not specify the cause. Though a serious and prolific scholar, Mr. Landon also had a knack for makin

The 'King of the Pop-Ups' Made Books Spring to Life

An impresario of printed extravaganzas, Waldo Hunt led a renaissance of pop-up books. Mr. Hunt, who died Nov. 7 at age 88, was a one-time advertising executive who developed a specialty in creating pop-up magazine inserts. But what started as eye-catching marketing for Wrigley's gum and Dodge pickup trucks grew into a literary subgenre. Fascinated by what had become a lost art in the U.S. by the 1960s, Mr. Hunt built on his experience developing pop-up marketing materia