Notable deaths last week

• The former drummer and a founding member of the Southern hard rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd, Robert Burns Jr., died late Friday in a single-vehicle crash in Georgia, police and his father said.

Burns' vehicle went off a road just before midnight as it approached a curve near Cartersville, striking a mailbox and a tree, Georgia State Patrol spokeswoman Tracey Watson said. Burns, 64, was killed in the wreck. He was not wearing a seatbelt.

Burns was one of five musicians who founded the band in Jacksonville, Florida. While Burns was with the group, it recorded "Sweet Home Alabama," "Gimme Three Steps," and "Free Bird." He left the group in 1974.

He continued to play for fun or in guest appearances nationally, said his father, Robert Burns Sr. Early on, the group played in the Burns' family garage.

"He was a product of his mother, so far as manners is concerned," the elder Burns said. "He had the manners that would suit the King of England. Very soft-spoken and extremely well-mannered person to come out of that kind of industry."

• Hall of Fame forward Elmer Lach, who centered Montreal's famed Punch Line with Toe Blake on left wing and Maurice "Rocket" Richard on the right, has died. He was 97.

The Canadiens say Lach passed away Saturday morning in Montreal. He had been the oldest living NHL player.

"They used to call him Elegant Elmer but he wasn't very elegant," said broadcaster Dick Irvin Jr., whose father Dick Irvin Sr. was Lach's only coach through this 14-year NHL career from 1940 to 1954. "He was a tough little guy.

"But he was a wonderful playmaker. He knew what to do with the puck."

Lach retired as the league's career leader in points with 623, a far cry from the current record of 2,857 by Wayne Gretzky but accomplished in an era of 50-game seasons in a super-competitive six-team league.

The Punch Line was a force for four years until Blake's retirement in 1948.

It started in 1944-45 when the linemates finished first, second and third in the scoring race. Lach won the Hart Trophy for NHL MVP after he had 54 assists and a league-leading 80 points, and Richard became the NHL's first 50-goal scorer.

Lach helped the Canadiens win the Stanley Cup in 1944, 1946 and 1953. He was enshrined in the Hall of Fame in 1966.

• Robert Hite, an Army Air Forces aviator who was captured by the Japanese and imprisoned for 40 months after flying in the Doolittle raid of 1942, the now-celebrated mission that invigorated American morale early in World War II, died March 29 at a nursing facility in Nashville. He was 95.

He had Alzheimer's disease and heart ailments, said his son, R. Wallace Hite.

Hite, who retired as an Air Force lieutenant colonel, was a 22-year-old second lieutenant when he departed for what would be one of the most dramatic early offensives of the second world war.

The date was April 18, 1942, not yet five months after Japan's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. The United States had waged battle with the Japanese throughout the Pacific but had not yet launched a strike on the enemy's home islands.

Tapped to lead that mission was then-Lt. Col. James Doolittle, a gutsy test pilot who would receive the Medal of Honor for his valor in the raid now known by his name. He was joined by 79 volunteers. Among them was Hite.

"I would have gone as bombardier, rear gunner, nose gunner," Hite said in an oral history cited by James Scott in his forthcoming book "Target Tokyo: Jimmy Doolittle and the Raid that Avenged Pearl Harbor." "I would have gone in any position to be on that raid," said Hite.

Hite was a co-pilot on the B-25 dubbed "Bat Out of Hell," the last bomber to take off from the carrier. After completing their missions, the bombers were scheduled to land in a safe section of China - a plan that was upended when they encountered foul weather and darkness.

All 16 planes were lost in the course of the mission. Hite and other aviators were forced to bail out over enemy-occupied China. Eight men, including Hite, were captured by the Japanese. Three were executed; the other five received life sentences after what was described as a sham court-martial. For more than three years in POW camps in China, they endured interrogation, beatings, disease and starvation.

• On a late summer's evening in 1985, she phoned the National Rifle Association headquarters and left a blunt message: "My name is Sarah Brady, and you've never heard of me, but I am going to make it my life's ambition to try to put you all out of business."

With that call, Brady started down a road that would make her the public face of gun-control activism for a generation. Her husband, James Brady, was Ronald Reagan's press secretary and was left paralyzed during an assassination attempt on the president in 1981. She was left to care for her husband through his long, at times excruciating, convalescence. He died Aug. 4, 2014, at age 73.

But it wasn't her husband's shooting that led Brady to call the NRA. The turning point for her activism came four years later, when their 6-year-old son, Scott, found what he thought was a toy gun and pointed it at his mother. She told him never to point a gun at anyone and, when he handed it to her, she found to her horror that it wasn't a toy but a fully loaded .22 similar to the one used to shoot her husband.

"The maddest I've ever been in my life," she told The Washington Post of the gun incident with her son that occurred during a visit to her husband's home town in Centralia, Illinois. "I was livid."

Brady grew into a determined foe of the NRA, one of most powerful lobbying organizations in the country. She died April 3 at age 73 at a retirement community in Alexandria, Virginia. She had pneumonia, a family spokeswoman, Gail Hoffman, said.

• A campaigner who raised awareness of the rare genetic condition progeria, which causes those affected to age about eight times faster than average, has died at age 17.

The U.S.-based Progeria Research Foundation said Hayley Okines, from East Sussex in England, died Thursday at her home.

The group's executive director Audrey Gordon praised Okines for her participation in drug trials and research that helped make progress toward treatment for the condition. Hundreds of tributes also poured into the group's website celebrating Okines' life.

Okines published her autobiography, "Old Before My Time," at 14, detailing her unusual life.

The Progeria Research Foundation says the condition affects about 1 in 4 million to 8 million newborns. Those affected die at an average age of 14.

• The Rev. Robert H. Schuller didn't wait for the faithful to flock to his upstart church in Southern California - he took his message to them.

As the car culture flourished in post-World War II California, the brash Iowa-born pastor began preaching from the roof of a concession stand at a drive-in movie theater, displaying a passion - and a marketing genius - that established him as a father of the megachurch movement that would soon sweep the nation.

But Schuller didn't stop there. In 1970, he reached out to the masses beyond his home base in the Los Angeles suburbs with his "Hour of Power" television program, which was broadcast into millions of homes every Sunday over the next two decades. He also constructed the soaring, glass-paned Crystal Cathedral that became the touchstone of his storied ministry.

The world-famous televangelist and author memorialized in decades of recorded sermons and books died early Thursday at a care facility in Artesia, daughter Carol Schuller Milner said. He was 88.

Schuller was diagnosed in 2013 with terminal esophageal cancer.

Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton said they were saddened by the passing of a man who offered them "unfailing kindness and wise counsel" during Bill Clinton's presidency.

"From the people who filled the pews of the Crystal Cathedral to the millions who embraced his ministry on television and through his books, Robert Schuller was a beacon of faith, hope, and love," the Clintons said in a joint statement.

Schuller had admirers that ranged from fellow evangelist Billy Graham to Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan.

• Writer Tom Koch, who created sketches for the comedy team Bob and Ray and invented a nonsensical, nearly impossible-to-play sport called squamish, has died at age 89.

The funny man, who received a bachelor's degree in journalism from Northwestern University, began his career writing for future "Today" show host Dave Garroway's NBC radio program "Monitor."

He tired of that work, however, and was living with his wife's family in St. Louis in 1955 when Bob Elliott and Ray Goulding approached him about writing for them.

Over the next 33 years he turned out thousands of uncredited sketches for the pair.

Segueing into television, Koch also wrote for "The Lucy Show, "My Mother the Car" and other programs.

He might be best remembered, however, for inventing the ridiculously complicated game of squamish for a 1965 Mad Magazine story lampooning professionalism in college sports.

It requires 43 players per side, each wearing a polo helmet and carrying hooked sticks called frullips. Players use the sticks to grasp the necks of opposing players trying to advance the pritz, a small ball stuffed with blue jay feathers.

The game developed a cult following, with fans claiming to have played various versions.

• Songwriter and keyboardist Michael Brown has died at his home in Englewood, New Jersey. He was 65.

Born Michael Lookofsky, Brown grew up in Brooklyn. A keyboardist and songwriter for the band The Left Banke, he co-wrote the 1966 hit "Walk Away Renee" - The Left Banke's biggest hit, which rose to No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart - and composed "Pretty Ballerina," which rose to No. 15 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

• College football Hall of Famer, former NFL quarterback and war hero Eddie LeBaron Jr. has died. He was 85.

LeBaron played at Pacific for coach Amos Alonzo Stagg and also helped lead the Tigers to an undefeated season in 1949.

He later served as a U.S. Marine in the Korean War and was awarded the Purple Heart and Bronze Star for heroism.

LeBaron played 11 seasons in the NFL for Washington and Dallas. He threw for 13,399 yards and 104 touchdowns and was selected to four Pro Bowls.

He later served as general manager for the Atlanta Falcons from 1977 to 1982 and was the league's Executive of the Year in 1980.

• Manoel de Oliveira, a celebrated Portuguese movie director believed to be the world's oldest filmmaker, has died, authorities said. He was 106.

Portuguese Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coelho said in a statement that Oliveira "was a central figure in the international projection of Portuguese cinema and, through films, of Portuguese culture and its vitality." President Anibal Cavaco Silva said in a televised address that "Portugal has lost one of the greatest figures of its contemporary culture."

Oliveira's last film, a short feature called "The Old Man of Belem," had its premiere last November in Porto and was shown at last year's Venice Film Festival.

Oliveira's career began with a silent documentary about Porto, Portugal's second-largest city, in 1931. He made his first feature-length movie in 1942 but his output was sporadic until he was 76, when he began directing roughly a film every year.

• Riccardo Ingram, a longtime minor league coach in the Minnesota Twins organization and a former football and baseball star at Georgia Tech, died at the age of 48 following his second battle with brain cancer.

A moment of silence was held for Ingram before Wednesday's Twins-Red Sox spring training game in Fort Myers, Florida.

• Cynthia Lennon, the first wife of former Beatles guitarist John Lennon, has died of cancer at 75.

Her death was announced on the website and Twitter account of her son, Julian Lennon and confirmed by his representative.

Julian Lennon posted a moving video tribute to his late mother with a song he had written in her honor.

"You gave your life for me, you gave your life for love," it begins, showing footage of him as a young boy with his parents. It also shows footage of Cynthia with John during the early days of Beatlemania.

Cynthia and John Lennon met at art school in Liverpool in 1957 and married shortly before the Beatles shot to worldwide fame. Julian was their only child together.

The couple divorced in 1968 after John Lennon started his much publicized relationship with Japanese artist Yoko Ono. They had spent 10 years together as a couple.

• Gary Ross Dahl, the creator of the wildly popular 1970s fad the Pet Rock, has died at age 78 in southern Oregon.

The smooth stones came packed in a cardboard box containing a tongue-in-cheek instruction pamphlet for "care and feeding." Dahl estimated he had sold 1.5 million of them at roughly $4 each by the time the fad fizzled. The Pet Rock required no work and no time commitment.

• Musician Jeremy Brown, a guitarist for Scott Weiland & the Wildabouts, died a day before the release of the band's debut album. He was 34 years old.

Weiland, the former frontman for Stone Temple Pilots, posted a statement on Facebook honoring his friend and collaborator, whom he met in 2008. He said he grew concerned when Brown didn't show up for a rehearsal for their album release show on Monday.

The band recently performed at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas. Its website lists more than 20 concerts for the next two months.

• Jim LaRue, who coached Arizona's football team for eight seasons and guided the Wildcats to an 8-1-1 record in 1961 and a share of the Western Athletic Conference championship in 1964 before becoming an NFL assistant, has died. He was 89.

LaRue coached the Wildcats from 1959-66 and had a 41-37-2 record.

LaRue later was an assistant at Utah (1968-73) and Wake Forest (1974-75) and then headed to the NFL.

With the Chicago • Bears, LaRue coached the secondary. Chicago went 15-1 in the 1985 regular season and shut out both playoff opponents to reach the Super Bowl in New Orleans, where the Bears beat New England 46-10.

Funeral services are scheduled for April 6 at Christ Church United Methodist in Tucson.

• James Wood, a supermarket executive who led restructuring of the Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co. in the 1980s and returned the owner of the A&P grocery chain to profitability, has died. He was 85.

• Nan Tucker McEvoy, a newspaper heiress who headed the parent company of the San Francisco Chronicle in the 1980s and 1990s and who became the first woman to chair the governing board of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, died March 26 at her home in San Francisco. She was 95.

McEvoy was already one of the richest women in America when she netted hundreds of millions of dollars in 1999 from the sale of the Chronicle, which she led for 14 years as board chairwoman and principal owner.

• Gene Saks, a prolific actor-director who teamed with playwright and fellow New Yorker Neil Simon on hit Broadway and movie productions of such Simon comedies as "The Odd Couple" and "Brighton Beach Memoirs," has died. He was 93.

Saks, who won three Tony Awards for his direction, died from pneumonia Saturday at his East Hampton home in New York, according to his son Daniel.

Saks' grab bag of hits also included many without Simon. Among them were the musicals "Mame" (1966), starring Angela Lansbury and his then-wife Bea Arthur; "Half A Sixpence," starring British pop star Tommy Steele (1965), and "I Love My Wife" (1977), as well as such comedies as "Enter Laughing" (1963) and "Same Time, Next Year" (1975).

In a 1987 interview Saks explained his affinity for Simon: "Aside from Neil's wit, his brightness and his ability to characterize, he writes about things I know about and care about. We both came from middle-class, first-generation Jewish families, and our humor springs from the same roots."

Saks had been an actor for 15 years, and his career was gaining momentum, when he moved on to directing after producer Morton Gottlieb had seen him direct a scene at the Actors Studio and was impressed.

Gottlieb asked Saks to direct "Enter Laughing." It became a hit, elevating Alan Arkin to stardom.

By the mid-1970s Saks was one of Broadway's most prominent directors, and at one point in 1977 he had three shows running concurrently on Broadway: "Same Time, Next Year," "California Suite" and "I Love My Wife."

It was the Cy Coleman-Michael Stewart musical "I Love My Wife" that brought Saks his first Tony. He went on to win two more for Simon plays, "Brighton Beach Memoirs" in 1983 and "Biloxi Blues" in 1985.