Noteable deaths this week

Al Oerter, the discus great who won gold medals in four straight Olympics to become one of track and field's biggest stars in the 1950s and '60s, died Monday. He was 71. Oerter died of heart failure at a hospital near his Fort Myers Beach home, wife Cathy Oerter said. He dealt with high blood pressure since he was young and struggled with heart problems, she said. Oerter won gold medals in 1956, 1960, 1964 and 1968. Oerter and Carl Lewis are the only track and field stars to capture the same event in four consecutive Olympics. Oerter, however, is the only one to set an Olympic record in each of his victories.

Lois Maxwell, who starred as Miss Moneypenny in 14 James Bond movies, has died near her home in Perth, Australia, the British Broadcasting Corp. reported. She was 80. The Canadian-born actress, who died Saturday, starred alongside Sean Connery in the first James Bond movie, "Dr. No," in 1962 as the secretary to M, the head of the secret service. Born Lois Hooker in Ontario, Canada, in 1927, she began her acting on radio before moving to Britain with the Entertainment Corps of the Canadian army at the age of 15, the BBC said. In the late 1940s, she moved to Hollywood and won a Golden Globe for her part in the Shirley Temple comedy "That Hagen Girl." After working in Italy, she returned to Britain in the mid-1950s. She was 58 when she appeared in her final Bond film, 1985's "A View To A Kill." She was replaced by 26-year-old Caroline Bliss for "The Living Daylights." Her last film was a 2001 thriller called "The Fourth Angel," alongside Jeremy Irons.

U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Davis, a Republican who represented southeastern Virginia for seven years, died Saturday morning after a two-year battle with breast cancer, her office said. Davis, 57, died at her home in Gloucester. Davis was found to have breast cancer in 2005 and had a recurrence this year. Her health took a turn for the worse during the past week, her office said. She became Virginia's first woman elected to Congress in 2000, and she was a member of the House Armed Services Committee and the Foreign Affairs Committee.

Mohegan Chief Ralph Sturges, who helped shepherd his eastern Connecticut tribe through federal recognition and the development of its highly successful casino, has died. He was 88. Sturges died Sunday night at Lawrence Memorial Hospital in New London from lung cancer, tribal officials said Monday. The Mohegans earned federal recognition in 1994, two years after Sturges was elected chief for life. Their Mohegan Sun casino in Uncasville, one of the largest in the world, opened in 1996.

Gary Franklin, a Los Angeles entertainment reporter whose 1-to-10 scale of movie reviews made him a familiar name and even carried weight with Hollywood studios, has died. He was 79. Franklin, who had suffered four strokes in recent years, died Tuesday at his suburban Chatsworth home of unknown causes, daughter Daryle Esswein said. Franklin worked at several TV and radio stations, first as a reporter and then as a movie reviewer. He rated movies and TV shows "on the Franklin Scale of 1 to 10, 10 being best." Because he was the local reviewer in the heart of the entertainment industry, his reviews influenced some of Hollywood's movers and shakers.

Eugene L. Saenger, a physician and University of Cincinnati professor who led controversial Cold War-era human radiation experiments, has died. He was 90. Weil Funeral Home in Cincinnati confirmed Saenger's Sept. 30 death. No cause of death was available. Some 90 late-stage cancer patients were treated with high doses of radiation from 1960 to 1971 without being told that a study of their responses would be used to help the military assess the effects of a nuclear attack on soldiers. In 1994, Saenger was sued by families of the cancer patients who said their relatives were unwitting guinea pigs in a military-sponsored experiment. The lawsuit was settled in 1999 for $3.6 million.

Broadway and screen actor George Grizzard, who won acclaim, and a Tony Award, for performing in Edward Albee's dramas, has died. He was 79. Grizzard died Tuesday at New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center of complications from lung cancer, said his agent, Clifford Stevens. Grizzard's film roles included a bullying U.S. senator in "Advise and Consent" in 1962 and an oilman in "Comes a Horseman" in 1978. On television, Grizzard made regular appearances on "Law & Order" and won a best supporting actor Emmy for the 1980 TV movie "The Oldest Living Graduate," which starred Henry Fonda. His TV credits stretch back to the '50s. He had made his Broadway debut in 1955 as Paul Newman's brother and fellow convict in "The Desperate Hours." He was nominated for Tonys for "The Disenchanted" in 1959 and "Big Fish, Little Fish" in 1961. Among his other credits were Neil Simon's 1976 "California Suite," a 1975 revival of "The Royal Family" and the 2001 drama "Judgment at Nuremberg."

Tony Ryan, who founded Europe's leading budget airline Ryanair, has died. He was 71. Ryan died Wednesday after a long illness, the airline and his family said. Ryan founded Ryanair in 1985 with a single 15-seat plane. By the time he floated the company on the Irish and British stock exchanges, Ryanair Holdings PLC was already expanding across the European continent with eye-popping fares, new routes and trademark boastful marketing. Today it operates 557 routes in 26 countries and plans to carry more than 50 million people this year.

Pedro Saul Perez, a leading advocate for the rights of immigrants from his native Dominican Republic in Puerto Rico, has died. He was 64. Perez, the founder and president of the Dominican Committee for Human Rights, died Monday of an apparent heart attack as he walked along a street in San Juan, Mayor Jorge Santini said. One of his biggest achievements was persuading Dominican authorities to investigate the death of an illegal immigrant during a Puerto Rican police raid more than a decade ago, said Claudio Matos, general secretary of the Dominican Journalists Association in Puerto Rico. He also led opposition to a proposed tax on remittances sent to the Dominican Republic from Puerto Rico that was ultimately defeated. Perez lived in Puerto Rico for nearly four decades and made a living by driving a taxi.

Alfred Audi, who rescued the L. and J.G. Stickley Co. from near financial collapse and restored it as one of America's pre-eminent furniture makers, died Saturday. He was 69. Audi died at his home after battling cancer for two years, said Audi's wife, Aminy. Audi bought the Stickley company in 1974. His father had been the biggest Stickley furniture dealer in the country at his store in New York City. Stickley had only 22 employees and annual sales of $250,000 when Audi took over the company. Today, it has 1,600 workers at three manufacturing plants, including about 1,000 in Manlius. The others are in North Carolina and Vietnam. It has 13 retail showrooms in five states and its sales are in the millions every year.

Harry Dent, a former top adviser to President Nixon who helped Nixon win the South, has died. He was 77. Bob McAlister, a longtime friend and Republican strategist, said Dent died Friday battling Alzheimer's disease. In 1968, Dent and U.S. Sen. Strom Thurmond played a major role in swinging conservative Southern primary voters to Nixon instead of Ronald Reagan. They helped Nixon win the White House by beating Democrat Hubert Humphrey by a slim margin that included winning the previously solid Democrat South. Dent was rewarded by being named special counsel to the president. Dent was not involved in the Watergate scandal that swamped Nixon's second term, but he did plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge for "aiding and abetting" an illicit, secret 1970 campaign fund that steered nearly $3 million into Republican Senate and House races. He was placed on unsupervised probation for a month by a federal district judge, who called Dent "an innocent victim of circumstances."

Bosnia-Herzegovina -- Milan Jelic, president of Bosnia's Serb Republic has died. He was 51. Jelic suffered a heart attack Sunday in his hometown, Modrica, his brother Slavko Jelic said. Jelic was elected president of the Serb Republic -- one of the two mini-states that make up Bosnia and Herzegovina -- in October 2006. The presidency is a largely ceremonial position, with power lying in the hands of the government and its prime minister.

Martin Manulis, a television, film and stage producer who created the classic, Emmy-winning program "Playhouse 90," has died. He was 92. Manulis died Friday of natural causes at his home in Los Angeles, according to his son, John Bard Manulis. Manulis was best known as the creator and original producer of "Playhouse 90," a live dramatic anthology series that took on serious subjects and won critical acclaim.