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Notable deaths last week

Sheila MacRae starred on the Broadway stage and in films, yet it was her small-screen role as the tolerant and brassy wife of a Brooklyn bus driver for which she is most remembered.

MacRae, best known for playing Alice Kramden to Jackie Gleason's Ralph in the 1960s recreation of "The Honeymooners," died Thursday. She was 92.

In the 1950s version of "The Honeymooners," Audrey Meadows starred with Gleason as lovebirds and sparring partners Ralph and Alice Kramden. Sheila MacRae replaced Meadows as the tolerant and brassy wife of a Brooklyn bus driver in a later version from 1966-70 on "The Jackie Gleason Show." MacRae was the last survivor from the '60s edition of the show; Jane Kean, who played Trixie Norton, died last fall.

A native of London, MacRae immigrated to America with her parents during World War II.

The producer of early Grammy and National Football League telecasts has died.

Ted Bergmann, 93, started his television career at NBC in 1947. He went on to work in advertising, where he matched companies such as Coca-Cola and Colgate with entertainment properties. The group behind the Grammy Awards sought Bergmann's help in 1962 to bring the ceremony to TV. He then produced the music awards show for seven years.

Carmen Berra, the wife of New York Yankees great Yogi Berra, has died. She was 85.

The Berras got married in January 1949 and recently celebrated their 65th wedding anniversary.

Yogi Berra, 88, was a 10-time World Series champion with the Yankees as a catcher, had two stints as their manager and now is an unofficial team ambassador, making frequent appearances at games and other events.

The former president of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, Henry "Hank" Rieger, has died in Oceanside, Calif. at age 95.

In his 40 years with the TV academy, Rieger also served as president of the organization's Hollywood chapter and editor and publisher of Emmy magazine.

Before joining the TV academy, Rieger worked for United Press International and in publicity for NBC, promoting such series as "Bonanza," "Star Trek" and "Sanford and Son." He later started his own publicity firm, which counted ESPN among its clients.

Dr. Frank Jobe, a pioneering orthopedic surgeon who was the first to perform an elbow procedure that became known as Tommy John surgery and saved the careers of countless major league pitchers, has died. He was 88.

Jobe performed groundbreaking elbow surgery on John, a Dodgers pitcher who had a ruptured medial collateral ligament in his left elbow. The injury previously had no solution until Jobe removed a tendon from John's forearm and repaired his elbow. John went on to pitch 14 years after the operation on Sept. 25, 1974, compiling 164 more victories without ever missing a start because of an elbow problem.

Geoff Edwards, the hip-looking 1970s and '80s host of TV game shows including "Jackpot!" and two incarnations of "Treasure Hunt," died Wednesday, his agent said. He was 83.

Edwards also worked as a radio DJ and actor, appearing on TV shows including "Petticoat Junction," "I Dream of Jeannie" and "Diff'rent Strokes."

"Geoff was one of the cleverest, funniest radio and television personalities I've worked with," said fellow game show host Wink Martindale. The two were DJs at pop radio station KMPC in Los Angeles.

Justin Kaplan, who brought a fresh literary elan to the art of biography, with his prize-winning books on writers Mark Twain, Lincoln Steffens and Walt Whitman, and who injected the voice of popular culture to an updated version of the venerable reference work Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, has died at 88.

After working as an editor at New York publishing houses, Kaplan published his first book, "Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain," in 1966. His biography so thoroughly captured the rambunctious and iconoclastic author of "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" and "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" that it was awarded the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award.

Kaplan published only two more full-length biographies: "Lincoln Steffens: A Biography" (1974), about the muckraking journalist of the early 20th century, and "Walt Whitman: A Life" (1980), about the 19th-century poet. Both were multilayered character studies set within the colorful tapestry of the times and brought Kaplan wide recognition as a master of the form.

Dr. Sherwin Nuland, a medical ethicist who opposed assisted suicide and wrote an award-winning book about death called "How We Die," has died at age 83.

"The necessity of nature's final victory was accepted in generations before our own," he wrote. "Doctors were far more willing to recognize the signs of defeat and far less arrogant about denying them."

"How We Die: Reflections on Life's Final Chapter" was published in 1994 and won a National Book Award for nonfiction, beating out a book about Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and three other finalists. In it Nuland describes how life is lost to diseases and old age. It helped foster national debate over end-of-life decisions and doctor-assisted suicide, which he called "the exact opposite direction in which we ought to go."

Daniel Moscowitz, a Chicago Jewish rabbi who helped encourage the growth of Chabad-Lubavitch centers in more than 20 Illinois cities, has died at age 59.

Moscowitz, the group's director, led the organization as it grew to nearly 40 centers in 21 Illinois cities with schools and services for seniors and children with special needs. He recently oversaw the opening of a new Chabad center in Carbondale.

The Chicago White Sox and Bulls say the son of Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf has died.

The teams released a statement saying the Reinsdorf family "has suffered a terrible loss today" with the untimely passing of son David Reinsdorf at age 51.

Alain Resnais, the French filmmaker whose cryptic "Last Year at Marienbad" extended its influence across generations, has died at 91.

Resnais was editing drafts of his next project even from his hospital bed, according to producer Jean-Louis Livi, who was working on the film with him.

Resnais, who died Saturday, was renowned for reinventing himself during each of his full-length films, which included the acclaimed "Hiroshima Mon Amour" in 1959 and most recently "Life of Riley," which was honored at the Berlin Film Festival just weeks ago.

Academy of Television Arts and Sciences shows Henry "Hank" Rieger, left, with Tom Sarnoff, former presidents of the Television Academy, at Rieger's retirement ceremony in 1999 in Los Angeles.
Dr. Frank Jobe, known for the development of the historic elbow procedure known as "Tommy John surgery," is honored during a ceremony at Doubleday Field, in Cooperstown, N.Y.
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