Neil Smith, who has died aged 58 of liver failure, brought a new dimension to geography by exploring the relationship between cities, the wider world and capitalism. If we want to understand the economic system’s workings, he argued, then we have to understand the spaces that make its existence possible. And if we want to live in a saner environment – natural and built – we need to revolutionise the ways in which it is produced.
Millie. Millie Hartman, math wizard, devoted wife and mother extraordinaire, passed away on September 14th in Glen Cove, NY, after a long illness. Born on March 29th, 1928, Millie Levenson grew up with her brother Manny in Brooklyn, NY, and was the link to the world for her beloved immigrant parents, Charles and Yetta.
Sitar maestro and Oscar winner Ravi Shankar, dubbed the “godfather of world music” by George Harrison, who helped popularize North Indian classical music in the West, died today at San Diego’s Scripps Hospital, where he was admitted last week after complaining of shortness of breath. He was 92.
Ulrich Franzen, a German-born architect whose fortresslike buildings seemed to buttress the interior landscape of New York City during the shaky 1970s, and who gave it some buoyance, too, with skywalks, died on Oct. 6 in Santa Fe, N.M. He was 91. His death was confirmed by his wife, Josephine.
Jay Levy, who worked with his father, then his son, to publish an economics-forecasting newsletter, now in its seventh decade, that predicted the collapse in housing and latest recession, has died. He was 90.
Martin E. Segal, whose puckish warmth and old-fashioned ways belied his power and influence as one of the city’s leading cultural figures, died on Sunday at his home in Manhattan. He was 96.
Camilla Williams, believed to be the first African-American woman to appear with a major U.S. opera company, has died. She was 92.
Earle Gister, who, as associate dean, chair of the Acting Department, and the first Lloyd Richards Professor of Acting during his two-decade tenure at the Yale School of Drama, was a highly influential figure in the acting world, died Jan. 22 in his sleep at his home in New Haven, his son Carey said. He was 77.
Bingham Ray, who championed indie films throughout his career as co-founder of October Films and prexy of United Artists and was recently named exec director of the San Francisco Film Society, died Monday in Provo, Utah, after suffering two strokes last week. He was 57.
Herbert Hauptman’s research on determining molecular structures using X-ray crystallography became indispensable to modern chemistry and the pharmaceutical industry.
