Posted from slobokan’s posterous

CBS News producer Bernard Birnbaum, who helped shape the public’s view of issues ranging from poverty to the Watergate scandal while working alongside Walter Cronkite and Charles Kuralt, has died, the network said.

Birnbaum died on Thanksgiving Day at Stony Brook University Medical Center in Stony Brook, N.Y., after having a heart attack while visiting relatives nearby, CBS News said in a statement Saturday. His death had been announced on the network news broadcast Friday. He was 89.

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Survivors include another daughter, Deborah Birnbaum-Kocay, and four grandchildren. His wife, Ronnie, died in 2005.

A funeral is scheduled Tuesday in Larchmont, N.Y., where he lived.

Rest In Peace, Bernard.

Jan Leighton, an actor who conjured a career by dressing up as historical figures, appearing in so many commercials, print advertisements and industrial films as George Washington, William Shakespeare and Christopher Columbus that he was both ubiquitous and anonymous, died on Nov. 16 in Manhattan. He was 87.

The cause was complications after a stroke, said his daughter, Hallie.

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Mr. Leighton was married four times. The first marriage was annulled and the others ended in divorce. Ms. Leighton, who lives in Manhattan, is the daughter of his third wife, Lynda Myles; he is also survived by a son, Ross Leighton, of Queens, whose mother was Mr. Leighton’s second wife, Ruth Markowe.

Rest In Peace, Jan.

Al Alberts, a founding member of the singing group, The Four Aces, and a longtime TV talent show host in Philadelphia, has died. He was 87.

Chris Alberts says his father died Friday at home in Arcadia, Fla. He says the apparent cause of death was complications from kidney failure.

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Al Alberts, born Al Albertini, is also survived by wife Stella and son Al Jr.

Rest In Peace, Al.

Lester D. Shubin, 84, a Justice Department researcher who turned a DuPont fabric intended for tires into the first truly effective bulletproof vests, saving the lives of more than 3,000 law enforcement officers, died after a heart attack at his Fairfax County home.

Mr. Shubin was working at the National Institute for Justice, the research and development branch of the Justice Department, in the early 1970s when DuPont came out with a fabric that was to replace steel belting on high-speed tires.

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In addition to his son, of Fairfax County, survivors include his wife of 50 years, Zelda Loigman Shubin, also of Fairfax, and two grandchildren.

Rest In Peace, Lester.

Charis Wilson, who modeled in more than half of celebrated photographer Edward Weston’s nudes, has died. She was 95.

The New York Times reported Tuesday that Wilson died Friday at her home in Santa Cruz.

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Wilson was born in San Francisco into a family of writers. She is survived by her daughter, Rachel Fern Harris.

Rest In Peace, Charis.

Posted from slobokan’s posterous

Waldo Hunt, 88, a Los Angeles entrepreneur who ushered in the modern renaissance in pop-up books when he revived the art form in the United States in the 1960s, died Nov. 6 of congestive heart failure at a hospital in Porterville, Calif.

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The first golden age of movable books began in the late 1800s, when European publishers crafted elaborate books for children, and ended with the onset of World War I. With Mr. Hunt’s epiphany, the second golden age was about to begin.

Rest In Peace, Waldo.

Dennis Cole, a blond, chiseled former model whose face became familiar to television viewers in the 1960s when he played the first of his panoply of roles in more than a dozen prime-time series, died on Nov. 15 in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. He was 69 and lived in Fort Lauderdale.

The cause has not been determined, said Mr. Cole’s publicist, Edward Lozzi.

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In 1978, on the set of “Charlie’s Angels,” Mr. Cole met and soon married one of the angels, Jaclyn Smith. They divorced in 1981.

Mr. Cole was born in Detroit on July 19, 1940. He is survived by his brother, Richard. Mr. Cole’s first marriage ended in divorce. His son from his first marriage, Joey, was shot to death during a robbery in Venice, Calif., in 1991. The crime remains unsolved.

Rest In Peace, Dennis.

If his job was selling term life insurance, President Obama would take the prize month after month, after month. He would fit right in too, the way he says one thing to one group, and something completely different to every other group. You can only go on so long, as employee of the month before you run out of people to sell too. Pretty soon everyone has heard your spiel and refuses to listen anymore.