AP News, January 23rd, 2008
Albert Bowker
BERKELEY, Calif. (AP) — Albert Bowker, a former chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley, and the City University of New York, died Sunday of pancreatic cancer, the colleges announced. He was 88.
Bowker was living at a retirement community near Stanford University when he died, although his primary residence was a condominium complex for faculty and staff near the UC Berkeley campus, according to university.
Bowker served as Berkeley's fifth chancellor from 1971 to 1980, a turbulent era of Vietnam War protests and new student activism over the university's financial ties to businesses supporting apartheid in South Africa.
The trained statistician was remembered for being a talented fundraiser who boosted contributions from alumni, helping to create programs in health sciences and energy and supporting women's sports.
Before taking the helm at UC Berkeley, Bowker spent eight years as CUNY's chancellor. He returned to New York from 1986 to 1993 to serve as a vice president at CUNY's research foundation.
Bowker spent one year working for the Carter administration as assistant secretary for postsecondary education and three years as dean of the School of Public Affairs at the University of Maryland.
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Heath Ledger
NEW YORK (AP) — Actor Heath Ledger was found dead Tuesday in a Manhattan apartment, facedown in bed with prescription sleeping pills nearby, police said. He was 28.
There was no obvious indication of suicide, NYPD spokesman Paul Browne said. The apartment where was found is believed to be Ledger's home, he said.
While not a marquee movie star, Ledger was an award-winning actor who chose his roles carefully rather than cashing in on big-money parts. He was nominated for an Oscar for his performance as a gay cowboy in "Brokeback Mountain," where he met Michelle Williams, who played his wife in the film. The two had a daughter, the now-2-year-old Matilda, and lived together until they split up last year.
His death was a shocking and unforeseen conclusion for one of Hollywood's bright young stars. Though his leading-man looks propelled him to early stardom in films like "10 Things I Hate About You" and "A Knight's Tale," his career took a notable turn toward dramatic and brooding roles with 2001's "Monster's Ball."
Ledger eschewed Hollywood glitz in favor of a bohemian life in Brooklyn, where he became one of the borough's most famous residents before apparently moving to Manhattan. "Brokeback" would be his breakthrough role, establishing him as one of his generation's finest talents and an actor willing to take risks.
Ledger was born in 1979 in Perth, in western Australia, to a mining engineer and a French teacher, and got his first acting role playing Peter Pan at age 10 at a local theater company.
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Lois Nettleton
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Lois Nettleton, a Daytime Emmy-winning actress who had a long career on Broadway and television, died Jan. 18 of lung cancer. She was 80.
Nettleton died at the Motion Picture and Television Fund Hospital, publicist Dale Olson said Tuesday.
Born Aug. 16, 1927, in Oak Park, Ill., Nettleton was Miss Chicago 1948 and a Miss America semifinalist. She studied theater in Chicago after high school and then moved to New York, where she joined the Actors Studio.
She made her Broadway debut in 1949 in "The Biggest Thief in Town." She later appeared in many other plays, both on Broadway and elsewhere, including a co-starring role with Burt Reynolds in a Chicago performance of "The Rainmaker."
On stage, she also played Blanche in the 1973 Lincoln Center revival of "A Streetcar Named Desire."
Her first movie role was a bit part in Elia Kazan's 1957 "A Face in the Crowd." She appeared in about two dozen movies and appeared on TV shows ranging from "In the Heat of the Night" to "Crossing Jordan" and "Seinfeld."
One of her best-remembered TV roles was Norma in a 1961 doomsday episode of "The Twilight Zone" called "The Midnight Sun." She also had a three-year role as Virginia Benson on the soap opera "General Hospital."
Nettleton won two Daytime Emmys for her work on the 1977 special "The American Woman: Profiles in Courage," and a 1983 episode of the syndicated religious anthology "Insight."
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Andy Palacio
BELIZE CITY (AP) — Andy Palacio, one of Belize's most popular musicians and a UNESCO Artist for Peace, died Saturday of a stroke. He was 47.
Palacio, known for singing "punta rock," which blends traditional folk rhythms with modern rock instruments, was hospitalized in Belize last week after complaining of dizziness, family members said at a news conference last week.
His condition worsened, and on Thursday he was put on a flight to Chicago but never reached the city.
The plane made an emergency landing in Mobile, Ala., where Palacio was placed on life support. He was returned to Belize, where he died, said Ivan Duran, a producer at Stonetree Records who has worked with Palacio since about 2003.
Best known for his album "Watina," Palacio began composing as a teacher in the early 1980s and went on to produce five punta rock albums.
He was appointed an Artist for Peace for the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization in 2007 and was known for his defense of the Garifuna people, descendants of the Amazon's Arawak Indians, the Caribbean's Caribes and escaped slaves who live along Central America's Caribbean coast.
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Lou Palmer
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Lou Palmer, a longtime announcer on radio broadcasts of the Indianapolis 500, died Saturday. He was 75.
Palmer died at St. Francis Hospital, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway announced Tuesday.
Palmer was a reporter and anchor on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Radio Network from 1958 to 1989, serving as chief announcer for the race in 1988 and 1989. He became an announcer on the CART radio network in the mid-1990s before retiring about 10 years ago.
He also was a news anchor for Indianapolis radio station WIBC from 1955 until the late 1980s.
Palmer was born Louis A. Perunko Jr. in Wheeling, W.Va., and was raised in Syracuse, N.Y. He used the name Palmer in his radio work.
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Kenneth Eugene Parnell
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Kenneth Eugene Parnell, one of California's most notorious child molesters, died of natural causes Monday. He was 76.
Parnell died at the California Medical Facility in Vacaville, corrections officials said Tuesday. He was serving a life sentence.
He was convicted of kidnapping 7-year-old Steven Stayner as the boy walked home from school in the Central Valley town of Merced in 1972. Parnell gave the boy a different name and kept him until Stayner escaped in 1980.
When Parnell abducted a second boy in Ukiah that year, Stayner fled, taking 5-year-old Timmy White with him to safety. He told Ukiah police that he wanted to save the boy from suffering the same abuse.
Stayner's story was told in the television movie "I Know My First Name is Steven." He died in a motorcycle accident in 1989 at age 24.
Parnell was paroled after serving prison time for the Stayner and White kidnappings. In 2004, he was sentenced to 25 years to life after he attempted to get another child for what prosecutors described then as the "last hurrah" of an aging pedophile.
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William Stracener
BLUFFTON, S.C. (AP) — William Stracener, a former managing editor of The Beaufort Gazette and Associated Press newsman, died Monday in a car accident, authorities said. He was 63.
Stracener died shortly after his 2004 Honda was struck by another car, said Beaufort County deputy coroner Edward Allen.
Stracener worked for the Beaufort newspaper after serving as correspondent in charge of the AP's Springfield, Ill., office. He spent the past two years as a sales representative with health insurance company Humana.
