Caroll Spinney, the puppeteer who gave life to Big Bird, the towering, yellow avian of TV’s “Sesame Street” who accompanied generations of youngsters in the arduous, yet wondrous, work of growing up, died Sunday at his home in Connecticut. An Air Force veteran, he was 85.
George Joseph Laurer, who revolutionized check-out lines across the world by creating the universal bar code, died earlier this month at his home in Wendell. He was 94.
Composer Irving Burgie, who helped popularize Caribbean music and co-wrote the enduring Harry Belafonte hit “Day-O (The Banana Boat Song),” has died at the age of 95.
World War II Army Staff Sgt. Jakeway dropped behind enemy lines just prior to the Normandy invasion on June 6, 1944. Jakeway, one of Central Ohio's most decorated veterans, has died at the age of 96.
Trained as an aviator, Holloway holds the distinction of serving as a four-star admiral at the same time his father held the same rank — the only father and son in the history of the Navy to do so.
Delta Force sniper Sgt. 1st Class James P. McMahon, one of the survivors of the October 1993 battle in Mogadishu, Somalia that claimed the lives of 18 U.S. service members, died Nov. 5. He was 64.
Robert L. Thoms — nicknamed “Cajun Bob” for his thick native Baton Rouge accent — was awarded the Silver Star medal for “conspicuous gallantry” during the assault on the Arch Tower on Feb. 15, 1968, during some of the most ferocious fighting of North Vietnam’s Tet Offensive.
During a news conference in 2014, Lauren Bruner announced he decided to have the urn that would hold his cremated ashes interred aboard the USS Arizona.
Retired Lt. Col. Richard “Dick” Cole was one of 80 members of the first U.S. strike against Japanese mainland targets in World War II, credited for bringing optimism of winning the war to the American people.
Sgt. Henry C. Smith was awarded a Silver Star for his efforts in leading an intelligence and reconnaissance patrol through the jungles of Burma in April 1944. He died Aug. 5 at the age of 98.
Holocaust survivor Branko Lustig's film career took him to movie sets across Europe and to Hollywood, where in 1994 he shared the Academy Award for best picture as a producer of "Schindler's List." Lustig died Nov. 14 in Croatia. He was 87.
A soldier who was shot in the head while searching for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who had deserted his post and was captured by the Taliban in Afghanistan, died Saturday.
Francis Currey's Medal of Honor — which he received on July 27, 1945, after the Allied victory in Europe and just before the defeat of Japan — was one of 472 awarded for service during World War II, according to the Congressional Medal of Honor Society.
Rudy Boesch, a retired, tough-as-nails Navy SEAL and fan favorite on the inaugural season of “Survivor,” has died after a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease. He was 91.
