Deaths in December - 2014

Hockey great Jean Beliveau died December 2 at the age of 83. His memoir was called My Life in Hockey.

Disgraced British politician Jeremy Thorpe died December 4 at the age of 85. He wrote In My Own Time.

Father of the videogame industry, Ralph H. Baer died December 6 at the age of 92. He wrote Videogames: In the Beginning.

Former New York Congressman Herman Badillo died December 3 at the age of 85. He wrote One Nation, One Standard and A Bill of No Rights.

Poet Claudia Emerson died December 4 at the age of 57. Her work includes Late Wife: Poems, Figure Studies: Poems and Pinion: An Elegy.

Photographer Arthur Leipzig died December 5 at the age of 96. His work can be seen in Arthur Leipzig: Next Stop New York and Sarah's Daughters: A Celebration of Jewish Women.

Ernest C. Brace, the longest held civilian American POW in the Vietnam War, died December 5 at the age of 83. He wrote A Code to Keep: The True Story of America's Longest Held Civilian Prisoner of War in Vietnam .

Puerto Rican scholar Juan Flores died December 2 at the age of 71. His books include From Bomba to Hip-Hop and Divided Borders: Essays on Puerto Rican Identity.

Collaborator and paramour of Ayn Rand, Nathaniel Branden died December 3 at the age of 84. A few of his books include The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem, How to Raise Your Self Esteem and My Years with Ayn Rand.

Psychiatrist Dr. Dennis Friedman died December 6 at the age of 90. He wrote Darling Georgie and Ladies of the Bedchamber.

Food historian Gil Marks died December 5 at the age of 62. He wrote Olive Trees and Honey.

Artist Jane Freilicher died December 9 at the age of 90. She wrote Jane Freilicher: Painter Among Poets.

American diplomat Robert B. Oakley, best known for negotiating the Black Hawk Down incident died on December 10 at the age of 83. He wrote Policing the New World Disorder.

Rugby and golf journalist Norman Mair died December 7 at the age of 86. He wrote The Year of the Thistle and Muirfield: Home of the Honorable Company (1744-1994).

Former Green Bay Packer Fuzzy Thurston died December 14 at the age of 80. His memoir is What a Wonderful World: The Fuzzy Thurston Story.

War-time and Hollywood photographer Phil Stern died December 13 at the age of 95. His work can be seen in Phil Stern: A Life's Work.

Prolific children's author and creator of Clifford the Big Red Dog, Norman Bridwell died December 12 at the age of 86. He based Clifford on his wife's imaginary childhood friend. Some of the more popular stories include Clifford's Good Deeds and Clifford Goes to School.

Former keyboard player for the Small Faces, Ian McLagan died December 3. His memoir was called All the Rage.

Former model famed for her role in the Profumo scandal, Mandy Rice-Davies died December 18 at the age of 70. Her memoir was called Mandy.

Portrait photographer Jane Bown died December 21 at the age of 89. Her books include Faces: The Creative Process Behind Great Portraits and The Unknown Bown.

British politician and BBC broadcaster John Freeman died December 20 at the age of 99. He wrote Face to Face with John Freeman.

Band manager for the Grateful Dead, Rock Scully died December 16 at the age of 73. He wrote Living with the Dead: Twenty Years on the Bus with Garcia and the Grateful Dead.

Actress Billie Whitelaw died December 21 at the age of 82. Her memoir was called Billie Whitelaw...Who He?

British comedy writer Jeremy Lloyd died December 22 at the age of 84. His work includes The Are you Being Served? Stories, The Woodland Gospels According to Captain Beaky and Captain Cat and the Carol Singers.

Romance novelist and children's author Roberta Leigh died December 19 at the age of 87. Some of her more popular books include One Girl at a Time, Two-Timing Man and It All Depends on Love.

Historian Carleton Mabee died December 18 at the age of 99. His books include American Leonardo: A Life of Samuel F. B. Morse and Sojourner Truth: Slave, Prophet, Legend.

Theologian Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis died December 18 at the age of 89. he wrote For Those Who Can't Believe and Finding Each Other in Judaism.

Biographer and music critic Michael Kennedy died December 31 at the age of 88. His books include The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music, Richard Strauss: Man, Musician, Enigma and Portrait of Elgar.

Natural food advocate Michio Kushi died December 28 at the age of 88. He was the author of The Macrobiotic Way, The Macrobiotic Path to Total Health and The Macrobiotic Diet.

Polish poet Stanislaw Baranczak died December 26 at the age of 68. He wrote A Fugitive from Utopia, Breathing Under Water and Polish Poetry the last two Decades of Communist Rule.

Paleobiologist Martin Brasier died December 16 at the age of 67 as a result of injuries sustained in an automobile accident. He wrote Darwin's Lost World and Secret Chambers: The Inside Story of Cells and Complex Life.

Former Belgian Prime MinisterLeo Tindemans died December 26 at the age of 92. He wrote De memoires: gedreven een overtuiging.

Scholar Sacvan Bercovitch died December 9 at the age of 81. He wrote The Puritan Origins of the AMerican Self, The American Jeremiad and The Rites of Assent.

Expert on voters Philip E. Converse died December 30 at the age of 86. He wrote The American Voter.

A writer proud of her forgeries Lee Israel died December 24 at the age of 75. She wrote Can You Ever Forgive Me.

Gordon Kinsey died 11 December aged 92. He wrote seven books about aviation in East Anglia and in his lifetime had a street in Kesgrave, Suffolk, named after him.

British naval wife Suzanne Kyrle-Pope died December 23 at the age of 93. Her memoir of her travels was called The Same Wife in Every Port.