Obituaries in the news

Monte Hale

LOS ANGELES (AP) _ Monte Hale, a singing cowboy whose tall frame, strong voice and handsome looks led to dozens of film roles in Westerns during the 1940s, has died. He was 89.

Hale died Sunday at home in Studio City after a lengthy illness, said Yadhira De Leon of the Autry National Center of the American West.

Born in San Antonio, Texas, Hale picked up the guitar as a teen and was discovered as a player at a war bond rally during World War II, according to a press release from the center.

Recommended for a screen test in Hollywood for Republic Pictures, he hitchhiked from Texas to California. He ended up snagging a part in 1944’s “The Big Bonanza,” then signed onto a seven-year contract with Republic.

Hale starred in almost 20 of his own films, including 1946’s “Home On the Range” with Robert Blake and “Out California Way.”

After departing the studio, he appeared in other movies, including 1956’s “Giant” with James Dean and 1966’s “The Chase” with Marlon Brando. He also guest starred on television shows such as “Gunsmoke,” “Honey West” and “Tales of Wells Fargo.”

Hale and his wife, Joanne, co-founded the Gene Autry Western Heritage Museum, later renamed the Autry Museum of Western Heritage and now part of the Autry National Center, with the late singing cowboy Gene Autry and his widow, Jackie.

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Maurice Jarre

PARIS (AP) _ Oscar-winning composer Maurice Jarre, who captured the majesty of the desert in his music for “Lawrence of Arabia” and wrote the haunting “Lara’s Theme” in his score for “Doctor Zhivago,” has died. He was 84.

Jarre died in Los Angeles, where he had lived for decades, Bernard Miyet, a friend of the composer and leader of the French musicians’ guild SACEM, said Monday. No cause of death was given.

Born in 1924 in Lyon, France, Jarre studied music at the Conservatoire de Paris, training initially as a kettledrum player. He started his career composing scores for theatrical productions and worked 12 years as permanent composer at the Theatre National Populaire.

He soon branched into composing soundtracks for movies, and in 1961 worked on director David Lean’s “Lawrence of Arabia,” for which he won his first Oscar.

He won a second for his work on another Lean film, “Doctor Zhivago,” based on the novel by Boris Pasternak. The movie’s song “Lara’s Theme” became a hit single and earned him worldwide recognition.

Jarre collaborated with Lean again in 1984 on “A Passage to India,” winning his third Academy Award.

Jarre’s musical style was noted for his use of ethnic instruments, and later synthetic sounds.

He received a lifetime achievement award at the Berlin Film Festival in February, after a career including more than 150 soundtracks. He worked with some of Hollywood’s most well-known directors including William Wyler, John Huston, Michael Apted, Alfred Hitchcock and Alfonso Arau.

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Helen Levitt

NEW YORK (AP) _ Helen Levitt, a giant of 20th century photography whose scenes of New York City street life provide a window into a vanished era, has died. She was 95.

Levitt died Sunday in her sleep in her Manhattan apartment, said Thomas Roma, a close friend and the director of photography at Columbia University’s School of the Arts.

Levitt was best known for street scenes of children in the 1930s and 1940s. In one photo, three children with masks stand on their stoop before trick-or-treating. In another, four girls on a sidewalk turn to stare at soap bubbles floating in the air.

Levitt was drawn to neighborhoods like Spanish Harlem and the Lower East Side where, in a time before television, people treated the streets as their living room.

Levitt was born on Aug. 31, 1913, in Brooklyn. After dropping out of high school she taught herself photography while working for a commercial photographer.

As she began to hone her craft, Levitt struck up acquaintances with celebrated photographers Henri Cartier-Bresson and Walker Evans.

Fortune magazine was the first to publish Levitt’s work, in its July 1939 issue on New York City. The next year her Halloween picture was included in the inaugural exhibition of MoMA’s photography department. In 1943, she had her first solo show there.

Levitt worked as a film editor to support herself in the 1950s. She returned to still photography in 1959 and was one of the first photographers to work in color.

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Walter Palmer

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) _ Walter Palmer, one of Indiana’s last living members of a famed World War II group of black fighter pilots known as the Tuskegee Airmen, has died. He was 87.

Palmer died at his Indianapolis home Saturday of stomach cancer, according to his daughter, Janice Carter.

Palmer flew on 158 missions over Italy and Germany during the war. The all-black Tuskegee 99th Fighter Group was formed in 1941 and trained in Tuskegee, Ala., but faced racism in the segregated South. Palmer was 21 when he became an airman in June 1943.

An eye injury in an auto accident ended Palmer’s military career. He and his wife Rosalind Palmer moved to Indianapolis from his native New York in the early 1970s.

Since then, the Tuskegee Airmen’s exploits slowly gained recognition, and Palmer gave motivational talks to schools and civic groups.

In 2007, Palmer was among about 300 Tuskegee Airmen who received the Congressional Gold Medal from President George W. Bush.

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Earl Paulk

ATLANTA (AP) _ Archbishop Earl Paulk, a former mega church leader who rose to fame with his progressive evangelical ministry only to have it crumble after a series of sex scandals, has died. He was 81.

Paulk, of the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit at Chapel Hill Harvester Church, died Sunday after a battle with cancer, his family said in a statement.

For years the church was at the forefront of many social movements _ admitting black members in the 1960s, ordaining women and opening its doors to gays. But Paulk was dogged for decades by accusations of molestation and sexual misconduct.

The most shocking revelation came in October 2007 when a court-ordered paternity test showed he was the biological father of his brother’s son, D.E. Paulk, who had become head pastor of the church after the archbishop retired the previous year.

Earl Paulk had sworn in an affidavit he’d never had sex with anyone but his wife, which lead to him pleading guilty to a felony charge of lying under oath. He was sentenced to 10 years’ probation and a $1,000 fine.

Paulk’s church, which he co-founded with his brother, Don, grew from a tiny congregation in the 1960s to a massive empire with 10,000 members, an international television ministry, a Bible college and a $12 million sanctuary on an expansive 100-acre plot in Decatur. Paulk was invited to a White House prayer breakfast by then-President Ronald Reagan, and the church was named one of former President George Bush’s “1,000 Points of Light.”