DIED. Bill Muncey, 52, dean of the hydroplane superstars; of a severed spinal cord suffered in a crash during championship competition; in Acapulco, Mexico. In three decades of competition, Muncey thunderballed to more victories (61), championships (seven) and Gold Cups (eight) than any other competitor who raced unlimited hydroplanes at 200 m.p.h. or better. A survivor of countless crashes, Muncey said in 1979: "Anything less than death is a minor accident."

DIED. Mary Coyle Chase, 74, a Colorado-born playwright and mother of three sons who wrote the 1945 Pulitzer-prizewinning play Harvey, an enchanting tale about Elwood P. Dowd, a gentle lush whose best friend is Harvey, a 6-ft.-plus talking rabbit that only Elwood could see and hear but two generations of Americans adored; of a heart attack; in Denver. A reporter for the Rocky Mountain News before she switched to playwriting, Chase was notably unsuccessful until Harvey suddenly brought her fame and fortune with its 1,775 Broadway performances and its remake as a movie starring Jimmy Stewart.

DIED. Robert E. Dixon, 75, retired rear admiral who as a Navy pilot in World War II radioed the famous message, "Scratch one flattop," that signaled the sinking of the first Japanese carrier by American warplanes; of cancer; in Virginia Beach, Va. In May 1942 Dixon commanded dive-bomber squadron V52 when 93 American planes attacked the light carrier Shoho during the Battle of the Coral Sea.

DIED. Blanche Noyes, 81, Aviation Hall of Fame member who was a Broadway actress before dropping her stage career to fly planes in the early days of U.S. aviation; in Washington, D.C. A friend of Amelia Earhart's, Noyes took John D. Rockefeller for his only plane ride, in 1930. A stunt flyer, she also competed in numerous air races and was a co-winner with Louise Thaden of the grueling 1936 Bendix Trophy race.

DIED. Cornelius Shields, 86, prominent Wall Street banker who was known in yachting circles as the Gray Fox of Long Island Sound because of his wily ways in skippering sailboats to victories; in New Rochelle, N.Y. A teetotaler from St. Paul, Shields and his brother Paul started the Shields & Co. investment firm in 1923 that eventually became Bache Halsey Stuart Shields. Sailing was Shields' ruling passion, and the first North American sailing championship, in 1952, was one of his many triumphs. A heart attack forced him to stop racing competitively in 1956, but he returned briefly to skipper the U.S. defender, Columbia, during the final trials of the 1958 America's Cup.

DIED. Mattie Talmadge, 100, proud, wizened, indomitable matriarch of Georgia's most prominent 20th century political dynasty (Husband Gene was elected Governor four times, and Son Herman served as Governor for seven years and four terms as U.S. Senator); in McRae, Ga. Six days after the Talmadges arrived at the Governor's mansion in 1933, "Miss Mit," refusing to shuck her rural demeanor, returned to the family's McRae plantation because she was homesick for the cows and chickens. She raised eyebrows again in 1936 when she spurned Eleanor Roosevelt's invitation to the White House because, she said, "I have to get my farm started."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.