Deaths in May 1998

The following is a list of **notable deaths in May 1998**.

Entries for each day are listed alphabetically by surname. A typical entry lists information in the following sequence:
* Name, age, country of citizenship at birth, subsequent country of citizenship (if applicable), reason for notability, cause of death (if known), and reference.

## May 1998
### 1
*Eldridge Cleaver, 62, American writer and political activist, prostate cancer.
*Heinie Heltzel, 84, American baseball player.
*Brian Kendall, 51, New Zealand boxer, cancer.
*J. S. Roskell, 84, English historian of the Middle Ages.

### 2
*Clyde Connell, 96, American abstract expressionist sculptor.
*Justin Fashanu, 37, English footballer, suicide.
*Johnny Grodzicki, 81, American baseball player.
*Hide, 33, Japanese musician, suicide by hanging.
*Kevin Lloyd, 49, English actor (*The Bill*), alcoholism.
*Maidie Norman, 85, American actress and literature and theater teacher, lung cancer.
*Carey Wilber, 81, American journalist and television writer.

### 3
*Jesse Alto, 71, American poker player.
*Erich Bergel, 67, German flutist and conductor.
*Louis Berry, 83, African American civil rights attorney.
*Erika Cheetham, 58, English writer.
*Johannes Driessler, 77, German composer, organist, and lecturer.
*Tom Elliot, 72, Scottish rugby player.
*Jean-Baptiste Hachème, 68, Beninese military officer and politician.
*Raimund Harmstorf, 58, German actor, suicide by hanging.
*David Vincent Hooper, 82, British chess player and writer.
*Venkatesh Kulkarni, Indian-American novelist and academic, leukemia.
*Loren MacIver, 89, American painter.
*René Mugica, 88, Argentine actor, film director and screenwriter.
*Gene Raymond, 89, American actor, pneumonia.
*Les Samuels, 69, English footballer.
*Xue Yue, 101, Chinese Nationalist military general.
*Gojko Šušak, 53, Croatian politician, lung cancer.

### 4
*Gordon Beningfield, 61, English wildlife artist, broadcaster and naturalist.
*Alois Estermann, 43, Swiss officer of the Pontifical Swiss Guard, murdered.
*Albert Glasser, 82, American composer, conductor and arranger of B-movie music.
*Theodor Oberländer, 93, German Ostforschung scientist and politician.
*Nicolò Rode, 86, Italian sailor and Olympic champion.

### 5
*Juan Gimeno, 84, Spanish road cyclist.
*Alan Glyn, 79, British politician.
*Tommy McCook, 71, Jamaican saxophonist, pneumonia and heart failure.
*Eleanor Ragsdale, 72, American civil rights activist.
*Frithjof Schuon, 90, Swiss author, poet and painter.
*Paul Seymour, 70, American basketball player and coach.

### 6
*Chatchai Chunhawan, 78, Thai army officer, diplomat and politician, liver cancer.
*Sybil Connolly, 77, Irish fashion designer.
*Juan Antonio García Díez, 57, American politician, liver cancer.
*Aleksei Gritsai, 84, Soviet and Russian artist.
*John Joseph, 65, Pakistani Roman Catholic bishop, suicide.
*Arvid Laurin, 96, Swedish sailor and Olympic medalist.
*Erich Mende, 81, German politician, Vice-Chancellor of West Germany.

### 7
*Blue Lu Barker, 84, American jazz and blues singer.
*Allan McLeod Cormack, 74, South African American physicist, cancer.
*István Hasznos, 73, Hungarian water polo player and Olympic champion (1952).
*Jack Heslop-Harrison, 78, British soldier and botanist, heart attack.
*John Meyers, 58, American football player, heart problems.
*Eddie Rabbitt, 56, American singer and songwriter, lung cancer.
*Allen Wikgren, 91, American theologian and New Testament scholar.

### 8
*Donald Stephen Lowell Cardwell, 78, British historian of science and technology.
*Jacques Dumesnil, 94, French film and television actor.
*Johannes Kotkas, 83, Estonian Greco-Roman wrestler and Olympic champion (1952).
*Raymond Premru, 63, American trombonist and compose, esophageal cancer.
*Jennings Randolph, 96, American politician.
*Charles Rebozo, 85, American banker and businessman.

### 9
*Lester Butler, 38, American blues harmonica player and singer, drug overdose.
*Donald Conroy, 77, United States Marine Corps colonel.
*Bernard Dwork, 74, American mathematician.
*Alice Faye, 83, American actress and singer, stomach cancer.
*Rudolf Ismayr, 89, German weightlifter and Olympic champion.
*Rommie Loudd, 64, American gridiron football player, coach, and executive, diabetes.
*Talat Mahmood, 74, Indian playback singer, heart attack.
*Bob Mellish, Baron Mellish, 85, British politician.
*Earl R. Parker, 85, American engineer and professor.
*Nat Perrin, 93, American comedy screenwriter, producer and director.
*R. J. G. Savage, 70, British palaeontologist, pancreatic cancer.
*Gerhard Siedl, 69, German football player.
*Marianne Strengell, 88, Finnish-American modernist textile designer.

### 10
*Lajos Czinege, 74, Hungarian military officer and politician.
*José Francisco Antonio Peña Gómez, 61, Dominican Republic politician, pulmonary edema.
*Robert Jewell, 78, Australian actor (*Doctor Who*).
*Oreste Kirkop, 74, Maltese singer.
*Cesare Perdisa, 65, Italian racing driver.
*Ronald Ridenhour, 52, American soldier during the Vietnam War, heart attack.
*Clara Rockmore, 87, American classical violin prodigy and theremin performer.
*Sumitro, 71, Indonesian general.
*George Wright, 77, American organist.

### 11
*Willy Corsari, 100, Dutch actor, author and composer.
*Gene Fowler Jr., 80, American film editor (''It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World*, *Hang 'Em High'').
*Ernst Ising, 98, German physicist.
*John Morrison, 94, Australian novelist and short story writer.
*Hans van Zon, 57, Dutch serial killer, alcohol poisoning.

### 12
*Myoung Hwa Cho, 44, American murder victim, homicide by asphyxiation.
*Hermann Lenz, 85, German writer, poet, and novelist.
*John McCarthy, 81, American gridiron football player.
*Graham Shaw, 63, English football player.

### 13
*Gunnar Jansson, 90, Swedish football player.
*Oscar G. Johnson, 77, United States Army soldier and recipient of the Medal of Honor.
*Chantal Mauduit, 34, French alpinist, climbing accident.
*Frank Ragano, 75, American mafia lawyer.

### 14
*Mabel Esther Allan, 83, British children's author.
*Bill Bishop, 67, American gridiron football player.
*Garth Boesch, 77, American ice hockey player.
*Tom D'Andrea, 88, American actor.
*Marjory Stoneman Douglas, 108, American journalist, writer and conservationist.
*Charlie Hall, 50, American gridiron football player.
*Geoffrey Kendal, 88, English actor.
*Floyd Lounsbury, 84, American linguist, anthropologist and epigrapher.
*Yitzhak Moda'i, 72, Israeli politician.
*Shawkat Osman, 81, Bangladeshi novelist and short story writer.
*Karl Schmid, 87, Swiss rower and Olympic medalist.
*Frank Sinatra, 82, American singer ("My Way", "That's Life") and actor (*From Here to Eternity*), Oscar winner (1954), heart attack.
*Mahmud of Terengganu, 68, Malaysian sultan.
*Jade Wilson, 21, New Zealand squash player, suicide.

### 15
*Joe Cibulas, 77, American football player.
*Gunter d'Alquen, 87, German nazi correspondent.
*John Hawkes, 72, American novelist.
*Richard Jaeger, 85, German politician.
*Earl Manigault, 53, American basketball player, congestive heart failure.
*Packy Rogers, 85, American baseball player, manager and scout.
*Naim Talu, 78, Turkish politician and former Prime Minister of Turkey.
*Patrick Wall, 81, British commando during World War II and later a politician.

### 16
*Pierre Cardinal, 73, French screenwriter and director.
*Idov Cohen, 88, Romanian-Israeli politician and journalist.
*Milan Creighton, 90, American football player and coach.
*William Alexander Hewitt, 83, American diplomat and businessman.
*Rufino Linares, 47, American baseball player, traffic collision.

### 17
*Genie Chance, 71, American journalist, radio broadcaster and politician.
*Hugh Cudlipp, 84, British journalist and newspaper editor.
*Nina Dorliak, 89, Russian soprano and a voice teacher.
*Gasper Urban, 75, American gridiron football player.
*Sarojini Yogeswaran, 97, Sri Lankan politician.

### 18
*Obaidullah Aleem, Indian poet, heart failure.
*Odd Engström, 56, Swedish politician, heart attack.
*Roy Evans, 88, Welsh table tennis player.
*Enid Marx, 95, English painter and designer.

### 19
*Edwin Astley, 76, British composer.
*Hank Earl Carr, 30, American murderer and spree killer, suicide by gunshot.
*Leela Devi, 66, Indian writer, translator, and teacher.
*Dorothy Donegan, 76, American jazz pianist and vocalist, cancer.
*Teresa Prekerowa, 76, Polish historian and author.
*Sōsuke Uno, 75, Japanese politician and Prime Minister of Japan, lung cancer.

### 20
*Chuck Bloedorn, 85, American basketball player.
*Tom Bolack, 80, American businessman and politician.
*Linwood G. Dunn, 93, American visual effects artist (*West Side Story*, ''It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World*, *Mighty Joe Young'').
*Ricardo Franco, 48, Spanish screenwriter and film director, heart attack.
*Jacob Katz, 93, Israeli historian and educator.
*Wolf Mankowitz, 73, English writer, playwright and screenwriter, cancer.
*Walter McKinnon, 87, New Zealand Army officer.
*Robert Normann, 81, Norwegian jazz guitarist.
*Alfredo Yabrán, 53, Argentine businessman and associate of Carlos Menem, suicide.
*Santiago Álvarez, 79, Cuban filmmaker, Parkinson's disease.

### 21
*Erik Bladström, 80, Swedish sprint canoeist and Olympic champion.
*Li Bo, 69, Chinese ecologist, traffic collision.
*Pedro Escartín, 95, Spanish football player, referee, coach, and author.
*Douglas Fowley, 86, American actor (''Singin' in the Rain*, *The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp*, *Mighty Joe Young*).
*Robert Gist, 80, American actor and film director.
*Jan Gullberg, 62, Swedish surgeon and science writer, stroke.
*Jim Power, 102, Irish hurler.
*Rajanala Kaleswara Rao, 73, Indian film actor.
*Torgny Säve-Söderbergh, 83, Swedish writer  and professor of Egyptology.

### 22
*Domenico Cantatore, 82, Italian painter.
*John Derek, 71, American actor and film director, heart failure.
*Arthur R. Gralla, 85, United States Navy Vice Admiral, pneumonia.
*Fred Hatfield, 73, American baseball player.
*Eddie MacCabe, 71, Canadian sports journalist and writer.
*Robert W. Morgan, 60, American radio personality, lung cancer.
*José Enrique Moyal, 87, Australian mathematical physicist.
*Francisco Lucas Pires, 53, Portuguese lawyer, and politician.

### 23
*Tony Halik, 77, Polish documentary film maker, author of travel books, and explorer.
*Grace Hartman, Canadian social activist and politician.
*Vic Kulbitski, 76, American gridiron football player.
*Andreas Liebenberg, 60, South African military commander.
*Ebbe Rode, 88, Danish stage and film actor, pneumonia.
*Monroe K. Spears, American university professor and literary critic.
*Telford Taylor, 90, American lawyer.

### 24
*Francys Arsentiev, 40, American mountaineer, hypothermia and/or cerebral edema.
*George Kelly, 82, American jazz tenor saxophonist.
*Tommy Moore, 35, American golfer, primary amyloidosis.
*Premnath Moraes, 75, Sri Lankan actor, film director and scriptwriter.
*Lucio Muñoz, 68, Spanish painter and engraver.
*Charles Rycroft, 83, British psychiatrist and psychoanalyst.

### 25
*Steve Michael, 42, American HIV/AIDS activist, complications from AIDS.
*Gary Thomas Row, 64, American informant for the FBI, heart attack.
*Claude Stubbs, 93, Australian politician.
*Todd Witsken, 34, American tennis player, brain cancer.

### 26
*Emil Braginsky, 76, Soviet and Russian screenwriter.
*Linda Hayes, 74, American rhythm and blues singer.
*Edgar A. Silinsh, 71, Soviet and Latvian scientist.
*Charlie White, 70, American baseball player.
*Sergey Yablonsky, 73, Soviet and Russian mathematician.

### 27
*Minoo Masani, 92, Indian politician.
*Robert Muller, 72, German-British journalist and screenwriter.
*Ghazaros Saryan, 77, Armenian composer.
*Shu Tong, 92, Chinese politician.

### 28
*Chung-Yao Chao, 95, Chinese theoretical physicist.
*Ragnar Fjørtoft, 84, Norwegian meteorologist.
*Bill Giles, 66, American football player and coach.
*Phil Hartman, 49, Canadian-American comedian and actor (*Saturday Night Live*, *NewsRadio*, *The Simpsons''), Emmy winner (1989), shot.
*Anatoliy Kabayda, 85, Ukrainian community and political activist.
*Bill Meek, 77, American football player and coach.
*Lana Morris, 68, British actress, heart attack.
*George T. Oubre, 80, American politician.
*Dieter Renner, 48, German football player and coach.
*Giovanni Valetti, 84, Italian road racing cyclist.
*Bill Williams, 37, American game designer, programmer and author, cystic fibrosis.

### 29
*Orlando Anderson, 23, American gangster and suspected murderer of rapper Tupac Shakur, gunshot wound.
*Eric Atkinson, 70, Barbados cricket player..
*Ted Dunbar, 61, American jazz guitarist and composer, stroke.
*Barry Goldwater, 89, American politician and author, complications from a stroke.
*Hazel P. Heath, 88, American politician and entrepreneur.
*Marion Milner, 98, British author and psychoanalyst.
*Philip O'Connor, 81, British writer and surrealist poet.

### 30
*Sam Aaronovitch, 78, British economist, academic and communist.
*Jozef Baláži, 78, Slovak football player and manager.
*Leon Bender, 22, American football player, epilepsy.
*Walter Carr, 73, Scottish actor and comedian.
*William Moreton Condry, 80, English naturalist, kidney failure.
*Robin Jackson, 49, Northern Irish loyalist paramilitary, lung cancer.
*Jan Pickard, 70, South African rugby player.
*Max Prieto, 79, Mexican football player.
*Wolfram Röhrig, 81, German pianist, composer and conductor.

### 31
*Sammy Collins, 75, English football player.
*Lotti Huber, 85, German actress.
*Valeriy Hubulov, 31, South Ossetian politician, murdered.
*Michio Suzuki, 71, Japanese mathematician.
*Charles Van Acker, 86, Belgian-American racecar driver.
*Stanisław Wisłocki, 76, Polish conductor of classical music.

## References