HOSPITALIZED. Vladimir Smirnov, 28, Soviet 1980 Olympic gold medal winner in the individual foil; in critical condition and "clinically dead" after a freak accident during a championship fencing match; in Rome. When Smirnov and West Germany's Matthias Behr lunged simultaneously, the tip of Behr's foil struck Smirnov's chest protector with unusual force. The blade snapped off at the tip; the jagged end then sprang upward, cut through Smirnov's wire-mesh face protector and sank between his left eye and left frontal lobe, severing an artery and piercing his brain.

DIED. Scott Meese, 19, son of Presidential Counsellor Edwin Meese Ill, a Princeton sophomore; of injuries in a car accident; in McLean, Va.

DIED. Vic Morrow, 51, tough-guy actor who starred in the 1960s TV series Combat; in a movie-set accident; northwest of Los Angeles. Morrow was filming a battle scene on the ground when a camera-carrying helicopter crashed, decapitating him.

DIED. Edward ("Sonny") Stitt, 58, swinging jazz saxophonist in the tradition of Charlie Parker; of cancer; in Washington, D.C. Stitt, a jazz scholar once said, knows "every lick and trick in the book."

DIED. Dave Garroway, 69, hornrimmed, bow-tied founding host of NBC's Today show; by his own hand (shotgun); in Swarthmore, Pa. Today's producers were looking for a dynamic personality in 1952 until Garroway sold them on "a lean-against-the-ladder, go-to-sleep-standingup guy like me." Of his style, he once said, "I talk right to the camera as if it were the one other single person who is here with me." He mixed movie and book reviews with political reports, as well as off-hand comments on personal passions such as sports cars, jazz and astronomy. Garroway, who reappeared on TV only occasionally after leaving Today in 1961, ended each program by holding up his palm and saying "Peace."

DIED. Betty Parsons, 82, discerning New York City art dealer who championed a stellar stable of abstract expressionists--Jackson Pollock, Barnett Newman, Ad Reinhardt, Robert Rauschenberg, Mark Rothko, Clyfford Still--in the post-World War II years when others scorned their works; of a stroke; in Southold, N.Y.

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