Milestones

By Melissa August, Amanda Bower, Val Castronovo, Ling Minhua, Ellin Martens, Julie Rawe, Sora Song, Joel Stein, Josh Tyrangiel and Rebecca Winters

GRANTED. JUAN RAUL GARZA, 44, the first federal prisoner scheduled for execution since 1963; a six-month reprieve; by President Clinton; in Terre Haute, Ind. Citing racial and geographic disparities in the federal death-penalty system, Clinton passed the fate of the convicted murderer to the next Administration.

DIED. JULIAN DIXON, 66, ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee and a senior member of the congressional Black Caucus who represented his west Los Angeles district for 22 years; of an apparent heart attack; in Los Angeles. A strong civil rights advocate and lobbyist for the District of Columbia, Dixon served on congressional ethics and defense-spending committees.

DIED. MATTHEW LUKWIYA, Ugandan doctor who led the country's fight to contain an Ebola outbreak that began in September; days after showing symptoms of the disease; in Gulu, Uganda. Lukwiya, who was in his early 40s, was the first to recognize that people were contracting the virus and is credited for the relatively low death toll, which reached 156 last week.

DIED. MARVEL COOKE, 97, pioneering journalist and political activist who in 1950 became the first black woman to write full time for a major white-owned newspaper; in New York City. She created the first local newspaper guild at a black publication, which in 1934 led to one of the first organized-labor victories for African Americans in U.S. history.

DIED. GWENDOLYN BROOKS, 83, prolific poet who, in 1950, was the first African American to win a Pulitzer Prize, for literature; in Chicago (see Eulogy, below).

DIED. WERNER KLEMPERER, 80, Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany who won two Emmys for his portrayal of the bumbling Nazi prison-camp commandant Colonel Klink on Hogan's Heroes; in New York City. After the prime-time series ended in 1971, he worked as an orchestral narrator with nearly every major U.S. symphony orchestra, and was nominated for a Tony in 1988 for his role as Jewish shopkeeper Herr Schultz in a revival of Cabaret.