Milestones
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DIED. Etta Baker, 93, influential blues matriarch whose music helped spark the folk revival of the 1960s; in Fairfax, Va. Baker worked for nearly three decades at a textile mill before taking up the guitar full-time at age 60. Her raw, soulful mix of bluegrass and Delta blues--starting with blistering renditions of Railroad Bill and One-Dime Blues on a 1956 compilation album of southern Appalachian musicians--won her a cult following and, in 1991, a folk-heritage fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.
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DIED. Byron Nelson, 94, gentlemanly legend of golf who in 1945 had the greatest season in the sport's history, winning 18 titles, including a still unmatched record of 11 straight tournament victories; at his ranch in Roanoke, Texas. The son of cotton farmers, Nelson learned golf after becoming a caddie to earn pocket money. In 1937 he won the Masters and gained the confidence, he said, "that I could make good decisions in difficult circumstances." His self-belief--and a swing so pure, it's still seen as the paragon--carried him to four more major titles and his historic streak. After he retired in 1946, others' careers became his priority. A natural teacher, he mentored players like Hall of Famer Tom Watson, encouraged a young Tiger Woods and was known for sending pros handwritten letters full of cheer and advice. "I have tried hard to do proper," Nelson said in 2002. "I think I've done a pretty good job."
DIED. Iva Toguri D'Aquino, 90, Japanese American jailed, amid rampant post--World War II anti-Japanese prejudice, as the traitorous radio host Tokyo Rose; in Chicago. In fact, there was no one Tokyo Rose--the name was given by U.S. troops to any English-speaking woman on the Japanese propaganda outlet Radio Japan. In 1941 D'Aquino flew to the country to care for an aunt and got stuck in the wake of the Pearl Harbor bombing. Suddenly an enemy, she was forced to work at Radio Japan. With on-air references to her audience as "our friends--I mean, our enemies" and off-air efforts to get food to starving Allied POWs, she made her loyalty to the U.S. clear. But in 1949, with testimony from witnesses who later said they had been coerced, she was convicted of treason and jailed for six years. Her pardon by President Gerald Ford in 1977 was, she said, "an act of vindication."
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