Robert L. Stone, a former top executive at the Hertz corporation who had hired O.J. Simpson in the 1970s as a famous pitchman for the car rental giant, died last Wednesday in Boca Grande, Fla. He was 87. Stone became the chairman and chief executive of Hertz in 1972, when the car rental company was a subsidiary of the RCA Corporation. It was Stone's decision to hire O.J. Simpson as the spokesman for Hertz in a series of iconic television commercials, said his wife, Sheila Muldowny Stone. At the time, Simpson was a national sports hero. The ads featured the Hall of Fame football star leaping over airport railings. An avid sportsman himself, Stone wanted an athlete to represent Hertz, according to his wife. "He was tired of watching commercials with actors who didn't do anything but talk," she said. Under Stone's leadership at Hertz, the company's revenue increased from $21 million in 1972 to $200 million by 1978.

Rabbi Leon Klenicki, an advocate for improving interfaith relations whose efforts were lauded by Pope Benedict, died Jan. 25 of cancer at his home in Monroe Township, N.J. He was 78. Klenicki wrote or co-wrote numerous books and papers aimed at improving relations between Jews and Catholics, according to the Anti-Defamation League, the organization Klenicki served for more than 30 years.

Russell Murray II, 83, a weapons analyst and assistant secretary of defense who played a role in long-range military planning and was known for raising concerns about the high cost of many weapons systems, died of cancer Jan. 26 at his home in Alexandria, Va. Murray trained as an aeronautical engineer and worked for the Grumman aircraft company in New York before joining the Defense Department in 1962 as a military weapons systems analyst.

Robert C. Broughton, 91, a pioneering camera effects artist for Walt Disney productions who worked on nearly every Disney motion picture from "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" in 1937 to "The Black Hole" in 1979, died Jan. 19 at a nursing facility in Rochester, Minn., according to his son Dan.

Billy Powell, the former roadie who became a rock star for his keyboard work with the band Lynyrd Skynyrd, died last week, apparently of heart problems, at his home in Orange Park, Fla., police said. He was 56.

Helio Gracie, one of the main creators of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu that gained worldwide popularity, died Thursday of pneumonia. He was 95. Gracie introduced a series of adaptations to traditional Japanese Jiu-Jitsu that emphasized leverage and position as a way to compensate for size differences among opponents.

NEWS SERVICES