In Passing

Dorothy Provine’ actress

Bremerton – Actress Dorothy Provine, best known for her roles as Milton Berle’s wife and Ethel Merman’s daughter in “It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World” and the high-kicking flapper in the 1960s TV series “The Roaring 20s,” has died. She was 75.

Her husband of 43 years, Robert Day, said Friday that Provine died from emphysema on April 25 at Silverdale’s Hospice of Kitsap County, about 10 miles northwest of Bremerton. He said there won’t be a funeral.

“She was so beautiful,” Day said from his Bainbridge Island home in Washington.

Provine’s movie credits also include “Bonnie Parker Story” and “Live Fast, Die Young” in 1958, “The 30 Foot Bride of Candy Rock” and “Riot in Juvenile Prison” in 1959, “Good Neighbor Sam” in 1964, “That Darn Cat!” and “The Great Race” in 1965 and “Never a Dull Moment” in 1968.

Provine played leggy flapper Pinky Pinkham on ABC-TV’s “The Roaring 20s” from 1960 to 1962, and she appeared on such shows as “77 Sunset Strip,” “Hawaiian Eye,” “Sugarfoot,” “Wagon Train” and “Mike Hammer.”

W. Willard Wirtz, Labor secretary

Washington – W. Willard Wirtz, a lawyer and labor arbitrator who was labor secretary in the Kennedy and Johnson administrations but broke publicly with Lyndon Johnson over Vietnam, has died.

Wirtz, 98, died April 24 of natural causes at his home in Washington, his son Philip said Sunday.

Wirtz left a Chicago law firm to join the Kennedy administration as undersecretary of labor in 1961. President John F. Kennedy promoted him to the top job in 1962 just one day after naming Labor Secretary Arthur J. Goldberg to the Supreme Court.

Wirtz continued in the post after Johnson succeeded Kennedy in 1963 and stayed on until Johnson completed his term in January 1969. He remained in Washington and resumed the practice of law, often serving on boards and pursuing labor-related projects.