Obituaries

Irving Stone, 90, who started working in his family's greeting card business at age 5 and helped transform it into one of the world's largest card makers, died in Cleveland yesterday of an unspecified extended illness. Stone held the title of founder-chairman of American Greetings Corp., at the time of his death, but was not involved in managing the day-to-day affairs of the 93-year-old company. The company has sales today of $2.2 billion with products sold in 75 countries around the world.

Thomas Francis Lambert Jr., 85, who prosecuted Nazi war criminals as a trial lawyer for the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg, died Wednesday at his Boston home. During the post-World War II Nuremberg trials, Mr. Lambert helped prepare the case against the Nazi Party that accused it of being a criminal organization. He had a long association with the American Trial Lawyers Association, and served 40 years as editor of the group's law journal and other publications. Maria de las Mercedes de Borbon y Orleansans, 89, the mother of Spain's King Juan Carlos, died yesterday in her residence in Lanzarote, Canary Islands, the royal palace reported.

William Purnell Johnson, 79, lumber executive, veteran William Purnell Johnson, chairman of the board of the J. F. Johnson Lumber Co., died Wednesday of a heart attack at the Lorien Rehabilitation Center in Columbia. He was 79. A former member of the U.S. Army Air Corps who served in Europe during World War II, Mr. Johnson joined Johnson Lumber as vice president in 1968. He served as president of the company between 1985 and 1994, and chairman of the board until his death. Before working at Johnson Lumber, which was founded in 1921 by his father and uncle, Mr. Johnson ran a real estate business, William P. Johnson & Co., near Towson.

Ken Clawson, 63, one of President Richard M. Nixon's staunch defenders as director of White House communications during the Watergate era, died Dec. 17 at a hospital in New Orleans after suffering a heart attack.A former newspaper reporter, Mr. Clawson joined the White House in February 1972 as deputy director of communications for the executive branch. He became White House communications director on Jan. 30, 1974, as the Watergate scandals were consuming the Nixon presidency.Mr. Clawson's name was associated with the "Canuck letter" that was sent to the Manchester Union-Leader in New Hampshire early in 1972 and claimed that Democratic Sen. Edmund Muskie of Maine had spoken disparagingly of French-Canadians.

Desmond Llewelyn,85, who starred as the eccentric gadget expert Q in a string of James Bond films, was killed in a head-on car crash yesterday near the town of Firle in East Sussex, England, police said.He was best known for his role as Q, who equipped 007 with the latest spy tools -- from toxic fountain pens to exploding toothpaste -- in 17 Bond films from 1963's "From Russia with Love" to the current film "The World Is Not Enough."Over the years, Q grew fond of Bond but could never forgive him for abusing his inventions.

Frank Day, 68, the man who led Trustmark National Bank through 15 acquisitions and watched its assets grow from $1.3 billion to more than $6 billion, died Monday in Jackson, Miss. from respiratory failure related to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease.Donald J. Lloyd-Jones, 68, president of the America Geographical Society, died Monday of lung cancer in Stamford, Conn.Nick Sanborn, 64, a champion and later president and CEO of the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb, died Monday in Cascade, Colo.

Lucile Petry Leone, 97, who founded the U. S. Cadet Nurse Corps and helped avoid the need to draft nurses for World War II, died in San Francisco Nov. 25. Ms. Leone, who helped recruit more than 100,000 young women to study nursing, founded and directed the Cadet Nurse Corps after the United States was fighting both in Europe and the Pacific.The program, authorized by Congress in 1943, covered a candidate's tuition, fees, room and board, books, monthly stipends and uniforms. In return, candidates promised to take part in military or civilian nursing until the war ended.

Matt Cohen,56, a Canadian writer who won one of the country's most prestigious writing awards last month, died Thursday of lung cancer in Toronto. Mr. Cohen had been a well-known writer in Canada since his first novel, "Korsoniloff," was published in 1969.Philip Elman,81, a lawyer who handled government briefs in the Supreme Court's landmark Brown vs. Board of Education case of 1954, died Tuesday at Sibley Memorial Hospital in Washington.Andrew D. Wolfe,77, a longtime publisher who built a chain of nine weekly newspapers in the Rochester, N.Y., suburbs, died Thursday of cancer.

Quentin Crisp,90, the British-born writer, raconteur and actor who found fame at 59 when he published "The Naked Civil Servant," an account of his openly homosexual life in London, and who found happiness when he moved to New York at 72, died Sunday in Manchester, England.He was in Britain for a new run of his one-man show "An Evening With Quentin Crisp," which was to have opened yesterday.Mr. Crisp was in Baltimore in June for a benefit for AXIS Theatre, a small, independent theater. As part of the benefit, he entertained 219 theatergoers at Center Stage, discussing the subject of style for 45 minutes, then answering questions for more than an hour.

Hazel A. W. Lewis, 87, homemaker, music-loverHazel Arbutus Williams Lewis, a homemaker, music-lover and churchgoer, died Sunday at Heritage Nursing Center in Dundalk after suffering a stroke that left her in a coma. She was 87.Born in a railroad car in Phillipe, W. Va., Mrs. Lewis lived most of her life in Cumberland. As a teen-ager, she wore a bride costume to a Halloween party, where she met Elmer E. Lewis Sr., a B & O Railroad worker. They were married 64 years. Mr. Lewis died seven years ago.Gospel music was a talent.