University Of Michigan

Dr. Andrew Herbert Foster, 42, cardiac surgeonDr. Andrew Herbert Foster, head of cardiac surgery at George Washington University Medical Center in Washington, died Friday of complications of lymphoma at University of Maryland Medical Center. He was 42 and lived in Severna Park.Dr. Foster was appointed head of the cardiac unit in 1998. From 1991 to 1998, he was assistant professor and then associate professor of surgery at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. From 1989 to 1991, he was cardiothoracic resident for the Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery at the Medical College of Virginia in Richmond.

What do the Intel Corp., Hallmark Cards, the Secret Service, the University of Michigan, the South Carolina motor vehicle administration, CBS SportsLine and a company that gives away free computers have in common?If you're into conspiracy theories, you could proably come up with a doozie involving this bunch. But if you're merely concerned about electronic privacy, they've all been involved in recent controversies that illustrate how easy it is for people to collect information about you and me in an age of instant, computer-based communication.

Denyse Wright-Thissedau, a premed student at Howard Community College in Columbia, doesn't have anything against basketball, or basketball players, or even, specifically, NBA star Robert "Tractor" Traylor of the Milwaukee Bucks.But she wonders why HCC officials invited Traylor, of all people, to speak at the orientation for new students last Friday, considering that he never graduated from college."You're trying to give these people motivation to move on, and this gentleman has not completed college," said Wright-Thissedau, 38, of Columbia.

New positionsWBAL-TV appoints Wertleib general sales managerWBAL-TV, the local NBC affiliate, appointed Jordon Wertleib general sales manager. A graduate of the University of Michigan, he had been the local sales manager for a Hearst-Argyle sister station, WCVB-TV in Boston, and is a member of the board of the New England Electronic Media Associations.Hinson is vice president of SOTAS global marketingSOTAS Inc. has appointed Wayne Hinson vice president of global marketing and communications.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- University of Michigan student Michael Blair says he feels the racial tension every day. He hears discussions laced with derogatory comments about minorities; he is uneasy during class discussions."

Don't be alarmed if the driver in the teal 1996 Oldsmobile minivan zipping along beside you on Interstate 79 outside of Pittsburgh has both hands cradled behind his head.It's probably Dean Pomerleau on his way to work.Pomerleau, a researcher at Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Institute, doesn't have to steer the van. It has an autopilot system, guided by a video camera mounted next to the rear-view mirror that keeps the vehicle on course while keeping a sharp "eye" out for potential trouble spots.

Dionis Coffin Riggs,98, a poet, author, newspaper columnist and civic leader who made Martha's Vineyard her home and her passion for the better part of a century, died April 20 at Cleaveland House, the West Tisbury, Mass., boardinghouse where she had listened to seafaring tales as a child and told them as an old woman.Art Hanes Sr.,80, former mayor of Birmingham, Ala., who closed the city's parks in 1962 to stop black residents from using them, died Thursday in Birmingham.Dr. Chia-Shun Yih,78, an authority on fluid mechanics, died of heart failure April 25 while in a plane over Japan.

Josephine Jacobsen has been a published poet for 79 years, since the children's magazine St. Nicholas printed a poem when she was 10 years old. Many years later, in an essay about becoming a poet, she remembered the never-to-be-equaled experience of going down to the newsstand, buying a copy of the magazine and opening it to her first published poem:"I stood on the sidewalk, obstructive, stunned, looking at my words, naked, displayed to the world, and...

WASHINGTON -- Federal agents detained yesterday in Montana a man they suspect of being the Unabomber, the terrorist who has left a 17-year-long trail of bombs across the United States that have killed three people and maimed 23.The suspect, Theodore J. Kaczynski, 53, is a former assistant professor of mathematics at the University of California at Berkeley who graduated from Harvard University and received a doctorate from the University of Michigan --...

The United Auto Workers union's decision this week to break with tradition and not pick a strike target should not be interpreted as a sign that it might strike all three automakers, union and industry officials said yesterday.A strike against the Big Three -- General Motors Corp. Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler Corp. -- is virtually unthinkable, industry leaders said yesterday. Such a massive undertaking would dry up the union's finances, preventing it from squeezing any of the so-called Big Three automakers to make concessions for a new contract.

WASHINGTON - - The government's first broad look at the recession's impact on American households in 2008 shows that the nation's poverty level jumped to an 11-year high, incomes sank for almost every group and the number of people without health insurance rose to 46.3 million. As bleak as these statistics were from the Census Bureau on Thursday, they captured only a part of the devastating effects of the economic downturn that worsened last fall and into this year. Analysts say they expect the official poverty rate, which rose to 13.2 percent, from 12.5 percent in 2007, to keep climbing this year and next, reversing the gains made in the 1990s.

WASHINGTON - -Even as the nation's economy begins clawing its way out of the worst recession in 60 years, there are growing signs that this recovery could come with an unsettling twist: The wheels of commerce may begin to turn again without any substantial boost in jobs. Not only is the unemployment rate - now 9.4 percent - likely to climb into double digits, it is expected to remain there well into next year or possibly longer, economists say, prolonging the misery of the unemployed, squeezing retailers and other businesses, and adding millions of dollars in government costs and lost productivity.

Detroit - It's not true that you must work 80-hour weeks, trash competitors and gouge your customers to get ahead in today's dog-eat-dog business world. That's what Rich Sheridan and his fellow computer programmers and high-tech anthropologists at Menlo Innovations in Ann Arbor, Mich., say. They are dedicated to reinventing the workplace, for themselves and their clients, as a means to a more ambitious goal, which is "to end human suffering in the world as it relates to technology," says Sheridan, president and chief executive officer of the software firm he founded with three partners in 2001.

PAUL B. GORDON, 84 Food distributor owner Paul B. Gordon, who expanded Gordon Food Service Inc. into one of the largest family-owned food distributors in North America, died Tuesday at his home in Ada, Mich., after a brief battle with cancer. The death was confirmed by B. Joseph White, president of the University of Illinois and a member of the company's board. Mr. Gordon's grandparents started the business in 1897, delivering eggs and butter. After serving in the Navy during World War II and graduating from the University of Michigan, he joined the business in 1948 as a salesman.

Folks back in Clinton Township, Mich., know Jeff Deliz for a number of reasons. He was one of Chippewa Valley High's best athletes, he made Navy his college choice over Toledo, and he was a big Ohio State fan. Yes, right there in Wolverine country, where University of Michigan bluebloods live. Navy@Rutgers Tomorrow, 7 p.m., ESPN, 1090 AM, 1430 AM Line: Rutgers by 16 1/2

WASHINGTON -- For Patrick Hicks, it was a teachable moment that he would share with his social studies class in Grosse Pointe, Mich. For Chris Berkley, it was an opportunity to honor a former president who had gone to grade school with his grandfather. For Jeff Myers, it was a way to show his respect for a former Wolverine and fellow alumnus of the University of Michigan. They -- and thousands of other ordinary citizens -- honored the memory of Gerald R. Ford yesterday, streaming into the Capitol to pay tribute to the former president as his flag-draped coffin lay in state for the first of two full days of public viewing in the cavernous Rotunda.

CHICAGO -- Time travel, long a staple of science fiction, has so far amounted to nothing more than a fantasy. But anyone interested in paying a visit to the past may soon get the chance. On Nov. 7, voters in Michigan will decide on a ballot initiative banning racial preferences in the public sector, and if it passes, opponents say, it will put the state back into the Dark Ages. Proposal 2 represents a reaction to the University of Michigan's use of racial double standards in selecting its students.

I'm willing to compete with Minesweeper, but not with the entire Internet." - DON HERZOG, University of Michigan law professor, who initiated the faculty discussion that led to a ban on student access to the Internet during their scheduled class times.

Arthur Franz, 86, a veteran movie and television character actor, died Saturday in Oxnard, Calif., of heart failure and emphysema, his daughter said. Mr. Franz appeared in the 1949 John Wayne film Sands of Iwo Jima and in 1951's Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man. He played alongside Ronald Reagan and his wife, Nancy Davis, in the 1957 film Hellcats of the Navy. Before becoming an actor, Mr. Franz served in the Army Air Forces during World War II. Born in Perth Amboy, N.J., he developed an interest in acting in his teens.

NEW YORK -- Customer service at U.S. airlines during the first quarter was the worst it has been in five years, according to a University of Michigan index that ranks customer satisfaction. Only cable television, satellite services and newspapers ranked lower than airlines in the American Customer Satisfaction Index, which also examined industries such as utilities, health care, telecommunications and food service. Among the U.S. airlines, Northwest ranked lowest, its rating falling 4.7 percent from the first quarter of last year.