James Stewart

To MILLIONS, James Stewart was Everyman. To Kelly Stewart, he was just Dad. "Dad was a very private person," she says, adding that her father never brought his work home with him. But she got her first inkling of his tremendous popularity at age 6, when she accompanied him to a charity event at the Akron Soap Box Derby. "I remember seeing these crowds of people, thousands and thousands of people, and police standing in a line to keep the crowds back. They were yelling 'Jimmy! Jimmy!'

James Stewart "Stew" Otto, 84, a radiation biologist who was involved with atomic bomb tests in Nevada and on Eniwetok Island and worked with Sam the space monkey, died June 29 in Lynn Haven, Fla. As a Navy researcher during World War II, Otto studied the effects of radiation on animals and helped advise President Harry S. Truman before atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. Later, Otto worked with the Navy's Animal Research Institute in Bethesda, Md.

Ric Hardman, 84, a writer of screenplays, TV scripts and novels, mostly in the western genre, died in his sleep June 29 at his home in Los Angeles, his son Chris said. He had cancer. For the big screen, Hardman wrote "Gunman's Walk," a 1958 western starring Van Heflin and Tab Hunter, and "The Rare Breed," another western from 1966 featuring James Stewart. In the early 1960s, Hardman wrote for the western TV series "Lawman" using his name as well as a pen name, Bronson Howitzer. He later turned to writing novels, including "Fifteen Flags," a 1968 story about American troops fighting in Siberia during the Russian Civil War of 1919-20, and "Sunshine Rider," a 1998 novel that Hardman called the first vegetarian western and a Boston Globe reviewer called "delicious whimsy."

There were 46 members in the America Online movie chat room when I checked in Wednesday night, hours after learning of James Stewart's death. Though these electronic forums are mainly the habitats of anonymous adolescents, it's the best way I know to get immediate reactions to news events, without heading for a bar or a street corner.

James Stewart, the folksy actor whose 50-year career includes some of Hollywood's most beloved movies, will receive an honorary Academy Award at this year's Oscar ceremonies. At the same time, producer David L. Wolper has been voted the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award. Wolper was cited for his work as producer of the Opening and Closing Ceremonies for the 1984 Olympic Games. The 76-year-old Stewart won an Oscar in 1940 as best actor in "The Philadelphia Story." He was also nominated for "Mr.