Two passings of note, both at 93.

You may  not know the name John Portman, but you have probably seen or been in the buildings he designed, including the Hyatt Hotel in Atlanta. Reported the Chicago Tribune:

"Everyone became a country bumpkin when they walked into the Hyatt,” former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young recalled in “John Portman: A Life of Building,” a 2012 documentary. “You had to say: ‘Oh, my God, what is this?’ ”

     Portman never retired, and gave a speech to an architects group in Shanghai last month.  He died at 93 in Atlanta, the city he helped transform.

  

   Then there was the death of the last pilot to fly a combat mission in WWII, also dead at 93. Jerry Yellin was on a mission against Japan when word came that Japan had surrendered, but as the NY Times reports, he never got word:

It was only when he returned to Iwo Jima some three hours after completing the mission that he learned the war had formally ended while he was still blasting away.

Mr. Yellin died on Thursday in Florida at 93. His death was announced by his son Steven.

     I guess there is a comparison to be made between the two men, one known for building cities, the other for destroying them. But both Mssrs Portman and Yellin did what was required to them at the time they collided with history. What more can we ask of anyone?