Louise Shepard, wife of Mercury astronaut Alan Shepard, died of a heart attack Tuesday while flying home to Monterey, Calif., after visiting a daughter in Colorado. She was believed to have been 74. Alan Shepard, the first American to fly in space, died in his sleep last month at age 74 while being treated for leukemia.

He and his wife shared a passion for golf -- Mr. Shepard was famous for hitting a golf ball on the moon -- and they were often photographed playing the game together when Mrs. Shepard accompanied her husband on business trips.

Francesco Crucitti, 67, Pope John Paul II's surgeon, died of cancer Wednesday in Rome. In 1981, Dr. Crucitti led the medical team that operated on the pontiff after he was shot in the abdomen in an assassination attempt in St. Peter's Square. He removed a benign tumor from the pope's colon in 1992 and his inflamed appendix in 1996.

Gene Page, 58, the music producer-arranger of such hits as Love Unlimited Orchestra's "Love's Theme" and the Diana Ross-Lionel Richie duet "Endless Love," died Monday after a lengthy illness in Los Angeles.

Pub Date: 8/28/98