Charles Louis Strouse, an American composer and lyricist best known for writing the music to the Broadway musicals Bye Bye Birdie for which he won his first Tony Award for Best Musical,  Applause, which gave him his second Tony Award,  and Annie, his third,  died on May 15 in Manhattan, at 96.

Annie, which included the song, “Tomorrow,” which quickly became a song hit and, in addition to his third Tony Award, garnered him two Grammy Awards. Strouse won Emmy Awards for music for television. He was also the recipient of the 1999 ASCAP Foundation Richard Rodgers Award, and the Oscar Hammerstein Award. He became a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame in and the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

His happy childhood memories later inspired the credits roll for “All In The Family” in which Carroll O’Connor and Jean Stapleton sit at the piano, singing together.

Peter Lax, whose work at the intersection of mathematical theory and application redefined how scientists used new computing technology to solve the technical problems of the Cold War, from designing aircraft and weapons to predicting the weather, died on May 16 at his home in Manhattan. He was 99.

As the computer age was dawning, Dr. Lax, a native of Hungary, led the way in figuring out how the new technology could be harnessed to mathematics for the purpose of analyzing complex phenomena in nature, technology and warfare. His theoretical breakthroughs and his leadership in developing large-scale computing infrastructure produced new ways to characterize and predict phenomena as varied as storm fronts, shock waves and stock prices.

“Mathematics is a broad subject,” he said. “It is true that nobody can know it all, or even nearly all. It is also true that as mathematics develops, things are simplified and unusual connections appear.”

Monroe Milstein, who purchased a derelict New Jersey garment plant and turned it into the nation’s third largest discount retailer, Burlington Coat Factory, died on May 9 at his home in Bal Harbour, FL. He was 98.

In 1972, he and his wife, Henrietta Milstein, ventured her savings as a Long Island teacher and transformed a former factory in Burlington, NJ, which they had bought for $675,000, into a mecca for busloads of frugal customers, lured from the Philadelphia metropolitan area and beyond to buy marked-down designer and brand-name coats for women and later, linens, men’s wear, baby clothes, and shoes. By the time they had divested themselves of their family-run company, it was operating 367 stores in 42 states and had recorded sales of $3.2 billion annually. The Milsteins sold their shares for $1.3 billion.

Susan Brownmiller, the feminist author, journalist and activist whose book, “Against Our Will: Men, Women and Rape,” helped define the modern view of rape, debunking it as an act of passion and reframing it as a crime of power and violence, died on May 24 in the Bronx. She was 90.

The book, published in 1975, was translated into a dozen languages and ranked by the New York Public Library as one of the 100 most important books of the 20th century.

The ascendant women’s movement was already opening the public’s eyes about sexual violence. Anti-rape groups had started to form in the early 1970s. Women were becoming empowered to take control of their bodies and their sexuality. Rape-crisis centers were opened, self-defense classes gained new popularity, and several states rewrote their laws to make it easier to prosecute rapists.

She devoted her life to writing and taught at Pace University into her ‘80s. She wrote scores of magazine articles and half a dozen books, plus some works of fiction.

Jesse Kornbluth, whose sly chronicles of cultural excess , celebrity and author profiles, personal essays, and investigative work enlivened magazines and newspapers, died on April 17 in Manhattan. He was 79.

He contributed to, among others, The New York Times Magazine, New York Magazine, Vanity Fair, Architectural Digest and New Times, an alternative biweekly newsmagazine published in the 1970s. He also worked as a ghostwriter, wrote screenplays, and wrote or co-wrote a number of nonfiction books.

“Jesse was the expert on everything,” Tina Brown, the former editor of Vanity Fair said, “or could sound like one.”

Marcia Marcus, a figurative and conceptual artist with a bold contemporary style, died on March 27 in Manhattan. She was 97.

She painted portraits of the artists of her time, but her favorite subject was herself. She painted herself frequently in a variety of costumes and settings: She was a helmeted Athena, a Medusa, and a reclining nude. She placed herself in front of Masada in pearls and a red sheath.