Sonia Pressman Fuentes, an early women’s rights lawyer who told the feminist author Betty Friedan that women needed an advocacy group to fight for them the way the N.A.A.C.P. fought for Black Americans, planting the seed for the National Organization for Women, died on Dec. 20 in Sarasota, FL. She was 97.

In 1965, Mrs. Fuentes became the first female lawyer in the general counsel’s office at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, a new agency that had been created to enforce Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Invited to speak to employers and unions about the new anti-discrimination law, Ms. Fuentes found that “any reference to women’s rights was greeted with laughter,” she wrote in a 1999 memoir.

In June 1966, Ms. Friedan and 27 others chipped in $5 each to create what became the National Organization for Women, eventually the largest feminist group in the country. NOW became the catalyst for significant change in the workplace and at home.

Later, Mrs. Fuentes worked in the private sector. She resigned after three years, unhappy there. “I was uncomfortable in the corporate world,” she wrote. “It was not the place for an outspoken, independent, liberal Jewish woman, who wanted to change the way things were done.”

Dr. Judith L. Rapoport, a child psychiatrist who brought public awareness to obsessive-compulsive disorder, died on March 7 in Washington D.C. She was 92.

            The disorder had long remained in the shadows because of the shame that surrounded its symptoms, which could include habits like checking and rechecking that appliances were off, performing counting rituals before doing something as simple as walking through a doorway, or scrubbing hands with soap and water until the skin was raw. Dr. Rapoport showed a neurological basis for repetitive thoughts, and also for their linked compulsions or pointless rituals of behavior.

            In addition to research on obsessive-compulsive disorder, Dr. Rapoport oversaw influential studies that shed light on attention deficit hyper activity disorder and childhood-onset schizophrenia.

Pedro Friedeberg, a Mexican Jewish artist who was often called “The last Surrealist,” known for his hallucinatory paintings of imaginary cities and for his absurdist furniture designs died on March 5 in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. He was 90. Born in Italy to German Jewish parents, Mr. Friedeberg moved to Mexico with his family as a child and was later hailed as an artistic force in his adopted country. He worked in various mediums, including sculpture and printmaking, but found fame with paintings and drawings that transcended the boundaries of his university architecture studies. His paintings and lithographs were intricately geometric and dreamlike, conjuring otherworldly skylines, town centers, buildings and temple-like interiors.

                     For all his other accomplishments, Mr. Friedeberg is best remembered for his hand chairs. More than 5,000 have been produced in a variety of materials, some fetching tens of thousands of dollars at auction.

Nathan Farb, a photographer whose career took him from downtown Manhattan to a city in Siberia and then to the Adirondack Mountains of New York, died on March 26 at his home in Jay, a town in Adirondack Park. He was 85.

            Mr. Farb did not pick up a camera in a serious way until he was 25, but when he did, he felt an immediate desire to be a photographer.

            “The camera satisfied so many needs for me: The need to be with people, the need to connect to people, the need to express myself, the need to be able to comment on society,” he said.

Sid Krofft, who with his brother Marty made zany children’s programming, gaining a following among both the young and adult members of the counterculture, died on April 10 in Los Angeles. He was 96.

            According to The New York Times, Mr. Krofft was “an eccentric visionary, a kids’ show P.T. Barnum who created improbable programming with a combination of creativity and chutzpah.” What tied the shows together was a madcap feel of fantastical creatures, elaborate costumes and puppets, psychedelic sets and slapstick humor — “ a mélange of the Three Stooges and “Alice in Wonderland,” The Times said.

            He was proud of many of his shows, Mr. Krofft had said, especially “Pufnstuf,” but watching reruns of the worst Krofft programs could make him cringe. “I have to turn away once in a while,” he said, “because I think, ‘Oh, my God, how did I ever allow that?’”

Adriano Goldschmied, the Italian businessman known as “the godfather of denim” for his role in developing versions of the world’s most popular fabric, died on April 5 in Castelfranco Veneto, a town near his home in Asolo, Italy. He was 82.

            On any given day, marketers say, nearly half the world’s population is wearing jeans. Last year, more than $98 billion worth of jeans were sold worldwide, and if you wear jeans, you own a pair that is influenced in some way by Mr. Goldschmied’s presence in the industry.

            By his count, Mr. Goldschmied collaborated on or started more than 50 brands, including Gap 1969, a retro label named for the year Gap was founded, as well as Goldsign and AG Adriano Goldschmied, now known as AG Jeans.