1997 deaths

Claudia Drake (born Olga Gloria Fishbine, January 30, 1918 – October 19, 1997) was an American actress and singer.At age 5, Drake and her sister Ella (age 8) formed the La Marr sisters, and the duo performed in vaudeville. When she was older, Busby Berkeley saw her singing in a casino and signed her to a contract with Warner Bros. Her roles in films included being leading lady in Hopalong Cassidy Westerns. She appears in both leading and supporting roles in a variety of B movies, mostly Westerns, from the 1940s and 1950s. One of her more memorable supporting roles is the character Sue Harvey in the 1945 film noir Detour. During the 1950s she also performed in several American television series.

Audra Marie Lindley (September 24, 1918 – October 16, 1997) was an American actress, most famous for her role as landlady Helen Roper on the sitcom Three's Company and its spin-off The Ropers.

Herta Ehlert (née Liess; 26 March 1905 – 4 April 1997) was a female guard at many Nazi concentration camps during the Holocaust.

Wilburn Rue Butland (March 22, 1918 – September 19, 1997) was an American professional baseball pitcher who appeared in 32 games in Major League Baseball for the Boston Red Sox over four seasons between 1940 and 1947. Born in Terre Haute, Indiana, Butland batted right-handed and threw left-handed. He was listed as 6 feet 5 inches (1.96 m) tall and 185 pounds (84 kg).
In his four-season MLB career, Butland posted a 9–3 record with 62 strikeouts and a 3.88 earned run average in 1502⁄3 innings pitched. His lone full season in the majors was 1942, in which he appeared in 23 games, won seven, lost one, threw two shutouts and six complete games, and posted a sparkling 2.51 ERA. He handled 46 total chances (15 putouts, 31 assists) in his major league career without an error for a perfect 1.000 fielding percentage.
Butland's pro career lasted from 1936 through 1950, although he missed three seasons due to service in the United States Army during World War II. He died in Terre Haute at age 79 on September 19, 1997.

Marguerite Henry (née Breithaupt; April 13, 1902 – November 26, 1997) was an American writer of children's books, writing fifty-nine books based on true stories of horses and other animals. She won the Newbery Medal for King of the Wind, a 1948 book about horses, and she was a runner-up for two others. One of the latter, Misty of Chincoteague (1947), was the basis for several related titles and the 1961 movie Misty.

Herman V. Wall (April 21, 1905 – January 13, 1997) was an American World War II combat photographer and photographic illustrator. During the June 6, 1944 D-Day landings in Normandy, France, Captain Wall was Commanding Officer of the United States Army's 165th Signal Photo Company. Of the conspicuous heroism Wall displayed to provide much of the Army's initial photographic intelligence in the Omaha Beach landing sector, General Dwight D. Eisenhower (Supreme Commander of Allied forces in the European Theater of Operations) wrote "...a salute to a man whose gallantry, on D-Day, was outstanding on a field when gallantry was the rule."
During the pre- and post-World War II periods, Wall was a well-known freelance photographic illustrator and a late member of "Camera Pictorialists of Los Angeles." His photographs covered six decades, and could be found in international photo salons and well-known magazines such as Time and Life. Notable among his associates were Charles Kerlee and Trevor Goodman.

Abraham Hyman Feder (July 27, 1908, Milwaukee, Wisconsin – April 24, 1997, Manhattan, New York) was an American lighting designer. He is regarded as the creator of lighting design for the theatre and was the country's leading consultant in architectural and urban lighting.The lights at Rockefeller Center and the Empire State Building were turned off for one hour in Feder's honor after his death.

James Kenneth Johnson (May 30, 1916 – August 22, 1997) was a colonel in the United States Air Force. In the Korean War he was a double ace, credited with shooting down ten enemy aircraft. He also had one "kill" in World War II, when he was a lieutenant colonel. He received numerous awards, including the Distinguished Service Cross, the Silver Star, the Legion of Merit, and the Distinguished Flying Cross.

Scott Thomas Armstrong Jr. (October 12, 1913 – August 20, 1997) was an American professional basketball player. He played in the National Basketball League for the Fort Wayne General Electrics, Oshkosh All-Stars, and Indianapolis Kautskys. Armstrong was an NBL all-star during his lone season on Oshkosh (1938–39). While living in Indianapolis, Indiana and playing for the Kautskys, he also served as an assistant coach for Butler University's men's basketball team, his alma mater where he had previously played. Armstrong's post-basketball life included serving in the United States Navy and becoming a principal of a junior high school.

Samuel Preston Bayard (April 10, 1908, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania – January 10, 1997, in State College, Pennsylvania) was an American folklorist and musicologist. He received a B.A. in English from Pennsylvania State University in 1934 and later earned an M.A. from Harvard University.
He collected fiddle and fife tunes in southwestern Pennsylvania and northern West Virginia from 1928 to 1963. He is known for his interest in the melodies of traditional music at a time when often only the texts were collected. He introduced the concept of "melodic families", which are groups of tunes that appears to be structurally related. He traced the origins of many traditional American fiddle tunes back to the British Isles.
In addition to his work on fiddle tunes, he was the expert on the use of the fife in traditional American music. He is fondly remembered by former students for his large collection of snuffboxes, which he used regularly.
He established the folklore program at Pennsylvania State University, and taught there from 1945 to 1973
He was a fellow of the American Folklore Society, and its president from 1965 to 1966.
He died on January 10, 1997, in State College, Pennsylvania. An award in his name has been established at Penn State for graduate students in comparative literature.