2005 deaths

Maclovia Ruiz Mailer (11 September 1910 – 31 December 2005) was a Mexican-American dancer in the 1930s with the San Francisco Ballet. She also had the lead role in a piece choreographed by George Balanchine for the 1936 production of Carmen at the Metropolitan Opera House.Born in Guadalajara, Jalisco, in Mexico, Ruiz was the eldest of three daughters. She moved with her family to San Francisco in 1914, arriving by the S.S. Peru. She was taught folk dancing by her father. She would perform in neighborhood clubs, but local dance schools discriminated against her because of her skin color and ethnic background. At the age of 10, she finally gained acceptance into the Peters Wright Dance School, where she studied interpretive dance while performing on the vaudeville circuit outside of class.When she was 23, she gained entry to the San Francisco Ballet. She went on to perform with the Metropolitan Opera Company and Balanchine's American Ballet Company. She also danced in Samuel Goldwyn's 1938 movie musical extravaganza, The Goldwyn Follies. She became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1945.Throughout her career, Ruiz continued dancing in nightclubs, performing flamenco throughout Spain and South America. Ruiz continued to dance well into her 70s, teaching ballroom and Spanish dance and offering movement classes to the elderly and the disabled.

Jaime Fernández Reyes (born 6 December 1933) is a Mexican actor. Over his career, he won 3 Silver Ariel awards — the Mexican equivalent of the Oscar — including one for what is arguably his best-known role, playing Friday, the protagonist's associate in Luis Buñuel's Robinson Crusoe. He appeared in over 200 films and served as the general secretary of the National Association of Actors (ANDA) for 11 years. His father is actor/director Emilio Fernández.

Alan Freese Wilt (May 14, 1937 – May 7, 2005) was professor emeritus of history at Iowa State University.

Knox Wagner "Bulldog" Ramsey (February 13, 1926 – March 19, 2005) was an American football offensive lineman in the National Football League (NFL) for the Chicago Cardinals, the Philadelphia Eagles, and the Washington Redskins. Ramsey also played in the All-America Football Conference (AAFC) for the Los Angeles Dons. When the All-America Football Conference dissolved in 1950, the NFL an AAFC dispersal draft to assign players from the Buffalo Bills, Chicago Hornets and Los Angeles Dons. Ramsey was drafted (1st Round) by the San Francisco 49ers as the 10th overall pick and traded to the Chicago Cardinals.
Knox Ramsey played college football at the College of William & Mary where he was selected for three consecutive years to Virginia's all-state teams and the Southern Conference teams. He also was named to the all-time state of Virginia team and the all-time William & Mary football team. Ramsey received second-team All-American honors in 1947 when he was selected by the Associated Press. He played in the 1948 College All-Star Game against the NFL Champions Chicago Cardinals where he faced his brother Buster Ramsey. Ramsey was drafted in the fifth round of the 1948 NFL Draft (32nd pick overall) by the Chicago Bears and in the ninth round (37th pick overall) of the 1948 AAFC Draft by the Los Angeles Dons. Following his professional football career Ramsey was inducted into the William & Mary Hall of Fame and the Blount County (TN) Sports Hall of Fame.

Ruth Miriam Siems (; February 20, 1931 – November 13, 2005) was an American home economist who created Stove Top Stuffing.A native of Evansville, Indiana, Siems graduated from Bosse High School in Evansville and earned a degree in home economics from Purdue University in 1953. She was employed for almost four years in product research and development at the old Igleheart Brothers plant of General Foods in Evansville, working on quality control for angel food cake mixes and researching the Swans Down brand of cake mixes and flours. She developed the stuffing, one of General Foods Corp.'s (now Kraft Foods Inc.) top convenience products, in 1971 while working at the corporation's Tarrytown, New York facility.Her name was the first on a patent application for the product. Her patent was based on a certain size of bread crumb that makes the rehydration, or addition of water, work. In an interview with The Evansville Courier in 1991, Siems said the idea for the instant stuffing came from the marketing department, but it was up to the research and development staff to create the product. The test kitchens, the chefs and all the workers in research and development were given a shot at developing the stuffing, but Siems' idea was the one the company chose. The brand was later acquired by Kraft Foods, which, as of 2005, sells about 60 million boxes of it at Thanksgiving. Some sources say that Siems first sold the recipe to the Mrs Cubbison's corporation, and that later she further developed it for wholesale purposes in the General Foods Kitchen."Everyone always had me pegged as a creative person," she said in a newspaper interview. "I've always liked to put things together."Siems retired from General Foods in 1985 after a 33½-year career. She died from a heart attack at her home in Newburgh, Indiana, on November 13, 2005, at the age of 74. In 2023 Holiday World announced that a new ride set to open in 2024, Good Gravy, pays homage to Siems.

David Thornburg Robbins (August 14, 1923 – September 23, 2005) was an American-Canadian trombonist, composer, arranger, and teacher.

Robert William Kearns (March 10, 1927 – February 9, 2005) was an American mechanical engineer, educator and inventor who invented the most common intermittent windshield wiper systems used on most automobiles from 1969 to the present. His first patent for the invention was filed on December 1, 1964, after a few previous designs by other inventors had failed to gain any traction in manufacturing.
Kearns won one of the best known patent infringement cases against Ford Motor Company (1978–1990) and a case against Chrysler Corporation (1982–1992). Having invented and patented the intermittent windshield wiper mechanism, which was useful in light rain or mist, he tried to interest the "Big Three" auto makers (General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler) in licensing the technology. Each rejected his proposal, yet began to install electronic intermittent wipers based on Kearns's design in their cars, beginning in 1969, when Ford rolled out the feature to its Mercury line.
Kearns's legal battle against Ford to protect his invention and patent was the subject of a 1993 article in The New Yorker magazine, which became the basis for a full-length biographical feature film titled Flash of Genius in 2008. Kearns was played by actor Greg Kinnear. Kearns had six children with his wife Phyllis, although they separated, supposedly as a result of the stress from the legal battle. He died of brain cancer at the age of 77.

William R. Frink (31 July 1926 – 1 July 2005) was an American former news presenter. He served as the sportscaster for Chicago's WLS-TV (an ABC-affiliate).

Anthony "Tony" George Kiritsis (August 13, 1932 – January 28, 2005) was an American kidnapper.
Kiritsis was a resident of Indianapolis, Indiana, and had fallen behind on mortgage payments for a piece of real estate. In early February 1977, when his mortgage broker Richard O. Hall refused to give him additional time to pay, Kiritsis became convinced that Hall and Hall's father wanted the property. The property's value had increased and could be sold at a high profit. Hall claimed that he had proof of this in writing.

Gerald "Jerry" Neal Williamson (April 17, 1932 – December 8, 2005) was an American horror writer and editor known under the name J. N. Williamson. Born in Indianapolis, Indiana he graduated from Shortridge High School. He studied journalism at Butler University. He published his first novel in 1979 and went on to publish more than 40 novels and 150 short stories. In 2003 he received a lifetime achievement award from the Horror Writers of America. He edited the critically acclaimed How to Write Tales of Horror, Fantasy & Science Fiction (1987) which covered the themes of such writing and cited the works of such writers as Robert Bloch, Lee Prosser, Richard Matheson, Ray Bradbury, H. P. Lovecraft, August Derleth, William F. Nolan, and Stephen King. Many important writers in the genre contributed to the book. Williamson edited the popular anthology series, Masques. Some of his novels include The Ritual (1979), Playmates (1982), Noonspell (1991), The Haunt (1999), among others.
In 1946, Williamson founded The Illustrious Clients of Indianapolis, a Sherlock Holmes scion society of the Baker Street Irregulars.
Williamson recalled in a 2003 interview that his first work of fiction was a Sherlock Holmes pastiche called "The Terrible Death of Crosby, The Banker".