Since when did the Conversation tree become a place for death announcement?

Legendary Broadway star and singer Barbara Cook died Tuesday morning at the age of 89, her family confirmed. Cook starred in musicals like The Music Man (for which she won a Tony Award), She Loves Me, and Candide, before her Broadway career ended in the early ’70s due to depression and alcoholism. A decade later, she re-emerged as a successful concert performer and interpreter of classic American Songbook tunes. She died of respiratory failure, her son told multiple outlets.

Ken Kaiser, a no-nonsense umpire who was unafraid over his colorful 23-year major league career to confront players and managers, but who lost his job during a misguided labor action by his union, died on Tuesday in Rochester. He was 72.
His son John said the cause was most likely congestive heart failure. Kaiser also had diabetes.
Kaiser called more than 2,800 regular season games in the American League and was part of the umpiring crews for the 1987 and 1997 World Series and the 1991 All-Star Game.
An old-school man in blue, he tried to control the game through force of personality and command of the rule book. He could be tough, funny, loud and belligerent. Ron Luciano, a fellow umpire, once likened Kaiser’s physique — 6-foot-2 and nearly 300 pounds — to a “barrel on which two arms had been stuck on backwards.”
David Fisher, who collaborated on Kaiser’s autobiography, “Planet of the Umps: A Baseball Life From Behind the Plate” (2003), said in a telephone interview: “Kenny was big, boisterous, tough and arrogant. He walked with a strut. And he took nothing from nobody — never.”
Continue reading the main story     In umpiring school, Kaiser said, he learned that players and managers were the enemy, although his son said that he developed friendships with players like George Brett, Nolan Ryan and Don Mattingly.
Another lesson: “Whatever call you make is the only right call,” he wrote in his memoir. “Never explain, never apologize.”
Like many umpires, Kaiser detested Earl Weaver , the diminutive, cantankerous manager of the Baltimore Orioles, who frequently battled umpires. He also loathed Eddie Murray, a power-hitting first baseman who played for the Orioles and other teams. Near the end of his career, Murray protested a strike-two call by Kaiser.
In his memoir, Kaiser recalled his response: “We ain’t talked in 15 years. Don’t start now.”
When Murray tossed his bat in the air after Kaiser had called him out on the third strike, Kaiser ejected him (one of 75 players or managers he tossed out in his career). Murray, a future Hall of Famer, challenged him to a fight. Kaiser agreed, telling him, “Eddie, you can even bring your bat with you because the way you’re swinging this year, you couldn’t hit me with it anyway.”

Bryan Murray, the longtime N.H.L. coach and executive who took the Florida Panthers and Mighty Ducks of Anaheim to surprising berths in the Stanley Cup finals as their general manager and coached the Ottawa Senators to the finals as well, died on Saturday. He was 74.
His death was confirmed by the Senators, who did not say where he died. He announced in 2014 that he had incurable colon cancer that had spread to his liver and a lung. He retired as the Senators’ general manager before the 2016-17 season and was named a senior adviser to the team.