RIP: A train-robber, a WWII resistance hero, and 11 other amazing people we just lost

A selection of people who died last week:

1. Van Cliburn—Texan classical pianist, whose gold medal performance at the 1958 Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow gave the US a major Cold War propaganda victory and made him a national hero, 78.
2. Bruce Reynolds—Jazz-and-literature-loving mastermind of the 1963 British train raid immortalized in pop culture as the Great Train Robbery. “Asked how he was feeling earlier this month, he replied: ‘Well, the axeman cometh.'” He was 81.
3. Orhan Suyolcu—Turkish Airlines pilot who, during the Iran-Iraq war, took part in an operation to rescue 200 Japanese stranded in the Islamic Republic, 87.
4. Bert Flugelman—Controversial stainless steel sculptor whose landmark public work in Australian cities earned nicknames such as “Mall’s Balls” and “Silver Shish Kebab,” 90.
5. Stephane Hessel—French Resistance spy, who survived the Buchenwald death camp. The key to his survival was, on the night before he was supposed to be hanged, assuming the identity of a deceased fellow inmate. He later helped write the UN’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and his  2010 essay “Time for Outrage” became an inspiration for the Occupy Wall Street movement. He was 95.