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Mr. Hefner the man and Playboy the brand were inseparable. Both advertised themselves as emblems of the sexual revolution, an escape from American priggishness and wider social intolerance.
Playboy Enterprises Inc; thumbnail, European Pressphoto Agency, 2005
Hugh Hefner
Died on September 27, 2017 at age 91
Mr. Hefner created Playboy magazine and spun it into a media and entertainment-industry giant, all the while, as its very public avatar, squiring attractive young women (and sometimes marrying them) well into his 80s.
Notable Deaths 2017
Remembering Mary Tyler Moore, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lewis, David Rockefeller, Trisha Brown, Glen Campbell, Dick Gregory, Edith Windsor, Sam Shepard, Tom Petty and many others who died this year.