[With my appologies to the author of the article]
= =
Author George Plimpton dead at 76
By Hillel Italie
The Associated Press - New York
George Plimpton, the gentleman editor, literary patron, and "participatory journalist" whose fumbling exploits included boxing, trapeze-flying and, most famously, quarter-backing for the Detroit Lions has died at 76.
Plimpton died Thursday night at his New York apartment, his longtime friend restaurateur Elaine Kaufman said Friday. She had no information on the cause.
Praised as a "central figure in American letters" when inducted in 2002 into the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Plimpton was beloved among writers for The Paris Review, the literarly quarterly he helped found in 1953 and ran with boyish enthusiasim for 50 years.
Plimpton enjoyed a lifetime of makgin literature out of nonliterary pursuits.
He boxed with Archie Moore, tended goal for the Boston Bruins, pitched to Willie Mays and performed as a trapeze artist for the Clyde Beatty Col Brothers Circus. In his book Paper Lion, he documented his punishing stint training with the NFL's Detroit Lions.