Rbraunwa (real name Robert Braunwart) died on Oct. 14, 2007. See Deceased Wikipedians for further information. His user page is preserved here.
My name is Robert Braunwart. I was born in Richland, Wash. in 1948 and grew up in Moses Lake, Wash. I currently live in Oaxaca, México and Los Angeles, California. I read and write Spanish fairly well, but slowly. For nearly twenty years I have been compiling a database of world history dates — birth and death dates of famous people, dates of historical events, scientific and artistic events, popular culture events, etc. This unpublished database now contains over 500,000 entries.
On Wikipedia I am a supporter of inclusionism and eventualism.
I underwent cancer surgery in December 2006.
Robert Braunwart passed away on October 14, 2007, at the age of 59 in Los Angeles. He had been living in Oaxaca, Mexico, for 15 years prior to returning to the US for medical treatment in 2006. His death from a rare form of melanoma followed a long and unsuccessful battle with his HMO, whose doctors refused to authorize treatment by a melanoma specialist. A profit-driven HMO system and incompetent oncologists denied Robert a chance to fight his disease. Authorization denials and deliberate delaying tactics by the HMO group resulted in his dying without receiving the treatment recommended by two melanoma specialists in second opinions.
Robert grew up in Moses Lake, Washington, and attended Reed College as a National Merit Scholar before transferring to the University of Washington. During his life, Robert worked as an administrative assistant, editor, small business owner, and online math tutor, but his major interests and activities centered on political activities and a variety of personal projects, ranging from co-founding the Professional Football Researchers Association to contributing hundreds of articles to Wikipedia, primarily on the viceroys of New Spain. While living in Oaxaca, Robert took an active interest in helping children from needy families continue their education through friendship, encouragement, tutoring, and financial assistance.
Throughout his life, Robert had a major influence on the people close to him by encouraging intellectual development and political awareness. He urged people to become informed and involved and to keep up the fight for a better, more just world. Robert will be missed by those he left behind in many ways, but he will continue to live in their memories as an inspiration to fight complacency and make a difference.