PASSINGS

Nate DeFrancisco

Ex-college football player, coach

Nate DeFrancisco, 89, a UCLA football player from 1939 to 1941 who became a football coach and an administrator at Riverside City College, died in his sleep Tuesday in Fairview, Texas, said his wife, Jo.

A Los Angeles native, DeFrancisco grew up in Boyle Heights and was captain of the Roosevelt High School football team in 1937.

He moved on to UCLA, where he was a stalwart offensive and defensive lineman. Among his teammates were Jackie Robinson, Woody Strode and Kenny Washington.

During World War II, he played for an Army Air Forces football team while based at March Field in Riverside. He also served in the South Pacific.

After the war, DeFrancisco played for the old Hollywood Bears and Los Angeles Bulldogs of the Pacific Coast Pro Football League before returning to UCLA as an assistant football coach.

He was named head football coach at Riverside City College in 1950 and remained in that role for six years before becoming an administrator at the school.

DeFrancisco helped establish the Tiger Backers, a support group for the college’s athletic programs, and oversaw many construction projects, including the Evans Park Sports Complex and the college’s Norco and Moreno Valley campuses.

DeFrancisco retired in 1987 and was named to the Riverside Hall of Fame in 2006. He and his wife moved to Texas a few years ago.

Arax Kalajian

Divorcee won name-change suit

Arax Kalajian, 64, co-owner of a computer consulting company whose lawsuit in the mid-1970s established a divorced woman’s right to revert to her birth name, died of complications from multiple sclerosis April 20 at her home in Annandale, Va.

Kalajian was divorced from George F. Egner in 1971 while living in Ewing Township, N.J. She wanted to use her original name for professional reasons but found she had to sue for the right.

The judge in her case blocked the name change because he feared the confusion of names would be harmful to her children and said that she should continue to use it “whether she likes it or not,” according to an Associated Press article, although her former husband had not objected to the change.

A state appeals court panel determined in 1975 that the lower court judge erred and noted that a woman is permitted to use any name she wants as long as there is no criminal purpose in mind and the name is not obscene or offensive.

Kalajian moved to Washington, D.C., and began working for the Washington Board of Trade in the mid-1970s. While there, she began learning about computers and soon started her own consulting company, AKT Associates. She became a contractor for the State Department.

She took on a business partner and renamed the firm Coyne Kalajian. She sold it to Card Systems and retired in 1993.

Born in Teaneck, N.J., Arax Marion Kalajian graduated from what was then Trenton State College.

-- times staff and wire reports news.obits@latimes.com