A prominent San Francisco arts couple died this week in a parked SUV along a scorching stretch of Interstate 5 near Redding, California. Judith and Wylie Sheldon, ages 84 and 86, were found unresponsive Monday evening in their still-running Jeep Compass on the freeway shoulder north of Fawndale Road, the California Highway Patrol said. Officers and medical personnel tried to revive them but pronounced the pair dead at the scene, the Los Angeles Times reports. Authorities say the cause of death remains under investigation but appears to stem from medical issues.
The discovery came on a day when Redding hit 109 degrees, conditions the National Weather Service described as close to "near record-breaking heat." They were around 220 miles from San Francisco and more than 100 miles from Ashland, Oregon, where they had planned to meet two other couples on their annual road trip to the city's Shakespeare festival, the New York Times reports. Their longtime friend David Smith says one of the couple's two sons told him that there was no water or other liquids in the car, and the fan was on high but the air-con wasn't working.
Smith says the son told him there was no sign of mechanical failure or foul play. "They didn't crash. They stopped. They both just died there," Smith says. "The entire thing is so bizarre. We're still in a state of shock." The Sheldons, who lived in San Francisco's Pacific Heights, were fixtures in the city's arts scene and longtime supporters of the San Francisco Silent Film Festival. Judith, the festival's board chair and daughter of Roman Holiday director William Wyler, and Wylie, a prominent lawyer, were known for hosting artists and festival events at their home. "They were so dear and devoted to one another," the festival's artistic director, Anita Monga, told SFGate, calling them "integral parts of the community."
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