I had the honor and pleasure of working with Larry for several years while he was at Amazon. While the Post, AP, and NY Times do a great job of capturing what Larry did, the really missed out on who he was. He was one of the kindest, gentlest, and most pleasant people I've ever known and worked with. As a vice president, he had enormous demands on his time. But if you were talking with him, you would never know it. His attention was on you, the problem you were trying to solve, and how he could help you achieve your goal.
I have read a number of messages about Larry privately exchanged by my Amazon colleagues over the past few days, and they are all universal in echoing those thoughts and feeling. Many executives think they need to be bombastic and crude to be effective. In contrast, Larry showed that by talking softly, but with authority granted by great knowledge, he could make great things happen.