LUCILLE DESIREE BALL: Birth Name :: Lucille Desiree Ball Birthdate :: August 6, 1911 Birthplace :: Jamestown, Chautauqua Co., New York Date of Death :: April 26, 1989 Place of Death :: Cedars Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California Occupations :: Actress, Musician, Comedian, Model, Producer Claim to Fame :: Starred in the CBS sitcom I Love Lucy (1951-57) Significant Other(s) :: Husband: Desi Arnaz (aka Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y Acha), actor, director, producer, bandleader; married November 30, 1940; filed for divorce 1944; reconciled; reaffirmed marriage vows June 19, 1949; divorced May 4, 1960; died December 2, 1986 Husband: Gary Morton (aka Morton Goldaper), comedian, producer; married November 19, 1961 until her death; Morton died March 30, 1999 at age 74 from Lung Cancer Family :: Father: Henry Durrell Ball, telephone lineman; born in New York, September 16, 1886; died of typhoid fever February 28, 1915 in Wyandotte, Michigan. Married Desiree Hunt in Jamestown, Chautauquo Co., NY, August 31, 1910. Mother: Desiree Evelyn (DeDe) Hunt, concert pianist; born in New York, September 1892; died July 20, 1977; parents were Frederick Charles Hunt and Flora Belle Orcutt; married second husband Edward Peterson ca 1918; divorced ca 1930 Daughter: Lucie Arnaz (aka Lucie Desiree Arnaz), actor; born July 17, 1951; married actor Laurence Luckinbill Son: Desi Arnaz Jr. (aka Desiderio Alberto Arnaz IV), actor, singer; born January 19, 1953 Factoids :: Learned comic use of props from Buster Keaton on MGM backlot (1942) Besides starring in the above movies, radio, broadway and TV shows she was also the Executive in Charge of Production (Producer) of The Lucille Ball Show (1962) as well as being the Director of a TV Movie, Bungle Abbey (1981), which was a comedy starring her friend Gale Gordon. Lucy wrote her autobiography, Love, Lucy with Betty Hannah Hoffman around 1966, but it was hidden away and forgotten about until 1996 when it was published. Education :: Chautauqua Musical Institute, Chautauqua, New York John Murray Anderson-Robert Milton Drama School, New York, New York; entered at age 15; classmates with 18-year-old Bette Davis
DESI ARNAZ: Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha III, the future husband of Lucille Ball and executive of Desilu Productions, was born in 1917 to a family of wealthy Cuban landowners. That changed when Batista took over in 1933, and Desi and his mother fled to Miami (his father joined them later). Desi started working with the Xavier Cugat band in 1937 and later put together his own rhumba band. In 1940, he appeared in both the stage and movie versions of "Too Many Girls." On the movie set, he and Lucille Ball hit it off, and they were married in November of 1940. The marriage was subject to the conflicting requirements of Desi's bandleader career which had him on the road most of the time and to Lucy's movie career. When the couple came up with the idea for a TV series, they fought to do it together to save their marriage. Network executives didn't think the pan-American shtick would work, so in the summer of 1950 Lucy and Desi went on tour, performing for live audiences to prove that Desi was believable as Lucy's husband. Early in 1951 the couple produced a film pilot with their total savings of $5,000. The rest, of course, is television history. Desi parlayed the five grand into millions in just four years. He convinced the show's sponser, Philip Morris, that Lucy having a baby on the air would be a publicity bonanza, and he was right. The filmed birth of Little Ricky in 1953 drew in 44 million viewers, and the story made headlines from coast to coast. While a successful executive at Desilu Productions, Desi also produced "December Bride," "Make Room for Daddy," "Our Miss Brooks," "The Untouchables," and other shows. Fashion-wise, Desi brought back smoking jackets, adult denims, and matching he-and-she pajamas. After Lucy and Desi divorced in 1960, Desi produced several shows, owned a successful breeding farm, wrote an autobiography, was a professor at San Diego State University, and was appointed Ambassador to Latin America under President Nixon. He died in 1986.
