Stan Laurel Is Dead

Feb. 23, 1965 - Stan Laurel (right in 1930), the skinny and bewildered half of the famed Laurel and Hardy comedy team, tied today of a heart attack. He was 74.

An invalid since he had a stroke in 1955, the lovable comic suffered a heart seizure last night and the fatal attack at 1:45 p.m. today.

His wife, Ida, and a nurse were at his side when he died in his small apartment at 849 Ocean Ave., Santa Monica, Calif.

Laurel’s physician, Dr. John Parrott, said the first attack was so severe that Laurel could not be moved to a hospital. However, the comedian was conscious when Dr. Parrott saw him this morning.

“It was the first time I’d seen him that he didn’t crack some kind of a joke,” the doctor said. “He’d has severe illnesses before, but they never stopped him from joking.

“I think he knew his time had come, but he didn’t say anything because he didn’t want to alarm his wife.”

During his final night, Laurel was cared for by Ralph Downs, the same male nurse who attended Oliver Hardy before the latter’s death in 1957.

Hardy, the fat and pompous know-it-all, and Laurel, the sad-eyed, squeaky-voiced simpleton, were the most successful comedy duo in movie history.

Laurel, living in semi-seclusion the last 10 years, never stopped getting fan mail from all over the world.

His long-lived popularity was due largely to showings of Laurel and Hardy films on television, but Laurel refused to watch such televised shows.

“I never watch myself on T.V. any more,” he said in a rare interview last year. “Everything is completely chopped. The important routines are ruined. But it doesn’t upset me. I don’t care. Why would I? There’s nothing I can do about it.”

Nor could Laurel do anything about the fact that he didn’t make a penny from the endless reruns of his films.

Laurel and Hardy made their movies for a flat salary and were left empty-handed when their work continued to reap millions.

In recent years, Laurel was confined to his modern, unpretentious, one-bedroom apartment overlooking the Pacific Ocean. He received a small pension from the Screen Actors Guild.

“It’s been a great life,” Laurel said in 1961, “and I’m happy that I have made people forget some of their sorrows — but it would have been nice to have made a little money along the way. I’m not complaining. I’ve got all I want in this little apartment.”

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