Actor lucille ball biography

(1911-1989)

Who Was Lucille Ball?

Lucille Ball got her start as a singer, model and film star before becoming one of America's top comedic actresses with the 1950s TV show I Love Lucy, co-starring on the show with her husband, Desi Arnaz.

The two divorced in 1960, and Ball went on to star in The Lucy Show and Here's Lucy while also becoming a top TV executive. She died in 1989.

Early Life

Ball was born on August 6, 1911, in Jamestown, New York, to Henry Durrell Ball and his wife Desiree.

The elder of the couple's two children (her brother, Fred, was born in 1915), Ball had a hardscrabble childhood shaped by tragedy and a lack of money.

Ball's father, Henry (or Had, as he was known to his family) was an electrician, and not long after his daughter's birth he relocated the family to Montana for work.

Then it was off to Michigan, where Had took a job as a telephone lineman with the Michigan Bell Company. Life came undone in February 1915 when Had was struck