ore films before the tragic death of a dear friend of hers. In the spring of 1951, S. Sylvan Simon at the age of forty-one committed suicide for unknown reasons. Lucy told that it was he who inspired the crazy comedy that led to I Love Lucy. Lucy and Desi went on to start their own television series. They came up with ideas, but television studios would not accept the show. After taking out loans, Lucy and Desi founded Desilu Productions. I Love Lucy became the most popular television series of its decade running continuously from 1951 to 1957. In 1960, Lucy divorced Desi. Later she became head of two major television companies and did more Lucy series; The Lucy show (1962-69), Heres Lucy (1968-74), and last and the least successful 1986 series Life with Lucy. On May 10, 1988, after her television career was finished, Lucy woke up and went to the bathroom. Suddenly she felt a heavy object fall into her lap. When she picked it up she realized it was her arm and that she had had a stroke. Her then husband, Gary rushed her to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and she spent a few hours in intensive care. She was then released and a nurse, Trudi Arcudi moved in with her. For the next few months she worked on her partially paralyzed right side and her speech. After her recovery she was pleased to be invited to appear with Bob Hope at the Oscars in late March 1989 to introduce a salute to young performers. Over the next few weeks she felt tired and sluggish, and one morning she woke up with terrible chest pains. She was driven to the hospital by Gary. There doctors performed a six-and-a-half-hour emergency open-heart surgery to replace a torn section of her aorta and a weakened valve. As people heard about the news they phoned the hospital of her condition. She received flowers and cards by the ton. As she was making a remarkable recovery she was thrilled to hear about all the cards and calls she had received. On April 26, 1989, just before she was ...
