Lane Sisters - Personal Lives

Personal Lives

Leota was married once, to Jerome Day. The couple had no children.

Lola was married five times, but bore no children. She was first married to actor Lew Ayres in September 1931. They subsequently divorced in January 1933. She then married director Alexander Hall in 1934. They divorced in December 1936. Her next marriage was to Henry Clay Dunham in January 1941. They divorced in October, 1945.

She then married Roland West in 1946. He was a producer, director and screenwriter, but was best known for being a suspect in the 1935 death of his girlfriend, actress Thelma Todd. Neighbors heard them quarreling the night before she was found in her garage, overcome by carbon monoxide poisoning. Though a suspect, he was never arrested. West and Lola remained married until his death on March 31, 1952 from heart disease. On his deathbed he allegedly confessed murdering Thelma Todd, to good friend and actor Chester Morris. Lola married Robert Hanlon three years later in 1955; they remained married until her death twenty-six years later. Hanlon died in 1988.

Rosemary married only once. On December 28, 1941, Lane married George H. "Bud" Westmore, wizard Hollywood makeup artist who previously had had a stormy three-month marriage to comic actress Martha Raye. The Lane-Westmore marriage lasted 13 years and produced a daughter, Bridget. But Lane sued Westmore for separate maintenance in November 1952, saying he walked out on her four months earlier, on July 11. Frank Westmore, in his book The Westmores of Hollywood (1976), said Lane and Westmore "had been very happy, or so everyone thought, including Rosemary". The couple went through a messy divorce in 1954.

Priscilla dated assistant director and screenwriter Oren Haglund. Impulsively she eloped with Haglund to Yuma, Arizona on January 14, 1939, but left him the following day. The marriage was soon annulled. In November 1941, Priscilla became engaged to publisher John Barry, whom she had first met in 1939. She wrote in the November issue of Photoplay about how she looked forward to their marriage. She also stated she would continue her career.

In early 1942, the engagement to Barry ended after she met Joseph Howard, a young Air Force lieutenant, at a dude ranch in the Mojave Desert. A native of Lawrence, Massachusetts, he had joined the Army Air Corps straight from college in 1939. He was scouting the area for likely sites for air bases and had taken a short vacation. The couple were married on May 22, 1942, in Las Vegas at the home of the executive officer of an Army Air Force gunnery school.

At the war's end in 1945, Priscilla and Howard were living in New Mexico and she was pregnant with their first child. Their son, Joseph Lawrence, was born on December 31, 1945. In 1946 after Joe's discharge from the service, the couple moved back to California, where they resided in Victorville. Howard, who had a degree in engineering, became a building contractor. The family moved to Van Nuys in December 1945. Afterwards Howard and Priscilla moved to Studio City. Priscilla became pregnant again in 1949. On April 17, 1950, her daughter Hannah was born. By June 1951 the boom in the construction industry in New England had Priscilla and her family moving back to Howard's native Massachusetts. Howard left the final decision to end her career to Priscilla, who later declared she never regretted her choice. She fell in love with New England, and the couple settled with their children in Andover, Massachusetts. Priscilla was busy with her family. She gave birth to a second daughter, Judith, on August 22, 1953. The Howards' fourth and youngest child, James, was born December 4, 1955.

Outside her family, Priscilla was a busy woman. She was devoutly religious, having converted to Roman Catholicism, as had her elder sister Lola. The family attended church regularly, and she was involved with Catholic charities. She enjoyed tending her garden, growing flowers and vegetables. She ran a girl scout troop and volunteered at local hospitals. She had, however, become less outgoing as far as public life was concerned. She refused offers of work, most interviews and did not answer fan mail.

In July 1972, Joe Howard retired from business, and he and Priscilla moved to their summer home at 7 Howards Grove in Derry, New Hampshire. Howard died suddenly on May 18, 1976, aged 60. He was still in the Air Force Reserve, which he had joined after his discharge from active duty in 1946. Heartbroken, Priscilla remained in Derry. She said, more than a year later in 1977, "I'm still trying to pull myself together after Joe's death." She busied herself with volunteer work and her garden.