Lois Weber - Later Years and Death

Later Years and Death

Weber and Gantz divorced about 1935. Gantz relocated to India from 1935 to 1940 on a special assignment for the Maharaja of Baroda, Sayajirao Gaekwad III. By March 1940, Gantz married Katherime Goldthwaite (born April 1883; died September 14, 1949), and lived in Bombay, India. A close friend of General "Hap" Arnold, during World War II, Gantz was called to duty by Arnold and served on the United States Army Air Forces staff in Washington, D.C., where he was promoted to lieutenant colonel. In August 1948, Gantz sold his 20-room English Tudor mansion in the exclusive Caucasian only Hancock Park neighborhood of Los Angeles for $65,000 to Nat King Cole, leading to protests from his neighbors, and threats from the Ku Klux Klan. Gantz died of pneumonia on August 11, 1949 in Cairns, Queensland, Australia), and is interred at Arlington National Cemetery.

On May 2, 1939, Weber's first husband Phillips Smalley died. and is interred next to his second wife, Phyllis Lorraine Ephlin, in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Hollywood Hills.

In November 1939, Weber was admitted to Good Samaritan Hospital in critical condition, suffering from a stomach ailment that had afflicted her for years. Almost two weeks later, Weber died penniless on Monday, November 13, 1939, of a bleeding ulcer, with her younger sister Ethel Howland and friends Frances Marion and Veda Terry at her bedside. Her death was largely overlooked, with her Variety obituary only two brief paragraphs long, and a brief mention in the Los Angeles Examiner. Gossip columnist Hedda Hopper contributed a more substantial tribute in The Los Angeles Times.

On Friday, November 17, 1939, more than 300 attended Weber's funeral, which was paid for by Frances Marion. After the funeral, Weber was cremated at the Los Angeles Crematory and the location of her remains are unknown.

Weber wrote a memoir, The End of the Circle, which was to have been published shortly before her death, but ultimately was not, despite the efforts of her sister, Ethel Howland, and was later stolen in the 1970s.

For her contribution to the motion picture industry, on February 8, 1960, Weber was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6518 Hollywood Blvd.