Later Years
Winchell announced his retirement on February 5, 1969, citing the tragedy of his son's suicide as a major reason, while also noting the delicate health of Magee. Exactly one year later, she died at a Phoenix hospital while undergoing treatment for a heart condition.
Winchell spent his final two years as a recluse at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, California. Larry King, who replaced Winchell at the Miami Herald, observed:
He was so sad. You know what Winchell was doing at the end? Typing out mimeographed sheets with his column, handing them out on the corner. That's how sad he got. When he died, only one person came to his funeral: his daughter.
(Several of Winchell's former co-workers expressed a willingness to go, but were turned back by his daughter Walda.)
Read more about this topic: Walter Winchell
Famous quotes containing the word years:
“Theoretically, we know that the world turns, but in fact we do not notice it, the earth on which we walk does not seem to move and we live on in peace. This is how it is concerning Time in our lives. And to render its passing perceptible, novelists must... have their readers cross ten, twenty, thirty years in two minutes.”
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)
“But to wish is first to think,
And to think is to be dumb,
And barren of a word to drop
That to a milder shore might come
And, years ahead, erect a crop.”
—Philip Larkin (1922–1986)