Dorothy Fay Ritter

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Actress-mother of the late actor John Ritter

Dorothy Fay Ritter, actress-mother of the late actor John Ritter and widow of singing cowboy Tex Ritter died Monday Nov. 5 in at the Motion Picture and Television Fund retirement home in Woodland Hills, Calif. She was 88.

Born Dorothy Fay Southworth in Prescott, Ariz., she attended USC and studied acting at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. She played opposite Buck Jones, William “Wild Bill” Elliott and other Western stars in several movies. Dorothy Ritter made four movies with Tex Ritter but gave up show business shortly after they married in 1941.

She did charity work for the United Cerebral Palsy Assn., the President’s Commission on Employment of People With Disabilities and other organizations.

The couple were living in Nashville when Tex Ritter died in 1974.

She later became an official greeter at the Grand Ole Opry.

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She had a stroke in 1987 and moved to a retirement home two years later. She moved back to California in 1981.

Her son John died in September after filming the first three episodes for the second season of his hit TV series “8 Simple Rules …”

She is survived by another son and four grandchildren.

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