Abdominal aortic aneurysm
Actress Lucille Ball died April 26, 1989 from an abdominal aortic aneurysm. At the time of her death, she was in Cedars-Sinai Medical Center recovering from emergency surgery performed just six days earlier because of a dissecting aortic aneurysm near her heart. Ball was at increased risk, as she had been a heavy smoker for decades.
The Ball (play)
"The Ball" portrays people of fashionable society preparing for a Courtly ball. The main plot centers on the widowed Lady Lucina, a "scornful lady" who enjoys mocking her unwanted suitors. Three of them, Lamont, Travers, and Bostock, she successfully dismisses; a fourth, Colonel Winfield, she openly ridicules. Winfield, however, has won the good graces of Lady Lucina's maid; with inside information, he manipulates both the other suitors and the Lady herself. Lucina agrees to marry him, if he swears that he has been virtuous. Winfield, a man of the world, refuses to take a false oath; in so doing, he paradoxically proves himself honest. He passes a further test as well, agreeing to meet Lady Lucina's six children from her first marriage — children who do not actually exist.