Loni Anderson, the Emmy-nominated actress best known for her role as receptionist Jennifer Marlowe on the 1970s sitcom “WKRP in Cincinnati,” had ties to Florida through her five-year marriage to Burt Reynolds, the Palm Beach County native who starred in “The Longest Yard” and the “Smokey and The Bandit” movies.
Anderson died Aug. 3 at a Los Angeles hospital following an acute prolonged illness, her representative confirmed to USA TODAY. Her survivors include two adult children, a daughter, Deidre, and Quinton, her son with Reynolds.
Anderson was 79 and would have turned 80 on Aug. 5, two days after her death.
More: Burt, Loni and Baby Quinton (stories from the Newspaper Archives – 1988)
Loni Anderson’s 1988 wedding near Jupiter, Florida
Anderson and Reynolds wed on April 30, 1988, at Reynolds’ 160-acre ranch west of Jupiter, Florida. A crowd of 65 guests, including celebrities Perry Como, Ann-Margret and Jim Nabors, attended the ceremony, which began at 1:53 p.m. in a cream-colored chapel built on the property for the occasion.
After the ceremony, the couple rode a motorized stagecoach to a reception in a flower-adorned airplane hangar, where guests dined on seafood and salmon, sipped Dom Perignon and enjoyed live 1940s music played by a five-piece orchestra.
More: Burt and Loni wed among the Stars (from the old newspaper archives – 1988)
Loni Anderson and Burt Reynolds at SunFest
In 1989, Loni Anderson and Burt Reynolds attended SunFest, the West Palm Beach waterfront festival where she bought a painting titled “Andy’s Pier” by artist Bill Johnson. The four-day event included a powerboat race, a juried art show, and a FoodFest competition.
Actress Loni Anderson and her bodyguards arrive before the gates opened at Sunfest in 1989.
Loni Anderson and Burt Reynolds divorce
More: Burt Reynolds files for divorce from Loni Anderson (from the archives – 1993)
The five-year marriage of Loni Anderson and Burt Reynolds ended in a highly publicized split marked by allegations of assault, infidelity and substance abuse. Their divorce played out in a courtroom in Martin County, Florida, where the couple had an estate in Hobe Sound, and attracted national media attention.
Reynolds was ordered to pay $11,000 a month in alimony and cover a $1.3 million mortgage on Anderson’s California home. The financial strain contributed to his 1996 bankruptcy filing, where he owed more than $10 million, some of it to Anderson.
The legal dispute dragged on for over two decades, ending in 2015 when Reynolds paid off the settlement after selling the Hobe Sound estate for $3.3 million.
Diamond Walker is a journalist at The Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach her at [email protected]. Help support our journalism. Subscribe today
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Loni Anderson dies at 79: Her life in Palm Beach County
