Elizabeth Patterson

Biography

A dainty but nevertheless feisty character actress, southern-bred Elizabeth Patterson started her career over her strict parent's objections and became a member of Chicago's Ben Greet Players, performing Shakespeare at the turn of the century. This followed college at Martin College where she studied music, elocution and English, and post-graduate work at Columbia Institute in Columbia, Tennessee. She eventually traveled in stock tours and moved to Broadway where she was seen throughout the 20s. By the time she moved into films, she was 51 years of age. Known for her drab, careworn, dressed-down appearances, she played small-town relatives, avid gossips, steadfast country women, persnickety town folk and other prickly pear types with great frequency, while adding greatly to the atmosphere of such films as A Bill of Divorcement (1932), Doctor Bull (1933), So Red the Rose (1935), Remember the Night (1940), Tobacco Road (1941), Hail the Conquering Hero (1941), and Out of the Blue (1948). It was in the 50s, however, that she became a familiar household face as Lucille Ball's fragile, elderly neighbor and part-time babysitter, Mrs. Trumbull, on the "I Love Lucy" series. Elizabeth died in 1966 of pneumonia at age 90.