Born May 12, 1907, in Hartford, CT; died June 29, 2003, in Old Saybrook, CT.Actress. Legendary actress Hepburn won four Academy Awards and received twelve Academy Award nominations during her sixty-year career. Known for her independence and strength, Hepburn acted on the stage on Broadway beginning in thelate 1920s before appearing in her first film, A Bill of Divorcement,in 1932. Immediately popular, Hepburn won her first Academy Award for her third film, Morning Glory (1933). She then starred in a number of films,including Little Women and Bringing Up Baby, before returningto the stage in The Philadelphia Story. Hepburn appeared in the film version in 1940 and then won a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. In 1942 Hepburn was featured in her first film with Spencer Tracy. The pair appeared in nine films together and had a lasting relationship off screen as well. Hepburnleft Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1951 and worked on stage and in films. Notable among her films were The African Queen, Long Day's Journey into Night, Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967), A Lion in Winter (1968), and On Golden Pond (1981), the latter three garnering Hepburn Academy Awards. Hepburn became a writer later in her life, publishing in 1987 the best-selling The Making of 'The African Queen': Or, How I Went to Africa with Bogart, Bacall and Huston and Almost Lost My Mind. She also wrotean autobiography, Me: Stories of My Life, in 1991. Hepburn received countless awards and honors during her career, and a survey conducted by the American Film Institute in 1999 ranked Hepburn the top screen legend among actresses.
June 29, 2003: Hepburn dies on June 29, 2003, at her home in Old Saybrook, Connecticut. She was 96. Source: CNN.com, www.cnn.com, June 30, 2003; New York Times, June 30, 2003, p. A1(L).July 2003: G. P. Putnam publishes Kate Remembered by Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer A. Scott Berg just two weeks after the actress's death. The book has been completed for years, but Hepburn requested it not be released until after her death. Source: New York Times, www.nytimes.com, July 10, 2003.September 4, 2003: Hepburn's long-time family homestead, Old Saybrook,near Hartford, Connecticut, is put on the market with an asking price of $12million. Source: Associated Press, http://customwire.ap.org, September 4, 2003.September 9, 2004: Hepburn's estate donated a collection of memorabilia containing thousands of photographs and letters to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Source: New York Times, www.nytimes.com, September 9, 2004.
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