Housewife Turned Humorist Dies

SAN FRANCISCO: A housewife turned syndicated columnist whose self-deprecating humor will be fondly remembered, Erma Bombeck died today at 69 from complications following a kidney transplant at a hospital in San Francisco. Bombeck began writing her column in 1965 and three years later it was nationally syndicated, appearing twice a week in over 700 newspapers. She was a correspondent on ABC's "Good Morning America" for 11 years and starred in the brief sitcom "Maggie" which lasted for only eight episodes. Bombeck was also the author of several books including "The Grass Is Always Greener Over the Septic Tank," "I lost Everything in the Postnatal Depression," and "When You Look Like Your Passport Photo, It's Time to Go Home." Bombeck suffered kidney failure in 1992 shortly after undergoing a mastectomy. Just as she raised the spirits of housewives across the U.S., Erma Bombeck kept her own spirits up throughout her illness. "She's an extraordinary person," says Aaron Priest, her literary agent. "If you didn't know her well, you wouldn't know that there's anything necessarily wrong with her.