Veronica Lake

Constance Frances Marie Ockelman (November 14, 1922 – July 7, 1973), known professionally as Veronica Lake, was an American film, stage, and television actress. Lake was best known for her femme fatale roles in film noirs with Alan Ladd during the 1940s, her peek-a-boo hairstyle, and films such as Sullivan's Travels (1941) and I Married a Witch (1942). By the late 1940s, Lake's career began to decline, due in part to her alcoholism. She made only one film in the 1950s, but made several guest appearances on television. She returned to the big screen in the film Footsteps in the Snow (1966), but the role failed to revitalize her career. Lake's memoir, Veronica: The Autobiography of Veronica Lake, was published in 1970. Her final screen role was in a low-budget horror film, Flesh Feast (1970). After years of heavy drinking, Lake died at the age of 50 in July 1973, from hepatitis and acute kidney injury. Early life Lake was born Constance Frances Marie Ockelman in the New York City borough of Brooklyn. Her father, Harry Eugene Ockelman, was of German and Irish descent, and worked for an oil company aboard a ship. He died in an oil tanker explosion in Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania in 1932. Lake's mother, Constance Frances Charlotta (née Trimble; 1902–1992), of Irish descent, in 1933 married Anthony Keane, a newspaper staff artist also of Irish descent, and Lake began using his surname. The Keanes lived in Saranac Lake, New York, where young Lake attended St. Bernard's School. She was then sent to Villa Maria, an all-girls Catholic boarding school in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, from which she was expelled. Lake later claimed she attended McGill University and took a premed course for a year, intending to become a surgeon. This claim was included in several press biographies, although Lake later declared it was bogus. Lake subsequently apologized to the president of McGill, who was simply amused when she explained her habit of self-dramatizing. When her stepfather fell ill during her second year, the Keane family later moved to Miami, Florida. Lake attended Miami High School, where she was known for her beauty. She had a troubled childhood and was diagnosed with schizophrenia, according to her mother.