Betty Lynn on The Andy Griffith Show, Thelma Lou dies at 95


Betty Lynn, who plays Thelma Lou, the patient girlfriend of Mayberry’s neurotic deputy sheriff Barney Fife, in the 1960s sitcom “The Andy Griffith Show” He died Saturday in Mount Airy, NC. He was 95 years old.

His death was announced by the municipality. Andy Griffith Museum It’s in Mount Airy, the hometown of Mr Griffith and the inspiration for Mayberry.

Miss Lynn, late in the first season, in 1961, when Sheriff Andy Taylor (Mr Griffith) is matchmaker between Barney and Thelma Lou.

Thelma Lou’s occupation for 26 episodes remained a mystery, as did her last name. Although Barney is (Don Knotts) He occasionally flirted on the phone with Juanita, a never-before-seen restaurant waitress, clearly Thelma Lou was Barney’s devoted daughter. But in a 1966 episode, after Mr. Knotts leaves the series, Barney returns for a high school reunion to learn that Thelma Lou is getting married.

Thelma Lou was divorced when most of the cast reunited for the two-hour television movie “Return To Mayberry” in 1986. She and Barney got married in the movie.

In 2007, Ms. Lynn moved from West Hollywood to a retirement community in Mount Airy, where recreations of familiar Mayberry haunts such as Floyd’s barber shop are made in addition to the Griffith museum. Ms. Lynn has become a nostalgic attraction for tourists who line up once a month to get an autograph, kiss her or chat about the show.

“I think God has blessed me,” he told The Associated Press in 2015. “He brought me to a sweet town, wonderful people, and said, ‘Now, this is for you, Betty.

Elizabeth Ann Theresa Lynn was born on August 29, 1926, in Kansas City, Mo. Her mother, Elizabeth, was a singer, organist, and choirmaster who raised Betty with her family. By the age of 14, Betty was singing at local dinner clubs, and at 18 she began performing at USO shows. After the war, he had small roles in the Broadway musicals “Park Avenue” and “Oklahoma!”.

Acted in movies Like “Sitting Pretty” and “June Bride” in 1948 and “Cheaper By the Dozen” in 1950. He has appeared on television in anthology series, westerns and sitcoms such as “Family Affair” and “My Three Sons”. In 1986, she played Mr. Griffith’s secretary in four episodes of the dramatic series “Matlock,” in which Mr. Griffith plays a lawyer.

Miss Lynn never married, and there were no immediate survivors. And among the regulars on “The Andy Griffith Show,” only Ron Howard, who plays Sheriff Taylor’s son Opie, survives.

In the series that ended in 1968, he said he could have stayed if he had accepted the producers’ offer to make him the owner of a hair salon. But Mr. Knotts was gone, continuing his film career.

“I didn’t think Thelma Lou made much sense,” she told the AP in 2007, without Barney.



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