'Changed for Good': Cd'A and the world mourn the death of Anna Pearce 'Patty Duke'
<p>In this Aug. 17, 2004 file photo, Academy Award winner, and television actress Patty Duke poses with her sons, actors Mackenzie Astin, left, and Sean Astin after being honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles. Duke, who won an Oscar as a child at the start of an acting career that continued through her adulthood, died Tuesday, March 29, 2016, of sepsis from a ruptured intestine. She was 69.</p>
<p>Patty Duke, foreground, reaches for freshly turned earth at the site of Coeur d'Alene Homes' addition in 2005 in Coeur d'Alene while her husband, Mike Pearce, left, and Mike Grabenstein, administrator of Coeur d'Alene Homes watch. Also photographed, from right, Dan Edwards, architect, Wally Goodson, Coeur d'Alene Homes board president, Kirk Weaver and then-Mayor Sandi Bloem.</p>
<p>"He saved my dog's life," Anna Pearce said before showing her appreciation to Hughey, a 4-year-old Greyhound whose blood was given to Pearce's dog more than a year ago. Hughey's blood has been used in 13 emergency situations at Prairie Animal Hospital in Hayden since February 2006.</p>
<p>Patty Duke receives a pin from Pamela Beyer, a district governor for Lions Clubs International, during a ceremony Monday in Coeur d'Alene honoring the actress for her service and contributions to the volunteer service organization.</p>
COEUR d'ALENE — One of Coeur d'Alene's brightest stars may have gone out, but not without leaving behind an incredible legacy.
The award-winning actress Anna Pearce, fondly known in the community and around the world by her stage name, Patty Duke, died about 1:30 Tuesday morning from sepsis caused by a ruptured intestine. She was 69.
“The world is shocked and saddened,” said Pearce’s son, Sean Astin, in a phone interview with The Press. “They’re also about the business of remembering how extraordinary she is.”
He described his mom as a world-class performer and a national treasure.
"I'm in a really good space because I feel like my job just came alive," Astin said, explaining that as an actor who she created, he will carry on his mother's love of the craft and continue to share it with others.
"Whether it was on the silver screen or the broad reach of a TV audience, there was nothing more important to her than working in community theater," Astin said.
Regarding her community, Astin said Pearce could not have been happier to live in North Idaho where she felt at home and was embraced by her neighbors.
"I want to stand on the rooftops and say, 'Thank you for loving my mom so much and she loved you too,'" he said. "She loves this city, this town, from when she had her first farm in Carlin Bay to when she moved into the little house on Forest Drive where her mother passed.
"It's 25 years that she's lived up here, suffering the winters," he continued. "She was only 4-foot-10 with thin white skin. She would tough it out to prove to her fellow Idahoans that it wasn't a joke. She wasn't living up here as a fair-weather person.
"She left Hollywood behind. While she reveres her colleagues and honors the work she did in her life, this is where she wanted to be. This is home."
Pearce was barely a teenager when she starred as the blind and deaf Helen Keller in the Broadway version of "The Miracle Worker." At 16, Pearce earned an Academy Award for her role in the film version, making her the youngest person to win an Oscar.
Another celebrity who calls Coeur d’Alene home, Pearce’s friend and colleague, Ellen Travolta, remembers seeing her in the Broadway performance.
"She was incredibly talented," Travolta said. "My memory of her is when I was in college and I was in New York and I saw 'The Miracle Worker.' I thought it was the most extraordinary performance that I had ever seen."
Travolta worked with Pearce in local theater, including the one-night Coeur d'Alene Summer Theatre production of "Over the River and Through the Woods" in 2012.
"We had one of the great nights of theater doing 'Over the River," Travolta said. "We did it as a fundraiser. It was a huge success and it was a great night for everyone involved."
She said Pearce was a great asset to the community.
"I’m sad," Travolta said. "I feel sorry for her family, for her wonderful boys and her husband."
Local theater director and producer Laura Little was Pearce’s neighbor and friend.
Little tearfully expressed her sadness of not being able to work with Pearce again. She said Pearce "was like a mother."
"It's a loss to our community because Anna was so giving with her craft," she said. "She was a good friend too. She was with me through my divorce, talked me down a couple times. It was special.
"The things I'm going to remember most are when she and I worked on a project," Little said. "She would always say how important it was to her to be a guiding light to younger actors, to teach them about the craft ... She had this information of the arts and she really did touch everybody in any production I worked on with her, whether they wanted it or not. She'd say, 'Let me teach you something, let me tell you how I did it.'
"She took advantage of these teaching opportunities. Not many people are as generous with that. People don't like to share sometimes what made them successful, and she was not at all like that. She was beautiful."
Pearce was well-known for her acting, including her 1960s sitcom, "The Patty Duke Show." She starred in several other roles in films such as "Valley of the Dolls" and was nominated for and won several Emmy Awards. She even brought television to Coeur d'Alene in 1995 when she starred in NBC's "Amazing Grace," where she played a single mom who decided to become a minister.
Pearce was also known for her kind heart and mental health advocacy. She was open about her own struggles with mental health and authored books about living with bipolar disorder.
When the Kootenai County Mental Health Court celebrated its 10-year milestone in 2014, Pearce participated in the celebration and shared personal stories.
"I didn’t expect to be so moved by your fight, your willingness to get healthy,” Pearce told the celebrants, according to a Press article covering the event. "God bless you all and thank you. I am so proud to live in a county where this kind of insight and foresight is happening.”
"She lived her life in the public eye," Pearce's nephew and former Coeur d'Alene City Councilman Mike Kennedy said in a phone interview. "She was an open book. She would talk to anyone about anything at any time. Even with shocking candor sometimes. She was no shrinking violet."
Kennedy's mom was Pearce's big sister. He said when her autobiography, "Call Me Anna," was published, people he didn't even know would approach him to discuss the book.
"It's not an exaggeration to say her story touched millions of people," he said.
Kennedy said his aunt performed in a traveling production of "Wicked" in San Francisco in 2009, and a song from the show really struck him as he was thinking about her Tuesday morning. It's titled, "For Good."
"Who can say if I've been changed for the better? But because I knew you, I have been changed for good," Kennedy said with emotion. "There's a lot of people around the world and in North Idaho who have been changed for the good (because of Pearce). She loved the community and they loved her.
"I think we've all been changed for the good," he said.