Who Is Barbara Sinatra? Frank Sinatra’s Wife Dies At 90

Barbara Sinatra, the wife of the late Frank Sinatra, has died at the age of 90 due to natural causes.

John Thoresen, director of the Barbara Sinatra Children’s Center, confirmed the news to BBC and said that the former model passed away in her home in Rancho Mirage, California. She was surrounded by family and friends at the time.

Read: “Home Alone” star John Heard dies at 71

In 1986, the former Las Vegas showgirl and her husband put up the center as a place where kids who have been physically, sexually and emotionally abused can receive care and therapy. “Barbara started raising funds for it in 1985 with Frank’s support. It opened in 1986, and since that time over 20,000 children have received beneficial therapy here. There are several child advocacy centers like it around the country, but this one is probably the most recognized,” Thoresen said.

Meanwhile, Mr. and Mrs. Sinatra tied the knot in 1976. Prior to their union, Barbara had already been married twice. Frank, on the other hand, had been married thrice. The couple stayed married for 22 years and had been separated only by the crooner’s demise on May 14, 1998 at the age of 82.

In her 2011 memoir, “Lady Blue Eyes: My Life With Frank,” Mrs. Sinatra revealed that she first met her husband when she played doubles with the latter’s then-wife, Ava Gardner. She and the swing artist were neighbors in Rancho Mirage, but were married and living with their respective partners. After divorcing Zeppo Marx in 1973, she married the “My Way” singer three years later.

“The year I married Frank Sinatra was a very good year. It was 1976, but it had taken us five years of flirting and courting to finally say ‘I do.’ It probably took another year before I grew accustomed to the idea that I now carried his iconic name. At first, I’d almost whisper when booking a restaurant reservation or beauty parlor appointment. Even to say ‘Mrs. Sinatra’ out loud felt like bragging,” she wrote in her memoir (via The Hollywood Reporter).

Mrs. Sinatra is survived by her son with Marx, Robert Oliver Marx, Robert’s wife Hillary and their daughter, Carina Blakeley Marx.