Frances Farmer, former University of Washington student who rocketed to fame as a film actress, reached the end of a turbulent trail yesterday in a small, plainly furnished room at King County Hospital where the county sanity commission ordered her recommitted to Western State Hospital at Steilacoom.
Miss Farmer was ordered back to the state institution, where she was confined from March until July, 1944, at the conclusion of a hearing presided over by Superior Judge Hugh C. Todd.
Took It Quietly
The blonde former film actress took the news of her recommitment quietly, Dr. A. J. Hockett, superintendent of King County Hospital where the county commission hearing was held, said. She did not appear before the hearing but was examined during it by hospital psychiatrists, Dr. Hockett explained.
The psychiatrists found her resting in the King County Hospital room where she has been since last week when her mother, Mrs. Lillian V. Farmer, 2636 47th Ave. S.W., filed a sanity complaint against her. She was reading and made no objection to the examination, Dr. Hockett said.
The complaint filed by Mrs. Farmer charged the young actress, identified by her married name as Mrs. F. E. Anderson, was not safe to be at large.
Twice Disappeared
After her release from Western State Hospital last summer, Miss Farmer spent some time recuperating on the ranch of an aunt near Reno, Nev. However, after she twice disappeared from the ranch and was found only after extensive search, she returned to her mother’s home in Seattle.
The filing of the insanity complaint followed another disappearance of a few hours May 6 when her mother sought police aid in finding her daughter. The young woman’s father is E. M. Farmer, veteran Seattle attorney.
Article appeared in The Post-Intelligencer - May 22, 1945
Provided by Ulrich
Fritzsche M.D.