Ande Lamb

Born in New Orleans on September 12, 1901,^[4] Lamb was the son of Robert Anderson Bursley Sr. and Edna M. Lamb, a musically and theatrically inclined New Orleans native who had until recently taught at the Fifth Ward School No. 1 in Ama, Louisiana.^{[5][6][7][8][9]} Following her premature death in 1909,^[10] Bursley Sr. married Elizabeth "Bessie" Surcouf in 1911.^[11]

Bursley Jr.'s professional transition to "Ande Lamb" was first noted in 1937, regarding a collaboration with director Spencer Bennet on a projected—but, evidently, never realized—6-picture package of films based on racing driver Pete DePaolo's autobiography, Wall Smacker.^[1] In August 1939, the Belasco Theater in downtown Los Angeles played host to the premiere of Lamb's Thank Your Lucky Stars, touted as a satire of Hollywood, and reportedly slotted for a Broadway engagement that fall.^[12] Such predictions proved overly optimistic, as the production was dealt a resounding thumbs-down by critics and audiences alike.^[13][14][15]

Given a mixed but markedly warmer reception was Lamb's murder mystery Honeymoon Ghost, staged in 1944 at the Hampshire Playhouse in Los Angeles, and starring Maria Riva (then billed as Maria Manton)^[16] While deeming the plot "complicated and slightly far-fetched," LA Times reviewer Katherine Von Blon went on to praise Lamb's "clearly-limned characters," adding that "many of the situations were rife with suspense and certain comic implication."^[17]

The first of Lamb's marriages, both of which ended in divorce, came in February 1926, preceding by more than a decade the transition from Bursley to his better-known pen name. The bride was Susan Gillett Lewis, and their union produced one child, a daughter, Diane Lewis Bursley.^{[18][5][19][20]} In October 1943, Lamb married actress Ruth C. Anderson.^[21][22][23] On December 16, 1952, the Los Angeles Mirror reported that Superior Court Judge William McKay had, that day, granted Ruth Lamb an interlocutory divorce decree, based on testimony that Mr. Lamb was, as the Mirror phrased it, "a lion as a husband," impacting both privacy and safety via alternating bouts of eavesdropping and beatings.^[24]

On March 16, 1961, Lamb, aged 60, suffered a fatal heart attack in Hollywood.^[3] His remains are interred at Holy Cross Cemetery in Culver City.^[25]

Not quite six and a half years later, Lamb's only child, the former Diane Bursley—having since become, respectively, Mrs. Robert Armstrong and Mrs. David Miller^[26][27]—died even more prematurely, at age 39 of undisclosed causes, survived by her husband and son.^[28]