Actress Amanda Blake, who played Miss Kitty for nearly 20 years on Gunsmoke, died August 16, 1989. She was 60.

Blake was born February 20, 1929 in Buffalo, New York. She was trained in radio and theater.

Signed by MGM in 1949, her film career never took off. She was cast opposite James Arness in the 1950 movie Stars In My Crown. Her most famous role would come later with Arness.

As written and shot, Blake had a hefty role in the 1954 theatrical release A Star Is Born, but most of her scenes were cut from the final product.

She made appearances in several Bowery Boys movies in the interim, but she got a break in 1955 when she was cast as Kitty Russell, the tough saloon owner in the television series Gunsmoke.

Gunsmoke, starring James Arness, Blake, Milbourn Stone and Dennis Weaver became the longest running western in TV history, completing 20 years in 1975 when it ended.

Blake left the series the year before Gunsmoke ended its run. She contracted throat cancer and went into semi-retirement, but did resume her career in several TV movies, including a Gunsmoke reunion movie entitled Gunsmoke: Return To Dodge in 1987.

Blake died two years later of AIDS on August 16, 1989 in Sacramento, California. It was reported that Blake’s husband infected her with the AIDS virus.

Blake was cremated and her ashes were spread on the animal preserve that she left her estate to---Performing Animal Welfare Society.