Arlene Francis

 Arlene Francis, born Arline Francis Kazanjian (October 20, 1907 – May 31, 2001)

She was an actress, radio and television talk show host, and game show panelist. She is known for her long-standing role as a panelist on the television game show What's My Line?, on which she regularly appeared for 25 years, from 1950 through the mid-1970s, on both the network and syndicated versions of the show. She also appeared on other game shows, including Match Game, Password, To Tell the Truth, and other programs produced by Mark Goodson and Bill Todman, including a short-lived hosting stint on Goodson-Todman show By Popular Demand replacing original host Robert Alda. Francis was a pioneer for women on television, one of the first to host a program that was not musical or dramatic in nature. From 1954-57, she was host and editor-in-chief of Home, NBC's hour-long daytime magazine program oriented toward women, which was conceived by network president Pat Weaver to complement the network's Today and Tonight programs. Newsweek put her on its cover as the "first lady of television". She hosted Talent Patrol in the mid-1950s. She acted in a few Hollywood films, debuting in the role of a streetwalker who falls prey to mad scientist Bela Lugosi in Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932). Francis was known for a heart-shaped diamond pendant, a gift from Gabel, which she wore on nearly all of her What's My Line appearances. A mugger robbed her of the pendant as she was exiting a New York City taxi in 1988. Francis died at the age of 93 on May 31, 2001, in San Francisco, California, from Alzheimer's disease and cancer. She is interred at tRoosevelt Memorial Park in Trevose, Pennsylvania.