A Touching Goodbye: Lucille Ball and Vivian Vance In Laughter

The Day Lucille Ball Said Goodbye to Costar Vivian Vance: ‘There Was Laughter

The two women had created comedy magic in the legendary ’50s sitcom I Love Lucy — here, author Paige Peterson recalls their tight bond

On a summer day in August 1979, Lucille Ball came to Belvedere, California, to bid farewell to her friend and beloved costar Vivian Vance.

The two women had created comedy magic in the legendary ’50s sitcom I Love Lucy, with Ball as Lucy Ricardo and Vance playing her sidekick Ethel Mertz. But now, two decades later, Vance was dying of bone cancer, and Ball had come to say goodbye.

“You could hear them laughing, and towards the end there was a lot of sobbing,” says Paige Peterson, who’d grown close to Vance after the actress rented her mother’s home in Belvedere. “It was an amazing thing to witness. The love of these two women.”

Peterson shared the story of the stars’ final meeting with PEOPLE while discussing her new book, Growing Up Belvedere-Tiburon, which tells the history of the beautiful town located in Marin County, California.

On that day in 1979, Peterson remembers, “We had brought Viv down and she was lying on the couch in the living room. They ate lunch and they talked and talked. Viv knew she was dying.” (The breast cancer she had been diagnosed with in 1973 had metastasized into bone cancer.)

Peterson, who was in an adjacent room in case Vance needed her, remembers seeing Ball as she left. “The pain on her face shook me to my core. She was in tears. She couldn’t speak.”

“I think Viv gave up after that,” says Peterson.

Vance died a few days later, on Aug. 17, at 70 years old.