| Mickey Deans | |
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Mickey Deans with Judy Garland on their wedding day in 1969. |
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| Born | Michael DeVinko September 24, 1934 Garfield, New Jersey, U.S. |
| Died | July 11, 2003 (aged 68) Cleveland, Ohio, U.S. |
| Cause of death | Heart Failure |
| Spouse | Judy Garland (1969) (her death) |
Mickey Deans (September 24, 1934 - July 11, 2003) a musician and entrepreneur, was the fifth and last husband of Judy Garland.
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Born Michael DeVinko in Garfield, New Jersey, on September 24, 1934 he ended up working as a discothèque manager.
Mickey met dashing actress and singer Judy Garland at a pub in late December 1967 while Judy was married to Mark Herron. Judy was addicted to drugs at the time and had been having an affair with Deans. Mark found Judy and Mickey in their bedroom at their Chelsea house. Judy and Mark divorced in early January 1969. After two years of knowing each other, Deans decided to marry Garland and they were married on 15 March 1969 with Deans being apparently unaware about Judy's addictions to alcohol and drugs. Deans became the widower and last husband of Judy Garland when she took an overdose of barbituates during their marriage on 22 June 1969 and Mickey found her dead body.
Following Garland's death, Deans co-authored a biography of Garland with Ann Pinchot, Weep No More, My Lady. The book includes autobiographical elements of Deans' pre-Garland life and their time together. The book was published in 1972 by Hawthorn Books with paperback editions issued by Pyramid Books.
Mickey played jazz piano professionally, often traveling when not working at New York's Jilly's nightclub. After Garland's death, he worked as assistant to impresario/producer Roy Radin in putting together old-fashioned vaudeville-type revues associated with The Police Conference of New York, a police fund raising organization also associated with Roy Radin. (Radin was found murdered in 1983 in the infamous Cotton Club murder, so named for a film Radin was producing: The Cotton Club.) Later, Deans settled in Cleveland, where, at one point, he opened a "haunted mansion" to paying customers.
Mickey spent time at his summer home getaway in a quiet suburb outside Cleveland, Ohio. There he kept to himself, barely making an appearance in his few-acre hideaway with a swimming pool and three-acre pond.
Mickey Deans died of congestive heart failure in Cleveland, Ohio on July 11, 2003, aged 68. Rather than being interred with Garland at Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York, his body was cremated and his ashes were sent to an individual in Florida. Before much could be learned about Mickey Deans, his son also died just a few months later.