1868-1939
Born Josephine Ditt, and mostly credited as such, she also has credits as Josephine Ricketts (in some place Ditt is misspelled Dipp). She is listed in most sources from the time period simply as "Mrs. Tom Ricketts," a convention of those times that was old fashioned even at the turn of the 20th century. Josephine was an actress born on this day in Chicago. She was undoubtedly a stage performer before her entrance into films, but biographical material on her life is hard to come by (strange considering that her husband has a lot of biographical stubs). Her credits as "Josephine Ditt" in film started in 1910 in the AFM western short Romantic Redskins. The film was directed by British born director/actor Tom Ricketts, who was either then or was soon to become her husband (most likely they were already wed). Though she is credited as Josephine Ditt in the film itself, in later sourced credits, she is listed as "Mrs. Tom Ricketts." She would not show back up again in a film for some two years, when she once again appeared in one of her husband's films: The Unknown Model (March 1912), where she was credited as Josephine Ricketts. The first film in which she acted that was not directed by her husband was the Al Christie melodramatic comedy Lottery Ticket Number 13 in 1912. She also appeared films by Wallace Reid Harry A. Pollard (that's not "Snub") and B. Reeves Eason, though her husband and Henry Otto account for the largest number of directors of films in which she acted. Fittingly, the last film in which she appeared in 1915--The House of a Thousand Scandals --was directed by her husband. She seems to have retired after this point. Her husband continued to direct through 1919 and there after had a long acting career, working up until his death. His wife doesn't really show back up until news of his death in 1939 broke. Josephine had suffered a stroke in December of 1938 and was still hospitalized when Thomas, some 15 years her senior, died suddenly of pneumonia in January. She followed him on the 18th of October in Santa Monica, California, never having fully recovered. She was 71 years old. He was either buried in an unmarked grave or cremated and put in an unmarked niche at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery; her burial is listed as unknown--it is quite possible that she was placed with him there.
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