Gregory Peck's widow, Veronique, dies

LOS ANGELES, Aug. 19 (UPI) -- Veronique Peck, the widow of actor Gregory Peck, has died of heart failure at her Los Angeles home, her family said. She was 80.

The French-born, one-time journalist and philanthropist died Friday, the Los Angeles Times reported Sunday.

Veronique Peck and Gregory Peck met in 1953 when she interviewed him for a French newspaper, and the couple were married on New Year's eve in 1955, the Times reported.

She assisted Gregory Peck in raising $50 million for the American Cancer Society in the 1960s and raised $50,000 through a fashion show to benefit her favorite cause, the Inner City Repertory theater in Los Angeles. The center introduced teens to arts in the 1960s and 70s, the newspaper said.

"I just participate in everything Greg does. I like it that way. I am not a career woman," Veronique Peck told the Times in 1967, when the publication named her Woman of the Year.

"What you saw on screen with Greg was what you saw off-screen," said Monroe Friedman, a longtime family publicist. "The same could be said of her. They were together a half-century. You never saw two people more delighted with each other."

The couple had two children -- writer-producer Anthony Peck and documentary filmmaker Cecilia Peck Voll -- and three grandchildren, the Times said.