HOUDINI, Beatrice (1876 - 1943). The Last Portrait of Bess Houdini. [Los Angeles], 1943. Mrs. Houdini sits in a wheelchair on the platform at Union Station in Los Angeles, California. She is attended by a nurse wearing an ambulance attendant's jacket. 10 x 8". Rubber date stamp to verso (Feb. 11 1943), along with photographer's credit stamp ("Photo by Geo. R. Watson / Staff Photographer"). 

Beatrice Houdini took her last breath not long after this image was captured, in Needles, California. She was en route to New York, where soon thereafter she would be laid to rest in the family plot at the Gate of Heaven Cemetery, in Hawthorne, New York. Though it was Houdini's wish for her to be buried in the family plot in Queens, only a cenotaph commemorating her life is part of the Houdini gravesite. 

George Watson had a long and prosperous career as a photographer, working for newspapers, shooting celebrity pictures, and managing a news photo service that would become UPI. 

Inked caption to verso, soft crease to image, two small pinholes.