The Andrews Sisters Tonight" cameras. An earthquake shook the area that very morning and the ceremony was nearly cancelled, which caused Patty to joke, "Some people said that earthquake this morning was LaVerne because she couldn't be here, but really it was just Maxene and me on the telephone." Besides this, and a few brief private encounters, they remained somewhat estranged for the last few years. Shortly after her Off-Broadway debut in New York City in a show called "Swingtime Canteen", Maxene suffered another heart attack and died at Cape Cod Hospital on October 21, 1995, making Patty the last surviving Andrews Sister.
The Dinning Sisters sisters were born in Caldwell, Kansas, United States, and raised in Oklahoma. From a family of nine children, all of whom sang harmony in church, the three sisters won amateur singing contests. In 1939, the Dinnings had a program on WENR in Chicago, Illinois. They first gained national exposure on the NBC Radio show "Barn Dance". In 1943, the group was signed by Capitol Records to be that label's answer to The Andrews Sisters, who recorded exclusively for Decca Records. Lucille (Lou) Dinning once said, "Let's face it, the Andrews Sisters were way ahead of us. We tried our darndest