Georgia Holt, Cher’s mother, has died. Cher confirmed the sad news on Twitter late Saturday night. Holt, a singer, model, and actress, was 96. A cause of death has not been announced.
“Mom is gone,” Cher simply wrote on Twitter, adding a sad emoji. The news came months after Cher said her mother was hospitalized for pneumonia. “Sorry I’ve Been MIA. Mom’s Been Sick Off & On. She Just Got Out Of Hosp. She HadPneumonia. She’s Getting Better,” Cher tweeted on Sept. 9.
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Holt was born Jackie Jean Crouch in Kensett, Arkansas on June 9, 1926. During the 1950s, Holt appeared in episodes of The Adventures of Ozzie & Harriet and I Love Lucy. She also had small roles in the movies A Life of Her Own, Watch the Birdie, Grounds for Marriage, and Artists and Models. She was a singer as well. During the 1980s, she recorded a country album, Honky Tonk Woman, which was not released until 2013. The album included a duet with Cher called “I’m Just Your Yesterday.”
In December 2020, Cher told PEOPLE she was being cautious about returning to performing during the COVID-19 pandemic because of her mother. “We have a little bubble that we’ve had all this time… We wear masks, and there’s not very many of us. It’s my sister, my brother-in-law, my mom, my assistant. And we stay far apart from each other,” Cher, 76, explained at the time. “I have to be careful too… because I have asthma, I’m 74, and I have different health problems.”
Throughout her life, Holt often appeared alongside her Oscar-winning daughter. She was interviewed for the VH1 Behind the Music episode on Cher and appeared in the series Becoming Chaz, which focused on her grandson Chaz Bono. In 2013, she also appeared in the documentary Dear Mom, Love Cher. The following year, she was a guest judge on RuPaul’s Drag Race.
Holt was married and divorced six times. Cher was her only child with Josh Sarkisian, whom she married in 1946. They divorced in 1947 but were briefly married again from 1965 to 1966. Holt is also survived by her daughter Georganne LaPiere, whom she shared with her second husband, John Southall; Cher’s children, Chaz Bono and Elijah Blue Allman; and her longtime partner, Craig Spencer.
“I had a little problem with her over Sonny [Bono], but that didn’t take her too long to get over,” Cher told PEOPLE in 2013 when asked what Holt said about her relationships. “She listened first before making a judgment, so I could always talk to her about my romances. She stressed the importance of being sure that the person you are with is the person you love.”
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