Last of the Famous Quintuplets Born During the Great Depression Dies at 91 of Complications from Alzheimer’s Disease

Annette Dionne — the last living member of the world-famous Dionne quintuplets — has died. She was 91.

Family spokesperson Carlo Tarini said Annette died in a Montreal hospital on Dec. 24 from complications of Alzheimer’s disease, according to The New York Times.

The Dionne Quints Home Museum in North Bay, Ontario — the relocated birthplace and early home of the quintuplets — also confirmed the death on social media.

“It is with deep regret that we announce the passing of Annette on Christmas Eve,” the museum wrote on Facebook. “Much beloved, Annette had championed children’s rights. She believed it was important to maintain the Dionne Quints Museum and the history it provides for the future of all children.”

Annette and her sisters — Marie, Yvonne, Cécile and Émilie — were born prematurely on a farm in Corbeil, Ontario, on May 28, 1934, and quickly became an international sensation as the first known set of quintuplets to survive infancy, according to Life Magazine.

Together, the five weighed a combined 14 pounds at birth. Annette, the family museum noted, stood out early on: she was the first to crawl, the first to cut a tooth and the first to recognize her name.

Their sudden fame came at a steep cost. In 1935, the girls were taken from their parents and turned into a public attraction — including being exhibited at the World’s Fair in Chicago.

“We dwelt at the center of a circus. A carnival set in the middle of nowhere,” the sisters later wrote in their 1964 autobiography, We Were Five. “Money was the monster. So many around us were unable to resist the temptation.”

Although their parents eventually regained custody when the girls were nine, the sisters left home at 18 and largely severed ties with their family, according to Life Magazine.

In the mid-1990s, Annette, Cécile and Yvonne alleged in their book, The Dionne Quintuplets: Family Secrets, that they were sexually abused by their father during individual car rides.

After spending two decades living away from home in Montreal, Annette returned in 2018 to the log cabin where she and her sisters were born to attend a ceremony recognizing their birth as a National Historic Event, according to CBC News.

“There was a lot of suffering for the sisters as part of their childhood,” Tarini told the outlet at the time. “What we want to do is talk about the good that can come out of their existence and their survival. It is truly a story of survival and about ensuring the proper raising of children.”

Annette was the last surviving quintuplet. Her sister Cécile died in July after a long illness, according to the Canadian Press and CBC News. Émilie died in 1954, Marie died in 1970, and Yvonne died in 2001.