Former Mouseketeer Bonita Lynn Fields Elder, in a 2006 photo. Elder was an agile dancer who showcased those skills on the 1950s children's show "The Mickey Mouse Club" and later performed on Broadway.

Former Mousketeer 'Bonnie' dies of cancer

The Associated Press

INDIANAPOLIS – Former Mouseketeer Bonita Lynn Fields Elder, an agile dancer who showcased those skills on the 1950s children's show "The Mickey Mouse Club" and later performed on Broadway, has died in Indiana at age 68.

Her cousin Robbin Myers said Tuesday that Fields died Saturday at a Richmond hospital following a two-year battle with throat cancer. Fields had smoked for decades but quit after her diagnosis, Myers said.

Fields had been living in Winchester after moving back to eastern Indiana a few years ago to care for her ailing, now-deceased mother.

She was 12 in 1957, when her dancing abilities helped her win a slot on the third season of "The Mickey Mouse Club." She auditioned in California, where her family had moved from Indiana when she was 9.

Fields always went by the name Lynn, but she adopted the stage name "Bonnie" – a shortened version of her real first name – at the suggestion of the show's producers because there was already a cast member, a boy, with the first name Lynn, her cousin said.

Myers, of Florida, said she and Fields were a year apart and grew up together in Richmond until Fields' family moved to Granada, Calif.

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