Dick York Cause Of Death

York died of complications from emphysema at Blodgett Hospital in East Grand Rapids, Michigan, on February 20, 1992, at age 63. He is buried in Plainfield Cemetery in Rockford, Michigan.

According to York, it was during filming on Cordura when he sustained a severe back injury. When the director yelled cut on a scene featuring Cooper and York propelling a handcar along railway tracks, one of the extras on the base of the car reached up and grabbed the rail York was pumping and pulling.

“Now, instead of lifting the expected weight, I was suddenly, jarringly, lifting his entire weight off the flatbed—180 pounds or so. The muscles along the right side of my back tore. They just snapped and let loose,” York said in an interview published in FilmFax magazine in 1992. “And that was the start of it all — the pain, the painkillers, the addiction, the lost career. I didn’t attend to the problem then. I continued to work through it.”

York continued taking doctor-prescribed medications, including codeine, muscle relaxants, and sleeping pills, though he stressed he avoided drugs while working. By 1968 he was addicted, and in 1969 he passed out while on the Bewitched set and had to be hospitalized.

While under care York knew his ability to continue working on the series was finished due to his worsening health and reliance on pain medication, prompting show producers to recast Sargent in the role for the sixth, seventh and eighth seasons, ahead of the series ended in 1972.