Anita Bryant died at 84. What her ex-husband said about their Miami experience

Anita Bryant, a multi-Grammy nominated singer, beauty queen, and Florida Orange Juice pitchwoman who morphed into a polarizing figure after crusading against gay rights in the 1970s, has died. She was 84.

Bryant passed away at her home in Edmond, Oklahoma, on December 16, according to a family obituary published in The Oklahoman, a local newspaper. They did not indicate a cause.

“May Anita’s memory and her faith in eternal life through Christ comfort all who embraced her,” her family said.

Ms. Bryant maintained a fruitful career in show business before being mired in career-altering controversy. Couple with being a runner-up in the 1959 Miss America pageant, she was a singer beloved for her powerful renditions of patriotic ballads, namely “Till There Was You” from “The Music Man.”

Bryant was a three-time Grammy nominee, singing at the 1971 Super Bowl, and cohosting the televised Orange Bowl Parade for nine years.

In addition to her early career success, she served as a spokesperson for Florida orange juice and Coca-Cola, who eventually became well-known for being a devout evangelical Christian and her anti-LGBTQ stances, which was celebrated by religious conservatives and rebuked by LGBTQ rights advocates.

Here’s a 2007 profile examining Bryant’s legacy through the lens of her ex-husband, Bob Green, from the Miami Herald archives.

By Steve Rothaus, retired Miami Herald reporter and desk editor, published in 2007:

Since the 1977 gay-rights referendum, life has not been good for Bob Green. Anita Bryant divorced the one-time rock ‘n’ roll disc jockey three years later and she left South Florida for good.

Green lives alone in a Miami Beach home a few blocks from where the famous couple lived with their four children on North Bay Road.

“I jog past the house and I say I wish I was back there in the good old days,” said Green, 76. “I used to jog on North Bay Road and cry all the way. I don’t have any friends. I have my family and people in the neighborhood. I’m kind of like a hermit. I’m not antisocial. It’s just the way I’ve become.

When Green and Bryant married in 1960, they had a bright future. He was a popular South Florida radio and television personality; she was a former Miss Oklahoma and runner-up to 1959 Miss America, Mary Ann Mobley.

Bryant, with a powerful singing voice, already had a hit record, Till There Was You from Broadway’s The Music Man.

Green became Bryant’s manager and her career took off. She performed for the troops with Bob Hope. She regularly appeared on television and at conventions. The Green family represented Coca-Cola on radio and television.

In 1969, the Florida Citrus Commission hired Bryant as its spokeswoman. She and the orange juice industry became nationally famous as she sang on TV commercials about Florida’s “Sunshine Tree.”

Bryant was among the most popular stars in the country, earning millions of dollars a year, Green said.

Also guided by theatrical agent Richard Shack, Bryant made a career of performing live at conventions. She sang The Battle Hymn of the Republic at President Lyndon Johnson’s funeral in 1973 and performed it again at the Super Bowl halftime show in 1976.

But the next year, Bryant’s show-biz career derailed as she led a successful vote to repeal Miami-Dade’s gay-rights ordinance.

From the campaign forward, Bryant dodged death threats and protesters, Green said.

He recalls Bryant performing before 3,000 fans at the Jackie Gleason Theater in Miami Beach. Gay-rights activist Bob Kunst and a few of his friends protested outside and got as much publicity as Bryant, Green said.

Shortly after the election, Bryant took a televised pie in the face and lost a TV series to be sponsored by Singer Sewing Machine, Green said.

Convention work disappeared because of the angry gay activists who protested everywhere Bryant traveled.

The Greens launched Anita Bryant Ministries to counsel gay people and built a radio studio in Pembroke Pines for a planned Anita Bryant Christian show, he said.

In 1980, Green came home one day and Bryant was gone.

“The pressure was so great on her, I really believe that was the time she decided to get the divorce,” he said.

The breakup caused many conservatives to also abandon Bryant, accusing her of not being a good role model.

“There were those who said, ‘You’ve written all these books about family togetherness and we’re not supporting you anymore. We’re not into buying your books and records anymore,’ “ Green recalled.

The ministry failed and the radio show never happened, he said.

Green had trouble getting work, too.

After 1980, Green had a job doing documentaries for a U.N. relief agency. “I did that and I did some party planning. Convention planning,” Green said. “As far as any holdover or spillover from Anita, I was also labeled. There were times when we made a presentation to a client and they found out who I was, it was over.”

For a year after their divorce, Green tried to get Anita back. She wasn’t interested and later married Charlie Dry, a former astronaut test pilot. They live in Oklahoma and have had a series of bankruptcies and tax troubles. Bryant, 67, still performs occasional gospel concerts.

Green says that today, his “religious beliefs are stronger by 1,000 than they ever were on a personal level, not a political level.”

“My faith has increased and I think much of that was accomplished by the trauma I suffered and having to reach out to God. For a couple of years I was really devastated,” he said. “Blame gay people? I do. Their stated goal was to put [Bryant] out of business and destroy her career. And that’s what they did. It’s unfair.”

If Green had it to over again, he wouldn’t. “No. It just wasn’t worth it. It just wasn’t. The trauma, the battling we all got caught up in. I don’t want to ever go back to that.”

This story was originally published January 9, 2025 at 9:42 PM.