Charles Kuralt cause of death systemic lupus erythematosus
Personal life
Kuralt married Jean Sory Guthery in August 25, 1954. She was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Val John Guthery of Charlotte, North Carolina. Both Kuralt and Sory were seniors at UNC. They had two daughters, Susan Bowers and Lisa Bowers White. The marriage ended in a divorce in 1960. 
He married Suzanne "Petie" Baird in 1962. They lived in New York City.Late in his life, Kuralt became ill with systemic lupus erythematosus. In 1997, Kuralt was hospitalized and died from heart failure at the age of 62 at New York–Presbyterian Hospital. By request in his will, Kuralt was buried on the UNC grounds in Old Chapel Hill Cemetery.After Kuralt's death, questions about his estate led to a decades-long companionship with a Montana woman named Patricia Shannon becoming public. Kuralt had a second, "shadow" family with Shannon of which his wife was unaware. Shannon asserted that the house in Montana had been willed to her, a position upheld by the Montana Supreme Court. According to court testimony, Kuralt met Shannon while doing a story on Pat Baker Park in Reno, Nevada, which Shannon had promoted and volunteered to build in 1968. The park was in a low-income area of Reno that had no parks until Shannon promoted her plan. Kuralt mentions Pat Shannon Baker and the building of the park—but not the nature of their relationship—in a book he published in 1990 chronicling his early life and journalistic career.
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