“American Pickers” star Frank Fritz had a tough last two years of his life, according to his close friend.
Jerry Gendreau told The Sun in an interview published Wednesday that Fritz never recovered after he was hospitalized for a stroke in July 2022.
“He felt really, really bad,” Gendreau said about Fritz, who passed away on Sept. 30 at age 60.
Fritz’s rep previously told TMZ that the star died from the effects of the stroke.
“You would go to see him in the nursing home and one-half of his body was completely done,” Gendreau told The Sun. “He would lift his arm up and it would just drop. That’s got to be tough to be totally bedridden.”
Fritz had a number of health issues in recent years. In addition to suffering a stroke, he had Crohn’s disease and underwent back surgery in 2021, which left him with 185 stitches and two rods in his spine.
Gendreau explained that after the stroke, Fritz became “frustrated” because he “couldn’t come out and say what he wanted to say.”
“I’ve seen this when people get tired, they get tired. I think if you don’t have the will to live, you won’t,” said Gendreau. “I think Frank could’ve lived a lot longer if the will to live would’ve been there.”
Gendreau said that he will remember Fritz for always being true to himself.
“Frank was pretty much a what you see is what you get guy. His faults were his faults,” the late star’s friend shared. “You can’t fault anybody for being what they are. He was a right is right and wrong is wrong kind of person. He made a mark on history.”
Fritz died in a hospice facility in Iowa while surrounded by friends, including former co-star Mike Wolfe.
“I’ve [known] Frank for more then half my life and what you’ve seen on TV has always been what I have seen, a dreamer who was just as sensitive as he was funny,” Wolfe, 60, said in a statement after Fritz’s death.
“The same off camera as he was on, Frank had a way of reaching the hearts of so many by just being himself,” he added.
Fritz and Wolfe had a falling out after ten years of hosting the History Channel series together. They went back and forth on social media in 2021 after Fritz left the show because of his health.
“I haven’t talked to Mike in two years,” Fritz told The Sun in a 2021 interview. “He knew my back was messed up, but he didn’t call me up and ask how I was doing. That’s just how it is.
In July 2022, Wolfe announced that his former co-star had a stroke.
“There has been lots of opinions in regards to mine and Frank’s friendship and the show but now is not the time to set the record straight,” Wolfe said at the time. “Now is the time to pray for my friend.”
Wolfe added, “Frank I pray more than anything that you make it through this okay. I love you buddy.”
Despite a period of tension between them, the pair were reportedly on better terms before Fritz’s death.
