How Much Did Linda Lee Cadwell Inherit After Bruce Lee’s Passing?

Like so many stars, death catapulted Bruce Lee into the stratosphere of iconic stars.

The young Bruce Lee got into so many fights on the streets of Hong Kong, that his parents decided to send him to martial arts school! There he learned the basics. And his opera singer father, probably in an attempt to keep him off the streets, got him involved in the film industry. According to celebritynetworth.com by the time he was 18-years-old, he had appeared in some twenty films.

Alas, it didn’t work. And when as a teen, he got involved in the Hong Kong street gang scene, his father sent him to the States. There he attended Washington University and met and in 1964 married Linda Lee Emory. They eventually had two children Brandon and Shannon.

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By the time he got married his tendency to get into fights had morphed into his studying and teaching martial arts. Then came his iconic movie career that brought Eastern martial arts to an eager Western audience.

Sadly, Bruce died in July of 1973 at the age of 32. The cause of his death is still something of a mystery. But he died rich. Thankfully, his memory lives on, with a new ESPN documentary about his life and work recently out.

So, how much did his wife Lee inherit when tough-guy Bruce Lee died?

Let have a look and see.

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The Early Days

Even when he was studying at the University of Washington, Lee had begun teaching martial arts and setting up martial arts academies in California. It was at one of his academies that he met his wife Lee.

According to grunge.com, in the early days of pursuing his acting career, he made money and supported his family by giving private lessons to celebs like Steven McQueen and basketball ace Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

“He taught me the discipline and spirituality of martial arts,” said Abdul-Jabbar, “which was greatly responsible for me being able to play competitively in the NBA for 20 years with very few injuries.”

For Lee, it was his passion.

And his other passion acting? In 1966 when he was only 26-years-old, he snagged the role of Kato in TV’s Green Hornet. Disappointed in the roles he was offered after the show ended, in the 1970s he decided to combine his passions and do feature-length films that featured him as a martial artist. It was incredible. Nobody thought it would work. But it did big time. And Bruce Lee became a multi-millionaire.

It’s hard to believe, but he appeared in only five full-length martial arts films in the 1970s, namely, 1971’s The Big Boss, Fist of Fury (1972), Way of the Dragon (1972), Enter the Dragon (1973), and, finally, The Game of Death in 1978.

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His first two films were produced by Hong Kong studio Golden Harvest. To everyone’s shock and surprise, martial arts and Bruce Lee were big box office. No dummy, Lee used the films’ success to cut a better deal with the studio and went on to form his own production company Concord Production, Inc. By the time he shot his third film Way of the Dragon, he was in the drivers’ seat and in complete control. He brought American karate champion, Chuck Norris, as his nemesis in the film. The fight scenes were epic and choreographed by Lee.

His Death

When Enter the Dragon premiered in 1978, Lee was not there to see it. Why? Well, he died while filming it in July of 1973.

Suspiciously, he died at the apartment home of Ting Pei, an attractive actress, who later claimed to be Lee’s girlfriend.

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Seems Lee wasn’t feeling well and she gave him the pain killer Equagesic. He went to lie down and never got up again. According to biography.com, some ingredient in the painkiller caused his brain to swell, leading to his death.

Chaos ensued, with Tin Pei calling her own doctor before Bruce was helicoptered to a Hong Kong hospital. When the hospital told actor Bruce Lee was on the way in, they thought it was a joke. When his wife Lee was told, she had much the same reaction. It just could not be.

But it was. There he was being rolled by her on a gurney. The fact he was with his “girlfriend” was hushed up.

Like so many stars, death catapulted Bruce Lee into the stratosphere of iconic stars.

Some cast doubt on the initial verdict, with all kinds of wild theories involving cannabis and perhaps other drugs making the rounds. What actually happened is still the subject of speculation these days.

What isn’t in doubt is that when he died Bruce Lee (according to celebritynetworth) had a net worth of some $10 million. It is likely that most, if not all of that, went to his widow Lee. She has since written a book, Bruce Lee: The Man Only I Knew and in 1991 she took the plunge again marrying Bruce Cadwell.

In 2002, she helped to set up The Bruce Lee Foundation. According to its website, it exists to encourage  “people to strive for honest self-expression in alignment with their mind, body, and spirit and in harmony with one another.” Very zen.

Bruce Lee would have been proud.

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