Edna Wallace Hopper

Edna Wallace Hopper
Edna Wallace Hopper in 1910
Born	Edna Wallace (1872-01-17)January 17, 1872 San Francisco, California
Died	December 14, 1959(1959-12-14) (aged 87) Manhattan, New York City
Cause of death	Complications of pneumonia
Occupation	Actress
Spouse(s)	DeWolf Hopper (1893-1898) Albert Oldfield Brown (1908)

Edna Wallace Hopper (January 17, 1872 - December 14, 1959) was an American actress on stage and in silent films. She was known as the "eternal flapper".

Hopper was reportedly born on January 17, 1872 as Edna Wallace in San Francisco, California to Josephine and Waller Wallace, but she refused to give her true age. Hopper claimed her birth records were destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Her father was the head night usher at the California Theater. She had one sibling.

Hopper trained for the stage in New York. While there, she had married DeWolf Hopper on June 28, 1893. They appeared in several comic operas together, including John Philip Sousa's El Capitan, before divorcing in 1898. The couple presented a striking physical contrast on stage. DeWolf, at 6 ft 5 in, was tall for that time, while Hopper stood under five feet tall and weighed less than 100 pounds. By the time of her mother's marriage to Alex, the actress was a star on Broadway.

Hopper starred in her most famous role, Lady Holyrood in the popular musical Florodora, which had premiered in London. Though not part of the renowned Florodora Sextette, she shared in some of the wild adulation of male admirers who mobbed the stage door after every performance.

Hopper remained active over the next decade, starring in George M. Cohan's Fifty Miles from Boston in 1907. She married Wall Street broker Albert Oldfield Brown in 1908. Her professional activity lessened in the 1910s but resumed in the 1920s. One of the earlier stage actors to have a facelift, Wallace Hopper had the operation filmed and then made personal appearance tours over the next eight years showing the film and revealing beauty tips. Her name became associated with a line of personal care products and cosmetics, Edna Wallace Hopper Cosmetics, sold by American Home Products.