Viola Dana
Dana in 1922
Born	Virginia Flugrath (1897-06-26)June 26, 1897 Brooklyn, New York City, New York, U.S.
Died	July 3, 1987(1987-07-03) (aged 90) Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Resting place	Hollywood Forever Cemetery
Nationality	American
Years active	1900–1933
Spouses	John H. Collins ​ ​ (m. 1915; died 1918)​ Maurice "Lefty" Flynn ​ ​ (m. 1925; div. 1929)​ Jimmy Thomson ​ ​ (m. 1930; div. 1945)​
Relatives	Edna Flugrath (sister) Shirley Mason (sister)

Viola Dana (bornVirginia Flugrath; June 26, 1897 – July 3, 1987) was an American film actress who was successful during the era ofsilent films. She appeared in over 100 films, but was unable to make the transition to sound films.

Born Virginia Flugrath on June 26, 1897, in Brooklyn, New York City, where she was raised, she was the middle sister of three siblings who all became actresses. Her sisters were known asEdna Flugrath andShirley Mason.^[1] Dana appeared (billed as Viola Dana) in the Broadway playThe Poor Little Rich Girl byEleanor Gates.^[2]

She began performing invaudeville withDustin Farnum inThe Little Rebel and played a bit part inThe Model byAugustus Thomas.^[1]

Metro Pictures advertisement for the filmmaking team of Viola Dana and John H. Collins (1916)

Robert D. Walker and Dana instill forAladdin's Other Lamp (1917)

With the stage name of Viola Dana, she entered films in 1910, includingA Christmas Carol (1910). Her first motion picture was made at a former Manhattan (New York) riding academy on West 61st Street. The stalls had been transformed to dressing rooms. Dana became a star with theEdison Manufacturing Company, working at their studio in the Bronx. She fell in love with Edison directorJohn Hancock Collins, and they married in 1915. Dana's success in Collins's Edison features such asChildren of Eve (1915) andThe Cossack Whip (1916) encouraged producerB.A. Rolfe to offer the couple lucrative contracts with his company,Rolfe Photoplays, which was released throughMetro Pictures Corporation. Dana and Collins accepted Rolfe's offer in 1916 and made several films for Rolfe/Metro, notablyThe Girl Without a Soul andBlue Jeans (both 1917). Rolfe closed his New York-area studio in the face of the1918 flu pandemic and sent most of his personnel to California. Dana left before Collins, who was finishing work at the studio; however, Collins contracted influenza and died in a New York hotel room on October 23, 1918.^{[citation needed]}

Dana remained in California acting for Metro throughout the 1920s, but her popularity gradually waned. One of her latter roles was inFrank Capra's first film forColumbia Pictures,That Certain Thing (1928). She retired from the screen in 1929. Her final screen credits are roles inTwo Sisters (1929),One Splendid Hour (1929), and with her sister Leonie Flugrath, better known as Shirley Mason (years earlier she had appeared with her older sister, Edna Flugrath, in the 1923 filmThe Social Code), inThe Show of Shows (1929). By the time she made her final film appearance in 1933, she had appeared in over 100 films. She briefly came out of retirement to appear in her first and only television role in a small part onLux Video Theatre in 1956.^[3]

More than 50 years after her retirement from the screen, Dana appeared in theKevin Brownlow/David Gill documentary seriesHollywood (1980), discussing her career as a silent film star during the 1920s. Footage from the interview was used in the later documentary seriesBuster Keaton: A Hard Act to Follow (1987) from the same team.^[4]

Dana's first husband was Edison director John Collins who died in the influenza pandemic of 1918. In 1920, she began a relationship withOrmer "Lock" Locklear, an aviator, military veteran and budding film star. Locklear died when his aircraft crashed on August 2, 1920, during a nighttime film shoot forThe Skywayman. Although married, Locklear had been dating Dana, and on the night before his death, in a premonition, gave her some of his personal effects. Dana witnessed the 1920 crash and did not fly again for 25 years.^{[5][N 1]}

Locklear was reputed to be the prototype for the character of Waldo Pepper played byRobert Redford inThe Great Waldo Pepper (1975). Dana was an honored guest at its premiere.^[6]

Dana was married to Yale football star and actorMaurice "Lefty" Flynn in June 1925.^[7] They divorced in February 1929.^[8] Her third and final marriage was to golferJimmy Thomson from 1930 to March 1945.^[9] In later years, she volunteered at theMotion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital, and she moved there permanently in 1979.^[10] In 1986, one year before her death, she was the subject of a documentary short by Anthony Slide titledVi: Portrait of a Silent Star, in which she talks of her life and career.

Dana died on July 3, 1987, at the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles at the age of 90.^[11]

For her contribution to the motion picture industry, Dana has a star on theHollywood Walk of Fame. It is located at 6541 Hollywood Boulevard.^[12]

• 
  The Flower of No Man's Land (1916)
• 
  The Flower of No Man's Land (1916)
• 
  The Light of Happiness (1916)
• 
  The Gates of Eden (1916)
• 
  Threads of Fate (1917)
• 
  The Mortal Sin (1917)
• 
  God's Law and Man's (1917)
• 
  Blue Jeans (1917)
• 
  A Weaver of Dreams (1918)
• 
  The Only Road (1918)
• 
  Riders of the Night (1918)
• 
  Some Bride (1919)

Wikimedia Commons has media related toViola Dana.

• Viola Dana photo gallery
• Viola Dana atIMDb
• Viola Dana at theInternet Broadway Database
• Viola Dana at Virtual History

• 1897 births
• 1987 deaths
• 20th-century American actresses
• American child actresses
• American film actresses
• American silent film actresses
• American stage actresses
• American television actresses
• American vaudeville performers
• Burials at Hollywood Forever Cemetery
• Actresses from Brooklyn

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