Bliss Milford

Bliss Milford, born Bliss Phoebe MacLaren on April 9, 1886, in Hope, North Dakota, was an American actress, screenwriter, songwriter, and singer whose career spanned stage, silent film, and music. She died on July 29, 1970, in the Bronx, and her ashes are interred at Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York.

Milford was the daughter of attorney C. Milford MacLaren and actress Alma Gallinger. Her uncle, William Edward McLaren, served as the archbishop of Chicago. She spent much of her childhood in Chicago before her family moved to New York City, where her interest in acting took hold. She began performing on the New York stage at approximately age 15, initially in minor roles. When she transitioned to film work, she adopted her father's middle name, Milford, as her professional surname.

Her Broadway career included an appearance in 1909 in the musical The Candy Shop. Around the same period, she joined the theatrical company of actor and playwright David Higgins, with her mother also part of the troupe. Milford and Higgins eventually married, despite an age difference of nearly thirty years, though the marriage did not endure. A subsequent marriage to filmmaker Harry Beaumont in 1915 also ended. Her third marriage, to Karl Klein in 1923, lasted until Klein's death in the 1960s.

Milford's film work was concentrated in the silent era. She was under contract with Edison until 1914, after which she moved to Kinetophone. Her screen credits include A Question of Hats and Gowns (1914), The Closing Net (1915), The Beloved Vagabond (1915), The House of Mirrors (1916), Flower of the Dusk (1918), And the Children Pay (1918), and Sylvia on a Spree (1918).

Beyond performing, Milford worked as a screenwriter and songwriter, and sang contralto at an opera recital in Washington, D.C., in 1928. She also served on the board of directors of the Toledo School for Crippled Children.