Cecil Kern

Tabitha Cecil Kern (c. 1880s – June 1, 1928) was an American stage and film actress and theater director whose Broadway career spanned from 1910 to 1928. Born in the 1880s to John Jacob Kern, publisher of the Portland, Oregon Deutsche Zeitung, and Henrietta Kern (née Marburg), she was the daughter of two German immigrants. Although 1910 New York City census records and contemporary news articles indicate she was born in Portland, an 1885 U.S. Census entry places her birth in Nebraska, where she was living in Thayer with her family at age two. Her elder brother, Albert E. Kern, went on to serve as president of the First National Bank in both Portland and Madras, Oregon.

Kern spent most of her early years in Portland, where she completed her primary education before relocating to San Francisco as a teenager to study dramatic art. Her first significant stage role came in 1907, when she played Cynthia, a stenographer, in a touring production of The Man of the Hour, which opened in Atlantic City, New Jersey. During a January 1908 performance at the Moore Theatre in Seattle, co-star Ruby Bridges punched Kern in the face at the conclusion of the show, claiming Kern had been ridiculing her from offstage. Bridges pleaded guilty to assault and was fined twenty-five dollars.

Kern made her Broadway debut in The Revellers in 1909, and the following year portrayed Hélène in the original Broadway production of Madame X. In 1911, she appeared as Esther opposite Oscar Adye in the Broadway production of Ben-Hur, and subsequently took part in The Governor's Boss in 1914. Her additional Broadway credits included La Gringa, Morals, and Something To Brag About. In 1917, she joined the New Denham Players, performing in a Denver production of Marrying Money. Kern extended her work to film, appearing in Rainbow for Vitagraph Studios and The House of Mystery, both in 1921. In 1923, she directed the Seattle Theatre Guild's opening season production of In Love with Love.

Kern died on June 1, 1928, and her body was discovered on June 5 in her room at a residential hotel at 24 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. She had reportedly remained in isolation for weeks prior, with a "do not disturb" sign hanging from her door for approximately three days before she was found. A report in Variety attributed her cause of death to pulmonary hemorrhage, as pronounced by Dr. Hitchley of New York Hospital. Her remains were cremated at Fresh Pond Crematory in Queens, and she was interred at Rose City Cemetery in Portland, Oregon.