Elita Proctor Otis

Elita Proctor Otis (born around 1860 in Cleveland, Ohio; died August 10, 1927) was an American stage and screen actress whose career spanned from the late nineteenth century through the silent film era. Her father, William Henry Otis, was a banker, and her great-uncle was Redfield Proctor, a senator from Vermont.

Otis began her theatrical training with the Kemble Dramatic Society before making her professional debut in the role of Ernestine Echo in Crust of Society at the Globe Theatre in Boston. Her Broadway career extended from 1897 to 1914, encompassing a wide range of productions. Among her earliest New York credits was A Ward of France in 1897, followed by Woman and Wine and Quo Vadis in 1900, and The Brixton Burglary in 1901. She appeared in In the Midst of Life in 1902 and The Two Orphans in 1904. Later Broadway appearances included About Town (1906), The Little Michus (1907), Mary's Lamb and Society and the Bulldog (both 1908), and The Girl from Rector's (1909). She continued working on Broadway in the early 1910s with credits including The Three Romeos (1911), The Greyhound (1912), Are You a Crook?, The Purple Road, and Potash and Perlmutter (all 1913), and The House of Bondage (1914).

Alongside her stage work, Otis pursued a career in early silent film. In 1909 she appeared in several Vitagraph productions, including Adventures of a Drummer Boy, Les Misérables (Part I), and A Midsummer Night's Dream, in which she played Hippolyta. That same year she took the role of Nancy Sykes in Oliver Twist, a performance that may have made her the first actress to portray that character on screen. She returned to film in 1914 with The Great Diamond Robbery, playing Mother Rosenbaum, and a screen adaptation of The Greyhound, in which she played a character known as Deep Sea Kitty Doyle. Her film work continued into the 1920s with roles in The Triflers (1920), Under Northern Lights (1920), The Torrent (1921), While the Devil Laughs (1921), The Secret of the Hills (1921), The Infidel (1922), Refuge (1923), Miss Nobody (1926), and The Lost Express (1926), though several of these later credits appeared under variant spellings of her name.

Otis was married to William C. Camp. She spent the final twelve years of her life as an invalid and died on August 10, 1927, in Pelham, New York. Her funeral was held on August 17, 1927, at the Church of the Transfiguration, and she was buried at Woodlawn Cemetery.