Norma Taylor

Norma Taylor, born Evelyn Ruth Shepard in Omaha, Nebraska, to Harrison Milton Shepard and Nina Olivia (Rosengren) Shepard, was an American dancer and showgirl whose Broadway career spanned from 1925 to 1931.

Taylor's professional life began in 1925 when she joined the chorus of a traveling show. That same year, she won a beauty contest at a Chicago park, earning the title of most beautiful blonde in Chicago. Producer Charles Dillingham subsequently added her to the Chicago run of the musical comedy Sonny, and in 1926 she transitioned into the Broadway production of that show as a dancer. Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr. then cast her in the musical Rio Rita, followed by The Ziegfeld Follies of 1927. Taylor continued her Broadway work with dancer roles in She's My Baby (1928), Smiles (1930–1931), and The New Yorkers (1930–1931). Her final Broadway credit was Here Goes the Bride in 1931.

Beyond staged productions, Taylor performed as a dancer in various nightclubs, including the speakeasies operated by Texas Guinan. She was a member of Guinan's traveling Whoopee Girls revue at the time French authorities banned the troupe from entering the country. Taylor and another dancer nonetheless slipped away for an unauthorized night in Paris, an episode that attracted worldwide press coverage.

Taylor also pursued a film career, appearing in a number of Hollywood B movies. Her screen credits include The Girl Habit (1931), Poppin' the Cork (1933), Coronado (1935), Waterfront Lady (1935), The Girl Friend (1935), Tumbling Tumbleweeds (1935), The Adventures of Rex and Rinty (1935), and I Demand Payment (1938).

Taylor's personal life generated considerable public attention across several decades. She married Robert S. Taylor, a Piggly-Wiggly supermarket employee, while traveling through Memphis, Tennessee, and was arrested for marrying at age sixteen before being released at her husband's insistence. The couple separated shortly thereafter. Beginning in October 1926, Broadway rumors circulated that Taylor was engaged to, and later married to, Tommy Guinan, brother of Texas Guinan. Those rumors persisted for years until 1931, when Tommy Guinan presented Taylor with a fifteen-thousand-dollar diamond bracelet as an engagement gift, only for her to marry nightclub owner William Newton Duryea three months later. That marriage ended after ten days when Taylor sought a divorce, telling reporters that being married had made it harder for her to find work. She subsequently became involved with millionaire playboy Tommy Manville, who would later set a Guinness world record with thirteen marriages, though Taylor was not among his brides.

In 1933, drama coach John Hutchins's wife, Muriel Young Hutchins, named Taylor in a divorce suit, and the case played out for months in the national press. Two years later, in 1935, Taylor was again the subject of sustained press coverage due to her alleged romance with surgeon Franklyn Thorpe, who had recently divorced actress Mary Astor. During a custody dispute involving Thorpe and Astor's child, details emerged of an alcohol-fueled altercation between Taylor and Thorpe in which police found both of them on a bathroom floor. Allegations also surfaced that Taylor had stabbed Thorpe twice with a turkey fork, which she denied. Her court appearance reportedly caused Taylor to collapse, and she subsequently checked into a sanitarium. Shortly afterward, she took refuge at the home of Tommy Manville, who was at that time married to his fourth wife, Marcelle Edwards, a showgirl with The Earl Carroll Vanities.

After leaving the entertainment world, Taylor led a markedly quieter life. She met Charles A. Adams during World War II while working in a New York defense plant, married him in 1945, and relocated with him to Tampa, Florida, in 1949. A 1958 newspaper account described her working alongside Adams at his Tampa gas station, washing windshields, changing oil, and pumping gas. She reported having used her diamond rings and bracelets as collateral to help finance the purchase of the station. Taylor died in 1983.