Sheila Bromley

Sheila Bromley, born Louise Fulton on October 31, 1907, in San Francisco, California, was an American actress whose career spanned film, television, and stage. She died on July 23, 2003, in Los Angeles, California, at the age of 95. Early in her career she worked under several billing variations, including Sheila LeGay, Sheila Manners, Sheila Mannors, and Sheila Manors. Her formal acting training began at the Pasadena Playhouse, following her education at Hollywood High School. She also held the title of Miss California.

Bromley entered the film industry in the early 1930s under contract with Monogram Pictures, initially billed as Sheila LeGay. Her earliest screen work placed her alongside Tom Tyler in Western productions beginning in 1930. She went on to co-star frequently with Ken Maynard, Hoot Gibson, Johnny Mack Brown, Bill Cody, and Dick Foran. Her first appearance opposite Bill Cody came in the 1932 Western Land of Wanted Men. She also appeared uncredited in the Marx Brothers film Horse Feathers that same year, delivering the line "The Dean is furious! He's waxing wroth!" Bromley starred opposite John Wayne in two 1935 films, Westward Ho and Lawless Range, and again in the 1937 film Idol of the Crowds. Over the course of her career she accumulated credits in seventy-five films, seventeen of which were Westerns.

During World War II, Bromley contributed regularly to USO service, continuing that work through the end of the war in 1945. It was through this work that she met her second husband, Jairus Bellamy. In 1944, she appeared in the touring production of Good Night Ladies, and in 1948 she performed on Broadway in Time for Elizabeth.

Bromley's television work included a guest appearance on I Love Lucy, in which she played Helen Erickson Kaiser, described as a childhood friend of Lucy Ricardo. She appeared in the Rawhide episode "Incident of the Deserter" in 1960, playing Mrs. Spencer alongside Paul Brinegar's character Wishbone. Over the nine-year CBS run of Perry Mason, she made five guest appearances. Her first, in 1959, cast her as co-defendant Agnes Nulty in "The Case of the Borrowed Brunette." In 1962 she played Elizabeth Dow, a murderer, in "The Case of the Mystified Miner," and in 1964 she appeared as Alice Bradley in "The Case of the Nervous Neighbor." She also guest-starred in a 1965 episode of The Cara Williams Show. Bromley retired from film work in the 1970s and remained in the Greater Los Angeles Area for the remainder of her life.