Una Abell

Una Abell-Brinker (August 16, 1874 – November 12, 1952) was an American actress born in Wayne, Michigan, to Oliver Clinton Abell and Mary E. Chase Abell. Her father served in the Michigan State Senate in 1867, and her mother later worked as a fraternity matron at the University of Michigan. As a child, Abell performed recitations for a reunion of Civil War veterans in Akron, Ohio.

Her professional stage career began by 1892, when she worked as an ingenue in the Hortense Rhéa company. During this period she appeared in productions alongside Helena Modjeska, Sarah Bernhardt, and Maurice Barrymore. She subsequently established her own repertory company at the New Century Theater in Newark, New Jersey, where she became known as the First Lady of the Newark Theatre.

In 1897, Abell appeared on Broadway in A Ward of France. After stepping away from the stage for a period, she returned to vaudeville in 1909 in Edward Weitzel's The Fifth Act. The following year she presented Ullie Akerstrom's The Eleventh Hour in Newark, where a reviewer observed that the role gave her every opportunity for acting, which she performed in a most artistic manner. In 1912, Abell-Brinker adapted and translated The Typhoon, a sketch by Melchior Lengyel; however, playwright Emil Nyitray claimed the adaptation as his own, and she was arrested to prevent its performance. She was also the founder of the Junior League of Pleasantville, New York, and her papers are archived at the New York Public Library.

In 1899, Abell married fellow actor H. Coulter Brinker. He died the following year after an accidental fall from a hotel window, and her mother died a few months afterward. Her second husband was theatrical producer Jacob H. Kahn, who died in 1944. She had two daughters, Joan Goldberg and Holly Becker. Una Abell-Brinker died in 1952 at the age of 78.