Florence Lake

Florence Lake Owens (born Florence Silverlake;^[1] November 27, 1904 – April 11, 1980) was an American actress best known as the leading lady in most of the Edgar Kennedy comedy shorts.

Early life

Florence Lake (née Silverlake) was born on November 27, 1904,^{[citation needed]} in Charleston, South Carolina.^[2] In the early 1900s, her father Arthur Silverlake and uncle Archie Silverlake toured with a circus in an aerial act known as The Flying Silverlakes.^[3] Her mother, Edith Goodwin, was an actress. Her parents later appeared in vaudeville in a skit "Family Affair", traveling throughout the South and Southwest United States. Florence and her younger brother Arthur Silverlake, Jr. became part of the act in 1910.^[3] Their mother brought the children to Hollywood to get into the burgeoning film industry. Arthur changed his professional name to Arthur Lake and later achieved great success as Dagwood Bumstead in the movie series Blondie.

Early career

Before acting in films, Lake was the leading lady for the Raynor Lehr stock theater company.^[4] Her film debut came in New Year's Eve (1929).^[5]

Comic acting persona

Lake was petite, with a high-pitched speaking voice. She perfected a comical, sing-song delivery that established her in "dumb" roles. She personified flightiness in the Kennedy shorts as the scatterbrained Mrs. Kennedy. After the series ended with Kennedy's death in 1948, she continued to play character roles in films and television. Her best-known TV role was Jenny, the Calverton telephone operator in Lassie. Lake played the role for the entire 10-year "farm seasons" of the show (1954–1964), thus becoming the Lassie player with the longest run on the series. She played the role of Mama Angel in "The Angel and the Outlaw", a 1957 episode of the TV series The Lone Ranger. She also appeared in the first color episode of the TV series The Adventures of Superman in 1957 as a cave woman.^[6][7]

On old-time radio, Lake portrayed Jessie in Charlie and Jessie,^[8] Tess Terwilliger in David Harum,^[8]: 94 Mrs. Featherstone's daughter in The Gay Mrs. Featherstone,^{[8]: 127-128} and Miss Smith in Phone Again Finnegan.^[8]: 272

In her later years, Lake appeared as Elvira Norton on an episode of Dragnet titled "Frauds". She appeared in an episode of the 1973 sitcom A Touch of Grace, and later that year played a blind date for the character Lou Grant on The Mary Tyler Moore Show episode "Lou's First Date". Her last roles were in the TV series Emergency!, Baretta in 1976, and Most Wanted in 1977.

Death

She died in 1980 and was interred in Woodlawn Memorial Cemetery, Santa Monica, California.^[9]

Selected filmography

References

External links

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