Florence Moore (born this day in 1886) is best known to posterity as the first female emcee at the Palace. Born in Philly, she started out in stock companies with her brother Frank. Her first Broadway work was in a couple of Lew Fields shows starting 1912. Over the next couple of decades she was a star of Broadway, big time vaudeville (for a while teamed with her husband William Montgomery), and silent films. Her last show was The Passing Show in 1932. She died during an operation for cancer in 1935.
To find out more about the history of vaudeville, consult No Applause, Just Throw Money: The Book That Made Vaudeville Famous, available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and wherever nutty books are sold.
For more on silent film don’t miss my new book Chain of Fools: Silent Comedy and Its Legacies from Nickelodeons to Youtube, just released by Bear Manor Media, also available from amazon.com etc etc etc
(Travalanche) 