Ziegfeld Girls were the chorus girl

Chorus Girl

A chorus girl is a female performer in a chorus or chorus line.It may also refer to:*Chorus Girl , a compilation from Atomic Records*Chorus Girls , a 1981 musical*"The Chorus Girl", a story by Anton Chekhov...

s from Florenz Ziegfeld

Florenz Ziegfeld

Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr. , , was an American Broadway impresario, notable for his series of theatrical revues, the Ziegfeld Follies , inspired by the Folies Bergère of Paris. He also produced the musical Show Boat...

's theatrical spectaculars known as the Ziegfeld Follies

Ziegfeld Follies

The Ziegfeld Follies were a series of elaborate theatrical productions on Broadway in New York City from 1907 through 1931. They became a radio program in 1932 and 1936 as The Ziegfeld Follies of the Air....

(1907–1931), which were based on the Folies Bergère of Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

.

These showgirl

Showgirl

A showgirl is a dancer or performer in a stage entertainment show. Showgirl is also often used as a term for a promotional model in trade fairs and car shows, etc...

s followed on the heels of the "Florodora girls

Florodora

Florodora is an Edwardian musical comedy and became one of the first successful Broadway musicals of the 20th century. The book was written by Jimmy Davis under the pseudonym Owen Hall, the music was by Leslie Stuart with additional songs by Paul Rubens, and the lyrics were by Edward Boyd-Jones...

", who had started to "loosen the corset

Corset

A corset is a garment worn to hold and shape the torso into a desired shape for aesthetic or medical purposes...

" of the Gibson Girl

Gibson Girl

The Gibson Girl was the personification of a feminine ideal as portrayed in the satirical pen-and-ink-illustrated stories created by illustrator Charles Dana Gibson during a 20-year period spanning the late nineteenth and early twentieth century in the United States.Some people argue that the...

 in the early years of the twentieth century. These beauties, of similar size, decked out in Erté

Romain de Tirtoff

Romain de Tirtoff was a Russian-born French artist and designer known by the pseudonym Erté, the French pronunciation of his initials, R.T. He was a diversely-talented 20th century artist and designer who flourished in an array of fields, including fashion, jewellery, graphic arts, costume and...

 designs, gained many young male admirers and they became objects of popular adoration. Many were persuaded to leave the show to marry, some to men of substantial wealth. The Ziegfeld Ball in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 continued as a social event of the season for years after the last production of the Follies.

Perhaps the most famous Ziegfeld Girl during the run of the revues was Lillian Lorraine

Lillian Lorraine

Lillian Lorraine was a stage and screen actress of the 1910s and 1920s, best known for her beauty and for being perhaps the most famous Ziegfeld Girl in the Broadway revues Ziegfeld Follies during the 1910s....

. Over the years they included many future stars such as Marion Davies

Marion Davies

Marion Davies was an American film actress. Davies is best remembered for her relationship with newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst, as her high-profile social life often obscured her professional career....

, Paulette Goddard

Paulette Goddard

Paulette Goddard was an American film and theatre actress. A former child fashion model and in several Broadway productions as Ziegfeld Girl, she was a major star of the Paramount Studio in the 1940s. She was married to several notable men, including Charlie Chaplin, Burgess Meredith, and Erich...

, Joan Blondell

Joan Blondell

Rose Joan Blondell was an American actress who performed in movies and on television for five decades as Joan Blondell.After winning a beauty pageant, Blondell embarked upon a film career...

, Barbara Stanwyck

Barbara Stanwyck

Barbara Stanwyck was an American actress. She was a film and television star, known during her 60-year career as a consummate and versatile professional with a strong screen presence, and a favorite of directors including Cecil B. DeMille, Fritz Lang and Frank Capra...

, Billie Dove

Billie Dove

Billie Dove was an American actress.-Early life and career:She was born as Bertha Bohny in New York City to Charles and Bertha Bohny who were Swiss immigrants. As a teen, she worked as a model to help support her family and was hired at the age of 15 by Florenz Ziegfeld to appear in his Ziegfeld...

, Louise Brooks

Louise Brooks

Mary Louise Brooks , generally known by her stage name Louise Brooks, was an American dancer, model, showgirl and silent film actress, noted for popularizing the bobbed haircut. Brooks is best known for her three feature roles including two G. W...

, Nita Naldi, Mae Murray

Mae Murray

Mae Murray was an American actress, dancer, film producer, and screenwriter. Murray rose to fame during the silent film era and was known as "The Girl with the Bee-Stung Lips" and "The Gardenia of the Screen"....

, Bessie Love

Bessie Love

Bessie Love was an American motion picture actress who achieved prominence mainly in the silent films and early talkies. With a small frame and delicate features, she played innocent young girls, flappers, and wholesome leading ladies. Her role in The Broadway Melody earned her a nomination for...

, Dorothy Mackaill

Dorothy Mackaill

Dorothy Mackaill was an English-born American actress, most notably of the silent film era and into the early 1930s.-Early life:...

, Odette Myrtil

Odette Myrtil

Odette Myrtil was an American actress, singer, and violinist of French birth. She began her career as a violinist on the vaudeville stage in Paris at the age of 14. She expanded out into acting and singing, and had her first major success at the age of 18 on the London stage in the 1916 musical...

, Lilyan Tashman

Lilyan Tashman

Lilyan Tashman was a Brooklyn-born Jewish American vaudeville, Broadway, and film actress. Tashman was best known for her supporting roles as tongue-in-cheek villainesses and the bitchy 'other woman'...

, Claire Dodd

Claire Dodd

Claire Dodd was an American film actress.Born as Dorothy Anne Dodd in Baxter, Iowa, Dodd was born to Walter W. Dodd, a farmer and veterinarian, and Ethel V. Cool Dodd, the daughter of Baxter Postmaster Peter J. Cool. As Dorothy Dodd, she attended school in Baxter...

, Cecile Arnold

Cecile Arnold

Cecile Arnold was an American silent film actress and Zigfeld Follies girl.- Life :She was born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1891 or in New York City in 1895 . Born Cecile Laval Arnoux , the blonde known for playing femme fatales was a Ziegfeld Follies girl before moving to Mack Sennett's Keystone...

, Iris Adrian

Iris Adrian

Iris Adrian was an American film actress.-Life and career:Born in Los Angeles, California as Iris Hostetter, Adrian won a beauty pageant and worked with the Ziegfeld Follies, before she entered films at the end of the silent era in Chasing Husbands and appeared as an extra or chorus girl in early...

 and other society and business successes such as Peggy Hopkins Joyce

Peggy Hopkins Joyce

Peggy Hopkins Joyce was an American actress and celebrity, famed as much for her several marriages to wealthy men, colorful divorces, scandalous affairs, her diamonds and generally lavish lifestyle as for her work on stage or screen.-Brief Biography:Born Marguerite Upton in Berkley, Virginia, she...

, Helen Gallagher

Helen Gallagher (Solomon)

Helen Gallagher Solomon was a Ziegfeld girl and restaurateur who co-founded Gallagher's Steak House. She was the wife of Ed Gallagher , of the "Mister Gallagher and Mister Sheen" comedy team....

, Anastasia Reilly, and Irene Hayes

Irene Hayes

Irene Hayes was a Ziegfeld girl and businesswoman who owned Irene Hayes Wadley & Smythe, a leading Manhattan florist, and Gallagher's Steak House after the death of her husband, Jack Solomon....

.

Although many future stars started out as Ziegfeld girls, many others were turned down by Florenz Ziegfeld to appear in his revue. Norma Shearer

Norma Shearer

Edith Norma Shearer was a Canadian-American actress. Shearer was one of the most popular actresses in North America from the mid-1920s through the 1930s...

 (in 1919), Alice Faye

Alice Faye

Alice Faye was an American actress and singer, called by The New York Times "one of the few movie stars to walk away from stardom at the peak of her career." She is remembered first for her stardom at 20th Century Fox and, later, as the radio comedy partner of her husband, bandleader and comedian...

 (in 1927), Joan Crawford

Joan Crawford

Joan Crawford , born Lucille Fay LeSueur, was an American actress in film, television and theatre....

 (in 1924), Gypsy Rose Lee

Gypsy Rose Lee

Gypsy Rose Lee was an American burlesque entertainer famous for her striptease act. She was also an actress, author, and playwright whose 1957 memoir was made into the stage musical and film Gypsy.-Early life:...

 (in 1927), Lucille Ball

Lucille Ball

Lucille Désirée Ball was an American comedian, film, television, stage and radio actress, model, film and television executive, and star of the sitcoms I Love Lucy, The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour, The Lucy Show, Here's Lucy and Life With Lucy...

 (in 1931), Phyllis Haver

Phyllis Haver

Phyllis Haver was an American actress of the silent film era.-Early life:She was born Phyllis Haver in Douglass, Kansas. When she was young, her family moved to Los Angeles, California, then a city of less than half a million people. Haver attended Los Angeles Polytechnic High...

 (in 1915), Eleanor Powell

Eleanor Powell

Eleanor Torrey Powell was an American film actress and dancer of the 1930s and 1940s, known for her exuberant solo tap dancing.-Early life:...

 (in 1927), Dolores Costello

Dolores Costello

Dolores Costello was an American film actress who achieved her greatest success during the era of silent movies. She was nicknamed "The Goddess of the Silent Screen"...

 (in 1919), Ruby Keeler

Ruby Keeler

Ruby Keeler, born Ethel Hilda Keeler, was an actress, singer, and dancer most famous for her on-screen coupling with Dick Powell in a string of successful early musicals at Warner Brothers, particularly 42nd Street . From 1928 to 1940, she was married to singer Al Jolson...

 (in 1924), Hedda Hopper

Hedda Hopper

Hedda Hopper was an American actress and gossip columnist, whose long-running feud with friend turned arch-rival Louella Parsons became at least as notorious as many of Hopper's columns.-Early life:...

 (in 1913), and June Havoc

June Havoc

June Havoc was a Canadian-born American actress, dancer, writer, and theater director. Havoc was a child Vaudeville performer under the tutelage of her mother. She later acted on Broadway and in Hollywood and stage directed . She last appeared on television in 1990 on General Hospital...

 (in 1931) were among the many hopefuls that the master showman discarded after auditions. In 1957, the then-current members were featured as mystery guests on the television panel show What's My Line?

The survivors of the chorus line

Chorus line

A chorus line is a substantial group of dancers who together perform synchronized routines, usually in musical theatre. Sometimes, singing is also performed. Chorus line dancers in Broadway musicals and revues have been referred to by slang terms such as ponies, gypsies and twirlies...

s of the last century are The Rockettes

The Rockettes

The Rockettes are a precision dance company performing out of the Radio City Music Hall in Manhattan, New York City. During the Christmas season, the Rockettes have performed five shows a day, seven days a week, for 77 years...

 of Radio City Music Hall

Radio City Music Hall

Radio City Music Hall is an entertainment venue located in New York City's Rockefeller Center. Its nickname is the Showplace of the Nation, and it was for a time the leading tourist destination in the city...

. The last surviving Ziegfeld girl was Doris Eaton Travis

Doris Eaton Travis

Doris Eaton Travis was a Broadway and film performer, dance instructor, and author. She was also the last surviving Ziegfeld girl.Travis began performing onstage as a young child, and made her Broadway debut at the age of 13...

, who died on May 11, 2010 at the age of 106.