Acting
Lillian Worth
Lillian Worth, originally named Lillian Burgher Murphy, was an American actress born on June 24, 1884, in Brooklyn, New York. She was the daughter of Katherine Stahler and John B. Murphy. Following her marriage in 1905, she adopted her husband’s surname as her stage name. By 1909, performing as Lillian Wiggins, she had captured public attention with her acclaimed role in the play Beauty Spot. By early 1913, she had risen to prominence as a leading actress at Pathé's West Coast studio in Edendale, Los Angeles, where she primarily featured in Western films. Shortly thereafter, she was transferred to Pathé's East Coast studio in Jersey City and then to their Southern studio in St. Augustine, Florida. In March 1914, she was sent to Europe, where she worked at the Paris studio before moving to London, creating films for both the British and Colonial Kinematography Company and the Motograph Film Company.
Returning to the U.S. in September 1914, Worth began collaborating with Deer Film Company the following year. After her first marriage ended, she remarried in 1918, but chose to keep the stage name Lillian Worth. Worth was married twice: first to Benjamin Platt Wiggins, with their divorce finalized in 1914, and later to actor Erville Alderson in 1918, a union that ended in 1925. She passed away at 67 in Los Angeles on February 23, 1952, and is buried at Hollywood Forever Cemetery, remembered in death records as Lillian Alderson, despite her long-standing divorce.
