Edith May

When I started my research into the Goetz theater, I didn’t expect to be drawn into the lives of other local celebrities. However, this is just what happened with Edith May.

Edith May Leuenberger was born in 1903 to the family of a Monroe blacksmith; as a teen she worked for her uncle at the local Waffle Shop. The story goes that Edith’s photograph was entered by the local newspaper editor (without her knowledge) into the National Salesgirls’ Beauty Contest. This contest was hosted by a newspaper-content provider called the Newspaper Enterprise Association, or NEA for short.

What Edith May won was a six week stint as a chorus girl in Ziegfeld’s Follies and a six-week contract with a fledgling film company called the Mayflower Film Corporation. She went with high hopes of becoming a movie star, what actually happened left her severely disappointed. Details in my upcoming book!

In the aftermath to the Ziegfeld affair, Edith May was approached by Leon Goetz and his colleague, O. A. Brinner, to produce a movie of her own: “The Romance of the Movies”. I was unable to locate a copy of this film, but it was played in Goetz’s theater— probably one of the last offerings before he was force to sell under suspicious circumstances…

After NYC, Edith May toured as a type of Vaudeville performer under the management of an incompetent cousin before settling down to married life in Brodhead, WI. Well into the 1980s long-time Monroe residents remember a well turned-out, elderly lady going about her errands, not a hair out of place and ready for her close-up.