Dorothy Coburn

Who was Dorothy Coburn?

Dorothy Coburn was a dark-haired actress, who appeared in a number of the early Laurel and Hardy silents. She was a niece of author Walt Coburn, and granddaughter of Robert Coburn Sr., founder of the Circle C Ranch in Montana.

Raised in Prescott, Arizona, Coburn was born to cowboy-poet and Western film producer Wallace, and Ann Reifenrath Coburn in Great Falls, Montana. Her documented film repertoire consisted of sixteen silent short subjects for the Hal Roach studios, but she was also in scores of films where she acted as horseback-stuntwoman opposite such stars as Gary Cooper and Joel McCrea, and as a stand-in for Ginger Rogers in several of her dancing films with Fred Astaire. Coburn retired from the movie business in the early 1930s. She was buried in Glendale, California's Grand View Memorial Park Cemetery.

A feisty, attractive silent screen actress, who worked for Hal Roach in the 1920s. The daughter of western actor-producer Wallace Coburn, she was a popular opponent to Laurel and Hardy. Never afraid to get herself covered in mud, pies or paint; a real good sport. An accomplished rider and a fit athlete, Coburn also occasionally worked as a stunt performer in westerns.