Biografia

In the Spring of 1918, the 18-year-old Ernest Hemingway claimed in letters to friends and family that he was engaged to Marsh. Hemingway was in New York at the time, preparing to go to Italy as an ambulance driver with the Red Cross, and he said he met Marsh at a party. Hemingway soon said that Marsh had broken the engagement. When asked about this incident 48 years later, in 1966, Marsh said she'd wished she'd known Hemingway (see letter and footnote in "Ernest Hemingway--Selected Letters," page 8).

Upon her death, her remains were interred in Pacific Crest Cemetery, Redondo Beach, Los Angeles County, California, USA. Her location plot is Grave 10, Lot 838, Section 5.

Her big break came when Mary Pickford, resident star of the Biograph lot and a married woman at that time, refused to play the bare-legged, grass-skirted role of Lily-White in Man's Genesis. Griffith announced that if Pickford would not play that part in Man's Genesis, she would not play the coveted title role in his next film, The Sands of Dee. The other actresses stood behind Pickford, each refusing in turn to play the part, citing the same objection. Mae was willing and eager for an opportunity to advance in the ranks.

Although Marsh's birth date is usually given as 1895, U.S. Census records from 1900 clearly indicate her birth date as 9 November 1894. Furthermore, the same census records indicate that her father, S.C. Marsh, did not die when she was four, as most stories have it, nor was he a railroad auditor. Rather, he was a bartender and was alive as late as June, 1900.

Mae Marsh appeared in well over 200 films.