Stage Name: Jane Wyman, AKA Jane Durrell
Birth Name: Sarah Jane Mayfield
Occupation: Movie, TV Actress / Singer / Dancer / Pinup Model
Years Active: 1932–1993
Notable Works: Wyman is a truly great award winning acting talent with many excellent movies and hours of TV productions and awards to her credit; but she has two great accomplishments exclusively her own, she is the record holder for the longest lasting cinematic kiss and she is the only woman to have ever divorced one of our United States Presidents. In 1941, she appeared in You're in the Army Now, in which she and Regis Toomey had the longest on-screen kiss in cinema history: 3 minutes and 5 seconds. Also Jane Wyman was the first wife of Ronald Reagan, marrying him in 1940 and divorcing him in 1948, long before he ran for any public office, but still it makes her the only woman to have been an ex-wife of a U.S. president.
Date/Place Birth: January 5, 1917(1917-01-05); Saint Joseph, Missouri, U.S.A.
Date/Death/Cause: Jane Wyman died at age 90 on September 10, 2007 from complications of arthritis and diabetes at her own home at the Rancho Mirage Country Club, City of Rancho Mirage, Riverside County, California, United States of America; she is buried at Forest Lawn Mortuary and Memorial Park in Cathedral City, California, U.S.A..
Spouse(s) & Children:a salesman Ernest Eugene Wyman (1933–1935 divorced); a dress manufacturer, Myron Futterman (1937–1938 divorced); an actor to later become United States President, Ronald Reagan (1940–1948 divorced) 3 children, Maureen Elizabeth Reagan (1941–2001), an adopted son Michael Edward Reagan born March 18, 1945 and and Christine Reagan (born prematurely on June 26, 1947 and died the next day); music director / composer, Fred Karger (1952–1955, 1961–1965 divorced twice)
Short Biography: In 1932, at age 15 she dropped out of high school and moved from St. Louis, Missouri for the second time and began taking on odd jobs as a manicurist and a switchboard operator, before obtaining small parts in films The Kid from Spain (as a "Goldwyn Girl") (1932), My Man Godfrey (1936) and Cain and Mabel (1936); Wyman learned her craft as a contract player before getting a chance at the major roles that would secure her reputation as a star. She won her Oscar playing a deaf-mute rape victim in 1948's Johnny Belinda and was nominated for her performances in The Yearling (1946), The Blue Veil (1951) and Magnificent Obsession (1954). In the 1950s she began her TV career with her own half-hour dramatic anthology show and continued her television work to become the award winning legendary matriarch you-love-to-hate in the long-running 1980s nighttime soap opera Falcon Crest. If you are interested in more information about her life there is a book Jane Wyman: A Biography and her official website has good biographical information also.