Frieda Mierse was a Ziegfeld Follies dancer who married comedian Ed Wynn
She was born Frieda Louise Mierse in New York City on July 11, 1911. Her parents had both immigrated from Germany. Frieda attended Bryant High school in Long Island. At the age of sixteen she was named Miss New York and competed in the Miss America pageant. She made her Broadway debut in the 1928 musical Whoopee. Frieda also appeared in the shows Simple Simon and The Laugh Parade. In 1929 she married William Droege, a Queen druggist, but they divorced a year later. The shapely blonde had blue eyes and a porcelain complexion. She joined the Ziegfeld Follies of 1931. Flo Ziegfeld said she was "the most beautiful girl in New York".
Frieda had a long term romance with playwright Bernard Sobel. Then she was cast in Ed Wynn's Laugh Parade show and began having an affair with the comedian. He was married and twenty-five years older than her. When Ed's wife filed for divorced in 1936 she named Frieda as the other woman. On June 15,1937 she and Ed were married in New York. City Unfortunately they were divorced just two years later. In court she claimed that he nagged her so much she lost weight and needed therapy. She later moved to Utica, New York. When Ed Wynn died in 1966 she told reporters he was "a wonderful man.". On October 10, 1972 she passed away at the age of sixty-one.
