Jean Parker (born Lois May Green; August 11, 1915 – November 30, 2005) was an American film and stage actress. A native of Montana, indigent during the Great Depression, she was adopted by a family in Pasadena, California, at age ten. She initially aspired to be an illustrator and artist, but was discovered at age 16 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer executive Louis B. Mayer after a photograph of her was published in a Los Angeles newspaper when she won a poster contest. She made her feature film debut in the pre-code drama
Divorce In The Family (1932), before being loaned to Columbia Pictures, who cast her in Frank Capra's
Lady for a Day (1933). The same year, she starred as Elizabeth March in George Cukor's adaptation of
Little Women opposite Katharine Hepburn, Joan Bennett, and Frances Dee. Subsequent roles included lead parts in the drama
Sequoia (1934), and in the British comedy-fantasy
The Gh..."> ()