Shirley Dinsdale
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Shirley Dinsdale Layburn (October 31, 1926 - May 9, 1999), better known by her maiden name of Shirley Dinsdale), was a famous ventriloquist and television and radio personality of the 1940s and early 1950s. She is often best remembered for her dummy, Judy Splinters, and for the early children's television show that bears that name. In 1948, she received the first ever Emmy award (first award in the first presentation) for Outstanding Television Personality. After her television career, she also achieved success in a second career as a cardiopulmonary therapist.
Shirley was born in San Francisco, California in 1926. After being badly burned in a household accident, she was given a ventriloquist's dummy by her artist father as part of her recovery. That dummy, which she named Judy Splinters, inspired her to make her break into radio. In 1940, at the age of fourteen, she made her start on local San Franscisco radio with a show entitled Judy in Wonderland. Two years later, in 1942, she and her family moved to Los Angeles and she was given a spot on Eddie Cantor's radio program. During World War II, she was an active member of the Hollywood Victory Committee. After the war, she made her break into the budding television industry on KTLA (also in Los Angeles) doing show announcements, birthday greetings, and small spots. These spots, while not initially prominent, garnered her critical acclaim and her Emmy award. (The award was given jointly to both her and her puppet.) After receiving the award, she was given her own Western-themed weekly children's show (entitled simply Judy Splinters) which ran from 1949 to 1950. In the years following, she also had shows in both Chicago and New York City.
In 1953, she embarked on the second phase of her life: getting married and retiring from show business. However, her retirement would not be complete; in 1966 she enrolled at the State University of New York at Stony Brook to study respiratory and cardiopulmonary therapy. She also found success in this second career and served as the head of the Respiratory Therapy Department of the John T. Mather Memorial Hospital in Port Jefferson, New York from 1973 to her second retirement in 1985. She died at the age of 71 of cancer.
