Dorothy Short on AllMovie

A pretty brunette ingénue from Philadelphia, Dorothy Short came to Hollywood in 1934 with an MGM contract. That studio, however, wasted her in minor assignments and she was soon a regular in Poverty Row Westerns, of which she did 11, ranging from Tom Tyler's Brothers of the West (1937) to the William Elliott-Tex Ritter vehicle Bullets for Bandits (1942). But Short is perhaps best remembered for playing the hard-luck heroine in the cult phenomenon Reefer Madness (1938), one of 19 films, including short subjects and the serial Captain Midnight (1942), she would do with her husband -- action and comedy star Dave O'Brien -- beginning in 1936. Their 1953 divorce created a flurry of highly imaginative headlines, after which the actress disappeared from show business.