Violet Mersereau on AllMovie

A popular child actress from the age of eight, Violet Mersereau was dubbed "The Child Wonder" after originating the role of Flora Cameron in The Clansman, the incendiary Thomas Dixon play that became the basis for D.W. Griffith's groundbreaking Birth of a Nation (made in 1915 with Mae Marsh as Flora). After touring in the title role of Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, Mersereau entered films in 1911 with the Los Angeles-based Nestor Company, a forerunner of Universal. With titles like The Spitfire, Little Miss Nobody (1917), and The Nature Girl (1919), Mersereau was a popular ingenue who, nevertheless, never gave Mary Pickford or the Gish sisters much to worry about. Nero (1922) was produced by Fox on location in Italy and was quite the spectacle, with Mersereau, the only American cast member, suddenly very grownup as a seductive Marcia. But she was innocent once again in Lend Me Your Wife (1924) in which she, the gardener's daughter, is nearly molested by a married man. There were a few more such roles to come but the vehicles were poor and she left films at the advent of sound. Mersereau's younger sister was the actress Claire Mersereau (1894-1982), with whom she appeared in The Avalanche (1915).