The Time Capsule: The Hilton sisters you’ve never heard of
The Hilton twins performed in Villisca’s historic Rialto Theatre Oct. 17, 1930. They were popular, talented, seemingly comfortable with their lives, the delight of audiences. The Rialto’s ad shows trim, attractive girls in a dancing pose, frills on their skirts and bows in their hair, and tells us they were “The World’s Most Unusual and Natural Attraction.” For as little as 25 cents (front row seats were 50 cents) the girls could be seen dancing, singing, playing musical instruments and performing “other entertaining stunts.” Following their show was an “all-talking feature picture.”
Attendees had no way of knowing the Hiltons had been rejected at birth by their unwed mother, given to (or bought by) the midwife and exploited since they were babies.
They were—at the time of their Villisca appearance—becoming a highly successful Vaudeville act. Their wretched final days were far in the future.
Daisy and Violet Hilton were born in England in 1908. They were joined at the hip, Siamese twins, a condition now referred to as conjoined. Biographical material and published newspaper interviews disclose that shortly after birth they were put on display in the window of a pub. When they outgrew the window they continued to entertain by song and dance. At eight years of age they were a sideshow act with a traveling carnival. Their foster mother died when the girls were 11. Her daughter and husband (Edith and Meyer Meyers) became managers and relocated to San Antonio.
The Hilton twins joined the Vaudeville circuit, at one time being part of a revue that included Bob Hope. They were reportedly making several thousand dollars a week, all of it going to someone else.
One year after their Villisca performance, the twins filed suit against their managers. In a nationally publicized trial, they testified to living in penniless servitude. They won, were freed from their contract, and awarded $100,000.
An article in The Review discloses details of an additional lawsuit. Some Villiscans had gotten to know William Oliver, the Hiltons’ advance agent. Mrs. Oliver’s suit alleged that while in town her husband had been enticed into an illicit relationship with one or both of the twins. She asked for $350,000.
The young ladies didn’t do well with men or money, and their careers faltered. The talking movie that followed their act at the Rialto was the wave of the future—movies were bringing about the end of Vaudeville.
Finding it increasingly difficult to secure bookings, Violet accepted a proposal of marriage. The application for a license was turned down in twenty-one states on the grounds of indecency and moral issues. She and her fiancé eventually prevailed, but the union was short-lived. Daisy then married. Hers didn’t last either.
They had a small role in a movie early in their career, and starred in one in 1952. The plot of “Chained for Life” centered on a Siamese twin who is married as a publicity stunt. Things didn’t work out, and she murdered her husband. A judge contemplates a perplexing problem—how to give one girl the gas chamber without punishing the sister.
Although the story sounds promising, “Chained” received awful reviews. (The movie can be seen on YouTube—it really was bad.) This flop pretty much ended the Hiltons’ career as entertainers. After eking out a living with a series of part-time jobs, they eventually settled into work in the produce section of the Park-N-Shop market in Charlotte, N.C.
During the Christmas season of 1968, they became ill with Hong Kong flu. On Jan. 5, when they hadn’t been seen for days, police were summoned. Their bodies were found prone on a heating grate, causing speculation they’d huddled there for warmth. The medical examiner determined that Daisy died first; Violet two to four days later.
Dot Jackson, columnist for The Charlotte Observer, wrote that the Hiltons “ ... lived a hummingbird’s life; color and glitter and always on the move. For a time they had glamor and wealth. Both preceded them in death.”
Forty years before their back-to-back demise, they’d played to a full house at the Rialto.
Roy Marshall is a local historian and columnist for the Red Oak Express. He can be contacted at news@redoakexpress.com.