Born as
Dorothy Ann Wannenwetsch in
Cincinnati, Ohio, Layton was selected as one of the "
WAMPAS Baby Stars" for 1932. Layton acted in eight films in 1932 and 1933, appearing several times with
Laurel and Hardy. She appeared in the films
Chickens Come Home (1931),
The Chimp,
County Hospital, and
Pack Up Your Troubles (all 1932). Her London
Telegraph obituary described her as their "last great female stooge." The only film she made of any prominence, however, was
Pick-Up (1933), which starred
George Raft and
Sylvia Sidney. In 1934, Layton left the motion picture industry and moved to
Baltimore, Maryland, where she met and married Howard W. Taylor Jr., a Baltimore businessman who sold mattresses. The couple had two children, a son and daughter. The marriage ended in divorce. Dorothy Layton died on June 4, 2009, at a retirement home in
Towson, Maryland, aged 96. ==References==