Editing Texas Guinan (section)

==Personal life and early career==
Guinan was one of four siblings born in [[Waco, Texas]], to Irish immigrants Michael and Bessie (née Duffy) Guinan, who had emigrated separately as adults, meeting and marrying in Colorado, where they initially operated a wholesale grocery business.{{refn|group=FN|Sources conflict as to point of origin. Some say both parents immigrated from Dublin, Ireland. Some say one or both of them had been born in Canada to immigrants from Ireland{{Citation needed|date=September 2020}}}} Moving to Texas, they ran a horse and cattle ranch.{{sfn|Shirley|1989|pp=1–3}}

As a child, Guinan was nicknamed "Mamie" and attended parochial school at the Loretta Convent in [[Waco, Texas]]. Growing up on a ranch provided her with basic cowboy skills, and she honed her marksmanship at a local shooting gallery. In 1898, her parents successfully secured her a two-year scholarship to the [[American Conservatory of Music]] offered by Chicago businessman [[Marshall Field]].{{sfn|Shirley|1989|pp=1–3}} After developing her soprano vocal talents and finishing her studies, she joined a touring actors' troupe that featured [[American frontier|American "Wild West"]] entertainment.<ref name=TSHA>{{cite web|last1=Cottrell|first1=Debbie Mauldin|title=Mary Louise (Texas) Guinan|url=https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fgu21|website=Handbook of Texas Online|publisher=Texas State Historical Association|access-date=April 3, 2018|date=June 15, 2010}}</ref>

By 1904 using the name Marie Guinan, she married newspaper cartoonist John Moynahan on December 2. Two years later, Moynahan took a job in Boston. The couple eventually divorced, and Guinan moved to New York to pursue a career as a singer in the entertainment business.{{sfn|Shirley|1989|pp=4–5}}<ref name=TSHA/><ref name=Walter>{{cite news|last1=Anthony|first1=Walter|title=Miss Guinan says she's a lonesome star from Texas|url=https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85066387/1910-12-11/ed-1/seq-39/|access-date=April 3, 2018|work=The San Francisco Call|date=December 11, 1910|page=39}}</ref> For years, she claimed she had been born with the name Texas, and never let facts stand in the way of her narrative: in a full-page 1910 interview in ''The San Francisco Call'', for example, she falsely stated that her father "was the first white child seen in Waco" (he had in fact been a married adult when he arrived, and white settlers led by [[Jacob De Cordova]] had lived in Waco from the early or mid-19th century).<ref>{{cite web|last1=Conger|first1=Roger N.|title=Waco, Tx|url=https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/HDW01|website=Handbook of Texas Online|publisher=Texas State Historical Association|access-date=April 3, 2018|language=en|date=June 15, 2010}}</ref><ref name=Walter/>

Theatre critic and ''[[Photoplay]]'' editor Julian Johnson, her companion for a decade, was influential in the creation of her public persona. Many erroneously believed them to be married.{{sfn|Cullen|Hackman|McNeilly|2007|p=465}}{{sfn|Slide|2010|p=52}} Her 1933 obituaries mention Johnson as her second husband, and millionaire George E. Townley as a third husband. Lacking any verification that the latter two marriages took place, Moynahan is now believed to have been her only husband.<ref name=TSHA/><ref>{{cite news|title=Death Beckons "Texas" Guinan|url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/380493077/?terms=Texas+Guinan|access-date=April 3, 2018|work=Los Angeles Times |url-access=subscription |via=Newspapers.com |date=November 6, 1933|page=2}}</ref>

Johnson's connection is thought to have led to a poem carrying her byline being printed in ''Photoplay''.{{sfn|Slide|2010|p=52}}<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Guinan|first1=Texas|title=Modern Cinderella|journal=Photoplay Magazine|date=April 1915|url=https://archive.org/stream/PhotoplayMagazineApril1915/Photoplay0415#page/n127/mode/2up/search/Texas+Guinan|access-date=April 3, 2018|via=[[Internet Archive]]|page=128}}</ref> An alleged connection to the U.S. Senator from Texas, [[Joseph Weldon Bailey]], evolved over time from a nonspecific tie to her family, to Guinan's being the senator's niece. The niece relationship seems implausible, since her parents were born and raised in a different country than either Senator Bailey or his wife. Mentions of him coincide with the timeline of her association with Julian Johnson. While he was editor at ''Photoplay'', an article written by then-staff journalist [[Adela Rogers St. Johns]] remarked that Guinan "bore a distinct resemblance to her uncle, Senator [[Joseph Weldon Bailey|Joe Bailey]] of Texas."<ref>{{cite news|title=Texas Guinan Visits Pres. Taft|url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/83577941/?terms=Texas+Guinan+favorite+niece|access-date=April 3, 2018|work=The Ogden Standard |url-access=subscription |via=Newspapers.com|date=November 12, 1909|page=6, col. 5}}; {{cite journal|last1=St Johns|first1=Adela Rogers|author-link1=Adela Rogers St. Johns|title=Guinan of the Guns|journal=Photoplay|date=February 19, 2024 |issue=July–December 1919|pages=59–60|url=https://archive.org/stream/phojuldec17chic#page/n205/mode/2up/search/Texas+Guinan|publisher=Photoplay Magazine Publishing Company|via=[[Internet Archive]]}}</ref>