| # | Fact |
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| 1 | Shirley was originally penciled in to be Carol's mother on The Brady Bunch but the role was re-cast by Sherwood Schwartz. |
| 2 | Is one of 22 Oscar-winning actresses to have been born in the state of New York. The others are Alice Brady, Teresa Wright, Anne Revere, Celeste Holm, Claire Trevor, Judy Holliday, Susan Hayward, Patty Duke, Anne Bancroft, Barbra Streisand, Jane Fonda, Lee Grant, Beatrice Straight, Whoopi Goldberg, Mercedes Ruehl, Marisa Tomei, Mira Sorvino, Susan Sarandon, Jennifer Connelly, Melissa Leo and Anne Hathaway. |
| 3 | In 1960 Shirley Booth was announced for the role of Melissa Frake in the forthcoming 20th Century-Fox Picture "State Fair", eventually released in March 1962, with Alice Faye having replaced Shirley Booth. |
| 4 | Is one of 4 actresses to win the Best Actress Oscar for her film debut (for Come Back, Little Sheba (1952)). The others are Julie Andrews (for Mary Poppins (1964)), Barbra Streisand (for Funny Girl (1968)), and Marlee Matlin (for Children of a Lesser God (1986)). |
| 5 | Was the 38th actress to receive an Academy Award; she won the Best Actress Oscar for Come Back, Little Sheba (1952) at The 25th Annual Academy Awards (1953) on March 19, 1953. |
| 6 | Shirley Booth was the first actress to win the Oscar, the New York Film Critics Circle Award, and the National Board of Review Award as Best Actress all for the same performance as Lola Delaney in "Come Back, Little Sheba". |
| 7 | Is one of 15 actresses to have won the Triple Crown of Acting (an Oscar, Emmy and Tony); the others in chronological order are Helen Hayes, Ingrid Bergman, Liza Minnelli, Rita Moreno, Maureen Stapleton, Jessica Tandy, Audrey Hepburn, Anne Bancroft, Vanessa Redgrave, Maggie Smith, Ellen Burstyn, Helen Mirren, Frances McDormand and Jessica Lange. |
| 8 | Campaigned for the lead roles in Summertime (1955) and Desk Set (1957), both of which she originated on stage, but lost both parts to Katharine Hepburn. |
| 9 | Biography in: "The Scribner Encyclopedia of American Lives". Volume 3, 1991-1993, pages 67-70. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2001. |
| 10 | Her father, Albert J. Ford, was a "martinet," a salesman for I.B.M. Corporation, and was a stern taskmaster. She was closer to her mother, Virginia Wright Ford. Her parents separated when Shirley was in her teens, and her mother died in 1933. Her father remarried and lived his life out in Brooklyn. When Shirley decided to act for a living, her father forbade her to use the family name, thereby losing the "Ford" and the "Thelma" in her name and becoming "Shirley Booth." After her parents' divorce, Shirley never saw or spoke to her father again out of the cruelties he inflicted on both her and her mother. |
| 11 | At age 12 she joined the Hartford Stock Company. For the next six years she did up to three plays a week, sometimes walk-ons, touring road and stock companies. |
| 12 | Divorced from Ed Gardner in the 1940s, the marriage was a rocky one as Gardner was a drinker and inveterate womanizer. She remarried in 1943 to William H. Baker, a kindly investment banker. The union was a happy but relatively short one. She was in rehearsals for "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" when he died suddenly of a heart ailment. She had no children from either marriage. |
| 13 | Later auditioned for but did not win the title role of radio's "Our Miss Brooks", the role that made Eve Arden a star in 1948. |
| 14 | Lived next to Julie Harris. |
| 15 | Died at her home in North Chatham, Massachusetts. |
| 16 | Three actresses earned Academy Awards nominations for playing the same character in motion picture versions of her plays: Ruth Hussey in The Philadelphia Story (1940), Rosalind Russell in My Sister Eileen (1942) and Katharine Hepburn in Summertime (1955). |
| 17 | Is mentioned by Jason Alexander's character "George Constanza" on the Seinfeld (1989) episode "The Subway" (1992). |
| 18 | First actress to win an award at the Cannes Film Festival and an Oscar for the same role (Come Back, Little Sheba (1952)) |
| 19 | Won three Tony Awards: in 1949, as Best Supporting or Featured Actress (Dramatic) for "Goodbye, My Fancy;" in 1950, as Best Actress (Dramatic) for "Come Back, Little Sheba," a role she recreated in an Oscar-winning performance in the film version of the same name, Come Back, Little Sheba (1952); and in 1953, as Best Actress (Dramatic) for "Time of the Cuckoo." |
| 20 | Became the fourth performer to receive the Triple Crown of Acting, winning an Academy Award in 1953, three Tony Awards (1949, 1950 and 1953) and two Emmy Awards (1962, 1963). |
| 21 | One of only eight actors to have won both the Tony and the Oscar for the same role on stage and film. The others are Yul Brynner (The King and I (1956)), Joel Grey (Cabaret (1972)), Rex Harrison (My Fair Lady (1964)), Anne Bancroft (The Miracle Worker (1962)), Paul Scofield (A Man for All Seasons (1966)), José Ferrer (Cyrano de Bergerac (1950)) and Jack Albertson for The Subject Was Roses (1968). |
| 22 | Portrayed Miss Duffy on "Duffy's Tavern" (CBS Radio: 1941-1942; NBC-Blue Radio: 1942-1943). |
| 23 | Is interred in Mount Hebron Cemetery, Montclair, New Jersey. |
| 24 | Known for a while as Thelma Booth Ford. |
| 25 | Made her Broadway debut in the play "Hell's Bells" opposite Humphrey Bogart (26 January 1925). |
| 26 | Born to Albert James Ford and his wife Virginia Martha Wright, she had one sister, Jean Valentine Ford (born in 1914). |
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