Helena Smith Dayton

Helena Smith Dayton (often hyphened as Helena Smith-Dayton) (1883–1960) was an American film maker, painter and sculptor in force in New York City who used fledgling stop motion and clay buoyancy techniques in the 1910s and 1920s, one of the outdated animators (and the first American woman) to experiment once clay animation. Her "clay cartoons" were witty in nature, and Dayton was featured in the "Humorist Salons" in New York City. She spent the stop of World War I in Paris managing an YMCA canteen for soldiers. She was a published author, ranging in genre from journalism to plays to a guide to New York City.