John A. Ellsler was an American actor, theatre manager and acting instructor who helped make Cleveland, Ohio one of the more important theatre towns in post Civil War America. Ellsler was instrumental in starting the careers of several well known actors of that period including his daughter's, and had once been a friend and business partner of the assassin, John Wilkes Booth.

Euphemia "Effie" Ellsler was an American actress of stage and screen whose career had its beginnings when she was a child and lasted well into the 1930s. She was best remembered over her early career for playing the title role in Steele MacKaye's hit play Hazel Kirke, and as the self-sacrificing Bessie Barton in Frank Harver's Woman Against Woman. Ellsler remained active during her later years appearing between 1901 and 1936 in at least six Broadway productions and twenty-two motion pictures.