Gold digger is a term for a person, typically a woman, who engages in a type of transactional relationship for money rather than love. If it turns into marriage, it is a type of marriage of convenience. Etymology and usage The term "gold digger" is a slang term that has its roots among chorus girls and sex workers in the early 20th century. In print, the term can be found in Rex Beach's 1911 book, The Ne'er-Do-Well, and in the 1915 memoir My Battles with Vice by Virginia Brooks. The Oxford Dictionary and Random House's Dictionary of Historical Slang state the term is distinct for women because they were much more likely to need to marry a wealthy man in order to achieve or maintain a level of socioeconomic status. The term rose in usage after the popularity of Avery Hopwood's play The Gold Diggers in 1919. Hopwood first heard the term in a conversation with Ziegfeld performer Kay Laurell. As an indication on how new the slang term was, Broadway producers urged him to change the title because they feared that the audience would think that the play was about mining and the Gold Rush. Society and culture General There exist several cases where female public figures have been perceived as exemplars of the gold digger stereotype by the public. The best-known gold digger of the early 20th century was Peggy Hopkins Joyce. Joyce was a former show girl who married and divorced millionaires. She was characterized as a gold digger during her divorce battle with Stanley Joyce during the early 1920s. Some have argued that she was the real-life inspiration for Lorelei Lee, the protagonist in Anita Loos’ 1925 novel Gentlemen Prefer Blondes which holds gold digging as a central theme. Additionally, some have contended that the term "gold digger" was coined to describe her. Former Olympian Eleanor Holm was dubbed the "swimming gold digger" for her divorce contest with Broadway impresario Billy Rose during the 1950s. The press and public described model and actress, Anna Nicole Smith, as a gold digger for marrying multi-millionaire octogenarian J. Howard Marshall II. There was even a book published as a Little Blue Book (Little Blue Book No. 1392, Confessions of a Gold Digger, by Betty Van Deventer, 1929). Law The recurring image of the gold digger in Western popular media throughout the 1920s and 1930s developed into an important symbol