Eduardo Cansino (Sr.)

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Eduardo Cansino (born in Castilleja de la Cuesta, Spain, on March 2, 1895, and died December 24, 1968 in Pompano Beach, Florida), was an accomplished dancer, an actor, and the brother of Spanish dancer Elisa Cansino.

In 1917 he married his partner in the Ziegfeld Follies Volga Haworth, and they had three children, Margarita Carmen, Eduardo Jr., and Vernon. Margarita Carmen Cansino would become the famous actress and dancer, Rita Hayworth, who took her professional surname from a variation of her mother's maiden name.

According to Barbara Leaming's biography on Hayworth, If This Was Happiness, her relationships with men were often difficult due to the physical, sexual and emotional abuse she endured from her father at a young age. These revelations were made during interviews with Orson Welles in later years. She confided in him about the incest in particular, as well as several beatings. At one point in the biography Welles recalls that when Cansino tried to visit he would always have to throw him out. "He was a terrible man," Welles recalls. "And she really hated him. She couldn't deal with him at all."