Florence Hines (1868–1924) was a Black American vaudeville entertainer who was best known for performing throughout the United States in the 1890s as a male impersonator with Sam T. Jack's Creole Burlesque show.

[4][5][6] The Creole Show was created when Buffalo Bill Cody made a $1,000 bet with his friend Sam T Jack, a white Chicago entrepreneur, that "the African could never shine upon the stage".

"It serves its legitimate purpose for which it was originally conceived," wrote the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette, " that of introducing a new type of beauty and native artists, and retaining its novelty by the introduction of new ideas; it is still one of the most popular attractions of the day.'

In 1893, Hines also performed as a male impersonator with Eaton's Afro-American Vaudeville Company, managed by Black comedian and entrepreneur Harry S.

[14][15] In 1896, she was one of the many celebrity performers in a "wildly successful" touring company called Darkest America that traveled fourteen states and included Sam Lucas and Billy Miller.

[16] Two years later, she entertained a full house with the Big Afro American Company, where she was featured along with male soprano Sylvester Russell.

"The utmost intimacy has existed between the two women for the past year," said the Cincinnati press, 'their marked devotion being not only noticeable but a subject of comment among their associates of the stage."

[18] [19] The following year, Hines and a female co-star were insulted and then assaulted by a man named William Brown as they finished their performance at the Olympia Theater in New York and were trying to catch a cable car.

"[9] Twenty-first century scholars and historians have written that African American male impersonators like Hines gave a more positive spin to the Black dandy that was often ridiculed by white performers: Hines' performance, wrote historian Henry Elam, made the dandy "into a jazz age sophisticate, resplendent in top coat tails, twirling a cane and donning a top hat.