After becoming a star on the New York stage, the repercussions of her involvement in a weight loss scam motivated her to switch careers to the film business.

In 1898, her parents successfully secured her a two-year scholarship to the American Conservatory of Music offered by Chicago businessman Marshall Field.

[1] After developing her soprano vocal talents and finishing her studies, she joined a touring actors' troupe that featured American "Wild West" entertainment.

[3][2][4] For years, she claimed she had been born with the name Texas, and never let facts stand in the way of her narrative: in a full-page 1910 interview in The San Francisco Call, for example, she falsely stated that her father "was the first white child seen in Waco" (he had in fact been a married adult when he arrived, and white settlers led by Jacob De Cordova had lived in Waco from the early or mid-19th century).

While he was editor at Photoplay, an article written by then-staff journalist Adela Rogers St. Johns remarked that Guinan "bore a distinct resemblance to her uncle, Senator Joe Bailey of Texas.

"[10] Initially finding work as a chorus girl, she adopted the stage name Texas Guinan to give herself an edge in the competitive marketplaces of vaudeville and New York theatre productions.

[13] That same year, she placed an advertisement in newspapers offering $1,000 to any songwriter who provided her with a song of equal popularity to the Gus Edwards–penned "That's What the Rose Said to Me"[14] She appeared as a soprano vocalist in many productions, including The Gay Musician, The Hoyden and The Lone Star.

United States Postmaster General Albert S. Burleson quickly acted to prohibit Guinan from receiving mail through the postal service.

The tour coincided with her unverified account of being casually approached in Berlin by Kaiser Wilhelm II, who engaged her in conversation as she sat alone reading a book.

Her later claims of being in France in 1917 entertaining the troops, and being decorated with a bronze medal by French field marshal Joseph Joffre, have been proven false by the timeline and California location of her prolific film-making.

[31] Guinan was again seen on the screen with two sound pictures, playing slightly fictionalized versions of herself as a speakeasy proprietress in Queen of the Night Clubs (1929) and then Broadway Thru a Keyhole (1933, written by Walter Winchell) shortly before her death.

[30] The 1920 Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution put Prohibition into effect, making sales or transport of alcoholic beverages illegal.

Her introduction into the business was when speakeasy partners Emil Gervasini and John Levi of the Beaux Arts club hired Guinan in 1923 as a singer, for which she was paid $50,000.

Bootleg huckster Larry Fay struck a deal with them to feature the show at his El Fey Club on West 47th Street in Manhattan.

[32][37] When Guinan returned to New York in January 1926, as hostess of the 300 Club at 151 W. 54th Street, the opening night's event was the marriage ceremony for actress Wilda Bennett and Argentine dancer Abraham "Peppy" de Albrew.

[32][38] In July 1926, the 300 Club was raided by the police, who seized bottles of liquor and arrested two people for "violation of the section of the penal code forbidding suggestive dances".

[39] The last week of June 1928, Assistant U.S. Attorney General Mabel Walker Willebrandt ordered a raid of speakeasy clubs in New York.

She attempted to move to Europe, but Scotland Yard threatened to board her ship if she tried to land in England, where she was on their list of "barred aliens".

She fell ill in Vancouver, British Columbia, and died there on November 5, 1933, age 49, exactly one month before Prohibition was repealed; 7,500 people attended her funeral.

Her family donated a tabernacle in her name to St. Patrick's Church in Vancouver in recognition of Father Louis Forget's attentions during her last hours.