Who Was Paul Mansfield? The Real Story Behind Jayne Mansfield’s First Husband

You search “Paul Mansfield” and you get pages about Jayne Mansfield.

You see his name mentioned once, maybe twice. Then the article moves on back to Jayne, her movies, her dresses, her Pink Palace.

Paul disappears. That bothered us. So we went looking for his real story. We read his full obituary, cross checked historical records, and traced his life from birth to death. What we found was a man worth knowing on his own terms.

He fought in Korea. He worked his way from theater usher to corporate manager. He raised five children. He ran a church bus ministry that fed families crossing Texas on long road trips. And yes he gave Hollywood one of its most famous last names, without getting any credit for it.

This is his story, told properly for the first time.

Quick Facts

Detail	Info
Full Name	Paul James Mansfield
Born	November 28, 1929 Galveston, Texas
Died	June 8, 2013 San Angelo, Texas
Age at Death	83
Profession	Public Relations, Corporate Manager
First Wife	Jayne Mansfield (married 1950, divorced 1958)
Second Wife	Mary Sue Greer (married June 1, 1957)
Children	5 total
Net Worth	Est. $300,000 – $700,000
Military	U.S. Army Reserve, Korean War, 2nd Lieutenant

Early Life Growing Up in Dallas

Paul James Mansfield was born on November 28, 1929, in Galveston, Texas. It was Thanksgiving Day.

His parents were Norman William Mansfield and Virginia Ruth Pigue Mansfield. In 1932, the family packed up and moved to Dallas. Paul was just three years old.

He grew up in Oak Cliff, a neighborhood on the southwest side of Dallas. It was not a wealthy area. But it was tight-knit, and his parents kept a stable, disciplined home.

He had two sisters Martha Virginia and Norma Ruth. The Mansfield kids were raised to take responsibility seriously.

Even as a teenager, Paul had a restless, curious energy. A few things stand out:

• At 15, he took a solo train trip from Dallas all the way to New York and Washington, D.C.
• At 16, his singing group the Sunset Quartet performed on behalf of Lyndon Johnson’s first Senate campaign.
• At 17, he joined a summer sales crew and hitchhiked alone from Portland, Oregon, back to Los Angeles. He made it home just in time for school.

These were not small things for a teenager in the 1940s. Paul was clearly not the type to sit still.

Education From Community College to University of Texas

Paul graduated from Sunset High School in Dallas in 1947.

He then went to North Texas Agricultural College (NTAC) in Arlington. He hitchhiked back and forth between Oak Cliff and Arlington for five semesters five days a week, no car.

At NTAC he rose to Lieutenant Colonel and Battalion Commander in ROTC. He was also elected cheerleader. Both things. At the same time.

In January 1950, he transferred to the University of Texas in Austin as a junior. He graduated in January 1952 with a BFA in radio production, scriptwriting, and performance, with a minor in journalism.

During his graduation week, he was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the Military Police Corps, U.S. Army Reserve through ROTC. That rank would matter very soon.

Meeting Jayne Christmas Eve, 1949

Before he even graduated, Paul’s life changed at a Christmas Eve party.

He met a girl named Vera Jayne Palmer. She was 16, still in high school at Highland Park. He was 20, finishing up his degree. They clicked immediately.

A few weeks later, on January 28, 1950, they got married in a quiet private ceremony. They kept it secret at first. Later, they held a public wedding on May 10, 1950 in Fort Worth, Texas.

Sources disagree on which ceremony was the “real” one. Paul always said the January elopement came first. Jayne later suggested she had already gotten pregnant before they wed. Either way, on November 8, 1950, their daughter Jayne Marie Mansfield was born in Dallas.

Vera Jayne Palmer became Jayne Mansfield that day and she liked the sound of it.

Paul, meanwhile, hoped that a baby might shift Jayne’s focus away from Hollywood. He was wrong. She wanted to be a star, and a baby was not going to change that.

Korean War Service The Chapter Nobody Talks About

This is the part of Paul’s life that almost never gets mentioned. Not one major article covers it properly.

In early 1952, Paul was called up to active duty with the U.S. Army Reserve. The Korean War was on, and his ROTC commission meant he was going.

Here is what actually happened, step by step:

• March 1952 Entered active service
• Camp Gordon, Georgia Trained as cadre in the Military Police School. He led a full training platoon.
• January 1953 Boarded a troop ship and sailed for Korea, assigned as a replacement to the 8th Army
• July 1953 The Korean War ceasefire was signed
• August 1953 Assigned to a Military Police unit in Osaka, Japan, providing security for U.S. troops on rest and recreation leave
• March 1954 Sent to Fort Bliss, Texas, to muster out of the Army

He was gone for about two years.

While Paul was deployed, Jayne stayed in Dallas. She took acting classes. She appeared on local TV. She practiced. She was not sitting still.

When Paul got back in 1954, he remembered a promise he had made. He had told Jayne that when he returned, they would move to Hollywood together so she could chase her dream. He kept that promise.

Paul Mansfield’s Career More Than Just “Jayne’s Husband”

Most people assume Paul was just tagging along with Jayne. That is not what happened.

Paul had his own working life. Here it is, in order:

1954 Los Angeles

• Joined a public relations firm
• Worked as an usher at Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood
• Became editor of the Los Angeles News-Advertiser, a weekly newspaper

Late 1954 San Francisco

• Joined the News Bureau Staff of Southern Pacific Railroad

1955 Houston, Texas

• Transferred to Houston as Assistant Editor and photographer for the Southern Pacific employee magazine (Texas and New Orleans railroad lines)

1956 Dallas (Dr Pepper Company)

• Joined the corporate staff of Dr Pepper Company as a Merchandiser
• Covered bottling plants across the eastern United States
• Got promoted to Regional Manager
• Relocated to Chattanooga, Tennessee to oversee 12 Dr Pepper plants in Tennessee and North Georgia

This was a legitimate career. He moved cities. He earned promotions. He did the work. Nobody handed him anything.

Hollywood Four Months and Out

In April 1954, Paul moved to Los Angeles with Jayne and little Jayne Marie. They lived in a small apartment in Van Nuys.

It lasted four months.

The arguments were constant about Jayne’s ambitions, her time away from home, the animals she kept (a Great Dane, three cats, two Chihuahuas, a pink-dyed poodle, and a rabbit, all in that small apartment). Paul had agreed to give Jayne six months to break through in Hollywood. She was making progress. But their marriage was falling apart at the same time.

By late 1954, Paul had returned to Dallas on his own.

They separated in 1955.

The Divorce A Long and Painful Process

The separation dragged on for three years.

Here is how it went:

• February 1955 Jayne filed for separate maintenance in California
• 1956 Paul filed for custody of Jayne Marie in Dallas, arguing Jayne was unfit because of her Playboy nude photos. The court disagreed. He lost.
• 1957 Paul filed for divorce in Texas. His grounds: mental cruelty.
• January 8, 1958 The divorce was finalized.

And then Jayne did something Paul probably did not expect.

She kept his last name.

She told people: “I liked the sound of Mansfield. It had star quality.”

That name went on to become one of the most recognized names in 1950s Hollywood. Paul’s surname the name of a Dallas boy who hitchhiked across America and served in Korea became an icon. And Paul had nothing to do with it after 1958.

Life After Jayne A New Start

Here is the part of Paul’s story that nobody tells.

In 1956, while the divorce was still being sorted out in courts, Paul met a woman named Mary Sue Greer at Cliff Temple Baptist Church in Dallas. She was a widow with a young son.

They fell in love fast.

On June 1, 1957, they married. Paul adopted Mary Sue’s son, Robert Otie Greer. The boy’s name became Robert Greer Mansfield.

Together, Paul and Sue built a real family. They had four more children:

• Paul James Mansfield Jr.
• Jennifer Suzanne Mansfield Peal
• Amy Foster Mansfield Babinski
• Plus Jayne Marie, who stayed connected to her father’s side

Over the next 56 years, Paul and Sue moved 11 times:

Chattanooga → Nashville → Dallas → Macedonia, Ohio → Kingston, New Jersey → Temple, Texas → Dallas (again) → San Angelo, Texas

Every move followed a job or a calling.

His faith became the anchor of his later years:

• He was ordained as a deacon at Wilshire Baptist Church in Dallas
• He taught English as a Second Language to immigrant students
• At First Baptist Church in San Angelo, he started a bus ministry that made bag lunches and handed them out to families passing through on long highway drives
• He volunteered for years at Baptist Memorials

No press releases. No publicity. Just work.

Paul Mansfield Net Worth

Paul was not a rich man by any Hollywood measure.

His estimated net worth at the time of his death was $300,000 to $700,000.

That figure comes from decades of steady work in mid-level corporate and media roles. He was a Regional Manager, not a CEO. He had no royalties, no entertainment deals and no inherited wealth.

What he had was a consistent income earned through real work over 30-plus years, a paid-off family life, and no debt associated with celebrity excess.

He was comfortable. His family was taken care of. That seems to have been enough for him.

Paul Mansfield’s Death June 8, 2013

Paul James Mansfield died on June 8, 2013 in San Angelo, Texas. He was 83 years old.

He is survived by:

• His wife of 56 years, Mary Sue Greer Mansfield
• Daughter Jayne Marie Mansfield (with Jayne Mansfield)
• Robert Greer Mansfield and wife Miriam
• Paul James Mansfield Jr. and wife Lorie
• Jennifer Suzanne Mansfield Peal and husband Tom
• Amy Foster Mansfield Babinski and husband Jeffrey
• Multiple grandchildren and great grandchildren

His obituary described a man who traveled the world with his wife, sang with her, built a life with her, and loved his children. It did not mention Jayne Mansfield until the middle of the text. That felt right.

Paul lived 55 years after his divorce from Jayne. That is a lot of living that nobody has ever written about.

FAQs

Conclusion

Paul Mansfield spent most of his life being a footnote in someone else’s story.

That bothers us, honestly.

Here is a man who hitchhiked across America as a teenager. Who led troops in Korea. Who worked his way from theater usher to corporate regional manager in less than five years. Who quietly built a second family after a very public divorce. Who fed strangers on Texas highways because he thought it was the right thing to do.

None of that shows up in the articles about him.

When we study celebrity history, we tend to focus on the brightest light in the room. Jayne Mansfield was certainly that. But behind every big story there are people like Paul ordinary men and women living real, complicated, quietly meaningful lives.

Paul never needed a camera. He needed a church, a road, a job, and his family. He found all four, multiple times over.

He died at 83 with a wife who had been by his side for 56 years, five kids, and a community that remembered him as someone who actually showed up.

That is not a footnote. That is a life.