Wyman (born Sarah Jane Mayfield) grew up in Cleveland, southern California, and Missouri. She went to Hollywood at age 15 and began an acting career whose highlights included an Academy Award for the film Johnny Belinda in 1948. In the 1980s she became better known as a character on the TV series Falcon Crest and as the former and first wife of President Ronald Reagan. The Reagan union was one of four broken marriages over the course of Wyman's life. Wyman converted to Catholicism as an adult and ended her days unmarried, as a Third Order Dominican. She had financially supported many Catholic causes in the Diocese of San Bernardino and elsewhere in California.