About Elvira Pagã
Elvira Olivieri Cozzolino, better known by her stage name Elvira Pagã, was a Brazilian vedette, actress, singer, writer, and painter. She was the first Rio Carnival Queen, the first woman to wear a bikini in public, and one of the first women to undergo cosmetic surgery in Brazil. Talented and controversial, she defied the status quo and challenged prevailing machismo with fearless audacity during the Brazilian military dictatorship and the revolutionary 1960s. In her later years, Pagã withdrew from public life, devoting herself to writing and painting, and eventually died in seclusion. In the early 1950s, after breaking her swimsuit and refashioning it into a bikini, she became known as the first woman to wear a bikini on Copacabana beach. Elvira began a solo recording career with Continental Records of São Paulo in 1944.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.