The two men who were the commanding generals of the The Opera War (as the newspapers loved to call it) between the Metropolitan Opera and the Manhattan Opera/Philadelphia Opera Company - financier Otto Kahn (1867-1934) in his dapper overcoat and bow…
The dancer Maud Allan in her vaudeville performance of "The Vision of Salome" at London's Palace Theatre in 1908. Allan (1873-1956), a Canadian, danced her interpretation of Salome at theaters worldwide - amazingly, she was actually performing tople…
The header image is the newly-completed Philadelphia Opera House in 1908 (courtesy Special Collections Research Center, Temple University Libraries). This is followed by a composite drawing of the opera house, Oscar Hammerstein, and the soprano Mari…
The above photograph is the graduating class of 1900 at Lincoln College (later Lincoln University) in Oxford, Pennsylvania - to the southwest of Philadelphia. As you can see, there were some white students at Lincoln, but the large majority of…
Above, the William B. Collins' 1973 review in the Philadelphia Inquirer about his visit to the Locust Street Theatre to see Pajama Tops.As you can see, we didn't even quote all the best lines from the article in our episode - especially the headline…
Above, a contemporary photo montage of the six principal members of The Theatrical Syndicate. Philadelphia producers Samuel F. Nixon (Nirdlinger) and J. Fred Zimmerman - and their mustaches - can be seen at the bottom. Above, Abraham Lincoln Erlang…
Above is the top of the front page of the Philadelphia North American for Tuesday, October 23rd, 1906. The article, "3000 Negroes Start Riot Trying to Stop Objectionable Play" - the report on the disturbance at the Walnut Street Theatre the previous…
Above, the title page for the 1845 of George Lippard's full novel The Quaker City. The illustrator, Felix Octavius Carr Darley, depicts both The Devil Bug revealing a secret tunnel inside Monk Hall, and also a coffin floating in a river, and its oc…
An 1844 portrait of the young George Lippard, depicted in front of what looks like a lake with a medieval castle (likely referring to a scene from his book The Ladye Annabel). The image is a lithograph by Albert Newsom, from a daguerreotype by John …
ABOVE, a view of Philadelphia in 1840, from the collection of the Library Company of Philadelphia. We can see in this image a view of the Philadelphia waterfront, looking across the Delaware River from New Jersey. The City of Camden is actually…
Cover of Barry Witham's book, A Sustainable Theatre, with an engraving of the Hedgerow Theatre by Wharton EsherickBelow, photo of Jasper Deeter on the stage of the Hedgerow Theatre, in a scene from Susan Glaspel's Inheritors. Arthur Rich and Jasper…
Paul Robeson, in a photo taken by the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin in February of 1974. PART ONE: BEGINNINGSBy the time the above photo was taken, Robeson's history in Philadelphia stretched almost fifty years. Below, an ad that …
Above, John Barrymore's oblong grave marker at Mount Vernon Cemetery in North Philadelphia. After many years of being unmarked, the oblong was finally placed there largely due to the efforts of local Barrymore buff Mark Apfel. Below left is a photo …
Above, John McCullough in costume as Virginius from Sheridan Knowles' play. It was a role he had inherited from Edwin Forrest.Below, Alexander Reinagle, in a miniature dated "1804" by the painter Robert Field in the collection of the Yale Universi…
To accompany our conversation with Jonathan Shandell and Jerrell Henderson, here are some of the images from Federal Theatre Project archives relating to the shows that we discuss in the episode:Jericho (including rare production photographs o…
Above: Mary B. Robinson in 1994.Below: Jack Stehlin (Oberon), embraces Titania (Gloria Biegler) as the Fairies look on. A Midsummer Night's Dream, directed by Mary B. Robinson, was staged by the Philadelphia Drama Guild at the Zellerbach Th…
Above is the Ida B Siddons Female Mastodons and Burlesque Company poster, described in the episode. After I posted the image on Twitter last year, the scholar Dr. Susan Kattwinkel replied and gave me some more information about it. Apparently t…
Above, John A. Arneaux, in a photo printed in the pages of his privately published edition of Shakespeare's Historical Tragedy of Richard III: Adapted for Amateurs And the Drawing Room. It is quite similar to the Edwin Booth acting version, bu…
As additional information about John Arneaux, here is the sheet music for his song "Jumbo the Elephant King". It is in the collection of the Library of Congress in Washington DC. (Arneaux appears to have written at least two other songs, "You Had Be…
Above, Illustration of Edwin Booth as Richard, in an engraving published in Booth's own acting edition of the play in 1872. Edwin Booth first played Richard III at Philadelphia's newly-built Academy of Music on Tuesday August 24, 1863 -…
Since I refer to it so often in the episode, and because I call the veracity of its details into question during this episode, I thought it was only fair that I reproduce the entire chapter about John A. Arneaux in William Simmons' book Men of Mark:…
Above, a drawing made by Major John Andre, depicting a knight of the Mischianza. According to one source: "André sketched this knight of the Mischianza with his squire for the souvenir book he assembled for Peggy Chew. The picture is a bit of…
As I promised in Episode #26, "The Everlasting Minstrel Show", here is the complete item from the June 13th, 1863 New York Clipper about the "Ira Aldridge Troupe". It was part of a longer article entitled "The Theatrical Record", and had the subhead…
Philadelphia artist Frank Taylor's rendering of Dumont's Minstrel's - also known as the Eleventh Street Opera House. Collection of the Library Company of Philadelphia.By the time Taylor made this drawing in the 1920s, the theater had been demo…
