The Mormons and the Theatre; or, The History of Theatricals in Utah

by John S. Lindsay

CHAPTER XIX.

SEASON OF '74-'75.

To open this season the stock company were brought into requisition again and played up to the 5th of September. On the 7th and 8th Howarth's Hibernica, a panoramic show with specialties filled in the time. The Vokeses returned on the 9th and filled out the remainder of the week, making ten nights and two matinees they got in during the heated term which was sufficient proof of their popularity. Close on their heels came the Hoskins-Darrell combination, consisting of William Hoskins, his wife, Fannie Colville, George Darrell and his wife. They were supported by the stock company and played from the 14th to the 23rd inclusive. Hoskins was an English actor of great and varied experience, and in high comedy roles was greatly admired. He was a man of sixty years of age and had been in Australia for a good many years. His wife, Fannie Colville, was very much his junior, in fact, it was a May and December alliance and apparently bore the usual kind of fruit. Fanny was not a great actress but was very pretty and attractive, in fact, too much so to prove comfortable to her much senior lord and master. The Darrells were clever and talented. The combination proved fairly successful. They toured about the country for a year or so and then returned to Australia with more experience than money, wiser if not richer. They wooed content in their former home.

The October conference approaching, the stock company were put in rehearsal for some suitable plays and the "Royal Marrionettes" were put in as an additional attraction for the conference season and continued for nine nights from October 5th to the 13th inclusive. The Marrionettes proved to be highly amusing and interesting entertainment and combined with the efforts of the stock company in drama gave the conference visitors the worth of their money and replenished the treasury to a considerable extent.

The next attraction also worked in conjunction with the stock company. This was Laura Honey Stevenson (now Mrs. Church), a lady of some celebrity as a reader. She was assisted in her entertainments by a brilliant young baritone singer, Mr. John McKenzie, whose singing proved to be quite taking and this conjunction lasted for eight nights.

It was during this last engagement that there occurred quite an exodus from the Salt Lake Stock company to John Piper's theatre at Virginia City, Nevada. Mr. J. A. Sawtelle and wife and daughter, a girl of twelve or fourteen years, Miss Adams (Mrs. Kiskadden), her daughter Maude, now two years old, accompanied by Mr. Kiskadden, Miss Carrie Cogswell-Carter with her son Lincoln J., then about ten years of age, and the writer went to Virginia City, all with the exception of Mr. Kiskadden and the children being under engagement to play with Piper for the ensuing season. There is much of interest connected with this exodus from Salt Lake. It materially weakened the stock forces, taking away the leading man, Mr. Sawtelle, the leading heavy (the writer), and leading juvenile lady, Miss Adams, and Miss Cogswell, the principal heavy woman; but their places were filled in a little while and the stock pushed along in the same old way.

The combination system, however, was now gaining ground and the stock companies throughout the country began to suffer correspondingly, their engagements becoming more and more intermittent as the traveling combination became more numerous.

At the opening of the season of '74 and '75 there were so many combinations booked that the managers of the Salt Lake Theatre could not offer the stock company a season's engagement, but only brief periodical engagements between the dates of the various combinations. It was in consequence of this that the above mentioned members of the company took a season's engagement with Mr. Piper of Virginia City. The Comstock was booming in those days and the theatre ran every night, Sundays included. At the close of the Piper season, Miss Adams went to San Francisco taking Maudie with her. There they made their home; Mr. Kiskadden having preceded them there and obtained a good situation as a bookkeeper with the firm of Park & Lacy. Mrs. Kiskadden played occasional engagements at the San Francisco theatres and there in due time little Maude made her first voluntary appearance on the stage, her first appearance which occurred at the Salt Lake Theatre when she was yet in long clothes, having been an involuntary one in which her feelings or inclinations were not consulted.

The writer's stay in Virginia City was brief. Receiving an offer from James A. Herne, who was managing stage at the Bush Street, San Francisco for Tom Maguire, and being anxious to visit the Golden Gate city, I got Mr. Piper to honorably release me by showing him how he could get along without me and save my salary. So, after playing a week at Sacramento during the State fair, I left the Piper company and went to San Francisco by steamboat which was running opposition to the railroad, giving very low rates—only fifty cents from Sacramento to San Francisco. Mr. Kiskadden, who had been with his wife and baby Maude since leaving Salt Lake, decided to take advantage of this low excursion rate on the steamer and go to San Francisco also in the search of a situation. "Jim," as he was familiarly called, was always ready for a little sport in the way of a game of cards or billiards, so as soon as the boat got under way, he got into a game of cards with some kindred spirits and although a crack player and usually a winner, on this occasion he lost every cent he had moreover he likewise lost his hat, a nice new summer one he had recently purchased. The wind was blowing strong upstream and a sudden puff took his hat into the river, leaving "Jim" bareheaded and dead broke; not a very desirable plight to be in going a stranger into a strange city. Moreover, to add to his discomfort, he was wearing a summer suit and as we approached San Francisco the weather was cold and foggy, and "Jim's" clothes were decidedly unseasonable when we reached our destination. Fortunately he had his trunk along and as soon as he got located he effected a change of costume, but he was in a dilemma for money to live on till he could find a job and he appealed to me to lend him a certain sum, which I was unable to do, having barely enough to see me through till I would have a week's salary due, but I let him have enough for immediate necessities, and he was not long in finding friends and a good situation.

My engagement at the Bush Street did not last very long. The house was doing a struggling business when I went there. Emerson's minstrels just across the street were doing a phenomenal business, turning people away every night, while "Jim" Herne at the head of a good company, was playing to very meager houses. "Zoe the Cuban Sylph" was the reigning star when I opened there and my opening part was an Indian—Conanchet, chief of the Naragansetts, in the "Wept of the Wishton Wish."

The Bush Street theatre season ended rather ingloriously soon after the New Year holiday. I had on the very morning preceding our closing night, received a telegram from Mr. Piper of Virginia City, offering me the leading business for the remainder of the season, but declined it, believing the Bush would struggle along. That night we had a new piece on, "The Circus Queen," and it proved such a failure that Tom Maguire decided to close, which he did without any previous notice, so the entire company were out of a job. Next morning I lost no time wiring to Piper to know if the engagement was still open to me and in a few hours I had received the agreeable answer "yes" and took the train the same day for Virginia City. I had been there about three weeks when I met T. B. H. Stenhouse, who was there writing up the Comstock mines for the New York Herald. He said to me, "They need you in Salt Lake badly; why don't you wire them? Katherine Rogers opens there Monday night for a two weeks' engagement and they have no competent leading man to support her." "Well," I said, "they know where I am. If they want me why don't they wire me?" "Will you go," said he, "if I wire for you and get you the engagement?" "Yes," I replied, "I shall be glad to go, for I am tired of this." So he went right off and wired, and the next day I left for home, but did not arrive in time to open with Miss Rogers in the opening bill, but got in on the second night and played throughout the rest of the engagement.

I had been absent from October 14th, 1874, to January 26th, 1875, a little over three months, during which time the following attractions appeared at the Salt Lake Theatre: The Wheeler Comedy troupe, October 29th to 31st. On November 2nd, Risley's Panorama "Mirror of England" opened for a week. On the 13th and 14th the Infantry combination. On the 16th Frank Mayo and Rosa Rand opened a week's engagement presenting "Davy Crockett" and "Streets of New York." On the 25th Agnes Booth and Joseph Wheelock opened in "Much Ado About Nothing," and filled out a week with "King John" and the comedy "Engaged." On December 2nd R. H. Cox, familiarly known as "Daddy Cox," among professionals on the coast, opened a four nights' engagement with "The Detective," which went for two nights. The other two nights he gave "The Bells That Rang Nellie a Bride." Daddy Cox had recently left Piper's theatre in Virginia City, where he had been stage manager for a time.

On the 9th, Harry Rickards, an English comic singer of great spread and self importance, opened for a week's engagement in conjunction with the stock company. Rickards was recently from Australia and put in a week at the Bush Street during the writer's engagement there. His singing and style did not catch on with the San Franciscans. He was too "awfully English, yer know." He did not prove any great attraction in Salt Lake. On the 21st a grand concert was given for the benefit of the Catholic church. On the 22nd, W. J. Florence opened for a week, supported by the stock company. His opening play was "Dombey and Son." He gave besides "No Thoroughfare" and the "Colleen Bawn." Each piece ran two nights, carrying the season through the Christmas holidays and the house closed with his last performance on the 26th until New Year's day. January 1st, 1875, the theatre reopened with the stock company, who, without the assistance of any stellar attraction, played two weeks when the house closed again until the 25th inst.

Of the people who had comprised the stock company the previous season, the following members had drifted away: J. Al. Sawtelle, leading man; Mrs. Sawtelle, general utility; John S. Lindsay, leading heavy; Asenith Adams (Mrs. Kiskadden), leading juveniles; W. S. Crosbie, comedian; Arrah Crosbie, characters; J. H. Vinson, first old man and stage manager; Buck Zabriske, prompter. The uncertain and spasmodic nature of the engagements this season, which had caused this strong contingent of the company to seek other engagements, also prevented the accession of new people to the ranks of the stock company, so that it was in a rather dilapidated and weakened condition, especially for the support of legitimate repertoire, such as Katherine Rogers presented for the patrons of the drama.

On January 25th she opened in "Romeo and Juliet." Mr. "Mike" Foster was the Romeo for the occasion. The "leading men" were all out of the way and this was sudden promotion for Foster one of those opportunities that come but rarely to the ambitious young actor, and nearly always bring new honors and distinction. "Mike" struggled manfully with his task, but he did not make an ideal Romeo. On the following evening the writer made his reappearance with the company, after an absence of three months. He played Master Walter in the "Hunchback" on the occasion and was warmly welcomed by the audience. Miss Rogers played in addition to "Romeo and Juliet" and the "Hunchback," "As You Like It," "Love's Sacrifice," "Pygmalion and Galatea," "Lady of Lyons," "Leah," in which the writer played the following characters respectively: Jacques, Matthew Elmore, Pygmalion, Claude Melnotte, Lorenz. Such a repertory, where each play ran for but two performances, put the company on high tension. Those who had new parts, and particularly if they had never played in the pieces, found it very exacting work. Fortunately for the writer, he had played most of the parts before, yet it was a busy time for him during that engagement.

Following closely on Miss Rogers with her legitimate plays, came the English comedian known professionally as Willie Gill and his wife, Rose Bain. These co-stars had recently been associated with the writer at Piper's theatre at Virginia City, where they played for a month or so in stock and it was a little of a surprise to me to find they had suddenly materialized into stars and were billed for a week at the Salt Lake Theatre. With sublime assurance, especially for a play writer, which Willie even then professed to be (as well as a comedian), he put up Mark Twain's "A Gilded Age." The piece had been but recently dramatized and had made a marked success with John T. Raymond as Col. Sellers. Raymond had played several engagements with us at the Salt Lake Theatre and was a great favorite, and was looking forward to another visit in the near future with his greatest success, Col. Sellers. Some one apprised him by telegram that Gill was billed to play the piece here and he promptly wired a well known law firm to enjoin Gill from playing it. The managers, Clawson and Caine, were also warned not to play it, so an emergency bill was prepared in the event that they should be stopped. The law firm had taken the necessary proceedings and just before "ringing up" time, as no change of performance had been announced, they appeared on the scene with the necessary officer and papers and the performance of "A Gilded Age" was formally and effectually enjoined. "All That Glitters Is Not Gold" was substituted. This was a lesson to the English comedian late from Australia which he possibly never forgot, especially as a few years later he retired from the stage and settled down in New York as a professional writer for the stage. He was a clever adapter and dramatizer, as his version of "A Gilded Age" bore witness, and he no doubt found plenty of materials to use in his craft, whose authors were not so well known as Mark Twain nor so particular in regard to their copyrights. Willie learned the truth of the axiom that "All that glitters is not gold," even "A Gilded Age" on that memorable night, for it materially injured the business during the remainder of his engagement.

"Built on Sand" was the next evening's offering and it was probably too suggestive of Willie's hopes in respect to "A Gilded Age" to be a good drawing card, so it only went the one night. The company had their work cut out here also; the next play was a new one with them; he called it Madge of Elvanlee; it was a dramatization of Charles Gibbons "For the King," a very powerful story of the Restoration period, and gave Rose Bain, his wife, the chance of her life to make a hit as a leading actress; but she failed to score any marked success, giving only a passable rendition of the character. Fortunately again for this individual, he had during his absence played in this play at the Bush Street Theatre. Jim Herne used it as the vehicle for the debut of a talented San Francisco' lady, who created a little ripple of excitement by her advent on the stage. I afterwards played the leading character in it at Virginia in conjunction with Miss Bain and Mr. Gill, so that it was comparatively easy for me in regard to study. This play was forced two nights, meantime the company had another new play sprung on them for Friday night. Miss Rose Bain was evidently bent on being the bright particular star of this engagement. Willie had failed in his Col. Sellers scheme, and Rose saw her opportunity and pushed it to the utmost. "The Sphinx," a mythological play, taxing the powers of no less an actress than Annette Ince (one of the greatest of her time) was the next offering to the public, and an exacting task for the company. Here again I was lucky, as I had only about six weeks before played a week in the piece with Miss Ince at the Bush Street theatre, and although I had now a different part, I was sufficiently familiar with the play to make my task easy, as compared with the rest of the company.

"The Sphinx" did not prove popular, owing largely to Miss Bain's inadequacy. So "Madge of Elvanlee" was restored for Saturday night, and so ended a very unprofitable week, both for "stars" and management. Willie Gill afterwards acquired fame as the writer of several successful comedy sketches. Rose Bain we have never heard of since. From the 13th to the 22nd of February, the theatre was dark, which gave the overworked stock company a rest they no doubt enjoyed, but cut off their salaries, which they did not relish.

On the 22nd, Washington's Birthday, the theatre was used as a ball room—the Firemen gave a "Grand Ball" and for the occasion the theatre was transformed, as it had been a number of times before, to accommodate an enormous crowd of dancers. The entire parquet was covered with floor made in sections, making the stage and the auditorium into one vast dancing hall. Hundreds who did not participate in the dance paid admission fees to sit in the circles and watch the dancers go through the bewitching and bewildering figures to the strains of a fine orchestra secured for the occasion. By the following evening, the floor was removed, the chairs back in place, and the theatre had resumed its normal appearance. On this date, the 23rd, The Alleghanians, a company of Swiss Bell Ringers and Vocalists, opened and played throughout the remainder of the week, five nights and a matinee. The company had now had a three weeks' rest and were anxious to be doing something again, so a series of "benefits" were put on. Commencing on March 6th, Clara Jean Walters took a benefit, playing Edward Tullidge's "Ben Israel," a very powerful play commemorative of the return of the Jews to England. On the 8th Mr. Lindsay "benefited," played "Jack Cade," and on the 10th E. B. Mar den, who had been in the stock for several years, took a benefit, playing Featherly in "Everybody's Friend." The theatre was again closed until the 22nd inst., when The Lingards came in and, supported by the stock, stiffened up business to some extent; continued until the 31 st. The April Conference being close at hand, it was decided to play the stock through the Conference in some of the old favorites, and they continued right along after the Lingards left. That is the marvelous part of it that they could do any business after dropping out a strong stellar attraction, but on they played through the Conference and on up to the 1st of May, when the season closed and with the season the management under the "Salt Lake Theatre Corporation" closed.

Their second season had not proved sufficiently profitable, although they had severely curtailed expenses by cutting down the company, to clear them of indebtedness, and the corporation quit badly in the hole.

The close of the Clawson and Caine management and the end of the Salt Lake Theatre Corporation was virtually the retirement of the stock company, which had been playing from the opening of the theatre in '62 up to the present date, May 1st, 1875, a period of 13 years. Of course a great many changes had taken place during those years in the personnel of the company, but a few of the original members remained, and the organization or ensemble of the company had been kept intact. Now, however, the gradually encroaching combination system made it impracticable for the managers to offer a season's engagement to those who were willing and anxious to engage. The necessity for a stock company became rapidly less from this time on, until in the year 1878 it had become defunct altogether.

Two entertainments were given after the closing of the stock company, before the corporation relinquished the house—on May 4th, Petroleum V. Nasby lectured, and on the 8th Mr. Mark Wilton rented the theatre and put up "The Ticket of Leave Man" for a benefit. To show the status of the company at this particular time, the program for the benefit performance is here appended:

SALT LAKE THEATRE.

Salt Lake Theatre Corporation …………… Proprietors
Clawson and Caine ………………………… Managers

SATURDAY EVENING, MAY 8TH, 1875.

Mr. Mark Wilton has engaged the Theatre for this night and will produce the great drama of

"THE TICKET OF LEAVE MAN."

Supported by the following

CAST OF CHARACTERS:

Bob Briefly, a Lancashire lad ……. Mr. John S. Lindsay
James Dalton (the Tiger) ……………. Mr. M. Forester
Hawkshaw (a detective) ……………… Mr. Mark Wilton
Melter Moss (a crook) ……………… Mr. J. C. Graham
Mr. Gibson (a bill broker) …………. Mr. Harry Taylor
Sam Willoughby …………………. Miss Dellie Clawson
Maltby …………………………….. Mr. Logan Paul
Burton …………………………….. Mr. H. Horsley
May Edwards ………………… Mrs. Clara Jean Walters
Mrs. Willoughby …………………. Miss Belle Douglas

This was the last performance given under the corporation managers and for some time the theatre remained without a manager; if any one wanted it, they had to rent it from President Brigham Young through one of his clerks. My record shows that the writer, on July 24th following, rented the house at the modest sum of one hundred dollars for the bare house. We gave Bulwer's five-act comedy of "Money" besides the farce "A Fish Out of Water" and a musical interlude, by Laura Honey Stevenson and John W. McKenzie, a popular young baritone from San Francisco. The total expense of this performance was $357.00, so it was a risk for an individual to take, but we pulled through clear and had a little left for our trouble.

About this time Mr. W. T. Harris or "Jimmy" Harris, as he was familiarly called, was installed as "business manager" of the theatre; he had succeeded in winning one of Brigham Young's daughters, Miss Louise Young, affectionately called by her friends "Punk." The Annie Ward episode was forgotten or condoned, and Jimmy had ingratiated himself so strongly in the President's good graces as to receive the hand of his favorite daughter, and in order that he might provide liberally for her, he was given the business management of the theatre. He assumed no financial responsibilities in accepting the position, but simply acted as the agent for Brigham Young, to whom he submitted matters of importance. He held down his job for two years or more, until some time after the death of Brigham Young, when the Salt Lake Theatre, which had been appropriated by the late President, (although built with Church means) in the settlement of Brigham's estate reverted to the Church. This brought a change of management and Mr. Harris was superseded by H. B. Clawson, one of the former managers.