Mr. Thompson returned to the United States in 1897, and rejoined Primrose and West’s Minstrels for the season. Practically all of the ensuing time until 1910, when he formed an alliance with Will Oakland, has been with the companies of Primrose and Dockstader, and Lew Dockstader.
Mr. Thompson is concededly one of the foremost baritones in minstrelsy.
W. H. Thompson was born in Liverpool, England, October 28, 1869.
John L. Sullivan, the former champion pugilist, was the principal feature of the Lester and Allen’s Minstrels, season of 1885-86.
Mr. Sullivan appeared in classic statuary poses; also New York, Brooklyn and Philadelphia.
Geo. Beban began—in minstrelsy. He had to begin somewhere. Away back March 19, 1883, in San Francisco at the Standard Theatre, he was with Emerson’s Minstrels.
The closing burlesque was “Pinafore”; and the man who can look and talk like Napoleon—before Waterloo—was one of the “rapturous maidens.” O! George, aren’t you awful.
Ed. Latell, the well-known comedian and banjoist, made his first professional appearance at the Bella-Union Theatre in San Francisco, in 1887. He subsequently was a feature of Cleveland’s, and George Wilson’s Minstrels.
Mr. Latell is no longer a minstrelite, but a vaudevilleite. He was born in Los Angeles, Cal., about 1869.
Billy Gould (Wm. J. Flannery), the brilliant versatile comedian, now once more of the well-known pair, Gould and Surratt, was a Madrigal Boy with “Emerson’s Minstrels” in San Francisco in 1883.