Stage Mobs a Specialty

The fun, but of course equally damnable, thing about research is that you always find things you were not looking for.  It's like exploring a foreign city with map in hand and suddenly saying "You know, that side alley is pretty darn interesting".  So it is down the alley, or as it is more commonly phrased, down the rabbit hole.

I'm doing research for a program on early movie theaters in our community.  Much of it is done with photos from the historical society and archived newspapers.  But while looking here and there I ran across a source called: Julias Cahn's Official Theatrical Guide.  

Starting in 1896 and spanning the era when "moving pictures" began to supplant vaudeville it is a treasure trove of information.  I was only looking for material on the local theaters, but in its hundreds of pages there is much more.  Lets have a look at some ads.....

Ben-Hur stables!  Of course this 1907 edition of the Official Theatrical guide is not referencing the classic 1959 movie.  That was based on an 1880 book written by Lew Wallace, Civil War general and one time governor of New Mexico Territory.  Horses for Stage Use.  Who knew?

The term "Klieg Light" for early arc lamp theater illumination was known to me.  I did not know it was marketed by the Brothers Kliegl.  So where did the L go?  Evidently the trade name was actually Klieglight with the L in the middle going with both Kliegl and Light.  An interesting company, they only went out of business in 1996, as by then everything electrical was being produced on the Cheap and in the East.

Ethel Barrymore.  Obviously part of the famous Barrymore family of actors.  Grand aunt to the fetching Drew Barrymore.  Supposedly, before he became famous, Winston Churchill proposed to her.

1907 was in the transition period where Vaudeville was in decline and Moving Pictures were ascendant.  Archie L. Shepard worked both sides of the aisle with "Moving Pictures Augmented by High Class Vaudeville".

Oh yes, the Stage Mobs.  Not something you'd need every day, but if you did.....