Circus Historical Society
Edited by William L. Slout and dedicated to the late Charles Crain, actor, director and longtime friend, who insisted I compile it. "Charlie, rest in peace." Copyright © 2005 by William L. Slout. All rights reserved.
"Early History of Negro Minstrelsy," by Col. T. Allson Brown
Burnt Cork Supplement
“Negro Minstrelsy: Its Starting Place Traced Back Over Sixty Years, Arranged and Compiled from the Best Authorities,” by Charles White
“The Golden Days of Minstrelsy,” by Frank Dumont
“Three Years as a Negro Minstrel,” by Ralph Keeler
“The Younger Generation in Minstrelsy and Reminiscences of the Past,” by Frank Dumont
“Some Cork and Sawdust 'Thinks' of the Past,” by Kit Clarke
“The Rise and Fall of Negro Minstrelsy,” by Brander Matthews
This volume is representative of the Clipper's contributions to minstrel history. With but one exception, all of the material has been compiled from its pages. Col. T. Allston Brown’s “Early History of Negro Minstrelsy,” a painstaking documentation of its “rise and progress in the United States,” was carried in fifty-nine installments, beginning with the anniversary issue on February 17, 1912, and continuing intermittently through March 8, 1914. The work is the most complete record of the genre ever assembled.
T. Allston Brown (1836-1918) is often underrated as an amusement historian, perhaps because he lacks an eloquence of style. He possesses neither the fluidity of William Dunlap, the quaintness of Joseph Ireland, nor the whimsy of George C. D. Odell. But where other 19th century amusement chroniclers were primarily interested in the “higher drama,” Brown concerned himself with a broader theatre; where they identified themselves with their immediate theatrical provinces, Brown kept no provincial borders. In announcing the beginning of Brown’s Clipper series on the “History of the American Theatres.” (March 10, 1888), the editor stated:
Brown’s varied experiences in the theatrical profession as literary correspondent, publisher, editor, business agent, advance man, circus treasurer, theatre manager, and talent agent supplied him with an intimate understanding of the business and its people. The mobility required by the nature of his various employments allowed him to collect material from the innumerable cities he visited. His published History of the American Stage (1870) and A History of the New York Stage from the First Performance in 1732 to 1901, three volumes (1903), are still in use, but his other material, his prolific contributions to the New York Clipper, are not easily available to the general researcher. They have been buried on dusty archival shelves for over one hundred years. And the microfilm copies of the paper, with its small type and hazy images, make for laborious reading. It is the intent of the editor, therefore, to create a greater accessibility to Brown’s “Early History of Negro Minstrelsy” as compiled in Burnt Cork and Tambourines.
To this end, Brown’s work, which originally resembled a “scrapbook,” almost randomly assembled, has been freely tampered with. The material has been re-arranged and edited into a more orderly format so as to enhance its usefulness as a source book of minstrelsy.
To make the volume more complete, additional material has been added, separated from Brown’s efforts through the Burnt Cork Supplement, a collection of articles written by men who were closely involved with the blackface entertainment. The selections were originally published over a period from 1860 to 1915. They augment Brown’s history by giving a more personal view of minstrelsy and minstrel people.
Charles White (1821-1891), author of “Negro Minstrelsy: Its Starting Place Traced Back Over Sixty Years,” is one of the earliest of minstrel performers. His recollections on the origin of minstrelsy add another piece to that controversial pie. He was said to have kept a diary of all that transpired in the profession; and, we are assured by the Clipper, he “is always found to be correct in his summing up.” A biographical sketch of this famed minstrel can be found in the section Brown's Burnt Cork Biography
Frank Dumont’s “The Golden Days of Minstrelsy” and “The Younger Generation in Minstrelsy and Reminiscences of the Past” are supported by the authority of the writer’s long career as a minstrel and manager of minstrel companies. He was perhaps a more prolific composer of songs, jokes, and afterpieces than anyone in the field. As manager, his record of continuous engagement at the Eleventh Street Opera House, Philadelphia, with the Dumont Minstrels, has never been surpassed. Dumont came from Utica, NY, the home town of minstrels Billy Birch, Sam Hague, Tom Prendergast and others. He began with George Christy as a boy singer at 585 Broadway and worked with a number of troupes before joining the Carncross party in Philadelphia in 1882. When Carncross retired in 1893, Dumont became the manager, a position he held until 1911, when the final curtain rang down on May 13 to the strains of “Auld Lang Syne.”
Ralph Olmstead Keeler’s (1840-1873) charming account of his experiences in “Three Years as a Negro Minstrel” was carried in three parts by the Clipper from August 1 through August 15, 1874, a reprint of an earlier piece in the Atlantic Monthly. Keeler was born near Toledo, Ohio. Orphaned at eight and in the charge of a guardian, he went to Buffalo to attend school, but, finding it not to his liking, ran away. For the next four years he wandered about the Great Lakes, serving as pantry and cabin boy on the ships. He followed a path of self-reliance, which led him to a season of railroading before serving a three year stint as a minstrel. Following this he attended college at Cape Giradeau, Missouri. He took a tour of Europe with $181 as capital, where he had a brief stay at Karl-Rupert University at Heidelberg. He lived abroad for two years, scantily supporting himself through contributions to American papers and foreign magazines. As a journalist, Keeler contributed articles to various periodicals, including Atlantic Monthly, Alta California, Golden Era, Every Saturday, etc. What is considered his best work, Vagabond Adventures, an autobiographical account of his life, appeared in 1870. On November 25, 1873, he left for Cuba as a special correspondent for the New York Tribune. He served the Tribune in Santiago during the excitement over the Virginius massacre - the execution of 53 men aboard a U. S. ship by the Spanish in 1873 because the vessel was carrying arms to Cuba. On December 15, 1873, he embarked on the ship Cienfuegos, en route from Santiago to Havana on his return to New York. On the night of the 17th he either fell or was thrown overboard and disappeared into the sea - dead at but thirty-three years of age. The article included herein was published after his demise.
Al G. Field (1850-1921), one of the last of the great cork artists and managers, relates in “Minstrelsy” his pleasing recollections of the great Dan Emmett. Field, whose real name was Alfred Griffith Hatfield, began as a ballad singer at the age of fifteen with Sharpley, Sheridan, Mack & Day’s Minstrels. In 1886 he formed his own minstrel troupe, which he operated successfully until his death in 1921 - during which time, so he claimed, he never had a losing sea- son - and became a wealthy man, known as the “Millionaire Minstrel,” from his successful managerial activities in that line of business. He was considered a good minstrel performer, remembered for his monologues. His training in management came from working with the Sells Bros.’ Circus and with Duprez & Benedict’s Minstrels, both outfits being noted for their advertising practices. It is said that Field was the first minstrel manager to carry entire stage settings and scenery and the first to use a special train of cars for transporting his troupe. He was a devoted family man and fond of dogs and horses. Indeed, he carried a fine pair of horses with the show to drive about in the cities he visited. His permanent residence was in Columbus, OH, where he owned considerable real estate, which included his “Maple Villa” Farm, located in the Olentangy Valley near the city, on which he bred blooded horses, pedigreed cattle, game fowl, and hogs. By 1909, he was director of the Central National Bank of Columbus, the Columbus Casualty Co., and had an interest in the street railway system there. And he was the author of the book Watch Yourself Go By.
Birkit “Kit” Clarke (1845-1918), the author of “Some Cork and Sawdust 'Thinks' of the Past,” was for many years an advance agent for a variety of traveling amusements. He was connected with Satterlee & Bell’s Circus, 1858, at the early age of thirteen. Within a few years he took up the study of photography in Chicago. However, he was back in the business with VanAmburgh’s Menagerie, 1864-67, during which time the circus visited Europe. For nine years throughout the 1870s he was director of press work for Adam Forepaugh’s Circus, being one of the first agents to use alliterative advertising. Aside from circus work, he occupied himself, among other things, by managing Prof. Hartz and Zera, magicians; conducting the business affairs of M. B. Leavitt’s musical troupe, “The Rentz Company”; and accompanying Haverly’s Minstrels to London. He had the distinction of being a friend and fishing companion of Grover Cleveland and Joseph Jefferson. After devoting much time in retirement to the writing of short stories and other items, several of which appeared in the Clipper, he died at his home in Flatbush, NY, at age 86.
The final inclusion in the Supplement, Brander Matthews’ (James Brander Matthews, 1852-1929) “The Rise and Fall of Negro Minstrelsy,” is the only selection not taken from the New York Clipper, it being from Scribner’s Magazine of June, 1915. The piece represents an intelligent assessment of minstrelsy from the perspective of the 20th century by a man well qualified to make it. Matthews’ credentials hardly need explanation. As a respected man of literature, he mingled with the elite writers of his age. He was part of a group who founded the Authors’ Club, the American Copyright League, the Dunlap Society, the Kinsmen, and the Players. He was a prolific writer on theatrical matters, the list of books, articles and plays being too long to mention. As a professor of literature at Columbia University he became the first man to hold the Chair of Dramatic Literature at a United States university. He has been called the “last of the gentlemanly school of critics and essayists that distinguished American literature in the last half of the nineteenth century.”
William L. Slout
