As you may or may not know, I recently started a job at a small photo archive (by the way, you may leave quarters or dimes in the straw hat upturned to my left). And I’ve found a treasure chest: three boxes of photos the boss is supposed to pick through, buy what he wants and send the rest back. Film, radio and vaudeville photos from the 1920s-40s.
What I’m obsessed with is the vaudeville photos: not the famous acts, but the ones that never made it. Fascinating, funny, sad, slightly creepy publicity stills of girl singers, clowns, dance teams, comics, blackface acts, apache dancers. “Ray and Sunshine, the Hudson Wonders,” “Paul Remos and His Toy Boys” (!), “The Three Nonchalants,” “Ethel and Dorothea Ponce, Society Entertainers,” “The California Redheads,” “Lynn, Roye & Vanya, Sophisticates of Satire,” “Smith, Rogers & Eddy, Wits of Pantomime,” “Buster Shaver and His Tiny Town Revue,” “Betty Jane Cooper and the Lathrop Bros.: Six Feet With a Single Thought.”
I’d love to buy these myself and approach a publisher (Feral House might be interested) and do a book of these bizarre old photos. It would be a crime to let them wind up in a Dumpster! One of the guys at work even came up with a great title for it: Unnatural Acts. After I am finished with the project I am being paid to do, I want to delicately approach my new boss with the request.
(By the way, I have no internet access at work, which is why my posts have been so hit-and-run . . .)
Thanks . . . But I think I’d actually let the photos speak for themselves. They’re really lovely, some of them–the unlabeled ones are the most fascinating. Who was the lovely blonde with one eye noticeably larger than the other? Who was the weird, creepy little guy with the funny wig? The adagio couple throttling each other? Did these people settle down and get jobs and move away from The Show Business, or did they wind up in walk-up cold-water flats off Times Square, eating in automats and wondering why they never hit the big time? At least I know The Ponce Sisters (despite their unfortunate name) ended happily.
Wonder if I could get John Waters to write a foreward?
Oh, yesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyesyes! Please do this! Don’t let them hit the Dumpster! Do something to save them.
These HAS to be of interest to someone. Groucho Marx used to talk about vaudeville acts like these, and you’ve got pictures!
This sounds like Luc Sante’s story where he recovered glass plates of crime scenes the NYPD took around 1910 when they were experimenting with photography. He published a book about them called “Evidence.”
Hell, yes! Put me down for a copy! When I get a job that pays better than being Zyada’s Toy Boy (! and ;)) I could even chip in a little something toward the photos. (I’d need visiting rights, you understand.) History like that needs to be preserved, and who better than you to do it?
Will you be supplying news clippings as well? I think those were the most amazing part of Wisconsin Death Trip. They really help put things in perspective when one is ranting about how terrible things are nowadays.
Love the idea and I am a huge fan of old B&W photos.
I would put the photos in a book, along with some photos of a few (obscure) acts that actually made it big.
Let the reader look through the book as though he/she were the casting agent back in the 1930’s-40’s and pick the acts you think made it. Let the reader know that 3 or 4 of these actually made the big time.
Then go to the back of the book and read a bio on each of the acts (assuming you can find something on all of them - even if it is “no record of them performing”) and list the acts that went on to be successful.
This would be like playing American Idol a few generations ago. It would be a fun read, great historical document and a game for wannabe casting agents to see if they could have picked the right acts to make it in the biz back then.
Never mind a whole book; I know several of my more colorful friends back in NY who would pay good money to see a photo of anything labled, “Six Feet With A Single Thought.”
Well, I pulled 128 photos, and when the boss gets back from vacation (and when my current project is completed to his delight) I will ask them if I may pleeeeeese have them?
None of these people became even remotely famous, though some of them were billed alongside famous people, like Ozzie Nelson, Olsen & Johnson, Major Bowes. What I’d like to do is something like Luc Sante’s Evidence, which pesch mentioned: have one photo on each page, the only text being whatever was written or stamped on the back of the photo (about a quarter of them have nothing–not a scrap of information on who these people were!). Then I can do an afterword, telling a little about vaudeville and whatever I could find on a few of these people. And I’d love to get John Waters to write an intro!
My heart will break if the boss says, “No, I don’t want to get into employees buying the photos.”
Eve, this reminds me of the photos posted on the walls of an old-school dinner house here in San Jose. It’s one of those old “road house” restaurants that used to feature entertainment and dancing back in the day. The walls are simply covered with publicity photos of all the acts that played there, and Mr. brown and I cannot recognize a single one of the performers - and he and I watch a lot of old movies.
The photos date from, I would say, the mid 40’s through the late 50’s. You can see that the performers are trying to capture and retain a little of the movie glamour that by that time was beginning to fade. A lot of them are even trying to preserve a little vaudeville feel.
The restaurant is going to close at the end of this year and be replaced by a bunch of condos. It’s a little sad to look up and see the old photos and know that they’re going the way of the road-house restaurant.
Doesn’t really matter – titles can’t be copyrighted.
My paternal grandfather was a musician, as was his father. Great-grandpa (who died before I was born) was a witness to history in 1901, when he happened to be playing in the band at the Temple of Music as President McKinley was fatally shot. Both ancestors accompanied vaudeville acts that came to Cleveland. Grandpa (who died when I was four years old) worked with a guy who had a female impersonator act. My dad inherited a photo of this impersonator dressed for work – it sounds as if the picture would be perfect for this book Eve is being encouraged to write.
By the way, her full name is Eve Golden – maybe a mention of that will get Google to link to ads for such already-published books as this one!
Two people at work already have said, “Oh, just take 'em, he’ll never know.” Yeah, I’m gonna start off my new job by stealing stuff.
I don’t think copyright will be a problem: these were all sent out by agents (a lot of them are William Morris) for publicity purposes.
I do wish there were some older ones . . . These all seem to date from the 1920s and '30s. Of course, this era might be more interesting to publishers and readers than the 1910s.
teela, ask the owner of that restaurant what will happen to those photos! If they’re just planning to throw them out, grab them!
You also might consider doing some kind of exhibition of them - contact local galleries, the various bars all over New York that show artwork, etc… I’d definitely show up for something like that.
Oooh, that is an idea–and I have a good friend who’s a very successful illustrator who’s had shows in NY and L.A., and he could get me in touch with galleries . . .
. . . Mind you, I don’t even know if I’ll be able to buy the photos yet, and I haven’t even approached any publishers!