It was a line-up of entertainment at just two of Hamilton’s many vaudeville theatres. Entertainment and diversions were badly needed as the news from Western Europe was becoming more and more grim.
At the Savoy Theatre on Merrick street,
the headline act for Friday and Saturday, September 25 and 26, 1914 was advertised
as “a Clean, Joyous, Sparkling Burletta, Bubbling Over with Melody and Merriment,
featuring ‘English Jack’ Miller, Inimitable Eccentric Comedian. Gay, Girlish
Group of ‘This is the Life Beauties”
The act was described
in the Spectator as follows :
“THE MOORISH MAIDS
“Sam Williams Moorish Maids, one of
the best burlesque attractions on the progressive wheel, will hold the boards
at the Savoy this week, with daily matinees.
“The show is said to
be a cyclone of comedy, introducing a big, singing and dancing chorus of
good-looking, well-costumed girls, while
the principals include some of the stage’s best-known entertainers.
“Alice Fowler makes an
ideal prima donna; Cyclonic Rene Cooper, a dainty soubrette, in a singing and
whistling specialty; English Jack Miller, an eccentric comedian of exceptional
ability; De Onzo Brothers, acrobats and tumblers and Master Alexander Hyda, 17
years old, the youngest musical director and composer on tour are others who
contribute to the success of the show,
‘The book of the
Moorish Maids is by Fred De Silva. The scenic and electrical effects are said
to be unusually fine.”1
1 “The Moorish
Maids”
Hamilton Spectator.
September 25, 1914.
The attraction which
received the biggest advertisement on the three Hamilton daily newspapers at
the time was the appearance of George Evans’ Honey Boy Minstrels at the Grand
Opera House.
The act, billed as “The
Best Minstrel Show Seen in Years” claimed to have “a Company of Sixty.” Readers
of the map might have been especially intrigued at the claim that theatre-goers
should not “miss ‘Honey Boy’ and his War Map.”
The same Spectator
issue which detailed the act at the Savoy described the Honey Boy Minstrels:
“George Evans’ Honey
Boy Minstrels will be seen at the Grand tomorrow night. For this, the seventh
year of the Honey Boy company, George Evans has made what is promised as a
notable production for this class of entertainment.
“A scenic environment
which provides for special settings for every feature of the show is absolutely
new. The costumes are all new and striking, and the songs are written for the
production and to be heard in no other, or chosen from the season’s most
popular song hits.
“This class which is
promised by the Honey Boy in every department of his show is said to provide
much that is new in minstrelsy. There will be no mediocre vaudeville, as the
specialists of the program are introduced in the action of the feature numbers.
“The program first
introduces a court of honor at the San Francisco Panama Pacific Exposition. In
this superb first part setting is found the traditional semi-circle of
minstrelsy, for George Evans believes that lovers of minstrelsy want the
old-time circle of silver-voiced singers and comic end men. The soloists and
jokers here hold full sway.
“The second part
introduces two full stage features in Underneath the Watermelon Moon, and
salute the Flag, then comes the new monologue introduction by the popular Honey
Boy. This year he devotes a lot of his talk to the war and illustrates his
remarks upon a big war map.
“The evening ends
with a new piece by George Evans, entitled The Brockville Bull Fighters, with
Evans playing the most wonderful toreador ever seen.”2
2 “Honey Boy
Minstrels”
Hamilton Spectator.
September 26, 1914
While Hamilton’s
vaudeville audience may have wished for a relief from war news, the war map and
monologue of Honey Boy would have been educational, and would have provided
context to the alarming course of a war which many, just a few weeks previously,
had felt would entail one big battle and would be over by Christmas.
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