Birmingham age-herald., 1895-04-14
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 When it comes to experience that costs | the amateur manager gets more than | those in any other part of the theatrical profession, or at least that is the way found it." said an old manager to me few days ago.
 T remember very distinctly that in the fall of 1888 1 was seized all of a sud- den with what seemed to be an insane desire to manage a theatrical company, not solely for the love of the business, but for the money 1 imagined 1 saw within my grasp. At that time was the junior partner of a we'll to-do Cincinnati dry goods firm, which was prospering. Finally decided to embark into the the atrical business, in which I had no ex- perience, but from which I expected to
 realize much larger profit than from
 the dry goods business. The first thing
 I knew contracts for performers had
 season paid for, a route booked and
 everything made ready for the opening
 night The very first night. for the
 whole company watched my every
 movement, they seized me up as an anna
 teur in the business, and from what l learned made up their minds to have everything tf.efir own way, and, in a measure, run the compNany. But that night the business was good Nand I felt as happy as small boy in his first l pair of pants. The world, in my own opinion, was mine; all I had 10 do was to signal and it moved just as my de- sires ran. Everything for the first week moved along smoothly, for the box office receipts were pleasing indeed, to say the least, but the members of the company began to have less regard for what l had to say, and even some of them had aria q fx d1Ia no formers grew careless and didn't seem to care how they went through with their parts. This brought forth bad press notices and as a matter of course bus mess became bad. It wasn't long until a salary day came, when the treasury did not contain enough money to make the ghost walk all of which was en- tirely due to the indifferent work of the performers for we were well advertised When they were apprised of this fact a howl was raised on all sides and some of them threatened to quit
 "The next night in little Indiana town the leading man came up to me and said that he either had to have his back sal ary or he wouldn't go on. l explained to him that there was no money in the treasurer's hands and that was power less He insisted on carrying out his threats, and after considerable trouble and delay I gave the understudy his part and took the understudys. We went through with the performance as well as possible under the circumstances, but received a gentle roast next morning from the papers Next morningI was lucky enough to pick up stage-struck amateur whom I placed in the vacancy that had been made by putting one of the company in the leading mans place. Every performance seemed to register gradual decrease in the box office re- ceipts. and the outlook grew more
 vAAly af ffnr taa IA. itFafr man quit we had a packed house. and began to feel better, but what should find after the performance but that the treasurer had skipped with nearly every dollar of the money belonging to the company I said nothing to any of the company, but put up our baggage, on which we rode to the next stand. Luck fly we had a very good house, and after paying hotel bills and railroad expenses had about $100 besides.
 T had an idea if the next salary day could be bridged over in some way that we would get back to firm basis, but what do you suppose happened? Just before the curtain went up that salary night every member of the organization, including the property boy. confronted me and politely stated that they had enough of my amateur managing, and that they intended to quit I tried to persuade them to go on with the per- formance. but without avail. Finally, after some delay, I stepped before the curtain and explained to the audience the exact situation, telling them at the same time that I would leave the entire company with them. l left them and went back home, and since that time have never had any trouble with actors although I have been out every season since, and 1 may also incidentally re- mark that handle my own cash"
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