The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1900-08-10

Miskel Hoyt stepped into a role tina
showed She had become an actress. Sh
appeared as Grace Holme in "a Con
| tented Woman"
| Il can see her now" wrote Alan Dale
after her death, ''in her disheelled enhtu
| sfasm at the end of her siege with tht
strong minded women of the play, the
| very picture Of that clinging, delicately
tinted femlniniyt that is so strangely op
posed to the womanof-the-world brand
1 could note the dramatic progress in this
comedy, and it looked as though the
stage was about to gain not only the
beauty that it accepts without question
but the talent that is rarer and more
Intellectual
This was the woman who was Charley
Hoyt's idol dor three years she was his
life. his light, his happiness. At the end
Of them he bowed his head over the cof-
fin where she lay with her dead baby on
. breast. When he raised it Charley Hoyt
the funmaker had fed. In his place was
broken heartfelt man destined to weep
and weep alone.
Before six months had passed the
author of "A Parlor Match" "a Trip to
Chinatown" "A Stranger in New York
and dozen other pleasantries had
broken down. He had tried to do what
hundreds of other grief-stricken men have
done before him. In work and dissipation
led the candle at both ends, dreading the
dark. In the dark he saw always his
young wife In her coffin, with the dead
baby on her breast.
Upon his health, in order to forget, he
put the double strain of constant COM
partnership and constant occupation
Rather than be alone he walked the
streets or sat in the corridors of hotels.
From sheer exhaustion, he was often
found sleeping in some public room. He
lived restlessly actively, necessarily. He
grieved morbidly, deeply, unremittingly.
Honths ago his friends began to fear
for his mind. They implored him to
give himself rest. To take better care
Of himself.
When he asked What for?" it was
hard to answer him
When his wife died Charley Hoyt was
left alone in the world without living
relative to care for his welfare.
In the court the other day he said: "I
have a cousin who lives somewhere in
Vermont. but there has been no communi-
cation between US for many years. So
far as 1 know, sic is the only relative
1 have"
Had his wife lived-But why speculate?
Less than two years ago Charley Hoyt
was a jolly good fellow. widely known
-
the other as the author of a dozen or
more roaring farces and satiric comedies.
Today there is still preserved in his
home at Charleston, N. H, play that
he wrote when he was nine years old. 1t
was his first attempt. He made his last
one a year ago.
For years he had been accustomed to
make annual productions. He announced
that the year following his wife's death
should make no exception.
II will write a farce" he cried with
break In his voice.
In tn ehours when others slept he
he was their companion. He rested
neither by night nor by day.
Let him work" said his physicians
when no friend could stop him. at VIII
take up his mind and may be of infinite
help TO him
In scenes for his new play Charley
Hoyt sought to obliterate the picture OF
his dead wife in her coffin, with her baby
on her breast.
To Washington he went a year after
her death TO attend the final rehea-sals
for - Dog in the Mango
There Charley HOyt encountered his
first failure. The heartbroken husband