The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1902-11-19
Annie YeamanS.

ANNIE NeamanS.
ANNIE YEAMANS celebrates a double
event this day. She is arrived at the COM
forting age of 81, and she made her en-
trance into the life theat rical lust fifty
seven years ago. If ones reward here
after is TO be measured by the pleasure
given on the rind of this hard planet then
Mrs. YEAMANs shall be escorted through
the corridors of eternity by a mob of
immortals joyfully expectant From her
lips will fall pearls of wit and the heavenly
shades will roar in sympathetic unison
1t is sure to be ANNIE YEAMANs who
will tell the newest parable Of upper
Broadway!
Although she Is countrywoman of
HALL GAINES, Mrs. YEAMANS has a
sense of humor. 1t was this same quail
ity that enabled her smilingly to with
stand the sings and arrows of theatrical
fortune, She went on the boards, in
the sawdust ring of the circus, to be pre-
else, at the age of 10. To-day she
faces the footlghts Of the Casino the
same ANNIE YEAMANs who tickled the
risible rib Of New York twenty years
ago. In the interim she has lived much.
much observed.
As she asserts, she is the only Manx
actress on the stage. She went TO Au-
stralia, and there in a mixed company
with Bohemian Girl one night and
farce the next, the girl learned the A &c
of her profession. Ballet. chorus. small
parts, il mattered not; she took things
as they came. Think of Mrs. YEAMANs
jumping through tissue paper hoops
balancing her agile person on the backs
Of fiery steeds She married the clown
Of the circus and together they went as
far as Java and Singapore. They lived
in Hongkong; they came TO California
in 1885 and two years later saw New
York. Widowed soon after, the young
woman worked bravely. She made
her first appearance at the New York
Theatre down Broadway. IL was in
Cendrllon." She was a page. MARK
SMITH and LEWIS BAKER we're the man
ayers. Later she appeared in The
Ticket Of Leave Man" What a SAVIOR
of old New York does not the very men
ton of this play make,
We find her dancing a barn-door tic
In AUGUsTIN DAYS production of" Crit
fifth Gaunt," and she was also in Mrs
+. b. CoNwAY's Brooklyn stock COM
pany. A round Of characters in a dozen
plays, and Mrs. YEAMANs went TO JOSH
HART's Theatre Comique She was a
close observer Of real life; she saw its
humor, its pathos; and she believed that
an ounce Of experience was worth a
pound OF art. Hence 1877 saw her a
star in her own way with the Harrigan
and Hart company. She followed the
fortunes Of that never-to-be forgotten
organization until il moved to the Gar
rick Theatre and eventually disbanded
in 1894 Since that most inalspicious
time Mrs. iEAMANs has been seen s,lc-
cessively in The Great Diamond Rob-
berry, and" Uncle Toms Cabin" She was
the Cook Lady in Why Smith Left
Home. She is now Mrs. Broom, the
official mother-in-law in A Chinese
Honeymoon, and both her colleagues in
the piece and many other professional
associates will make this day memora-
BILE one in her long, laborious, trium-
plant career.
But the ANNIE YEAMANs we all loved
and laughed with was the ANNIE YEA
MANS of HARRIGAN and Harris. Can we
ever forget Cordelid Mulligan in Cor
dclia's Aspirations, as she tottered on
the edge Of moral abyss, holding on to
consciousness by sheer will power? II
was a wonderful portrayal of a respect
able lady who had taken a drop too
much. one who carried her liquor with a
dignity that bordered on despair, vet
never relaxed a title of self-respect.
There were also white, tense features.
the upper lip tremblingly eloquent, and
hysterical laughter. 1t may not have
been high art, but it was mighty close to
nature. And Marian McCorthy, with
that fascinating headdress. in "The
Leather Patch" or Mary Ann Dooley in
Reilly and the Four Hundred" or
mirnble dictu!-Mrs. MuHigan in" The
Mulligan Guards what shall we saw
of these inimitable creations? The world
has grown more sage, more artistic ;"
since those old Harrigan and Hart
days, but alas, where are the laughs of
yesteryear?
With Ed HARRIGAN, JOHNNIE WILD
a genius in the art of gentle grimace-
Tony HART and ANNIE YEAMANs made
pleasant evenings. II was brisk humor
hers, and its crusty satire cleft many
snobberies. She studied
her art in the crowded world of the East
Side, and only just before the company
did Mr.. HowELLs discover
that such an expression of realism was
never before seen on the American stage!
But aesthetic theories never bothered |
the blithe and wholesome nature Of Mrs.