The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-03-22
PASSING OF THE M1NsrRELs.
The Majority, Once on the Tide of
Prosperity, We're Left Stranded.

Inc majority, Once on the Tide of
Prosperity, Were Left Stranded.
Montgomery Phister, who was a friend
and companion of many old time min
strels, tells of the rise and fall of the
black face celebrities as follows in the
Cincinnati Commercial Tribune:
Haxerly, West, Emerson, Queen, Rice
Bryant, all dead, and gone, the minstrel
ranks thinning out, and with but few
recruits appearing for either managerial
or stellar honors to swell them to their
former i'm portance.
The fact seems to be that negro min
strelsy itself died years ago, and these
veterans, the last of the great ones of
their profession, Jagged superfluous on
the stage" Poor Billy Manning depart
ed this life quite a number of years ago
and old McAndrews, 1.-The Watermelon,
man., died like most of his fellows in
sore distress, veritably a pauper. Billy
west left something of a fortune, the
random guess of his friends putting it
at a half million dollars. but Haverly
the greatest and most successful min
Strel manager ever known, died without
a dollar and Billy Emerson Billy
Rice and all of the others dragged out
their few miserable remaining years as
the recipients of the charity of their
friends.
Emerson had a rich wife somewhere
in California, who, as his fearful widow,
sent for the body at Boston, where it
narrowly missed q final lodgm ent il
the potter's field. BILLY" Rice's re-
mains, even now, are lying in a receiv-
ing vault at Hot Springs, Ark, unless
his widow has succeeded in raising Suf-
ficient money to bury them within the
last 81 hours. Rice was sent to this
health resort by his friends a few weeks
ago. The Actors Fund, always quick
to respond to any demand for aid, had
offered to bury the dead minstrel at the
0XDPnSR n
Cemetery, but no one had subscribed
anything toward the shipment of the
mortal remains of this man who in his
time had brought good humor and joy
GUS laughter to thousands. In this par
ticular, if pride has any abiding place
beyond the grave, poor Emerson was
more fortunate than Billy Rice, for
the woman who, from all reports, neg
lected him in his days of earthly sorrow
did provide a few shovels full CT clay
to cover his weary bones after DEATH
Billy West, it must be rem embered,
married a wealthy widow of Philadel-
phia, few years ago, who died seven
or eight months afterward, leaving to
the famous ong-and-dance man her en-
tire fortune, which, it is said. amounted
to more than a quarter of a million dol
lars.
E.merson's last wife was also a widow,
and rcputed to be possessed of an album
dance of wealth, but, for reasons known
only to himself, this always proud man
refused to live with her. and, indeed,
rarely ever alluded to this second mar
riage without some sort of apology.
Il John Queen, younger and more fortu-
nate in not being dependent entirely up
on his minstrel salary, escaped absolute
poverty; but neither he nor Mr.. Neil
Bryant had ore than enough to see
their bodies decently inferred. while big
hearted, wholesouled generous Jack
Haverly was almost as poorly off as
either Emerson or Rice when he died.
George Primrose, BILLY" Vests old
ma rf ma ic ~ To ha T.ayx
Dockstader has earned sufficient as a
performer and manager within the past
few years to nay off his debts, which
amounted to thousands of dollars and
now has sufficient money laid by for 4
rainy day.
AL Fields, shrewd, careful, hard-work-
ing. good manager and not given to
any great extra va gance, is, no doubt,
comfortably well off. but the fact re-
mains that there is no longer room for
the big minstrel companies in the thea
ter of today, with it's marvellous attrac-
lions in the. field of drama.
Some 20 or 80 years ago Haverly, with
his big Forty, Count En-. Forty
Mastodons, whirled through the country
in his own private cars and played his
troupe to houses that groaned in their
efforts to accommodate the surging
crowds.
Those were the days of golden harvest
for the minstrel men-comedian as EN-
erson was, with song and dance pro-
cliVitieS; clog dancer and graceful poser,
as was "Billy' West, or plain, round.
fat and jolly fun-mal1er, like poor, I'M
fortunate Billy Rice. But the joint
salaries even then of these three IA
nous stars would not pay for single
act like Fanny Rice's, to be enjoyed in
these times every night for modest
sum al any fashionable vaudeville. 1t
may be true that Billy Emerson once
did receive the princely salary of $500 a
week, but those who tell you this al
ways interesting story fail to say, if
ever they knew, just how many weeks
were included in that season.
1t. is frequently said that Manager
Haverly lost his, supposedly, enormous
fortune in mining speculations in the
west. The more knowing ones believe
that Baverly's fortune, never anything
like as large as it was reported to have
been, went with the sudden and unex-
pected decline in minstrelsy, and in his
bold endeavor to bolster I'D dying
cause. Jack Haverly, in early days,
was a professional gambler, but he new
er was drinking man. Quiet in his do
nestle habits, devoted to his wife, al
ways honest and always respected by