Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-05-23
IN THE PROPERTY ROOM.
A Varied Collection of Articles in the
Old Boston Museum.
From the Boston Globe.

From the Boston Globe.
| Some idea of the varied collection of OBJ
| jects which accumulate in the property
| room of a theater is to be obtained from a
| description of the contents of the old Bos-
| ton Museum property room, which will
| soon be scattered to the four winds In a
| general way the public has learned to
know that the. property man. of a thea
| ter is one who looks after such details of
| the productions as concern chairs and
| tables, the bottles that the people pour
| their liquor from, and the pen and ink used
| by the heroine to indite her loving mes
sages.
| The master of properties must still be a
reSourceful person, but in the old days,
| where the frequent changes of bills neces-
STATED additional props every week or
so, the ingenuity of this functionary was
often taxed to the utmost.
The apothecary'S shop in Romeo and
Juliet wasn't a circumstance to the old
property manufacturing shop in the cellar
of the museum, where may be seen skulls
and crossbones, stuffed animals of both
wild and domestic species, wings for
witches. angels and DEVILS and other Gu
rious things that can't be enumerated in
column. The animals. both real and of
PAPER mache, repose on shelves all around
the walls, a weird, grinning, motley troupe
of once indispensable stage characters that
would have brought their possessor to the
for the dirt heap within few days.
There are the wolves heads, with gleam-
ing teeth, fangs and eyes, that were wont
to be thrust beneath the door of the log
cabin which the stout arm of Frank Mayo
held in place in the thrilling honeymoon
scene in .'Davy Crockett" The big bel
lows with which lilly Slowboy once blew
the fire in 1.-The Cricket on the Hearth
hangs upon the wall. and the cradle in
which she rocked the baby lies in corner.
In another corner are stacked old rusty
muskets, including some f1intlocks that de-
Tended the breastworks in DR.. Jones' CEN
Hill, ''-twenty-eight years ago.
From the center of the ceiling, suspended
by strings, hang three mangylooking
stuffed animals that were once features in
conveying the moral lessons taught by the
waxwork tableaus, sold more than decade
ago. For sixty years these animals,
domestic cat, a dog and a monkey, have
been comrades. but they must now go the
way of all else identified with the museum.
The cat and dog now half hairless and
showing repulsively their dred-up gums and
loosened teeth. used to be pictures of ease
and contentment when representing the sole
objects of the affection of the old maid and
the old bach in a wax tableau.
The monkey had his mission to fill also,
but what it was is now forgotten. OF late
years he has hung by a movable string be-
fore the door of the property room in such
a way that he would drop with dull thud
on the breast Of any one entering the door,
a starting experience Tor an unSuSpectlng
stranger which has contributed to the en-
joyment of the property mans life, how
ever.
In another part of the cellar Is stored a
raft Of stage furniture of every kind. There
are the seats of Caesar and Brutus from
the senate house, the royal chairs of Mac
beth and his restless helpmeet, the big,
glittering chair in which John Wilkes Booth
was crowned as Richard III. and the grace
fully formed medieval chairs In which
Hamlet has oft pondered the proposition
ITO be, or not to be-.
There are stacks of spears and halberds
and Roman standards, and a pathetic SOU
venir in the shape of rude effigy of bur-
lap stuffed with excelsior which is recog-
nized as the dummy used in the burial of
Ophelia, over which the queen strews flow
ers and weeps and says, Sweets to the
sweet fair maid"