The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1904-04-17

ton Museum property room. In a gen
eral way the public has now learned to
know that the property man" of a play
house is one who looks after such details
of the productions as concern chairs and
tables the bottles that the actors pour
their wine from, and the pen. ink and
writing paper used by the leading woman
when she sends note post haste to her
hero. The property man of to-day must
still be a resourceful person, but in the old
times, when the more frequent changes OF
bills necesstated additional props every
week or so, the ingenuity OF this junction
airy was often taxed to the utmost. The
property room of the old Boston Museum
is thus interestingly described in the
Boston Globe:
THE apothecarys 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 and angels, and devils, and other
curious things that can't be enumerated in
a column. The animals, both real and or
papier mache, repose on shelves all around
the walls, weird, grinning, motley troupe
of once Indispensable stage characters
that would have brought their posSessOr to
the stake in witchcraft days, and all des-
tined for the dirt heap within a few days.
There are the wolves heads with gleam-
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 bellows
with which lilly Slowboy once blew the
fire in The Cricket on the Hearth hangs
upon the wall, and the cradle in which
she rocked the baby lies in a corner. In an
other corner are stacked old rusty muskets,
including some flintlocks that defended the
breastworks in DR.. Jones's centennial
drama. The Battle OF Bunker HILL twenty
eight years ago.
From the center OF the ceiling sus-
pended by strings, hang three NANCY look
ing stuffed animals that were once features
in conveying the moral lessons taught by
the waXwork tableaus, sold more than q
decade ago. For sixty years these animals,
domestic cat, dog and 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 repuSivey their dried-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 ii was is now forgotten. OF late
years he has hung by a movable string
before the door or the property room in
such a way that he would drop with a
dull thud on the breast of any one enter
ing the door, a startling experience for
an unsuspecting stranger, which has con-
tributed to the enjoyment of the property
mans life, however.
IN another part or 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
Macbeth and his restless helpmeet the big,
glittering chair in which John Wilkes Booth
was crowned as Richard III, and the
gracefully formed medieval chairs in
which Hamlet has oft ponde-ed the propo-
sition, To be, or not to be-
There are stacks of spears and hal
herds and Roman standards. and a pa
thetic souvenir in the shape of rude hui
man effigy OF burlap stuffed with excelsior
which is recognized as the dummy used in
the burial of Ophelia, over which the
queen strews flowers and weeps and says,
Sweets to the sweet, fair maid "