Daily Arizona silver belt., 1908-11-29
THE QUEEN OF BURLEsoUE


 Lydia Thompson, after long and ar duous career on the stage, has gone to her reward. She was queen of bur lesque and one of the very first women in America to head a show whose main feature was a chorus of girls in flesh colored tights, and in this capacity she won recognition, if not fame. It was somewhere in the 70's that Lydia Thompson took this company out, and she rather startled the natives. In Chi cago her show made a sensation, so much so that MT. Wilbur F. Storey, ed itor of the Chicago Times, honored the subject with an editorial which called tho ladies of the Thompson troup name which is seldom seen in print now adays outside the pages of Shakespeare, and asked for the intervention of the police. For this insult to her artistry, Miss Thompson visited the editorial sanctum and tried a horsewhip on Ed itor Storey.
 But it is not to recall these things entirely that we mention Lydia Thomp- sons name. In spite of the fact that she wore hesh-colored tights and in- duced company of young women also to posture in such garb, she may have been, and probably was, a good wife and mother, and, dying at a ripe old age, she is probably mourned by many who loved and respected her.
 Her death brings to mind the thought of what distance we have travelled in the matter of theatrical morality since the days when Lydia Thompson first put on what has vulgarly, but euphon- iously, been called '"leg show" Then it came as shock. To-day nearly one half of the efforts of theatrical mana gers are given up to producing these shows, and so has the public taste been vitiated, the public mind been educated or debased-that lubricity and the salacious appeal can hardly further go
 Forty years of progress we have made since the days of Lydia Thompson s prime. We have not, as a general thing, thought it necessary to make any ex- cuse for ourselves. We are "less con. ventional" or ''less hidebound," which seems to be sufficient justification in our minds for the way we laugh and ap- plaud and grimly chuckle over each step downward-for downward the tendency is. Poor Lldia Thompsor's pink tights would seem very harmless today in comparison with the gorgeous flmy silk neshings of these modern days, though we evidently have no desire to stop there, but turn out in force and applaud most heartily ard pay our s1 fee most cheerfully when ladies, out Thompson ing Thompson, appear before Us bare legged.
 And We cannot help but remember that when Lydia Thompson introduced her chorus in tights the tights were but | an accessory to show that had wit and | humor and good acting to commend it. | In this matter, too, we have travelled far; and so long as a show is libidinous enough in these days our audiences are not inclined to inquire too closely into the merits of the comedians, the origi- nality of the plot, or the value of the music. Year by year the artistic value of certain class of our musical shows is approximating the vulgarity of the cheap burlesque. One wonders where the downward progress will stop.
 The fault, of course, does not lie whol, ly with the theatrical managers who get these shows tokether, but with the public which supports them. But it is a sad commentary on our civilization,