The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-03-14
"The Forest Fire' is a Modern Version of ''The
 Boy Stood on the Burning Deck Only This
 Time the Boys Little Telephone Girl
By DOLLY DALRYMPLE

II venturesome, the climax of cleo ~ trical effect with a dandy good love story thrown in, describes partially ''The Forest Fire" the marvelously clever scenic sensation which is showing
 round at the Lyric this week.
 The Forest Fire is modern version of our old friend, "The Boy Stood on the Burning Deck" only this dime the boys a little telephone girl.
 Had you ever stopped to think how in modern times the little telephone girl that humble little figure not melted by high pecuniary reward of the hope of of the most disastrous calamities that happen?
 Floods earthquakes, fires, war, con vulsfons of nature avld ferocitics of man, overturn suddenly the accustomed order of things and each individual acts ac- cordng to what he thinks best; some De- come heroes, some towards, some go omentarily-insane, but when such dis ssters are recorded the newspapers al- ways point out one solitary lone little figure that displays the utmost cool ness, devotion to duty, when duties are forgotten by the others in the midst of the frenzy, and that little figure is-the telephone girl.
 There's a girl playing the heroine in
 ,The Forest Fire" named Sylvia Bidwell; I never heard of her before, which doesn't t argue anything, because the people and things I've never heard of would fill volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica; but this girls worth knowing; she's just as clever and attractive as she can be, and when you see her on the stage in the midst of the dust and the smoke and the fire and the wreck and devastation Of the fatal forest fire you mentally ob- serve:
 Who is Sylvia? What is she?"
 I'll tell you; she's the whole show" in the big scenic sensation: she owns the show in the first place, and in the sec ond place she owns the audience when the show is over because she does won derfully clever bit of work and scores big success at the crucial moment.
 When 1 went -back stage to talk to Miss Sylvia Bfdwell about The Forest Fire,' she was just about the most played out, smoky, dusty little piece of humanity you ever saw; I imagine our old friend
 1dSiDldIlCd tOOhed anu leIl Just as SHo did whence all but him had fled;' you may not know it, but the little telephone girl is pretty hard worked person dur ing the brief spectacular scenes of the big electrical Drama of the Timber lands.''
 There's one thing certain and sure can't afford white shirt waists any longer when I'm playing in The Forest F'ire,' said Miss Bidwell as she brushed | @l.- I....k -ts.. -..41 held up two very much besmirched and bedraggled looking little palms to me- It's just as bad as being in real forest fire''
 Where did you get the idea of the act?'' I asked curiously. q
 Flight years ago out in the west, my husband, Langdon Mccormick and my self read a little story in a Minnesota paper about a little telephone girl who stood by her post during one of the most disastrous forest fires that ever occurred in the far west. It made a great impress Sion upon both of us and we filed the story away in our scrapbook; a little later we read of the great dams break ing at Austin, Tex, and the water swept down the valleys wiping out houses and homes; a telephone girl again was the heroine who stood at her post while she sent out the warning; that story was filed away with the other; the great floods of Dayton wrecked the Ohio valley towns and again the newspapers recorded the heroism of the telephone girl and last but not least the story went all over the world later (but after Mir Mccormick had written The Forest FireD of the story from Belgium about the little telephone girl at Dahlen, who in the midst of the fiercest warfare telephoned the officers at the forts that they were not properly placing their shells, and guided by her instructions, they regulated them effec- lively, until Gernan shell destroyed the office in which she was working"
 MT Mccormick wrote the story of The Forest Fire" Miss Bidwell said "and we produced it first in Liverpool, We opened the show at the Fol1ies Of the war, and rlayed it just one week I shall never forget the night that the gendarmes went though the audience handing little cards to the men, who promptly got out of their seats answering the message inscribed on the cards, that they were to report at headquarters. At that time we had 105 people in the show besides two dozen horses: it was a mar vicious spectacle, an damong those hun dred people, the cards were also dis tributed by the gendarmes and many of the boys in the company, walking to their dressing rooms, took their hats from the wall, and with the key of their dressing room in their pockets left and went- God knows where! Many of them have never been heard of since"
 Then we decided to come to America, ," said Miss Bidwell, 'and in order to move our scenery and belonsings from Paris