The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1919-03-23
AMERICAS BEST SELLER.
sSNN HAT American book do you have to hav
w rebound oftenesti' I asked Gbraria

DOCK enduring popularity.
"Uncle Toms Cabim" was the surprising an
swer. Every year there is new generation OF
young readers coming along who have never read
Uncle Tom; We keep dozen copies of it in circuls-
ton all the time
One wouldn t expect to find Uncle Toms Ccbf~
in active demand south of Mason and Dixon's line;
but only few days later, euriously enough, the
title of Mrs. Stoves epoch-making work popped
up in list Of the six most popular books of the
month reported by library in Texas!
If l believed that condolences run in threes
would expect to see before, long the announcement
of revival-with an {" all-star" east, perhaps-of
Uncle Tom on Broadway. One of the wisest theat-
rical managers / ever knew found it profitable to
revive Uncle Tom for month s run every four or
five years. And New York must be the only spot
outside of the still unreconstructed corners of the
South whose inhabitants have not had a chance to
Uncle Toms Cabin in one or another OF its dra-
matte forms within the last few years. ...
Figuring 1t Out. -. e~....-
Ny Librarian friend thought he was doing pretty
well to keep dozen copies of the book in eircula-
ton all the time. Allowing week to each reader
that would give six hundred persons their intro
duction to Eliza and Legree, to Topsy and Little
Eva and Tom himself in the course of year. Null
tpy this by all the seven thousand Libraries in the
country and there would be four million known
readers of the book annually. But there has been
many year when more than that met Miss Ophelia
and "Massa Clair and the blOodhounds across the
footlights
L don I know how many there are now, since the
movies have superseded all other forms of en-
tertanment in the rural districts and small towns,
but less than ten years ago l was able to identity
and locate one hundred and twenty travelling
theatrical companies whose repertoires consisted OF
the single drama, Uncle TOMS Cabin! They ranged
all the way from wagon shows, tesming it from
to town and pitching their tents in the village
baseball lots to railroad shows carrying their seen
cry, props and live stock, and the members Of the
troupe in gorgeously painted second hand sleepers
and baggage cars; no gaudier or more naive In
their painted appeal, however, than Tom" cara
l once met Flooding over mountain road,
Legree himself driving the leading wagon, the
sides of which was the modest inscription: Tho
Barnum of them all
They were caste by themselves the Tom
mers'' of the days before the film; Legitimate"
actors scorned them, but the pages of the Clipper
used to be filled with advertisements such as
woman and child wanted for Eliza and Eys,"
MAN for Tom who can play piano in second
show and "Can use at once good Legree who can
double in brass 1t was the vaudeville afterpiece
or second show that kept the audience in the
tent and enticed another dime from reluctant
pockets, but it was the street parade-brass band
Legree blowing the slip horn, Tom cracking the bell
of his fat, the little boy who, often not played
Eva, rafting { snare drum; shouting children,
barking dogs, shying horses, windows opening with
a bang all the village craning and sraining to see
and heartfelt what got the crowd to the tent
in the first place. not to see Uncle Tom much as
to see anything that would break the dead monot-
ony of small town life. And not in thou
sand of them knew that Uncle Toms Cabin
book anything but cheap show in dingy
tent and bright spot in their dull lives
Libraries and Movies.
The movies have driven Uncle Tom from the
boards and the youngsters of to-day must know
him in the book not at all. So wise librarians
are Turing them into their tents by the tried and
tested trick of the ''Tommer, known as doubling
in brass, or more politely, advertising. Is the
Tarzan film showing at the local movie housed
With little attention from the librarian it serves
az street parade to advertise the fact that Mr.
Burroughs booksare available at the library those