page_title: John A. Ellsler
section_title: Early life and career
hierarchical_section_title: John A. Ellsler / Early life and career
caption_attribution_description: English: Academy of Music Cleveland
context_page_description: John A. Ellsler was an American actor, theatre manager and acting instructor who helped make Cleveland, Ohio one of the more important theatre towns in post Civil War America. Ellsler was instrumental in starting the careers of several well known actors of that period including his daughter's, and had once been a friend and business partner of the assassin, John Wilkes Booth.
context_section_description: John Adam Ellsler Jr. was born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and later moved with his family to Baltimore, Maryland. He first became acquainted with the theatre as a delivery boy for a firm that printed theatrical programs and posters. He later returned to Philadelphia where by 1846 Ellsler was employed as assistant treasurer, property man and bit player at Peale's Museum. The next year he joined William E. Burton's company at the Arch Street Opera House, and then after three seasons moved on to New York City to play leading roles at Chatham Theatre. After an engagement at Charleston,. South Carolina, Ellsler became co- manager with Joseph Jefferson on a two-year road tour of the Southern American States.  For two seasons in the early 1850s Ellsler managed the Utica Museum, Utica, New York.
caption: Academy of Music, Cleveland c.1875
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