Tubas, Cornets and Cowboy Hats

There are many tubas and cornets in my photograph collection. And a good number of them are played by boys in soft caps. A local "kids band", unaffiliated with any school, was once a very common musical organization in American communities. Between 1905 and 1930, many of these bands, mostly with boy musicians but sometimes with girls, had a photo taken of their band to sell as a souvenir postcard to their supporters.

 

Brass bands were the most popular because the instruments were easier to learn and more durable against any harm from youthful enthusiasm. They also made more noise. The better photos of these kids bands are posed informally, usually outdoors. If the camera lens was any good it gives us a glimpse of young personalities, a guess at the sibling connections, and an estimate of musical skills. 

The postcard I'm featuring today has a boys' band that resembles many that I've shown before, with cornets, trombones, tubas, and snare drums. Except for one thing.

 

This is the only one with cowboys and horses.

From personal experience I can attest that horses are quite fond of brass bands. (But that's a photo story for another day.) I'm less sure about what sentiments cowboys have regarding  tubas and trombones, but I do know that it is very rare to find them all pictured together in a vintage photo.

And not just a couple of horses, but a half-dozen that includes a donkey too.

 

Put them altogether and it becomes a curious oddity of photography that invites more questions than the typical portrait or group photo. Unfortunately, like many of the photos in my collection, this postcard has more questions than answers.

 

Five cowboys and one cowgirl sit astride their horses (except for the cowpoke and his donkey), posing for the camera in front of a large white canvas tent. Crouching before them is a boys' brass band of nine boys assisted by three men, also with instruments. There are at least three cornets, two baritone horns, two trombones, one tuba, and snare and bass drums.  One man standing on the left wears a bowler hat and holds a bass drumstick. I think he may be the band's leader. The boys are roughly age 9 to 15, and wear regular clothes instead of band uniforms. Their short knee pants and the postcard's photo paper suggest a vague date from 1910 to 1930, probably closer to 1915-20.  They resemble the Famous Cadet Band of Malta-McConnelsville, OH which I featured in my November 2015 story on The Kid Band of Caldwell, Ohio.

 

But of course, the real interest in this photo are the cowboys and cowgirl. I don't think the way they are arranged is by happenstance. Each person fits a stereotype of the Hollywood Western. In the center, the man on the white horse is our lead character, and next to him is his cowgirl sweetheart. To the left is his old sidekick and the sidekick's younger sidekick. To the right is the faithful scout and the comic stable hand with his obstreperous donkey. I also think it's fair to say that the complexion of the men on far left and right could easily be Native-American or Mexican. It's an unlikely combination that doesn't fit the description for a typical gathering in small town America in this era.

 

The best clue to explain the occasion is the big tent in the background. This could be group of cowboy performers at a rodeo, a circus, or a wild-west show. Which would also make a good reason for a boys' brass band to be in attendance. With no notes on the postcard or other clues like German sofas, I can't be sure. Perhaps I'm mistaken and it's just a day at the Wyoming state fair with some local ranchers assembled for a parade.

But let's look closely at our heroic lead character. With his carefully knotted neckerchief, ten-gallon hat at aslant, and a long face chiseled out of Ponderosa Pine, that is the Hollywood image of a western cowboy straight off the range. And who gets to ride a white horse? Only one of the good guys, of course!

So off I went on a search for cowboy actors in America's early cinema. Naively, I thought it would be easy to find a match. One useful website, entitled Famous Cowboys Actors in Movies and TV Westerns, lists over 155 names with links to each actor's Wikipedia pages and filmography. Since I think this cowboy's postcard photo with a boys' band was taken around 1911-1920, surely no later than 1926, then he has to be an actor who appeared in a silent film. As he is a young man, perhap 20 something, this limits the search to men born before 1900. But it is still a long list.

Fortunately movie stars love the camera so there are lots, and Lots, and LOTS of square chins, long noses, and big hats with which to compare this cowboy's visage.

Gilbert M. "Broncho Billy" Anderson (1880 – 1971)
Source: Wikimedia

Let's start with Gilbert M. Anderson (1880 – 1971) also knows as "Broncho Billy".  Born Maxwell Henry Aronson in Little Rock, Arkansas to Jewish parents. At age 18 he left the Midwest to seek his fortune in the wild frontier of New York City, where Max found employment in vaudeville theatres and as a photographer's model. In 1903, he met Edwin S. Porter, an early film pioneer, who cast Aronson to appear in his Edison Co. motion picture The Great Train Robbery.  Aronson was so impressed by the thrill this motion picture gave audiences that he set off to create his own moving pictures.

Moving to Chicago he changed his name to Gilbert M. Anderson and started one of the first major film companies with George Kirke Spoor called Essanay Studios ("S and A" for Spoor and Anderson). Writing, directing and acting, Anderson appeared in over 300 silent short films, including a series of 148 popular westerns which transformed him into America's first cowboy film star, "Broncho Billy." Though the company headquarters remained in Chicago, Anderson traveled the country to find the best filming locations. Many of his early silent shorts were made in Niles, California. south-east of San Francisco.

However, despite gaining some success in films, in 1916 Anderson sold his share in Essanay Studios and bought a theatre in New York City. His later attempts to get back into Hollywood films were not successful. And as far as I know, he didn't ride a favorite horse in New York. So I don't think he is my mystery cowboy.

Tom Mix (1880 – 1940)
1921 movie poster for "Hands Off!"
Source: Doctormacro.com

Tom Mix, (1880 – 1940), is another early cowboy actor who fits the bill. Born Thomas Hezikiah Mix, in the appropriately named town of Mix Run, Pennsylvania, Tom was the son of a stable master for a wealthy lumber merchant, and learned to ride and love horses at an early age. After moving to Oklahoma and trying various odd jobs, he found work at the Miller Brothers 101 Ranch, one of the largest cattle ranches in the West, covering 101,000 acres, which gave it its name. The ranch promoted itself with its own touring Wild West show in which Mix proved to be a skilled horseman and expert marksman, winning national riding and roping contests in 1909 and 1910.

In 1909 he got a supporting part in a short film, The Cowboy Millionaire, produced by the Selig Polyscope Company. Shot in Los Angeles, the film was a great success and Mix went on to appear in over 100 films for the Selig studio. When the studio was hit with financial problems, Mix signed a contract with Fox Films and went on to make 291 films in his career, all but nine of which were silent movies. 

In 1913 he moved his family to a ranch in Prescott, Arizona. At his new home called the Bar Circle A Ranch, Mix built his own studio where many of his films were shot. His success and fame made him one of the highest paid actors in the 1920s. And his characters defined him as the first Hollywood cowboy star.

From 1929 to 1930, Mix also toured with the Sells-Floto Circus at a reported weekly salary of $20,000. With his earlier work in rodeos, Tom Mix was clearly just the type of Western showman who might pose for a photo with a boys' band. But there's just one problem matching him to my mystery cowboy. His horse.

Tom Mix rode a horse called "Tony the Wonder Horse", who was credited for 34 films between 1924 and 1932. When Mix placed his handprints into the concrete sidewalk outside Grauman's Chinese Theatre in 1927, Tony’s hoofprints were right there alongside them. Tony was the first horse to be given equal billing with his human costar, and was featured in the title of three movies: Just Tony (1922), Oh! You Tony (1924), and Tony Runs Wild (1926). 

The problem is that Tony was a dark horse, not a white horse. So I don't think my cowboy could be Tom Mix. 

William S. Hart (1864 – 1946)
Source: Motion Picture Magazine, June 1917

The next cowboy actor has, I think, the best face match. He is William S. Hart, (1864 – 1946), one of the best-known actors of the silent film era. Hart was born in Newburgh, New York and got his acting start in traveling companies who toured the country. He played roles in Shakespeare and was in the original 1899 stage production of Ben-Hur. For a short time in 1900, Hart even directed productions at the opera house in Asheville, North Carolina, where I now live. 

After returning to New York City, he got parts in a few short films. But it wasn't until 1914 at the age of 49 that he got his big break starring as the lead in the Western feature The Bargain. For the next 14 years, Hart appeared in 75 films, nearly all as some kind of cowboy. He was a major Hollywood Western star who owned Billy the Kid's "six shooters" and was a friend of legendary lawmen Wyatt Earp and Bat Masterson. In 1923 he was Wild Bill Hickok in the movie of the same name. 

Hart's sharp, craggy face resembles my mystery cowboy, but if my photo was taken in 1915 he would be too old to be a match. And once again there's a problem with the horse too. 

Bill Hart's horse was named Fritz, and was the first horse to get its name in film credits. Like Tom Mix's Tony, Fritz was a very talented horse who carried Hart through many thrilling stunts. For my purposes the problem is that Fritz was a brown and white pinto.  

Fred Thomson (1890 – 1928)
Source: Doctormacro.com

The last cowboy actor I've considered as a possible match is not so well known anymore, but is the only candidate who was a genuine native westerner. Fred Thomson (1890 – 1928) was born in Pasadena, California, the son of a  a Presbyterian minister. From 1910 to 1913 Fred attended the Princeton Theological Seminary, where he played football and was awarded three times the All-Around Champion title given out by the Princeton Amateur Athletic Union. 

In 1917 when the United States declared war on Germany, Thomson enlisted as a chaplain in the 143rd Field Artillery Regiment from California, known informally at the time as the Mary Pickford Regiment after the movie star. Before his unit was sent to France, Thomson broke his leg playing football and was sent to hospital. It was there he met Pickford and her screenwriter Frances Marion who were visiting patients in the ward. Just like in a Hollywood romance, Thomson and Marion fell in love and soon arranged to marry after the war. Fortunately Fred's unit arrived to late in France to see any action and when he returned he married Frances in November 1919 with Pickford as maid of honor. 

It was through Frances  that Thomson found work in Hollywood films. In 1921 he appeared with Mary Pickford in The Love Light. By 1923 he was starring in a Universal production, The Eagle's Talons, where he performed his own stunts. The other big studios took notice of his cinematic talent, and in 1924 he signed with Film Booking Offices of America, the studio run by Joseph P. Kennedy, father of President John F. Kennedy. By 1926 Fred Thomson was ranked as Number 2 in box office stars, and was promoted as  "The World's Greatest Western Star". He went on to make 30 films, including playing Kit Carson in the 1928 movie Kit Carson, shortly before his tragic death. In December that year while working in his stables, Thomson stepped on a nail and contracted tetanus, which his doctors initially misdiagnosed. He died on Christmas Day, 1928. 

Fred had a wonder horse too, a white Palomino named Silver King. In a quote from Thomson's Wikipedia page, Al Rogell, who directed Thomson's first seven Western films said,

He did all of the work...everything in the early pictures—the mouth work, the jumps, the chases, the falls, quick stops—and could untie knots, lift bars, etc. He could wink one eye, nod his head yes or no, push a person with his head. Thomson trained him to do certain things and expected him to perform them

Fred Thomson's Silver King seemed a nearly perfect match for my mystery cowboy's horse. Except for one little thing. Silver King stood 17 hands high at the shoulder, or 5 ft 8 inches. My cowboy's white horse doesn't measure up to that. 

So I surrender. I'm hanging my spurs up on this mystery. Tuba plumbing and the history of German sofas I can figure out, but Hollywood cowboys and horses? I give up, pardner. Here's my badge and guns. I'm heading back to the old homestead.

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday
where hugging, kissing, and other close contact
are not permitted by order of state health authorities.
Remember, WEAR A MASK AT ALL TIMES.

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Movie poster from Just Tony (1922)
Source: Wikimedia

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William S. Hart with his horse Fritz
and Mary Thurman in Sand! (1920)
Source: Wikimedia

 

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Fred Thomson and Silver King the Horse
in Silver Comes Thru (1927)
Source: Wikimedia