The Swan Prince

 

The Swan Prince

   Once upon a time a handsome young prince named Sydney wandered away from his royal estate.  This prince, who happened to be a swan, considered himself a member of the winged aristocracy because long ago his great-great-great-great-grandfather was a royal swan of the King of England.  And that same lineage was shared by all swans as far as he knew.  They were all either princes or princesses.  Everyone else was just plain common. 

   Sydney was a curious fellow who enjoyed exploring new places and sampling exotic cuisine.  One day rather than follow his courtly flock to their usual freshwater ponds he decided to take a new direction.  Maybe for a change he would try someplace with saltwater, he thought.  As he flew over the maze of waterways beyond his estate he spotted a distant bay that looked promising.  There was something about its shape that seemed familiar.  Perhaps he might find some fresh eel grass or tasty little fish.  He banked into the wind and circled round to investigate.  

   After splashdown Sydney took a few minutes to check out the underwater menu before swimming into a tiny inlet.  He was surprised at how quiet it was.  Though a few boats were moored along the embankment there were no humans or noisy machines around. 

   Okay, he thought, this isn't as interesting as I thought it might be, so he turned back.  But just as he about to prepare for take off he saw a female swan floating near a bulkhead.  She was the most beautiful swan he had ever seen.  He couldn't take his eyes off her.  He paddled closer, pretending to forage in the shallow water.

   At first the little pen paid him no attention as she slowly spun in the gentle current of a rising tide.  She seemed disinterested in feeding with him and made no effort to graze at the seaweed by the boat dock.  Perhaps she just wasn't hungry, he thought.  Sydney tried a different approach. 

   He began with a few nonchalant wing flaps and feather combing.  When she remained indifferent, he ruffled more plumage and stretched out his curvy neck in that way the ladies like. 

   Nothing.  She was unimpressed and turned silently away as if he were not there.  Why was she being so aloof?  Sydney tried a few soft grunts in swan sweet talk.  No reaction.  Maybe she was naturally shy.  Afterall he was a prince.  Sometimes meeting royalty can trigger speechlessness. 

   The more she ignored him, the more enchanted he became.  Her small figure was oddly alluring and he found that twist in her head most beguiling.  Maybe she was not from around here.  She might be one of the tundra swan clan.  Unlike his flock, the tundra swans were great travelers and she might have strayed from her flight.  They were also pretty raucous, making a big racket heard for miles as they sped along their long trek.  He didn't understand much of their lingo, but he liked it better than the harsh squawking of the trumpeter swan clan.  His clan, being royal and all, never needed to talk so loudly.

   The way she rejected his advances made Sydney lose patience.  It was infuriating that she would rebuff his offers of love.  Her cold silence just made him angrier.  He was a prince.  No one ever turned away from him.  He pecked at her, lightly at first and then harder when she gave no reaction.  Furious he could not hold back and jumped onto her in a very un-princely way. 

   Suddenly with a flurry of bubbles the little swan pen sank beneath the water.  Sydney backed off nonplussed.  That was not a swan-like thing to do.  Swans were not diving ducks.  Something was wrong with her.  What should he do?  He scudded over to the middle of the boat basin to think it over.

   A few moments later a human walked over to the bulkhead.  Using a long stick the man reached down into the water and snared the sunken swan.  He lifted her up and placed her on the dock.  Sydney could see that her legs were fettered with chains.  

   Now he understood!  She was a captive swan, probably bewitched by a sorcerer for some wicked design.  How cruel!  No wonder she shunned him.  She was surely restrained from talking to him by a very strong magic.   

  Sydney was heartbroken.  He had no idea how to release this beautiful damsel from the sorcery that bound her to this place.  He felt sorry for what had happened.  Swan princes could be very brave but also foolishly headstrong.  They were also not very good at solving puzzles.  There was nothing for him to do but gaze fondly at her one last time.  He bade her farewell for a love fated not to be.  Without a backward glance he paddled out of the inlet, never to return.  

The End.

This tale is a re-telling of an animal story that happened in May 1993 at my parents' former house in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Their home (which once used to be my home, too) was situated on Bay Island, a small island less than a mile inland from the southern mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. 

The back yard of this waterfront property had a fine view of Broad Bay which was part of the Lynnhaven River, a tidal estuary. That's the background of this picture of my parents, Barb and Russ Brubaker, taken when we first moved there. The tiny beach did not last long as countless storms scoured the island's shoreline forcing my folks to replace that original railroad tie bulkhead at least four times. (creosote timbers; pressure treated planks; aluminum slats; and finally granite rip-rap.) 

In the early 1970's my dad anticipated that his army career was about to end and he and mom decided that Virginia Beach was a perfect place for him to retire. They chose this house, a brick-built 1950s ranch style, because it was on a very quiet dead-end lane with just three houses. Two small side yards offered space for my dad to store cars, boats, and other junk. And along the front lane opposite was a small boat basin shared with a few neighbors that had with enough room for a half dozen shallow draft boats.  

That little boatyard became the center of my dad's next military career when in the 1980s he joined the U. S. Coast Guard Auxiliary. As a volunteer instructor and weekend watchguard for recreational boaters, my dad taught thousands of people how to safely operate boats, navigate, tie knots, and hoist sails. The picture here shows his last "big" motor boat. There were several others, and just outside the camera frame there were two sailboats, a rowboat, an aluminum punt, and a kayak. This boat basin is the setting for my story of "The Swan Prince".

When our family moved here in the 1970s the area was still semi-wild with a long section of Broad Bay that was part of a state park and then undeveloped. Many wildfowl like red knots, avocets,  brants, geese, etc. still used Virginia Beach's waterways for a rest stop during their annual migration across North America. It was also home to many more birds that inhabited the region year-round like herons, egrets, ospreys, eagles, etc.  In this photo my mom introduces her dog Lucy, a Cairn Terrier, to ten curious juvenile mallard ducks. The ducks are really just interested in begging for more corn feed. Behind Lucy is an unfinished paper-mâché animal, a cat, I think, that my mom made for her elementary school art classes.  

Here is Barb in her wooden rowboat out in the inlet with her previous dog Muffin, a West Highland Terrier. She named the boat, Mah Boat, and painted an Egyptian Eye of Horus on it after seeing it on boats in the Nile River during a tour of Egypt. Just beyond her is a small flock of mallard ducks. They were so tame and habituated to human activity that the hens would often build a nest right next to the front door. 

Here are a clutch of Canada geese cruising in the same place that Sydney the Swan shows up. Geese are  generally wary of humans and do not like to hangout with ducks. Some Canada geese migrate while others stay put. This is the second type, I think. They usually only came up on the lawn at night when they were more confident humans would stay inside. The location of their nests was more secretive but once the little geese were hatched they were a delight to see in family groups paddling out in the larger water behind our house.

Here is my mom again in Mah Boat, this time with the next previous dog, Katie, a Scottish Terrier at the bow. Despite her short legs, Katie was an avid swimmer who liked to dive for rocks. She also seemed to enjoy sitting under my chair as I practiced my horn. Few dogs or cats will do that without complaining very loudly.

This next photo was also taken by my dad, of course, one of thousands he took of his little boat basin and the landscape around it. This is the scenery for "The Swan Prince". My dad named his motorboat Micker, supposedly his childhood imaginary friend. The sailboat's name escapes me right now, but next to it by the shed is Mah Boat. A leak in the wooden hull had permanently laid it up, so my mom converted it into a raised bed/boat garden. She grew some excellent tomatoes there. Though it's hard to see, beyond Micker is another runabout motorboat and a sailing dinghy, both on trailers. My dad like to collect stuff.

So one day in May 1993, my mom saw a large swan out in the water by the boats. She alerted my dad who always had a camera at hand and he quickly went out to watch and take photos. This big bird had indeed fixated his attention onto a small fiberglass goose decoy. My mom had put it out  years before in a hope that it might attract some of the migrating wildfowl. It didn't. And neither did the fake heron, or the faux owl that she put up later. Most birds are not easily fooled. The exception was this one very amorous swan. 

The swan paid court to the goose decoy for some time, around a half hour or more I was told. I wasn't there at the time, so this is a family tale retold second-hand. Names were changed to protect the innocent. When the swan finally broke the decoy, my mother thought he seemed contrite and upset at what had happened. My dad rescued the decoy and put it up on the dock where the swan stayed around for a few more minutes until finally moving on. A few days later my dad submitted his photos to a weekly newspaper where two were published along with an account of this unlikely failed romance. My mom and dad always enjoyed telling this story and for years I always thought of it as a fairy tale come to life. I hope I haven't left anything out.

Sydney was a Mute Swan, Cygnus olor, identified by his orange bill topped by a large black knob. The species is native to Eurasia and was first introduced to North America in the mid-1800s to early 1900s as a decorative animal to adorn ponds in large estates, city parks, and zoos. Many of these imported mute swans escaped to establish breeding populations around the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, Great Lakes, and Pacific Northwest regions of the United States. In some areas they are considered a harmful invasive species as their increasing numbers has an adverse effect on other waterfowl and can severely damage the densities of submerged native vegetation.

Mute swans mate for life and since medieval times they were often depicted in European art as a symbol of love and fidelity. They are also known to grieve for a lost or dead mate or cygnet. A male mute swan, called a cob, can range in weight from 9.2–14.3 kg (20–32 lbs), while the female mute swan, a pen, may weigh from 7.6–10.6 kg (17–23 lbs). In the wild a mute swan's life expectancy might reach 10-11 years, but in captivity 20-30 years is possible. Mute swans are actually not mute but make softer vocal sounds that are more like snorts, whistles, and hisses than the louder honking calls of Tundra Swans and Trumpeter Swans. 

My final photo of Barb and Russ Brubaker's home on Bay Island was taken on a very snowy winter day across the inlet looking back toward the house and boat dock. In the center is a flock of mixed ducks. They are hearty creatures who never seemed fazed by snow, ice, rain, or storm. There may be a swan in the picture too, but they're hard to spot since they are naturally camouflaged for snow.  

Chesapeake Bay, Hampton Roads, Virginia
Source: Google Earth 1996

This is a 1996 satellite view of the southern mouth of the Chesapeake Bay with the Virginia cities of Newport News, Hampton, Portsmouth, Norfolk and Virginia Beach. The southern boundary of this great bay is marked by Cape Charles is in the upper right corner and Cape Henry below. The thin line across the bay is the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel, a marvelous 17.6 mile bridge-tunnel complex that connects the Virginia mainland (near Virginia Beach) with the Eastern Shore of Virginia (aka the Delmarva Peninsula). Comparing this 1996 image with the satellite view of 2025 will show an appalling expansion of development in all the cities but especially along the waterfront areas. Today there is far less wilderness in the region and it makes me very sad to imagine what has happened to Sydney and his swan clan.  

The red dot marks my parents' home where they lived for 37 years. Unfortunately floods and storms became too much for them to manage dealing with all the boats, house maintenance, and their health issues, too. In 2007 they sensibly moved to a retirement community in south Virginia Beach. It had a large wetland pond and lots of semi-wild critters but it was not the same. Less than a year after selling the house on Bay Island a Nor'easter hit Virginia Beach and water came into the structure for the first time making it uninhabitable. It took three years before the new owner got the house repaired and raised 8 feet from its foundations, supposedly making it storm proof. Time will tell.

I've always been struck by a hidden pattern in the landscape of the Virginia coastline. You can see it in maps but it's more apparent I think in a view from space. It's a shape that always lets me find my former home. Can you see it? I've highlighted it in the next lower altitude image.

Cape Henry, Virginia Beach, Virginia
Source: Google Earth 1996

It's in a duck's bill as it twists to preen itself.
I believe even a high flying swan would recognize it too.

My story of The Swan Prince
deserves some music.
Here is a beautiful rendition
of Camille Saint-Saëns, "The Swan"
performed by cellist Yo-Yo Ma.

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday

where you should never feed a bird

unless you are prepared to feed its friends too.

Music for a Sideshow

 

 A tiny micro story

teased out of a photo postcard.

 

 

  "Can you see anything, TJ? What's goin' on?" said Archie as he knelt down.

 

   "Shush up! Keep quiet." hissed Tom. "You'll get yer turn." He fiddled with the canvas to pull a bit more away from the tent's seam. "Wish I had my paw's Barlow. You gotta knife on ya, Arch?"

 

   Archie rolled over and reached into a pocket of his overalls. "Just this old pen blade. I just use it to pick  my teeth so it ain't very sharp." He handed it to Tom.

   "Maybe it'll do to cut these stitches." Tom sawed at the threads and opened up more of the torn canvas. He wriggled closer to the tent wall and peeped through the gap.  

 

   "Looks like they're gonna take a photo," Tom whispered. "I can see Mr. Wachtel from the drugstore setting up his camera. Here you take a look." 

 

   Archie shifted his bulk over to the rip in the tent wall. "I can't get my specs close enough to see thru." 

   "Then take 'em off!"

    "But then I won't see nothing," whined Archie. He put just one eye up to the hole. "I think I can see some lady in dark stockings moving around. I sure wish we could get a peek at them hootee-kootee dancers."   

 

 "Hoochee-coochee, ya dummy," grumbled Tom. "You wouldn't wanta meet the kootee kind." He shoved the other boy aside and looked through the canvas. "Psst! I think what you saw was a trombone. There's a brass band setting up an' Mr. Wachtel is pointing at 'em to get onta stand outside the show tent. That bass drummer looks like the same fella we saw wrangling everybody over at the ring toss game. He seemed like an awful sharp cheat." 

 

 

    "What's a oh-ree-intal dancer anyway," asked Archie. "Those pictures on the tent don't look like any lady I ever seen. And that one laying down sipping from a jug looked real odd."

 

   Tom sighed. "That's cause they're not from America but from far off Araby. They dress different there cause it's so hot, I suppose. And that woman wasn't drinkin' , she was smokin' Turkish tobbacky in a pipe." He gave his friend a poke. "Hush now. There's girls stepping up to a table on the other side." 

 

    "I bet they're something else," chirped Archie. "I wish we had a couple of quarters to go in, but all I got is a dime and six pennies."

 

   Tom gave a snort. "They're something else all right. The most skin I can see is an elbow, an' one gal looks older than my Aunt Lou. I don't think none of 'em ever danced for no Sultan of Bagdad." 

   Suddenly the two boys were jerked up by their braces and spun around to face a huge man dressed in a tight blue leotard. Clenching a shoulder in each hand he hoisted them up so they were standing on their toes. 

 

 

 

   The giant thrust his enormous head so close to their ashen faces that they could feel the bristle of his mustache and smell the sour odor of his breath. "Yous in mine tent. Whys you in Klaus' tent?" he growled. "I tink yous like the pretty ladies, yah?" He tightened his grip. "Maybe yous wanna join the circus. Yous got any tricks?" The boys shook their heads vigorously. "No? Maybe yous wanna try win prize inna ring rassling with big Klaus. Tink yous mens strong nuff to beat Klaus?" The boys' eyes widened. His grin did not seem very friendly. 

   With a laugh he dropped them to the ground. "Yah, dass what I tink. Yous boys git now. Run home to mama." As Archie and Tom scrambled out of the tent, the giant called after them. "Maybe next time Klaus shows yous how to dance the cootchee  goot!" 

 

 

 

 * * *

 

 

 

This postcard photo of a small brass band and three "Oriental" dancers posing outside the entrance to a carnival or circus sideshow tent is unmarked and without date. The "Interesting and Amuseing (sic) Dancing Girls" are dressed in vaguely exotic costumes that suggest, but actually don't reveal much uncovered skin. We can recognize the dancer's hook because it's the same seductive lure used since ancient times when the idea of paid entertainment was first invented. Despite the tent show's claim of "The Dance of Art", this was not a performance of sophisticated ballet, but was instead a cheap burlesque act to skim the pockets of country rubes. 

 

My guess is that the photo was taken around 1905-1915, an era when traveling tent shows like this were America's most common form of entertainment. The nation was then more rural than urban, and distance was measured by train timetables. Every day hundreds of circuses, carnivals, minstrel shows, wild west companies, and dramatic troupes were constantly on the move, dismantling their tents in one town to reassemble in the next place on the rail line. Every show, even one with exotic oriental dancers, needed a band. It didn't necessarily require a big band, or even one with talent, but at the very least it had to be a noisy one to grab the patrons' attention.  

The Streets of Cairo
or the Poor Little Country Maid,
song written and composed by James Thornton, 1895
Source: Wikipedia

The hoochie-coochie, or hootchy-kootchy as it is sometimes spelled, was an early burlesque dance that borrowed the sexually provocative belly dance style of Middle-Eastern or Eastern European Gypsy women. The music associated with this dance is a minor key jingle called "the snake charmer song" or Arabian riff, and was also known as "The Streets of Cairo" by James Thorton, published in 1895.

 

In 1893 the city of Chicago hosted the Columbian Exposition to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus' arrival in the New World. One of the attractions at this enormous World's Fair was a so-called Egyptian Theater at the fair's Midway which included dancers performing traditional Arabic belly dancing. The show was titled "The Algerian Dancers of Morocco" at the attraction called "A Street in Cairo". One of the dancers was a woman named Farida Mazar Spyropoulos who went by the stage name of Fatima, though she was neither Egyptian nor Algerian, but actually Syrian and married to a Chicago restaurateur who was a native of Greece. Because of the theater's name and Fatima's size, she earned a nickname at the fair as "Little Egypt".  

 

During the short run of the fair from May 1 to October 30, 1893, "Little Egypt's" exotic dance became a popular attraction and was often referred to as the "Hoochee-Coochee", or a "shimmy and shake" dance, as the word "bellydance" had not yet become part of American vocabulary. The music used to accompany her dance became a worldwide cliche tune known as the Snake Charmer song. I can attest that children in 2021 still regularly request oboe players to play this melody.

Three years later, James H. White, a Canadian-American filmmaker and one of the pioneers of early cinema, made a moving picture short for the Edison Manufacturing Company of "Little Egypt" recreating her dance from the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. Despite being only 30 seconds long and without sound, the short became incredibly popular at amusement parks and boardwalk arcades around the world. In later years it was subject to censorship and bars were painted on the film to obscure the supposedly naughty bits. YouTube provides a double feature to see both the original and the censored version of Fatima's Coochee Coochee Dance (1896)

 

 

 

 

After Fatima, aka "Little Egypt", achieved some notoriety with her exotic dance, other women stepped forward with their own "Oriental dance".  In 1904 a woman named "Princess Rajah" earned a name for herself with a dance that she performed in the "Mysterious Asia" concession at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis. She got her start as a "cooch" dancer at Coney Island in the 1890s. This next short film of Princess Rajah's unusual belly dance style was shot on location at the St. Louis Exposition in May 1904 for the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company. She uses a prop in a surprising way that authentic Egyptian dancers would probably consider as absurdly dangerous. In later years she added a snake to her performance.

 

 

 

Sideshow exotic dancers were once a very common part of carnival entertainment, familiar to that part of the American public who understood the salacious hook. Nudge, nudge. Know what I mean?

But the thing about entertainment cliches, or memes in modern parlance, is that eventually even children learn about them. In 1929 Walt Disney made a short cartoon animation called The Karnival Kid. It was the ninth cartoon to feature Mickey Mouse, and the first one which let him speak. The story is set in a carnival where Minnie Mouse appears as a "Shimmy Dancer." 

 

 

It's important to note that the voice of Mickey (and the cats too), came from Carl W. Stalling (1891–1972), the composer of the cartoon's music. (Walt Disney voiced Minnie) Stalling came to Hollywood by way of his friendship with Walt, but his tenure at the Disney Studios was short. He is more closely associated with the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons produced by Warner Bros. Under his IMDB entry, Carl Stalling earned 774 credits as a composer during his long career. 

 

 

 

The previous short films are, of course, parodies of a traditional Middle-Eastern dance form. Here is an example of the real thing, with celebrated Egyptian dancer Nabaweya Moustafa (1919–2001) performing in a scene from the 1948 Egyptian film "Narges". The word Narges or Narjis is a female Arabic name that translates in English as the flower "Narcissus". Here the band and music have an authentic Arabic sound, and as far as I know, no chairs or hot dogs were harmed during Nabaweya's dance.  

 

 

 

The first belly dancers were exploiting a universal male desire to see scantily clad women perform a salacious bump and grind. Ignoring for the moment its obvious sexual nature, at its essence the "hoochie coochie dance" was, and still is, a bad imitation of misunderstood foreign culture. It shares the same kind of 19th century pigheaded insensitivity to the Arab and Middle-Eastern world just as the black-face minstrel shows did with African-American culture. It may seem like a harmless terpsichorean display but a century ago there was an underlying racist overtone to the "Oriental" dance that demeaned a number of national and ethnic cultures. Just the very word "Oriental" implies a myriad of offensive notions of imperialism, colonialism and white superiority over the rest of the world's people that does not resonate well in the 21st century.

Yet it's strange that somehow,

whenever you hear the first five notes

of the snake charmer song,

you can't help but think of dancers like these.

 

 

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday
a picture show that's always showing reruns.

The Band on the Bus

                              Aug. 22, 1908
Dear Sis,

   Rec'd your postal last week. Everyone is well here. The corn's now higher than me and Pop says it'll be a good season if it stays dry. Decided to type you a letter rather than stuff it all onto the back of this postcard of our band. Need the practice before I go off to Valparaiso next month. 

   I guess you know most everyone except a few of the fellas riding up front. The big man is Congressman Crumpacker. He gave a speech at the park about tariffs and the Philippines and a lot more. Behind him is his son who also made a speech. Didn't say much of nothing, but sure used a lot of big words to do it. Mr. Bowman loaned us the motor bus from his new automobile shop and had Jake drive us. He sends his regards.

   I suppose you think the boys in the band look kind of worried. We'd just played down at the station when Congressman Crumpacker arrived on the train, and we expected everyone would just march up to the park. But I guess the Con'man don't walk much and Mr. Bowman wanted to show off his new motor bus, so we hitched a ride with him. Seems Prof. Clay had an idea we could play some tunes as we went along, but when Albert started on his cornet fanfare, the Con'man put a stop to that.

   The new uniforms are swell but as you can see I'm not wearing one. When Prof. Clay opened up the box from the Chicago music store, there was only three suits in the large size. We drew straws and I lost. I sat at the back with Walter and his piccolo. There wasn't much room for my bass drum so I had to stand. When Jake fired up the motor the wagon took a jolt and I lost hold of the cymbals. You should have seen everyone jump! The Con'man's son lost his hat too.

  In a few weeks Mama and Pop will ship me off. I don't know yet if I can get in the band at college, but I thought I'd try out for the b'ball team. I suppose we'll see you and Charlie at Thanksgiving. Give little Ella a kiss for me. Tell her the tooth fairy teaches a course at my dental school.

   Your brother, (uncle) — Tom

This invented letter is inspired by a wonderful photo postcard that has no clues for names, place, or time. The ten boys in the band, along with their bandleader and five men, posed for the camera seated on an unusual early omnibus which has  five open benches for 15 passengers. On the radiator is a badge for The Overland Automobile Company, which manufactured automobiles in Indianapolis from 1903 to 1912, when it was acquired by John North Willys who renamed the company Willys-Overland. That automotive brand folded in 1926.

The Overland Automobile Co. logo, 1909

I've been unable to find any history on when the Overland Automobile Co. produced this kind of tourist auto. But in January 2014 I featured another postcard of The Mason City Band riding a smaller 12 passenger model made by Overland. This band would have enjoyed having an extra bench.

The postmark date on that postcard was October 1910, so I can presume my unknown boys band comes from roughly 1908-1912. Since the motor bus was built in Indianapolis, I chose the name of a real Indiana congressman from this era to use in my fictional letter. Congressman Edgar Dean Crumpacker (1851 – 1920), Republican, represented Indiana's 10th congressional district for seven terms from 1897 to 1913.  Surprisingly he resembles the big man riding in the motor bus, though that is surely just a coincidence. 

Edgar Dean Crumpacker
(May 27, 1851 – May 19, 1920)

But the real mystery
is a ghostly image
on the pavement beside the bus.
It this the notorious missing limb
when people say
a politician doesn't have a leg to stand on?

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday
where everyone is getting tired
waiting for the No. 53.

The Novelty Musical Artists

A micro-story fabricated
from two cabinet card photographs

  Maybe he should have stayed home today, thought Gus. Between random hammering from the stage crew for the new set, to the rhythmic clatter of tap shoes in that new dance act, his headache was not going to get any rest. Why did that pianist have to play so damn loud? He groaned and downed the rest of his coffee. At his age staying up for a Friday night card game would cost him much more than his winnings, or in the case of last night, his losings. Whatever made him think to bet against a magician? Professor Berkell, my eye. What college teaches you to be a card sharp? Stupid luck.

   "Jules," he shouted. "More coffee!" Gus rubbed his eyes and picked up the latest New York Clipper. He flipped through a few pages of the trade paper scanning the dense type for any news of the acts he'd hired this season. The theater circuits were pretty lively this year.

   The door to his office opened and a stout young man with a wispy blonde mustache entered carrying a tray with a coffee pot and a tall stack of mail. "Here's some fresh ink, Uncle Gus," he said. "Nice and hot. I put sugar and cream on the side in case your tummy needs some relief too." He pointed to the letters and packets. "You want me to sort them for you? Hide the bills from Aunt Milly?" He grinned.

   "Yeah, sure," Gus grimaced. "That's the first job of an assistant theatre manager." He refilled his cup, leaned his chair back, and put his feet up on the desk. Outside his window the sky was darkening. After a minute or two, he looked up from the paper. "Anything to report from the show last night? What's the take?" 

   "Not good," said Jules. "Maybe half of last weekend. And that's counting both shows. The rain's supposed to let up this afternoon so maybe folks will come into town. Mr. Ritchie sent a note this morning. Says he ain't feeling well, so his trick cycle bit is out. But Mr. Parker said he could add another turn with his dogs to fill the slot. He has a goat cart that folks haven't seen before."

   Gus grunted, he knew what ailed Richie. Little guy drank enough for three last night. Probably couldn't keep his balance if his bicycle had five wheels. He went back to studying the Clipper's adverts.

   Jules finished separating the post and picked out one larger package. Taking a penknife he cut the twine binding it and unwrapped a letter with a set of photos. "Say, Uncle Gus. Here's a novelty duo that might play well here. Take a look at this ol' fellow and his gal playing banjo and guitar." He passed a card photo to his uncle.

   "Hmmph," snorted Gus. "Hayseed Reuben meets rich big city socialite. That's an original. Where have I seen that before?" He waved at the hundreds of entertainer photos pinned to the walls of his office. Gus handed the photo back to Jules. "What's the matter with her? She don't look like she appreciates having her strings plucked. They got a name?"

   "They call themselves Fitz and Frazier. Say they're at liberty next month. Something about a tent show that went bust." Jules turned the letter over. "They're looking for bookings on the route back to Boston. One night or a week."

   Gus turned back to his paper. "Banjos are ten cents a dozen now, and there's not much noise in a guitar. What else can they do?"

   Jules put another photo on the desk. "Country boys don't usually play saxophone to their cows, uncle. This bit's not your typical minstrel routine. Looks like they got a tenor and a soprano sax."

   Gus turned over the second photo and paused in thought. "Okay, this is novel. I'll give them that. A comic sketch with a pair of saxophones ought to wake up the loafers sleeping in the balcony." he scratched his head. "But I still don't get her. She looks like she swallowed a plug of tobacco and is trying to decide whether to spit or ..." Gus started to snicker but it changed into a hacking cough that made him spill coffee on his vest.

   Jules chuckled handing him a towel. "Says here, Mr. and Mrs. Fitzgerald—that's their real names—played good dates last fall in Seattle and San Francisco. They come with a bunch of other instruments. The Mrs.—Mamie is her name—she plays handbells, cornet and violin too. You know the Knights of the Golden Arches have their state convention here next month. With the Tracey trio breaking up after Doris ran off with that Italian trapeze fella, we got a hole in our lineup that week. We could use some novelty musical artists to replace their song and dance numbers."

   Gus turned to stare out the window where the rain had returned. "All right. You write to them about dates that week with the usual guarantees, etcetera, etcetera. Tell them we want refined material and decent skits. No bum work. The Majestic Theatre caters to a family crowd." He watched the rain splatter on the marquee below his window. "Mostly. Except when it rains."

   "Sure thing, Unk." Jules picked up the tray and scattered papers. "I'll get it out to the post office before this afternoon's matinee." He turned toward the door. "You gonna stay around today?"

   Gus sighed. "Maybe. Let me know when the Professor takes his turn. I want to check his bit with the three cards again. I still don't understand how it works." He turned the two photos over. Harris of Chicago was the photographer, corner of West Ohio Street and Milwaukee Avenue. Not far from the theatre district, if he remembered correctly. Seems like a classy studio. So why couldn't they get the dame to smile? 

   Gus shuddered. He'd seen that kind of face before. It was like when the sky turns another shade of grey just before the storm hits. Just like Mildred's face when she learns he's been out for a late night of poker. 

   With a shiver he threw the two photos into his desk drawer. Maybe he should find a reason to stay around for the second show.

* * *

Sometimes old photos come with really good clues but they still fail to reveal their true history. So instead I get to make up my own story. In this case I've tried to illustrate the purpose of a vaudeville entertainer's promotional photograph.

With these two images we see two musicians dressed in incongruous stage costumes. The man in his big straw hat, farmer's boots, and scrubby duster coat fits a stereotype of the country bumpkin or rube. The woman in her glamorous sequined gown looks the part of a matron of upper-class urban society. Both were familiar character types of American theater and literature in the 1890s, which is the period for their fashions and their over-sized cabinet card photographs. Their trick banjo/guitar style, (take a second look if you missed their hand positions) identifies the couple as performing in the comic genre of novelty musical artists.

On the back of the banjo/guitar duo's photo is a name, Mamie Frazier,  written large in ink. Despite my best effort, I could not find any entertainer by that name, much less someone who played guitar and saxophone too. It doesn't help that it is very common name, which even in Chicago, Illinois, showed up too regularly to fix an identification. But if we look closely both the man and woman wear wedding bands on their left hands so it seems probable that they were married to each other. Stage names that used alliteration was also a bet on an old showbiz tradition.

But it's their second photo holding tenor and soprano saxophones that is especially unique. These hybrid brass/woodwind instruments were still relatively "foreign" to American audiences in the late 19th century. The sound color of the saxophone family–soprano, alto, tenor, baritone, bass–was only beginning to be used in professional bands. And the notion of a saxophone playing a jazz solo would not be invented for another 25 years or so.

When I searched for "saxophone duet" in newspapers from the 1890s, I came up with very few hits and even fewer that connected to vaudeville musical artists. But in the New York Clipper, the weekly trade magazine for theatrical arts, there was a mention of one couple in February 1893 that caught my attention. 

New York Clipper
23 February 1893

"The Holbrooks are still winning much praise for their clever work with Dr. Goerss' Specialty Co. They are stationed for the present at Galesburg, Ill., and good business is reported. Mr. and Mrs. Holbrook excell in their saxophone duet. Both are accomplished and versatile musicians."   It's a short and succinct notice, likely supplied by the Holbrooks themselves. Self-promotion was another old showbiz tradition.

But searching for this name in the New York Clipper, I learned that in 1891 that, "Al Decker has arranged for the Holbrooks a neat musical sketch, entitled "Down on the Farm."" 

New York Clipper
3 October 1891

The Clipper and similar national newspaper magazines like Billboard, and Variety, were the social media of this era for theatrical and circus performers, agents, managers, and supporting businesses. The pithy notes read like today's Twitter and Facebook feeds and were intended for people working in the entertainment world, and not for the general public. Letters to performers could be posted care of the Clipper to be picked up or sent to the addressee on the road. Like many artists, the Holbrooks took out regular advertisements in the Clipper to seek new bookings. Their full names were J. H. or Josh and Lizzie Holbrook, America's Greatest Musical Artists. The word "Great" was surely the most ubiquitous adjective of this era.

New York Clipper
8 April 1893

The Holbrooks lived in Sherborn, Massachusetts, just 20 miles west of Boston. Josh Holbrook was born in England and in the summer of 1894 he and his wife left America to play on the British music hall circuit. In June they appeared at Mr. Stoll's Panopticon in Cardiff, Wales. This "museum" venue presented a series of several tableaux of sentimental romantic paintings using live but static actors. In between these staged events were musical skits when the Holbrooks were featured.

Cardiff Western Mail
26 June 1894

"Prior to the tableaux, the Holbrooks, an American couple, contribute a splendid musical show. Miss Holbrook plays beautifully on the cornet, bells (a Yankee novelty) and a saxophone. On the latter instrument she is equally expert as Mr. Holbrook, who extracts sweet music from a banjo, cornet, and clarionet."

By August 1894, London's Royal Aquarium advertised The Holbrooks (J. H. and Lizzie)  Instrumentalists, and the Lady Champion Saxophone, Cornet, and Post Horn Soloist. The post horn was described in another report as a coach horn, a long straight bugle used by the driver of a horse drawn stagecoach to signal arrival at the next station.

By October 1894, the Holbrooks were back in the States performing as an act within a traveling variety show. Their musical and comedic talent on "novelty" instruments was enough to keep them get them on the Clipper's notice boards through 1899. After that, they seem to have disappeared.

It's very little to go on. Maybe there is a Mamie Frazier who played saxophone in vaudeville, but I think the name is not directly connected to the subjects of the two photos. The Holbrooks, on the other hand, played both saxophones and banjo. They advertised as a duo of novelty musical artists. The played a comic skit called "Down on the Farm". They promoted Lizzie Holbrook as a virtuoso soloist on saxophone and cornet. And more importantly they played around Chicago during the era for this kind of cabinet card photograph. That's a lot of curious coincidences.

It may not be proof,
but it is enough to make believe.

So maybe one day,
with a bit more searching,
I'll find another photo
of a dour-faced female cornet player
accompanied by an ancestor
of Henry John Deutschendorf Jr.,
a.k.a. John Denver (1943-1997).

This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday.
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