Brown, Belle

Biographical Note

Though little biographical information exists concerning Belle G. Brown, the contents of her collection document her relationships with prominent and respected European performers at the turn of the twentieth century. Miss Brown was born in Massachusetts to Joseph and Maria Brown and, aside from her studies in Europe, remained a Bostonian until at least the early 1900s . During the decade leading up to 1900, Miss Brown enjoyed the privilege of studying with such celebrated performers and pedagogues as Désirée Artôt, Pauline Lucca, and Jean and Edouard de Reszké. In 1893, Bronsart von Schellendorf (General Intendant of the Court Theatre at Weimar from 1887-1895 ) offered a five-year contract to Miss Brown to perform for the Court Theatre. Two years into her contract, on December 15, 1895, the Boston Globe printed an announcement that “Miss Belle Brown of Newbury Street [had] received by cable an offer of an engagement at the opera house in Weimar.” Both her contract signed by Schellendorf and the cable offer to perform in Weimar reside in this collection. There is also a limited amount of information available concerning Miss Brown’s professional opera career abroad as well as the remainder of her life, which was presumably spent in Boston (correspondence indicates that she resided in Boston’s Hotel Puritan when she gifted her materials to the Music Division in 1933 and 1934 ).