Tony Pastor Collection, 1861-1908 (bulk 1866-1890).

ArchivalResource

Pastor, Tony, 1837-1908. Tony Pastor Collection, 1861-1908 (bulk 1866-1890).

Tony Pastor Collection, 1861-1908 (bulk 1866-1890).

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/122617191

The bulk of the collection consists of scripts and actors' sides for more than one hundred sketches, burlesques, and pantomimes dating from pastor's earliest days as the manager of Tony Pastor's Opera House in 1866 on up to his heyday at the Fourteenth Street Theatre in the 1880s. The range of topics is narrow, with rags to riches stories and abductions being common. Many of the unsigned sketches may have been written by Pastor himself. Identified authors include John F. Poole, Charles F. Seabert, James Coleman Glynn, and J. C. Stewart. The Instrumental and Vocal Parts Series contains autograph instrumental and vocal parts for six sketches and over two hundred songs. Some of the songs may have been interpolated into sketches, while others, like the topical songs, were performed as a single "turn" on a vaudeville bill. Much of the music contains performance annotations. Supplementing the scripts and music parts, the Song Lyrics Series comprises autograph, typed, and printed lyrics for about sixty songs, most from later in Pastor's career. Parodies of popular songs are common. The Financial Journals Series is divided into two subseries: A. Touring Companies, 1882-1887, and B. Fourteenth Street Theatre, 1886-1894, eac arranged chronologically. The touring company journals contain detailed daily entries on receipts and the amount spent on advertising, properties, salaries, carriages, and the like. In contrast to the rich detail of the touring journals, the journals for the Fourteenth Street Theatre contain weekly summaries of receipts and expenses. The Programs Series comprises over one hundred weekly programs for the Fourteenth Street Theatre, 1890-1894, and two copies of an undated playbill. The scrapbooks contain publicity materials for touring companies and the Fourteenth Street Theatre: advertisements for upcoming shows, reviews, and promotional articles about Pastor or the acts appearing at his theater. Series VII contains sheet music for music hall songs published between 1878 and 1897. Much of the sheet music was given to Pastor as a complimentary copy by the lyricist, composer, or singer who popularized the song. The Miscellaneous Series contains a managers' report book with typed evaluations of vaudeville acts that appeared in 1902 in New York, the Midwest, and Washington, D.C. The often candid appraisals were written by theater managers judging the success of their own acts. The series also contains two notebooks, one from 1861 with a partial script in Pastor's hand, and the other containing undated lyrics for speaker and chorus in another hand.

25 document boxes, 12 oversize boxes, 2 oversize folders (16.6 linear feet).

Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center