Thomas G. Moses’ recorded painting for a variety of venues during the 1893 Columbian Exposition. One of his projects included scenery for Dr. F. Ziegfeld’s Trocadero. That would be Flo Ziegfeld’s father! Ziegfeld Sr. advertised the Trocadero as the “International Temple of Music” and featured a variety of musicians. However, it soon became a “high-class vaudeville theatre” under the management of his son. Ziegfeld Sr. was the first president of the Torocadero and also the General Manager. Thos. W. Prior was his assistant manager. Prior later managed the Schiller Theatre and then the Garrick Theatre.
The first few months in the history of the Trocadero were fraught with disaster. Their sophisticated music policy provided many artistic successes, yet consistently lost money to the tune of $3,000 each week. Furthermore, their first performance venue burned to the ground. Located in the armory of the First Regiment, Illinois National Guard on Sixteenth Street and Michigan Avenue, the Trocadero was entirely destroyed by fire on April 29, 1893.
In this disastrous turn of events, all of the Trocadero Amusement Company’s scenery and costumes went up in flames (Green Bay Weekly Gazette, May 3, 1893, page 7).
Their next venue was located a short distance to the north in the Battery “D” armory on the lakefront at Michigan Avenue and Monrose Street. In the second armory they continued to feature international musicians, such as Voros Miska’s Hungarian Band, Hans von Bülow’s Orchestra and Military Band, and Iwanoff’s Russian troupe of singers and dancers (Detroit Free Press, 27 April, 1893, page 5). All the while, the Ziegfeld Corporation continued to lose money at Trocadero.
After the fire and on the verge of bankruptcy, the company’s board of directors decided to make a radical change in their performance policy. Ziegfeld Jr. became the sole manager and vaudeville acts entered the picture.
Newspapers reported that “High class music, which was finely presented, but found too few patrons, gave place to vaudeville. This change produced an instant difference in results, and the handsome profits on the business week by week made it possible not only to avert the threatened intervention of a receiver, but to recover all the losses and place a balance to the credit of the enterprise” (The Inter Ocean, Dec. 3, 1893, page 29). By December of 1893, the substantial profits facilitated the Trocadero to reopen in a new home on Jackson Street. It was another remodeled armory on Jackson Street between Wabash and Michigan Avenues. The seating capacity was 1,600 with two balconies, twenty-five boxes, a parquet and orchestra circle. A large restaurant was located in the basement with smoking and retiring rooms on each floor. The stage was to be “roomy and built with special reference to vaudeville performance” (Chicago Tribune 19 November 1893, page 25).
Dr. F. Ziegfeld Sr. was born in northern Germany. A talented pianist, he studied at the Leipzig Conservatory under the direction of Moscheles, Richter, Plaidy, David, Wenzel, Paperitz and others. Graduating in 1863, he not only declined an offer from a leading Russian conservatory, but also left Europe entirely and moved to the United States. By 1867 he had founded the Chicago Musical College for the purpose of “furnishing a symmetrical and thorough musical education” (Chicago Board of Trade, page 291).
The institution was a school of music, acting, elocution of modern languages, and opera. After the great fire of 1871 destroyed many of the college rooms, property, and library, Ziegfeld reopened the school in another location. So the fire that destroyed the first Trocadero’s performance space was only a stumbling block for Dr. Ziegfeld in 1893.
Ziegfeld Jr. entered the musical scene in 1885 when he worked as the assistant treasurer for the Chicago College of Music. At the time, he was noted as a “very popular and talented young businessman,” later rising to celebrity status as the Broadway impresario and creator of the Ziegfeld Follies. The Follies ran from 1907 to 1931.
In Chicago during 1893, the elder Ziegfeld opened a nightclub to obtain business during the Columbian Exposition. His venue promised “the comforts of European Music Halls.” To help his father’s nightclub succeed after fire and near bankruptcy, Ziegfeld Jr. hired and managed strongman Eugen Sandow.
Ziegfeld Jr. convinced Sandow to terminate his previous contract with Abbey, Schoeffel and Grau. The Chicago’s Sunday Inter Ocean featured Sandow as “The Strongest Man” and “a Prussian of Perfect Physique” (June 25, 1893, page 25). It was rumored that wealthy ladies paid extra money to sneak backstage after the show and feel his muscles. After a two-month engagement at the Trocadero in 1893, Sandow left for New York and European engagements, touring throughout the U.S. in Ziegfelda show called, “Sandow’s Trocadero Vaudevilles.”
Other vaudeville acts at the Trocadero included Marlo and Dunham (horizontal bar performers), Abachi & Masuad (acrobats), the Great American Amann (protean artist, facial artist and mimic), Papinta (the serpentine dancer), George Adams (the clown), Harry La Rosa (the Equilibrist), John Le Claire (the Comedian), Iwanoff and his Royal Russians,Effie Stewart, Carmencita, Eunice Vance, Lottie Gibson, and the Great Santini Brothers. Later, Sandow continued performed on a vaudeville bill with the musical comedy star Billy B. Van, the French clown Mon. O’Gust, and the aerial acrobats called the Five Jordans.
There are no details about the scenery that Moses painted for the Trocadero. As he was a well-known landscape artist, it is possible that he created the beautiful pastoral backings for the various international performances during the first half of 1893. The lovely scenery behind Hans von Bülow’s orchestra and military band could possibly be the work of Moses.
And from Gene Meier…voila! It was across from the Chicago Fire Panorama. It’s great to have smart and inquisitive friends.
To be continued…
