The tragedy at the New Lyceum Theatre when the paint bridge collapsed was published all across the country. The Times Herald reported about the “accident of four scenic artists and their assistants” (Port Huron, Michigan, 5 December 1894, page 3). The details of the article described, “Seven men, four white and three colored assistants, were hurled through a crashing scaffold and fell forty feet to the floor of the new Lyceum theatre.” All were part of the paint crew hired by Thomas G. Moses for this specific project.
As I re-read “three colored assistants,” my mind flashed back to a blog comment from last month. A gentleman brought to my attention the scenic art career of an African-American during the 1870s. I was surprised, but not shocked, as studios didn’t always advertise hiring people of color or women. However, I was thrilled to have another name for my database and tucked away this little bit of information for further research. However, his story allowed me to read “three colored assistants” in a much different light and ponder if they were simply helpers or artists in their own right. I looked at the 1894 newspaper article with a different perspective than I would have a year ago, knowing that an African-American had been publicly acknowledged as a scenic artist two decades earlier.
Were the three assistants for the New Lyceum Theatre local hires? If so, some could argue that they were ready labor to help on site. The answer is “no.” One of the three gentlemen was from Chicago – Horace Posey. Posey was likely on Moses’ staff at the Sosman & Landis annex studio. He suffered both a broken arm and sprained ankle when the bridge collapsed. The other two gentlemen were from Memphis – A. E. Wells and John Wiley. Wells (also spelled as Well or Weil in some newspaper articles) broke his leg during the accident and Wiley suffered a sprained ankle. Wiley was the luckiest one of the entire paint crew.
The use of “colored assistant” to describe these three men suggests that they might be paint boys for the project, also termed “pot boys.” Pot boys filled the artists’ pots of color on their palettes. They also made one-fifths of a scenic artists wages. Regardless of the word, pot boys had a very important job in preparing both the pigment and binder. They may have also been artists in their own right who were painting sections for the journeymen. The one thing to keep in mind is that there is no way Moses would have had anyone on that paint bridge who was not qualified or hard working. He expected perfection. All of Moses’ writing suggests that he demanded speed and quality; not just from himself, but from all those on his staff as well. It is highly unlikely that these “assistants” were inexperienced or randomly selected. They, like all of his staff would be paid a weekly salary.
Finding information about African-American scenic artists in print during the nineteenth century is just about as difficult as locating women scenic artists from that same time; these three gentlemen have been left out of theater history. I thought back to graduate school and recalled studying African-American stereotypes and characters, but not African-American theatre practitioners beyond playwrights, directors and performers.
While painstakingly looking for any crumb of evidence that suggested these three gentlemen had a scenic art career in the public eye, I stumbled across another name – Jas. W. Bell.
Bell was purported to be “the only colored scenic artist in the country” in 1892. Well, that was wrong. The St. Louis Dispatch included an article titled, “Negro Demonstration” (10 May, page 2). The article reported “The ‘day of prayer’ set apart by the colored people of the United States, May 31. will be followed by a race demonstration by the Square League. This demonstration will be given at the Exposition Building at some date between June 1 and 15. It will embrace a discourse on ‘The Great Iniquity,’ by Geo. Vashon; with tableaux illustrative of the cause by Jas. W. Bell, the only colored scenic artist in the country.” That was like Grace Wisaahr, a decade later being the “only woman scenic artist in the country.” Nice tag line, but incorrect.
I believe that there were many more African-American scenic artists. One just doesn’t pop up out of nowhere with the skills to paint scenery and survive on the profession. The problem is that we just haven’t included them in theatre history – yet. Tomorrow, we’ll look at an African-American scenic artist who predated Bell by more than two decades – Solomon E. White.
To be continued…
Date: Saturday, April 9,1892
Paper: FREEMAN (Indianapolis, Indiana)
C.E.Porter, an artist of Meridian, Conn., is at work on the cyclorama of NIAGARA FALLS, to be presented at the World’s Fair. He was the first colored man admitted to the Art academy of New York, and has studied two years in Paris, France