Copyright © 2020 by Wendy Waszut-Barrett
In 1924 Thomas G. Moses wrote, “On the [March] 30th, I stopped at St. Louis, where Kirke met me at the station and we went to Volland’s studio. It is some studio.” Toomey & Volland built a new studio in 1922. Work was pouring in, especially Masonic scenery orders.
Moses continued, “They were very anxious to have me come down and help them out, as they had more work that they could handle.” I bet, as they had kept winning bids from Sosman & Landis over the past few years. Moses’ bid for the Chicago-based firm was always higher than their St. Louis competitors, especially in the post-WWI years. Moses was a close friend both Patrick J. Toomey and Hugo R. Volland. He repeatedly mentioned stopping by the Toomey & Volland shops whenever he was in St. Louis, Missouri.
There was another issue at play when Moses’ mentioned stopping by Volland’s in 1924. Both of the studio founders passed away within six months of each other, and Toomey & Volland transitioned into Volland Scenic Studios. Volland’s son Victor was now running the business with his own ideas. The two founders, both skilled scenic artists in their own right, were gone.
It has been a while since I covered the history of the Toomey & Volland Studio, so I’ll do a brief recap. Then I’ll cover the collapse of the original firm between 1922 and 1923.
Volland Studios evolved from an earlier partnership known as Toomey & Volland. Moses was close friends with Toomey. Toomey & Volland evolved from an earlier scenic art partnership called Noxon & Toomey. Thomas C. Noxon and Patrick Joseph Toomey joined forces in approximately 1867. Interestingly, Volland Studio would claim 1869 as their establishment, but Noxon was the firm’s first president and senior partner in the company.
Noxon and Toomey expanded in 1881 and changed its name to Noxon, Albert & Toomey. The famed Ernest Albert was added to the company, while Toomey was reported to be “the itinerant member of the firm” (Richmond Dispatch, 24 Jan 1886, page 3). The company ran regional offices with studios in St. Louis, Missouri, Chicago, Illinois & Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Noxon, Albert & Toomey lasted for almost a decade, but Albert eventually returned to Chicago to partner with Walter Burridge and Oliver Dennett Grover, forming Albert, Grover & Burridge. This was immediately after Moses partnered with Burridge, forming Burridge, Moses and Louderback. By 1891, Albert, Grover & Burridge partnered and built an innovative scenic studio in Chicago with twenty paint frames and a display area to fully light and stage completed sets for clients. Although there was much promise, the firm went bankrupt in two years.
The majority of late-nineteenth-century and early-twentieth-century scenic art partnerships formed quickly; they came and went. In some ways, they were like the type of fire-works that make a big boom and then quickly fizzled to the ground. Very few companies lasted the test of time, with both Sosman & Landis and Volland Studios being the exceptions. However, Toomey & Volland really did not withstand the test of time, as the partnership only lasted two decades. Volland Studios certainly lasted longer, but that it wasn’t a partnership; Volland became a family firm.
To be continued…
