This dissertation has been Mic 61-2823 microfilmed exactly as received BROWN, Irving Marsan. CLEVELAND THEATRE IN THE TWENTIES. The Ohio State University, Ph.D., 1961 Speech - Theater University Microfilms, Inc., Ann Arbor, Michigan CLEVELAND THEATRE IN THE TWENTIES DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of the Ohio State University By Irving Marsan Brown, A.B., M.A. *.»**** The Ohio State University 1961 Approved by Adviser Department of Speech ACKNOWLEDGMENT To lay wife, Eleanor, without whan this would not have been ii CONTENTS Page LIST OF TABLES........................................ iv Chapter I. INTRO SU C T I O N ............. 1 II. CLEVELAND IN THE TWENTIES....................... U III. THE AMERICAN THEATRE IN THE T W E N T I E S ........... 20 IV. CLEVELAND THEATRE IN THE TWENTIES: INTRODUCTION. U6 V. CLEVELAND THEATRE IN THE TWENTIES: THE COMMERCIAL THEATRE ........................ 71 VI. CLEVELAND THEATRE IN THE TWENTIES: THE AMATEURS ................................. 128 VII. CONCLUSION................................... 20$ BIBLIOGRAPHY............................................ 210 AUTOBIOGRAPHY .......................................... 216 TABLES Table Page 1. Plays That Ran for Over $00 Performances on Broadway Between 1919-20 and 1928-29 . .......... 2$ 2. Road and Stock Company Shows in Cleveland; Statistics: 1919-20 to 1928-29 122 3. Kinds of Shows, 1919-20 and 1928-29 123 U. Play House Productions, 1928-29................ 191 iv CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION The purpose of this study is to examine closely the theatrical activities of the population of a single, reasonably significant American city, Cleveland, Ohio, during the decade 1919-1929. The hope for the study is that it may reveal by this examination as much as possible of the exact nature of the commercial and amateur dramatic activities of the period, may place in some perspective the relation­ ships of the many and varied dramatic endeavors that occurred in the city, and may note, wherever found, the implications of the dramatic developments of this decade for those of later years. This particular ten-year period was selected for its position in the developmental era of American drama. By the end of World War I the American commercial theatre was struggling to recover from the war of the commercial syn­ dicates. Amateur interest in the drama had broken through the psycho­ logical and organizational barriers of the professionals but had not yet moved far from the hands of the select and exclusive groups that first dared to produce plays. The years which followed the decade under examination brought forth the American community theatre. The question of what happened in between may deserve an answer, and Cleveland as a major American city may offer a fairly reliable indication of what the answer might be. The method of the study has been to accumulate from the principal Cleveland sources as much data as possible concerning the smallest as well as the greatest of Cleveland's dramatic activities. Following a survey of the theatrical clipping and program files of the Reference, Literature, and Fine Arts Divisions of the Cleveland Public Library, a page-by-page examination of each issue of the Cleveland Plain Dealer published during the decade was undertaken. This information was supplemented by a search of the pertinent drama files of the library of the Cleveland Press, by examination of other Cleveland periodicals, by interviews with Clevelanders active in the drama of the period, and by background reading and research in books and periodicals concerned with the city of Cleveland and with American drama. During and fol­ lowing the process of information gathering, the material was collected into related groups for the purposes of description and comparison which make up the body of this work. There is no intention here to offer statistical analysis as the principal method of determining the nature of Cleveland's dramatic activities. Drama groups, especially newly formed ones, rarely concern themselves with record keeping and often do not date their programs. To ask interviewees to recall personalities and events of thirty to forty years past was to ask a great deal. Material taken from local periodicals and even the Cleveland Plain Dealer, as fine a newspaper as it was, sometimes lacked important details and occasionally was in­ accurate. The author's language limitations prevented examination of the many foreign language periodicals, but a number of factual pamphlets on Cleveland's nationality groups remedied that deficiency to some extent. This is not to say, however, that the study has little value. No work thus far appears to have attempted to describe the base upon which the more obvious theatrical enterprises of a major city or nation have stood. Did the theatre of the twenties live by the support of an enthusiastic, devoted, educated, leisure-endowed, and financially suc­ cessful few? Or was it the result of a broad general interest, a concern for the drama which swept through the populace? Was this interest limited to the staging of prepared plays, or did it find ex­ pression in a variety of dramatic activities created by different groups of people? Did this activity appeal to particular kinds of groups, or was it common to all or most? These and lesser questions should be investigated if the nature of the development of the theatre is to be understood as fully as possible. This study attempts to answer as many of these questions as the availability of information makes answerable. Where statistics are inadequate, the study will attempt to supply an estimate of the typical example or the "sense" of events or attitudes. Where comparison is possible or enlightening, comparison will be used. The principal objective is to record and interpret, for whatever values may be found, the nature of dramatic activities in Cleveland in the twenties. CHAPTER II CLEVELAND IN THE TWENTIES Some description of the characteristics of the city of Cleve­ land may assist in understanding its theatrical interests, whether it be to correct erroneous impressions or to provide some new details with which to complete the information held. Cleveland's location at the mouth of the Cuyahoga River is of much less importance than river mouth placement might indicate. The Cuyahoga has never been easily navigable and therefore has not served Cleveland, as other rivers have served their ports, as a major means of commercial transport. Lake Erie, which establishes Cleveland's northern boundaries and connects Cleveland through the other Great Lakes to the iron mines of Minnesota, the industries of Detroit and Chicago to the west and Buffalo to the east, has been of much greater service. The southward thrust of the lake has also forced American railroad lines to thread their way along its southern edge and thus through Cleveland. The lake's tempering influence produces a longer growing season and less severe ranges of temperature than might be ex­ pected from Cleveland's northern location. This relatively mild climate, in conjunction with the fertile soil deposited by the glaciers that created the lake, has fostered a nursery industry of considerable economic importance to the area as well as the truck gardening tracts necessary to urban areas. The foothills of the Appalachians, which bound Cleveland to the south, are a factor in keeping the railroads on the level land along the lakeshore and have tended to reinforce Cleveland's east-west orientation and to retard relationships with the more southerly cities, Columbus, Cincinnati, and Pittsburgh, although the Ohio Canal cut through the hills to bring coal from southern Ohio in the nineteenth centuryThe Pennsylvania Railroad runs between Pittsburgh and Cleveland, but the two major roads through the city, The Nickel Plate and The Mew Tork Central (The Water-Level Route), go directly along the lake shore to Buffalo to the east and towards Detroit and Chicago to the west. The population of Cleveland, like that of all the major Ameri­ can cities, increased significantly during the twenties, though to a lesser extent than did that of the Greater Cleveland area included in Cuyahoga County. Cleveland itself rose from approximately 797,000 in 1920 to 900,^00 in 1930, an increase of 13 per cent, while Cuyahoga County expanded 27 per cent to 1,201,000 by 1930.2 As early as the fall of 1919 the shift toward heavier suburban than urban growth was surprising Cleveland officials. In September, 1919, the Cleveland Public School System Statistician noted that city school enrollments were far less than expected and reported that unusually heavy enroll­ ments had occurred in Lakewood, Cleveland Heights, and other Greater ^William Sanson Rose, Cleveland: the Making of a City (Cleveland: The World Publishing Co., 19^0), p. 607• 2Bureau of the Census, "Growth of the Largest United States Cities," The World Almanac and Book of Facts for 1957, p. 362. 6 Cleveland suburbs.^ In the 1910 census Cleveland ranked sixth largest among the cities of the United States, New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, St* Louis, and Boston preceding it. The 1920 census found it fifth, St. Louis and Boston below it and Detroit in fourth place. By 1930 Cleveland had dropped to sixth place as Los Angeles swept into fourth, some 700,000 persons ahead of Cleveland. ** An indication of the lateness of Cleveland’s population growth may be seen in the totals set forth below. i860 1930 Cincinnati 161,000 U9i,00O St. Louis 160,000 821,000 Cleveland U3,000 900,9003 Immigration greatly affected the composition of Cleveland's population. Over two-thirds of Cleveland's residents in 1920 were foreign born white or American born with foreign born or mixed parent­ age.^ There were more than twenty-five different nationalities repre­ sented Including approximately 35,000 Poles, 26,000 Germans, 21^,(XX) Czechs, 22,000 Russians (or Russian Poles), 18,000 Italians, 16,000 Jugoslavs, and 19,000 Austrians.^ During the next ten years iusni- gration kept up with population growthj by 1930 the foreign-derived category described above had dropped only 3.9 per cent to 69.9 per cent.