LOUISE DRESSER The situation stunned Louise, who noted that Dresser had not asked for her “consent, or how I felt about it. It was his idea, his way of thanking my father.” She later had the privilege o f introducing Dresser’s hit song, “My Gal Sal.” Lou­ ise Dresser remained in touch with her “brother” through the years and was with him when he died in New York in 1906. Critics of the day described Dresser as “the girl with the pleasing contralto voice.” In 1898, at the age of twenty, she joined the vaudeville company o f Ward and Vokes. She played a bit part in The Gover­ nors and also appeared in the chorus— all for a salary of twenty-five dollars a week. A year later she met and married Jack Nor- worth, a vaudeville monologist who later became a lyricist. The marriage did not last long, as the couple divorced in 1907. One year later, Norworth penned the lyrics to York stage in musical comedy and light “Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” a song opera. It was here she met Jack Gardner, a with a melody created by Hoosier Albert veteran of many musical comedies. They Von Tilzer. were married in 1908. After ten years of Dresser performed in vaudeville until marriage, they finally managed to appear Above, Left: Based on a long- 1906, when she made the first of her thir­ on stage together. They made two tours 1934 running Broadway play by Frank teen appearances on Broadway opposite of vaudeville as headliners, doing musical Bacon, Lightnin’ had Dresser as Lew Fields in his play About Town. The sketches. the wife o f a character dubbed production’s impressive cast also included In 1911 Dresser received her first Lightnin’ Bill Jones, played by Norworth, Vernon Castle, and Mae Mur­ starring role on stage. Her debut was in comic Will Rogers. Comforting ray. The next year she starred with Fields her home state at the English Theatre in Dresser is her daughter in the film, Milly (actress Helen Cohan). in The G irl behind the Counter. In 1909 Indianapolis. This was a tryout for the Above, Right: With the film o f the Dresser had her greatest stage opportunity Chicago premiere o f the play Lovely Liar. Gene Stratton-Porter novel when she appeared in The Girls o f Gotten- After the play opened successfully in A Girl of the Limberlost, Dresser berg at the Knickerbocker Theatre in New Indianapolis, it went on to the Olympia gave a powerful performance as York City to excellent reviews. “Miss Lou­ Theatre in Chicago. Later that same year, the mother ofElnora Comstock ise Dresser’s Pilsener beauty was the real Dresser appeared in A M atinee Idol with (Marian Marsh), whom she blames for the drowning death malt extract o f ‘The Girls of Gottenberg,”’ DeW olf Hopper. Her understudy was of her husband. noted the New York Press. The performance Hopper’s wife, Hedda, who later became a placed her as one of the musical comedy well-known Hollywood columnist. favorites of the day. However, she was not Dresser kept busy in New York, mostly happy. “The strangest part of it all to me in musical comedies. She created the is that I should have strayed into musical feminine lead on Broadway for Montague comedy when I always longed to become a Glass’s Potash and Perimutter plays in 1914 real, legitimate actress,” Dresser said. and 1915. She also had a role in George With her reputation secure, Dresser M. Cohan’s Hello Broadway in 1914. The began to appear regularly on the New New York Star said of her performance, TRACES | Winter 2009 | 7.