Wednesday, September 9, 2020

The Federal Theatre Project in Alabama

The Federal Theatre Project was a New Deal program designed to promote new and classical theatrical productions and provide work for playwrights, actors, musicians, directors and others during the Great Depression. Plays and musicals were produced in many cities across the country, including Birmingham. The program began on August 27, 1935, and was cancelled June 30, 1939. 

Here's Wikipedia's summation of the project, which was driven by the vision of director Hallie Flanagan:

"Within a year the Federal Theatre Project employed 15,000 men and women,[7]:174 paying them $23.86 a week.[8] During its nearly four years of existence it played to 30 million people in more than 200 theaters nationwide[7]:174 — renting many that had been shuttered — as well as parks, schools, churches, clubs, factories, hospitals and closed-off streets.[3]:40 Its productions totalled approximately 1,200, not including its radio programs.[4]:432 Because the Federal Theatre was created to employ and train people, not to generate revenue, no provision was made for the receipt of money when the project began. At its conclusion, 65 percent of its productions were still presented free of charge.[4]:434 The total cost of the Federal Theatre Project was $46 million.[3]:40"

Very little has been written about the project in Alabama, which closed in January 1937 when its personnel were transferred to Georgia. The Alabama Mosaic site has about 34 articles mostly from contemporary newspapers via the Birmingham Public Library. Some of those are below with comments. 

I recently read an article by John R. Poole, "Making a Tree from Thirst: Acquiescence and Defiance in the Federal Theatre Project in Birmingham, Alabama" published in Theatre History Studies 21: 27-42, 2001. In it Poole discusses the only black project in the Deep South, which happened to operate in Birmingham. Several plays originated in this unit, and I'll also discuss some below the relevant newspaper articles. Poole wrote his dissertation, cited at the end with some other materials, on the project in Georgia and Alabama.  

Before its demise the Federal Theatre Project became the subject of Congressional criticism and investigation. Many of the productions addressed, sometimes  graphically, racial and labor injustices and other problematic topics. A few of the Birmingham plays fit that profile as noted below.

What also happened is that for some intense months in 1936 a lot of theater was produced in Birmingham involving both white and black actors and audiences and in some cases tough subjects. 




Jefferson Theater on 2nd Avenue North around 1903. Most of Birmingham's "white" plays were produced here.

Source: BhamWiki


Industrial High School [now Parker]. Most plays of the "Negro" unit were produced here. 

Source: BhamWiki


Birmingham Post 31 March 1936

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections via Alabama Mosaic 


"Home in Glory" a "symphonic drama" was written by Clyde Limbaugh, the white director of the Negro Repertory Theater, the first federal project in Birmingham. The previous year Limbaugh had participated in "Roll Sweet Chariot" a project presented at Legion Field. Rehearsals for "Home" took place at the Y.W.C.A. for blacks since the play about black life in Shelby County featured 26 black actors and a chorus of 100. As noted below, the production took place at Municipal Auditorium on two nights in mid-April. There was apparently a third performance; according to Limbaugh, in total 2500 people attended. 




Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections


Birmingham Post 2 April 1936

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections via Alabama Mosaic

During this period Limbaugh was also busy with projects outside the Federal Theater, including this "minstrel" show with an all black cast staged at the Industrial High School. 


Birmingham Post 24 April 1936

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections via Alabama Mosaic 

This article gives us some details on the Federal Theater Project for white professionals and audiences in Birmingham. The plan was to pay $75 a month "be it for villainy, heroism, or plain butlering." The first production to open about May 12 will be "After Dark" by Dion Bousicault, "an old-fashioned melodrama with plenty of asides." Director Verner Haldene was previously with the Montgomery Little Theater, and had taken over April 23 from Ivan Paul of the Federal Theater's Washington office. The play's 25 actors included veterans of the Birmingham Little Theater. Performances were planned for Tuesday through Saturday nights with a Saturday matinee; prices ranged from 20 to 40 cents. The company was large enough to support one always in Birmingham and another touring the state. 


Birmingham Age-Herald 12 May 1936 

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections via Alabama Mosaic




Birmingham Post 13 May 1936

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections via Alabama Mosaic


Birmingham News 24 June 1936

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections via Alabama Mosaic

This article sums up the season as presenting a "series of successful play", ending with a second week of "Chalk Dust" that "deals with educational problems in these trying times." Optimism ran high; the piece notes rehearsals will take place over the summer for the fall season. 



Birmingham News 9 July 1936

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections via Alabama Mosaic 

Noted here is "Swamp Mud", the second production of the Birmingham "Colored Unit." The venue was Industrial High School, with Clyde Limbaugh the director and Wallace Pritchett the musical arranger. The play, set among prisoners in the south Georgia swamps, included works songs and spirituals sung by a choir of 200 voices. Seating was available for both blacks and whites. 






Birmingham Post 9 July 1936

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections via Alabama Mosaic

We learn here that "Swamp Mud" had been first presented by a group in Ann Arbor, Michigan. The symphonic drama featured an "invisible choir. 

Author Harold Courlander had a long career as novelist and anthropologist, publishing 35 books and plays and many scholarly articles. He died in 1996. 
 


Arthur K. Akers [1886-1980] was a Birmingham writer who published several dozen stories in various magazines between 1910 and 1936. Some featured stereotypical African-American characters and dialect. You can see a list of them here and here.




Birmingham Post 5 November 1936 

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections via Alabama Mosaic

The Birmingham Federal Theater Project will suspend performances until after Christmas, and hopefully take its successful production of "It Can't Happen Here" on a state tour. That play, based on the 1935 Sinclair Lewis novel, had premiered on October 27 in 21 theaters in 17 states. The company also plans to begin work on "Altars of Steel" a play by Thomas Hall-Rogers about the development of the steel industry in Birmingham. That play was produced in Atlanta the following year to great controversy; see references below. 

 


Birmingham News 16 May 1971

Source: Birmingham Public Library Digital Collections via Alabama Mosaic


This article provides some more interesting details. The Jefferson Theater remained "dark and deserted" after the theater project left in 1936 and was finally torn down in 1947. There's also an anecdote from Federal Theater Project national director Hallie Flanagan's testimony before the U.S. House committee about subversive influence in the productions around the country. U.S. Representative Joe Starnes of Alabama wanted to know if the 16th century English playwright Christopher Marlowe was a communist. 




FURTHER REFERENCES

Flanagan, Hallie (1940). Arena: The Story of the Federal Theatre. New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce.

Ralph T. Jones, ‘Altars of Steel Highly Praised as Best Drama Ever Presented Here,” Atlanta Constitution, April 2, 1937, 11

John McGee, Federal Theatre of the South: A Supplement to the Federal Theatre National Bulletin, Quarterly Bulletin 1, no. 2 (October 1936),

John Russell Poole, The Federal Theatre Project in Georgia and Alabama: An Historical Analysis of Government Theatre in the Deep South (PhD Diss., University of Georgia, Athens, 1995)

Mildred Seydell, “Altars of Steel Aids Communism with Tax Money,” Atlanta Georgian, April 4, 1937, 4D







Wednesday, September 2, 2020

Alabama Photos of the Day: Gayfers

At mom's in Huntsville I recently came across the small jewelry box shown below, now being used to hold a few photographic slides [remember those?]. Naturally I thought, "There's a blog post in that..." And here we are...

Alabama marriage records show that Englishman Charles John Gayfer married Caroline Lurbeck in Mobile on April 11, 1871. Later in that decade he opened a dry goods store at 20 North Joachim. He soon partnered with A.N. Edmondson, and they relocated to 103 Dauphin at the corner with Conception. A move to St. Emmanuel in 1919 became the final downtown location of Gayfer's. 

Charles died in Mobile on December 7, 1915; he is buried in Pine Crest Cemetery. By that time the store had 150 employees and around $500,000 in annual sales. The business continued to thrive, and in the 1950's it was purchased by Mercantile Stores Company, a department store chain operating under various names. The new owners soon expanded the Gayfer's brand beyond Mobile. By 1969 stores had opened in Pensacola, Biloxi, Mississippi, and Tuscaloosa. 

The apostrophe in the name disappeared in 1970. That same year a Montgomery Fair store [the one where Rosa Parks had once worked] became a Gayfers and a store opened in Jackson, Mississippi, and a second one in Pensacola. The flagship store in downtown Mobile closed in 1985 and moved to West Mobile. By the early 1990's Gayfers was one of the largest southeastern department store chains. 

In 1998 the end arrived. The Dillards chain purchased Mercantile and the Gayfers brand came to an end. The name had a good run. 

In the 2001 book Mobile: Photographs from the William E. Wilson Collection by Marilyn Culpepper you can see Wilson's photograph of Gayfer's taken around 1900. At that time the store occupied the first floor and the Fidelia Club operated upstairs. 

A recent article by John Sharp, "‘I Wish for Gayfers’: Memories of beloved Mobile department store surface as redevelopment evolves" can be found here




A drawing of what became the Gayfer's store that opened on St. Emanual in 1919. This one remained the downtown location until the move to West Mobile in 1985. 

Source: Alabama Dept. of Archives and History




Entrance to Gayfers at Wiregrass Commons Mall, Dothan, 20 April 1988





Teenagers modelling back-to-school clothes in the Mobile Gayfers on July 19, 1977. The young woman in the middle is holding a copy of Seventeen magazine.

Source: Alabama Dept. of Archives and History





Tuesday, September 1, 2020

Alabama History & Culture News: September 1 edition

 


Here's the latest batch of links to just-published Alabama history and culture articles. Most of these items are from newspapers, with others from magazines and TV and radio station websites. Enjoy!


Local history: Watertown hosted Booker T. Washington
Local history: Watertown hosted Booker T. Washington ... about the connection between a historically Black university in Alabama, and a small city in ...

Huntsville sites herald women's suffrage
Nevertheless, this mural can serve as a teaser in opening vital community conversations about the true history of Alabama's sexist and racist past.


Monroeville, Alabama, the inspiration for 'To Kill a Mockingbird', has elected its first Black mayor
It also garnered national attention with the release of the film and book “Just Mercy” — which tells the story of Walter McMillian, a Black man from ...


'Classic Restaurants of Montgomery' a fun taste of city's past
Copies may be ordered through the Old Alabama Town website, www.oldalabamatown.com. Click on “Events” and follow through to find book ...

Montgomery's history includes tasty tales from the culinary trail
For about a hundred years — a period that began just before Alabama and ... King and Pell, who partnered for the new book “Classic Restaurants of ...


Racism denied Auburn's first Black student a master's degree. Then, at 86, he returned.
He'd teach history — at Alabama State University, North Carolina A&T State University, Tuskegee Institute and Talladega College — until his retirement ...


Local author's book selected for national festival
The Alabama Center for the Book has selected “The Night the Forest Came to Town,” by Homewood author Charles Ghigna to be featured as the ...


The unveiling of Elba's Alabama Legacy Project bronze marker will be held Tuesday, Sept. 1, at 10 a.m., at the Evergreen Cemetery. This will be near ...


Who knew? Oak Mountain State Park could have been a National Park + other fun facts
“Oak Mountain State Park was going to be Alabama's “Little Smoky ... First, a little bit about Lauren Muncher, who gave me a historical and natural tour ...

Elba City Council gives go ahead to Masonic Lodge #170 for historical marker to be placed in ...
During Monday evening's meeting, Kelley said the Alabama State Archives office had approved the Lodge to receive one of its historical markers.


After her epic debut novel on slavery's descendants, Yaa Gyasi wrote even closer to home
If you buy books linked on our site, The Times may earn a commission from ... to make sense of the traumas of her childhood back in Alabama: the death of her ... Combining them in one book “gave me this rich landscape in which to ...

Pleasant Grove makes history; elects first Blacks to council
Pleasant Grove makes history; elects first Blacks to council. Updated 11:23 ... Alabama Rep. Merika ... He tweeted: “In Pleasant Grove AL now. Great to ...


(Charles Hay is also on record as an 11-year-old Confederate soldier from Alabama.) “I can't state this as historical record and I haven't been able to ...


Spirit of Steel: music of the Mines, Railroads and Mills of the Birmingham District
The music created during this period of Alabama history provides a glimpse at the lives of the men and their families at this time. All OLLI programs are ...

Alabama Century & Heritage Farm Applications Due Aug. 28
The purpose of both programs is to recognize family farms that have played a significant role in Alabama's history. adai. A Century Farm is one that has ...



Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame Museum. Birmingham, The Carver Theatre, black history The Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame Museum in the historic Carver ...

Tuscaloosa's Bamastuff Recognized in National Register of Historic Places
It was a day for the history books for three Alabama properties. Literally. Three more Alabama properties were recently added to the National Register of ...




'Lovecraft Country' and the dark history of Alabama's 'sundown towns'
In his 1934 book “Stars Fell on Alabama,” author Carl Carmer described seeing the sign while visiting Cullman. Carmer asked his caddy, Henry, as to ...

Art of history: Preserving African American dioramas
The director of the Legacy Museum at Alabama's Tuskegee University, she describes the scene as the moment of emancipation. "It's a moment that is ...


History made in Central Alabama as Pell City elects 1st black woman to city council
History made across Central Alabama from Tuesday, August 25 elections. Ivy Mcdaniel is the first black woman elected to Pell City's council. She will ...

Thursday, August 27, 2020

Movies with Alabama Connections: The Sin of Nora Moran

If I followed the Alabama connection in this film into other movies, I would never have to find other topics for this blog. Late in his career Henry B. Walthall, a major star in silent films, appeared in this 1933 crime drama. Walthall was a Shelby County native and made dozens and dozens--and dozens--of films between 1909 and 1936. But I'm getting ahead of myself. 

As The Sin of Nora Moran opens we learn that Nora, lover of a married Governor, sits on death row convicted of a murder that the District Attorney, the Governor's brother-in-law, helped her cover up. She has refused to tell the truth about the crime in order to save people she loves. We can sympathize because she had killed a man who raped her. We eventually learn she claimed to have murdered him to cover the accidental death actually caused by her lover--the Governor. Got that?

Early in the film we follow Nora as she unsuccessfully looks for a job until she's hired as the assistant to a circus lion tamer. He eventually rapes her, and Nora leaves the circus for New York City. Before that we get to see an incredible wrestling match between the tamer and one of the lions.

This film is a strange amalgam of scenes set in the present as Nora awaits her fate and flashbacks--and flash forwards within those flashbacks-- to various periods as we learn about her earlier life. There are visions of the dead and from the soon-to-be-dead. District Attorney John Grant narrates the tale to his sister, the wife of Governor Dick Crawford, who is Nora's lover. There are also interesting tracking shots,  montages, and at one point a rather lingering focus on the backsides of some young ladies in a chorus line.

Zita Johann who plays Nora was an Austrian-American actress with some credits in Broadway productions and a few films. In addition to this one, she's also remembered for her role in the classic 1932 horror film The Mummy. 

Walthall has a small role as Father Ryan, who has known Nora since her days as a little girl in his orphanage. By this time, three years before his death, Walthall was acting in smaller roles but many of them. He finished his final film only three weeks before he died of an intestinal illness at age 58.

We can find Walthall listed in the 1880 U.S. Census at age two. His parents, Junius L. and A.M. Walthall, were living on their farm near Harpersville with young Henry, an older sister, and his father's mother. By 1900 they were living in Columbiana, and Henry, then 22, was a deputy sheriff. He had been educated mostly at home, but attended Howard College for six months. Walthall served in the military during the Spanish-American War, but caught malaria and was not deployed overseas before the end of hostilities. 

At some point he left Alabama for New York and began a career on the stage. By 1909 he had made his first film for D.W. Griffiths' Biography Studios. His role in Griffith's infamous 1915 film Birth of a Nation made him a star. I'm planning a blog post on Walthall in the near future and will explore his career on the stage and in the movies.

You can read appreciations of the film here and here. Nora Moran was the product of Majestic Studios, a Poverty Row outfit that operated from 1930 until 1935. This crisp 65-minute film is a strange one, but well worth watching. You can find it online at the Internet Archive.

This film is known as a pre-code Hollywood film, meaning it was made before the implementation of strict content rules for motion pictures rigidly enforced from 1935 until the mid-1950's. The rules are widely known as the Hays code after the man who developed them. I've written about another pre-code film with Alabama connections, the very strange--and I mean very--1934 production, Murder at the Vanities. 

More comments are below some of the images. 





One of the film's original posters, designed by Alberto Vargas. This same image was used on the 2013 DVD release. 

Born in Peru, Vargas moved to the U.S. as a young man after art studies in Europe. He soon began poster designs for the Ziegfield Follies and then Hollywood studios. He is most famous for the many pin-up paintings he did for Esquire during World War II and later for Playboy. 













We learn that Nora was a resident at the orphanage run by Father Ryan. She was adopted by a couple who are soon killed in a car wreck.





In this fantasy sequence three men gather around Nora's casket to talk about her execution, which has not yet taken place. Father Ryan is there, along with the District Attorney and the Governor. Her former lover, on the right in the photo below, notes that he doesn't like the way they've fixed her hair. His companion the district attorney replies that they shaved part of it so the current would go through her body. Her lover insists that's not true....Father Ryan remains silent and stoic. 











In another of several fantasy sequences in the film, an adult Nora visits Father Ryan in his office at the orphanage. 








Walthall did make it into the main credit sequence, but his role is rather small. 



Henry B. Walthall [1878-1936]

Source: Wikipedia