The Actress

 

Unknown Actress. American Vaudeville Museum. 

The discovery of the 1899 Shelby County News-Gazette article on the family reunion between Agnes Atherton O'Brien and her father, John O'Brien, prompted me to look back at the records to take a closer look at her life and career on the stage. During her 30+ years in the business, she was highly regarded as a singer, dancer, vaudeville performer and actress.

It appears that Agnes got her start in Chicago, perhaps around 1879 when she was 20 years old. The first news clipping I have been able to find mentioning her noted she appeared in Patrick Conley's Varieties Theater in St. Paul, Minnesota during the fall season for 1879, and that she was contracted by Conley's agent out of Chicago (referenced in the New York Clipper, 30 August 1879). A November 1879 article from St. Paul, Minnesota mentioned that Agnes "sings motto songs in a manner that captivates the young men."

By Christmas 1879, Agnes had moved on to perform a song-and-dance with a company at the Coliseum Theater in Council Bluffs, Iowa. Her run in Council Bluffs ended in January 1880 and she returned to Chicago.

Agnes appears in the 1880 US Census in Hancock, Houghton, Michigan between 3-4 June 1880 as a performer in theater. In mid-January 1881, she performed in Janesville, Wisconsin. She then did two weeks at the Academy of Music in Detroit, Michigan in mid-February 1881.

In October 1881, Agnes was performing in a variety show in Indianapolis, when she had an impromptu marriage to musician Fred E. Day. The marriage appears to have been very short lived, as Fred filed an annulment in Nashville, Tennessee in August 1887 so that he could marry another woman in September 1887. Agnes likely returned to Chicago while Day moved on to perform in Nashville in 1882, as she joined a new company, Niblo's Humpty Dumpty pantomime company. They performed at the New Gem Theatre in Deadwood, South Dakota in early January 1883.

Indianapolis Sentinel. 21 Oct 1881.

Nashville Daily American. 7 Aug 1887.

Between September and December 1883, Agnes performed in Saginaw, Michigan. In early January 1884, she moved on to the Vine Street Opera House in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Cincinnati Commercial Gazette, 20 Jan 1884.

Agnes performed in Indianapolis in February 1884.

In early April 1884, Agnes performed "exquisite song and dance" in Kohl & Middleton's West Side Museum in Chicago, then Omaha, Nebraska (14-20 April), followed by an extended run at the Theatre Comique in St. Paul, Minnesota, with the Gillett Brothers (and future 2nd-husband Alfred Gillette).

New York Clipper, 15 Mar 1884

St. Paul Globe, 21 Apr 1884.

After a two-week run in St. Paul, Agnes moved on to Milwaukee, performing Poetry of Motion at Kohl & Middleton's Milwaukee Dime Museum (2-7 June 1884). Her next stop was Columbus, Ohio (28 July 1884), followed by Grand Rapids, Michigan (14-28 August 1884 due to popularity), where she was billed as "the queen of song and dance."

Evening Leader, 12 Aug 1884.

Evening Leader, 30 Aug 1884.

By early September 1884, Agnes returned to the Milwaukee Dime Museum for performances of "refined songs and dances."

In late November 1884, Agnes was in St. Louis, Missouri at the Alhambra Theater. She likely stayed on in St. Louis through the holidays. With the start of 1885, Agnes performed in St. Louis, Missouri (week of 12 January), followed by Nashville, Tennessee (19 January). She returned to St. Louis in late February at Broadway & Treyser's Dime Museum (last week of February), and at the Palace Theater with the Gillett Brothers (first two weeks of March 1885). Agnes was still at the Palace Theater during the first week of June 1885.

St. Louis Globe-Democrat. 1 Mar 1885.

Agnes' next stop took her to Evansville, Indiana, and I'll pause her career recap at this stage for the next post, covering mid-1885 into the early 1890s.