Social Victorians/1887 American Exhibition/Souvenir Program and Messenger Boy

Logistics

• Sometime in the Summer of 1887

Related Events

• The American Exhibition, which opened on 6 May 1887

The Event Itself

William F. Cody Was Involved in Making a Souvenir Program

At some point in the summer of 1887, E. H. Southern sent a "messenger boy" from New York, Eugene B. Sanger, to deliver a souvenir program to the authors of a The Highest Bidder in London, John Madison Morton and Robert Reece; Reece was living at the Charter House (Southern 394). Sanger delivered the package and letters to Reece, and according to Southern, “Buffalo Bill was at that time giving an exhibition at Earls [sic] Court; to him also was a souvenir sent, and we soon received a photograph of our boy surrounded by Buffalo Bill's Indians, cowboys, and other Wild West citizens. Sanger's mission to Morton and Reece was discussed in the Daily Telegraph and other papers” (Sothern 395). A photograph was taken of Sanger with some members of the Wild West show.

Daniel Frogman, E. H. Sothern's manager, adds some details

<quote>When we approached our fiftieth night at the Lyceum with The Highest Bidder I felt we ought to have a souvenir. These offerings were then in vogue for long runs. We felt that fifty nights in the summer was a long run — for us. Mr. Sothern had begun life as a draughtsman; so he agreed to make the drawings of the characters in our play, and they were embodied in a neat brochure and presented to the audience. In addition to this, we thought it would be a good scheme — so elated were we young fellows — to send a copy to each of the prominent actor-folk in London.

At that time the messenger-boy service was in its infancy. I called up the head of the district office and requested him to send me a reliable boy who could be trusted with a mission to London by the next day's steamer. They sent me one of their young superintendents, Eugene B. Sanger. I gave him his instructions, which were to deliver fifty addressed souvenirs, and bring back by the same steamer the autographed receipts for each. These included Henry Irving, Forbes Robertson, Mary Anderson, Madge and W. H. Kendal, George Alexander, Beerbohm Tree, Buffalo Bill and others. The messenger afterward, possibly inoculated by a theatrical germ acquired from this experience, became an actor and was added to the cast of The Highest Bidder. He is now a prominent stage manager. Buffalo Bill treated our boy very well. He assembled his entire Wild West Show of several hundred people and had the boy photographed seated in the centre of this picturesque group, with himself on one side and his fidus Ac hates, Major Burke, on the other. These pictures were reproduced in various papers, and the entire enterprise, owing to its novelty, received a large amount of press attention.</quote> (Frogman 16–18)

Bibliography

• Frogman