Fregoli, DeWitt Young and Sister Jugglers, miscellaneous postcards

While in Florence earlier this year I did a little postcard hunting at the local flea market. It was an interesting place. Not many postcards, but some fascinating objects. So here are some postcards from Italy and some others that turned up during my Easter cleanup.

Paulino and Zeze- I know nothing about this card. If anybody has any information please post it.

Fregoli- This is a reproduction of an original. Fregoli was a quick change artist, very famous during the vaudeville era

A 1993 Festival in Italy.

DeWitt, Young and Sister- The College Boy Juggler. I suspect that there is a very interesting story behind this card. Young was a very famous juggler, DeWitt is a very famous name in Juggling, and 'College Boy Juggler' was a very early juggling skit. This card is an American card dated 1908 and sent to Ohio- a hotbed of early American juggling. Somebody, somewhere will have a story about this one, I'm sure.

I found this one while cleaning my house. Judith Anderson, a very famous Australian actor, in a Criterion Theatre Sydney production.

Another Italian festival.

On the back of this picture postcard it says, ' Doris and Dessy' Danceurs......acrobatique" Obviously French. It looks like it's been taken from somebody's photo album and I picked it up in Florence.

New Postcards

My visit to the postcard fair today was very profitable. Well profitable for the stall owners, but very interesting for me.

Upper left is Pansy Montague. Pansy, also known as La Milo, was a human statue performer.She was born in Sydney and started her career with the Tivoli Circuit in the early 20th Century. In this postcard she is posing as the Water Nymph.

Upper right is Little Baby Watson, another Tivoli performer. Little baby Watson was a favorite of Tivoli owner Harry Rickards in the early 20th century.

Lower left is Teresa Carreno, who toured Australia in 1907. She was a Venezuelan pianist, singer and composer.

Lower Right is Margaret Thomas, one of JC Williamson's Royal Comic Opera Company.

Above to the left is a lovely postcard of the 'red headed spark' Daisy Jerome. I have something about her elsewhere on this blog. Next to her is one of my favorites, Carrie Moore. On the bottom is a very interesting advertising postcard for a Bland Holt production. Bland Holt was one of Australia's premier producers of melodrama. This particular postcard is advertising a 1904 production at the Theatre Royal in Sydney. It features a caricature of the man himself staring out a window.

These three postcards feature at the top left, a 1950s Australian magician named Tommy Parer. Next to Tommy is Annette Kellerman, the famous Australian swimmer who made a name for herself in the movies. Below is a picture of Miss Valli Valli an English Edwardian actress.

Finally, two wonderful postcards. The first is of Vivien Leigh during her contract with London Films. This probably dates from the mid 1930s, just before Gone with the Wind.

The second is an intriguing picture postcard of a parade in Sydney to advertise the Criterion Theatre's production of 'A Beggar on Horseback'. A quick internet search dates this to 1908. If anybody can tell where this was taken, I would appreciate it. I'm guessing Hyde Park because it was the closest park to the Criterion.

Alas, No Jugglers!