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Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West

Winners will be announced on February 28, 2016

Long before actors were vying for an Oscar nomination and world wide fame thespians were trying to carve out a modest living entertaining prospectors and settlers of the Old West. Today the curtain goes up on a woman entertainer who captured the hearts of the western pioneers.

Ladies and gentlemen, Lillian Russell,

America’s Greatest Beauty

It was not so much the late Lillian Russell’s great dramatic ability or her clear, well-trained voice as her personality and physical beauty that made her the most famous musical comedy star of her day and acclaimed for more than a generation as “America’s Greatest Beauty.” And after she had ceased to sing and act for the public the compelling charms that had lifted her to the stage’s topmost pinnacle persisted and made her up to the very day of her death one of the most admired of women.

Other women marveled to see how Lillian Russell, as she neared sixty years of age, still retained the clear complexion, soft skin, unwrinkled face, youthful expression and all the vivacity of earlier life.

How did she achieve this modern miracles? What was the secret of her unfading beauty.

Lillian Russell made no secret of some of the measures and means she employed to retain her extraordinary good looks, but she did not tell the whole story. She did not say that in addition to the baths, cold creams, cosmetics, exercise and wholesome living she made liberal use of common sense, self-control, persistence, energy and cheerfulness-factors neglected by many women who faithfully follow her other formulas.

She employed the combination of mental qualities and drug store and beauty parlor accessories not only during her whole stage career, but long after the time when most women realize that they are growing old and believing that they have become passé and unattractive, make no effort to improve their appearance. At sixty Lillian Russell was even more careful of her appearance her face and figure, than she was at twenty or thirty.

To learn more about

Lillian Russell’s career and her beauty regiments, read

Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the

Old West.

Enter to win a copy of

Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West

Winners will be announced on February 28, 2016

Long before actors were vying for an Oscar nomination and world wide fame thespians were trying to carve out a modest living entertaining prospectors and settlers of the Old West. Today the curtain goes up on a woman entertainer who captured the hearts of the western pioneers.

Ladies and gentlemen, Jeanne Eagels, the Forlorn Leading Lady

Triumph and tragedy, alternating strangely throughout her life converged on the night on October 3, 1929, when Jeanne Eagels, beautiful and famous actress, suddenly collapsed and died. At a time when her health seemed much improved and she was planning a comeback to the Broadway that had barred her for eighteen months, the black curtain descended noiselessly and swiftly.

It brought to an end the drama of a woman who had made a sensational rise to the heights of theatrical stardom, a woman men clamored for and loved, perhaps too well. Romance, broken hearts, success and defeat, adulation and repudiation – a pageant of experiences and emotions – had paraded through her life. And in the end Jeanne Eagels was the same woman she had been years before – a proud, tempestuous spirit seeking bewilderingly for some distant horizon of happiness.

On her last day alive it probably did not seem to her that death was in the wings. If so, it made no difference. For that night she dressed in her most elaborate and beautiful clothes. She was planning to join a Broadway party. Broadway! The street which soon, she thought, would once more echo to her name and where incandescents would spell it out in glittering letters.

But hardly had she dressed when she suddenly fell faint. The night before she had taken an overdose of a solution of a sleep-producing drug called chloral hydrate. She was rushed from her Park Avenue home to a private sanitarium. They brought her into a room for an examination. She sat on the bed a moment, and then wearily took off her coat. It revealed her in all her glory. Jewels shone magnificently. Diamonds and pearls sparkled on her fingers, about her neck and on her wrist.

She signed. There was only a nurse to see this last act. She sank on the bed in convulsions. A little later she was lifeless. And then Broadway and the whole world learned with astonishment of her sudden passing.

To learn more about Jeanne Eagels career and the events that led to her untimely death read

Entertaining Women:

Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.

Entertaining Women:

Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West

Long before actors were vying for an Oscar nomination and world wide fame thespians were trying to carve out a modest living entertaining prospectors and settlers of the Old West. Today the curtain goes up on a woman entertainer who captured the hearts of the western pioneers.

Ladies and gentlemen, Dora Hand, the Tragic Songbird

Dora Hand was in a deep sleep. Her bare legs were draped across the thick blankets covering her delicate form and a mass of long, auburn hair stretched over the pillow under her head and dangled off the top of a flimsy mattress. Her breathing was slow and effortless. A framed, graphite- charcoal portrait of an elderly couple hung above her bed on faded, satin-ribbon wallpaper and kept company with her slumber.

The air outside the window next to the picture was still and cold. The distant sound of voices, back-slapping laughter, profanity, and a piano’s tinny, repetitious melody wafted down Dodge City, Kansas’s main thoroughfare and snuck into the small room where Dora was laying.

Dodge was an all night town. Walkers and loungers kept the streets and saloons busy. Residents learned to sleep through the giggling, growling, and gunplay of the cowboy consumers and their paramours for hire. Dora was accustomed to the nightly frivolity and clatter. Her dreams were seldom disturbed by the commotion.

All at once the hard thud of a pair of bullets charging through the wall of the tiny room cut through the routine noises of the cattle town with an uneven, gusty violence. The first bullet was halted by the dense plaster partition leading into the bed chambers. The second struck Dora on the right side under her arm. There was no time for her to object to the injury, no moment for her to cry out or recoil in pain. The slug killed her instantly.

In the near distance a horse squealed and its galloping hooves echoed off the dusty street and faded away.

A pool of blood pored out of Dora’s fatal wound, transforming the white sheets she rested on to crimson. A clock sitting on a nightstand next to the lifeless body ticked on steadily and mercilessly. It was 4:30 in the morning on October 4, 1878, and for the moment, nothing but the persistent moonlight filtering into the scene through a closed window recognized the 34 year-old woman’s passing.

Twenty-four hours prior to Dora being gunned down in her sleep she had been on stage at the Alhambra Saloon and Gambling House. She was a stunning woman whose wholesome voice and exquisite features had charmed audiences from Abilene to Austin. She regaled love starved wranglers and rough riders at stage and railroad stops with her heartfelt rendition of the popular ballads Blessed Be the Ties That Bind and Because I Love You So.

To learn more about how Dora Hand’s career began and about the other talented performers of the Old West read

Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.

Entertaining Women:

Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West

Long before actors were vying for an Oscar nomination and world wide fame thespians were trying to carve out a modest living entertaining prospectors and settlers of the Old West. Today the curtain goes up on a woman entertainer who captured the hearts of the western pioneers.

Ladies and gentlemen, Lillie Langtry, the Professional Beauty

Twenty-three-year-old Lillie Lantry’s striking looks inspired poets to write sonnets about her grace and pin-and-ink artists to sketch her elegant profile. She was known as a “Professional Beauty,” one of a handful of women in England with such arresting features they were invited to the finest soirees just so guests could admire them. Langtry was a tall, curvaceous lady with titian red hair, and portraits of her sold in shops for a penny.

Emile Charlotte LeBreton was born to William Corbet and Emile Martin LeBreton in October 1853 on the Isle of Jersey, a few miles off the coast of Saint-Malo, France. She was the only daughter in a family of six children. Her mother called her “Lillie,” which fit the beautiful child with lily-white skin.

Her education included studies in history, the classics, and early theatre. By the time she turned age twenty, she had developed a love for theatre and a strong desire to leave her birthplace and see the world she had read so much about.

She married Edward Langtry on March 9, 1874, not long after watching his yacht sail into the Jersey harbor. He took her away from her home to England, where they met and mingled with the country’s most renowned aristocrats. But their marriage would not survive the attention Lillie received from male admirers and friends who persuaded her to pursue a career on stage. The two separated after the birth of their daughter in April 1881.

Theatre owners looking to capitalize on the well-known siren’s popularity invited her to join their acting troupes. Knowing that only her beauty attracted them, Lillie refused all offers, deciding instead to take acting lessons. For months she trained with the critically acclaimed actress Henrietta Hodson Labouchere, and on December 15, 1881, she made her acting debut at the Theatre Royal in Westminster.

To learn more about how Lillie Langtry’s career began and about the other talented performers of the Old West read

Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.

Entertaining Women:

Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West

Long before actors were vying for an Oscar nomination and world wide fame thespians were trying to carve out a modest living entertaining prospectors and settlers of the Old West. Today the curtain goes up on a woman entertainer who captured the hearts of the western pioneers.

Ladies and gentlemen, Lola Montez, the Countess of Landsfeld

Lola stood quietly in the middle of the stage at the Bella Union Saloon in San Francisco and let the audience gaze up at her. She was a captivating beauty with dark, curly hair. Men from the various mining camps around traveled to town nightly to see the “fair-skinned woman with the pretty face.” She always began her act the same way:

“Good evening, gentlemen. I am Lola Montez. I was born in the year 1830, in Seville, the capital of Andalucía, the land of the serenades and balconies, of troubadours and romance – the fatherland of Miguel Cervantes, of Las Casas of the Roman Emperors Trajan and Theodosius.”

After the short introduction the music would start and the audience would cheer wildly. Lola would dance out on stage wearing flesh colored tights and a crinoline skirt. The excited crowd didn’t know that most of what she had just told them about herself was a lie. Lola had spent so many years creating her fictitious background that she had probably forgotten what the truth was anyway. And as long as the house was packed with men who paid to see her, she didn’t care.

Lola was actually born in 1818 in Ireland and her name was really Marie Dolores Eliza Rosanna Gilbert. By the time she had reached the Gold Country in 1851, she had already built a reputation for herself as a woman who possessed extravagant charm and thrived on adventure.

Like many other entertainers, Lola had come to California to enjoy the rewards of the Gold Rush. Stories of gold being tossed at the feet of performers lured many singing and dancing acts west. Lonesome and bored miners had an insatiable appetite for entertainment and they were willing to pay handsomely to see shows and variety acts. Lola Montez became one of the most popular performers of her time.

Lola was well known for a number she called the “Spider Dance.” She wore a risqué costume and fluttered around the stage pretending to be trapped inside a spider’s web. The music and dance became more and more frantic as giant tarantulas made of cork were dropped down on her from high above the stage. The curious miners were thrilled and shocked at the display. Lola’s dancing brought her high praise, but some found the scene a little too provocative for their taste.

To learn more about how Lola Montez’s career began and about the other talented performers of the Old West read

Entertaining Women: Actresses, Dancers, and Singers in the Old West.