Tony Pastor, Showman

Most Elks know their order was originally a drinking club called the Jolly Corks, founded in New York in 1867 by the English comic singer Charles Vivian. Some Elks even know the names and occupations of the fifteen “original Jolly Corks.” But there was a common denominator for most of these performers that is less known today: Tony Pastor.

The History of the Order of Elks reports that “just before the holidays--Charles Vivian [& fellow Corks] returning one afternoon from a funeral of a friend--Ted Quinn, of local concert hall fame--dropped into Tony Pastor's. There they found Billy Gray, Tony and 'Dody' Pastor, John Fielding and William Sheppard, who became interested in the story of the 'Jolly Corks,' and all of them strolled over from Pastor's to 'Sandy' Spencer's, where they found George F. McDonald and others.
After hearing the story of the funeral the 'Jolly Corks' had attended, McDonald suggested that the organization should become a 'protective and benevolent society.' During the next week or ten days McDonald broached the idea to a number of Jolly Corks ...” (WP 12).

That the Jolly Corks would go by Tony Pastor’s Opera House on 201 Bowery is no surprise. In the winter of 1867 and spring of 1868, the period when the Elks were founded, many Corks were associated with Pastor’s: William Carleton was singing his native Irish songs there, and G.W. Thompson began an engagement in The Shipwrecked Sailor.

The Black Crook, which scandalized New York with its “large number of female legs,” was parodied by Pastor’s The White Crook, in which Corks Thomas G. Riggs, George F. McDonald, and William Sheppard played the respective roles of Black Crook starlets Rosina Paganini, Marie Bonfanti, and Betty Rigl. Apparently, the Early Elks weren’t adverse to appearing on stage in a dress!

[read a contemporary review of Pastor's]

Pastor first made a name for himself as a comic singer and performer at the 444. In particular, he was known for his pro-Union patriotism. He seems to have been the first stage performer to have ended his performances with a sing-along-version of the “Star-Spangled Banner,” a practice that became a personal trademark.

Pastor was pro-draft at a time when this was a dangerous stance, especially with the Irish immigrants who formed a significant portion of his audience. In 1863, New York City erupted into draft riots, lynchings, and street battles with police that did not subside until federal troops intervened. At least once when Pastor sang a pro-draft song, a cordon of bartenders had to struggle for several minutes to eject cat-calling, object-hurling members of the audience. (PZ 1-22)

Pastor is best remembered today for his ties to vaudeville. This historian’s account is typical:

The most immediate roots of vaudeville … were in the concert saloon, from which it drew its audience , structure, and performers. In virtually all accounts, the key figure in its development was ‘the father of vaudeville,’ Tony Pastor. … In 1865, he opened Pastor’s 201 Bowery Opera House, and he spent the next ten years successfully riding a fine line between retaining his concert saloon base and trying to expand his audience. (JC 132-3)

Pastor walked this line by attempting to bring more women into the audience, at first with special, family-friendly matinee performances, and then by making his evening shows more “chaste.” This emphasis on bringing in women, which could potentially double his audiences, accelerated when he moved his theater from the Bowery to Broadway in 1875. By 1885 had succeeded in creating what one newspaper noted was “the only vaudeville theatre in New York that is patronized by the ladies.” (PZ 85) This would change in the 1890s as vaudeville— thanks in no small part to Pastor’s pioneering efforts—found its legs and began to flourish.

Lillian Russell

References

CE: Charles Ellis. An Authentic History of the BPOE 1910. OD: George O’Dell. Annals of the New York Stage vol. 8, 1936. JC: Jim Cullen. The Art of Democracy: A Concise History of Popular Culture in the U.S. 1996. PZ: Parker Zellers. Tony Pastor, Dean of the Vaudeville Stage 1971. WP: William Phillips, 1922, reprinted in James Nicholson, History of the Order of Elks 1992.