{"id":11280,"date":"2017-04-16T23:21:21","date_gmt":"2017-04-17T03:21:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/phillyhistory.wpengine.com\/?p=11280"},"modified":"2021-02-01T16:28:24","modified_gmt":"2021-02-01T21:28:24","slug":"burning-it-up-at-the-lincoln-from-mini-the-moocher-to-hitler-in-effigy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/2017\/04\/burning-it-up-at-the-lincoln-from-mini-the-moocher-to-hitler-in-effigy\/","title":{"rendered":"Burning it up at The Lincoln: From “Mini The Moocher” to Hitler in Effigy"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Lincoln<\/a>
Lincoln Theatre, [formerly The Dunbar] Southwest Corner of Broad and Lombard Streets, January 11, 1932 (PhillyHistory.org)<\/figcaption><\/figure>In the Spring of 1919, \u201cMarian Dawley and a few other girls of color\u2026went to the movie theater at 59th and Market Streets.” They lined up to buy tickets and were told “all tickets for colored people have been sold.\u201d<\/p>\n

They left \u201cdisgusted,\u201d according to the Philadelphia Tribune.<\/em><\/p>\n

Other than The Standard Theatre<\/a> on the 1100 block of South Street, audiences of color had few options for entertainment. \u201cThe white theatres are and have been for some time drawing the color line,\u201d pointed out the Tribune<\/em>. \u201cWe have but one theatre owned and controlled by our race in this city, and when it is full, which is at every performance, there is practically no place for our people to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

But change was coming, readers learned. \u201cIn a few months the new Dunbar theatre will be completed at the corner of Broad and Lombard Streets.\u201d This theatre, The Dunbar<\/a>, will be \u201cowned and controlled by citizens of color\u201d to serve the city\u2019s African American theatregoers, which, as a result of the Great Migration<\/a>, was estimated at 50,000.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Quality Amusement Company, of which Mr. E. C. Brown, of the Brown and Stevens, Bankers is the head\u201d soon had \u201cten Negro Theatres\u2026in cities including Savannah, Richmond, Washington (Howard) New York (Lafayette) and Chicago.\u201d Philadelphia\u2019s promised to be \u201cthe finest theatre in the world owned, managed and controlled by colored people.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a grand spectacle December 29, [1919] to see the thousands of happy souls, men and women, boys and girls, as they wended through the streets of Philadelphia and filled every available space in the new Dunbar Theatre\u2026\u00a0 The colored citizens of Philadelphia have something really their own,\u201d something \u201cthat they will be and are proud of and can boast about\u201d something \u201cwonderful, marvelous, almost inconceivable, yet so true.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWithin The Law<\/a>,\u201d starring Cleo Desmond<\/a> and Andrew Bishop<\/a> filled the 1600-seat house twice daily for a solid week. And thanks to the Lafayette Players, the productions kept coming.<\/p>\n

John T. Gibson, owner of the Standard Theatre responded by cutting his ticket prices. Gibson, according to A History of African American Theatre<\/a> knew that the Dunbar\u2019s parent company \u201chad overextended itself by building the $500,000 Douglass Theatre in Baltimore, as well as the Renaissance Theatre in Harlem.\u201d And in September 1921, just a few months after the \u201cShuffle Along<\/a>\u201d premiered at the Dunbar, Gibson bought the theater.<\/p>\n

As the stage of choice, \u201cGibson’s New Dunbar Theatre\u201d hosted the full array of African American talent: Will Marion Cook\u2019s<\/a> Internation Orchestra and Entertainers in the Quintessence of Jazz; the Ethiopian Art Theater\u2019s version of Oscar Wilde\u2019s \u201cSalome\u201d fresh from its run on Broadway; \u00a0The\u00a0 Lafayette Players productions of “The Shoplifters” and \u201cThe Hunchback of Notre Dame;\u201d the Manhattan Players\u2019 “Cat and the Canary; \u201cSunshine Sammy;” “Runnin’ Wild;” \u201cSwanee River Home;\u201d \u201cStruttin\u2019 Time;\u201d \u201cCome Along Mandy;\u201d \u00a0Mamie Smith; and “The Chocolate Dandies,” featuring Josephine Baker\u2019s first Philadelphia appearance.<\/p>\n

The Great Depression forced the sale of Gibson\u2019s Dunbar to new (white) owners, who added a giant marquee, dubbed it The Lincoln and continued to bring in the talent including Duke Ellington and his Orchestra and Cab Callaway, \u201cthe Heidi Ho King and his original Cotton Club Orchestra,\u201d who brought “Mini the Moocher<\/a>” back to life once more. The Lincoln stage saw \u201cFats” Waller, Louis Armstrong, Bill “Bojangles\u201d Robinson, Earl Hines, Ethel Waters, as well as other headliners.<\/p>\n

From the beginning, the theater played a critical role in addition to serving as the city\u2019s most desirable stage for African American performers. The Lincoln was often dedicated to race relations, human rights and political protest.<\/p>\n

In 1920, the Bramhall Players, an interracial troupe, presented Butler Davenport \u2018s \u201cJustice,\u201d described as a “race drama.” Where “Uncle Tom’s Cabin “went far to free the Negro\u2019s body from bondage\u201d \u201cJustice,\u201d claimed one review, \u201cwill go far to liberate the white man’s\u00a0mind from prejudice.”<\/p>\n

Three years later, more than 3,500 packed a mass meeting in the theater to protest “The Shame of America” and support passage of the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And in December 1938, The Lincoln hosted a public meeting denouncing \u201cNazi Germany’s persecutions of racial and religious minorities\u201d warning that \u201csuch actions are sympathetically received in some quarters in this country.\u201d About 500 attended the event, sponsored by the United Committee Against Racial and Religious Persecutions. It began with a march up South Street, from 5th<\/sup> to 15th<\/sup> and then to The Lincoln, where \u201can effigy of Adolf Hitler, replete in brown shirt swastika and mustache\u2026in front of the theatre\u2026was publicly burned.\u201d<\/p>\n

Such was Broad and Lombard’s<\/a>\u00a0well-earned niche, once-upon-a-time.<\/p>\n

[Sources include: “All Seats For Colored People Are Sold Out,” Philadelphia Tribune<\/em>, March 8, 1919; Philadelphia to Soon Have a New Colored Play House, Philadelphia Tribune<\/em>, November\u00a0 8, 1919; \u201cThe Dunbar Theatre has Swung Open its Doors to the Public,\u201d Philadelphia Tribune<\/em>, January 3, 1920; \u201cPhila. Has “Something New Under the Sun,\u201d by Anny Boddy, Philadelphia Tribune<\/em>, January 3, 1920;\u00a0<\/span>The Crisis<\/em>, 1920, vols. 21-22, Advertisement for \u00a0\u201cJustice;\u201d<\/a> \u201cAnti-Lynching Bill Support Asked,\u201d The Philadelphia Inquirer<\/em>, July 3, 1923; \u201cHitler’s Effigy Burned by Crowd,\u201d The Philadelphia Inquirer<\/em>, December 6. 1938; and Advertisements for The Dunbar and The Lincoln, 1920-1936 in The Philadelphia Inquirer<\/em>. ]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the Spring of 1919, \u201cMarian Dawley and a few other girls of color\u2026went to the movie theater at 59th and Market Streets.” They lined up to buy tickets and were told “all tickets for colored people have been sold.\u201d They left \u201cdisgusted,\u201d according to the Philadelphia Tribune. Other than The Standard Theatre on the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11280"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11280\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}