In my research about the backstage life of the Hippodrome, I’ve run into a couple of sources about how performers and staff got paid. Between the two Saturday shows, everyone who punched in and out lined up at the pay window. Electricians and ballet girls, ticket takers and elephant trainers were each assigned a number. When they got a new time card for the week — like the one above— they kept the top half, sort of like a dry cleaning ticket. The bottom half was the time card, used to punch in and out for Monday morning rehearsals, and matinees and evening shows Monday-Saturday. Sunday was a day of rest, and more importantly theatrical performances were generally prohibited by blue laws, which I talk a bit about on the New York 1920s website here. (Performers sometimes got roped into “volunteering” their time for Sunday benefit shows.)
“The Saturday Pay Line Behind the Scenes at the New York Hippodrome,” The Theatre, December 1908.
The overly intrusive photo edits on some of the faces remind me of that botched fresco restoration in Spain.
Here’s a halftone reproduction of a photo from pay day. I like the visual echo between the chorus girl who’s fifth in line and the native performer standing next to her, both of whom wear feathered headgear. The other feature on the 1906-07 bill with Neptune’s Daughter was a spectacle called Pioneer Days that cast 100 Lakota Sioux performers. As I think about the role of indigenous performers in Hippodrome shows, I’m so excited to check out Christine Bold’s "Vaudeville Indians" on Global Circuits, 1880s-1930s. You can read a short, open-access article that addresses part of her book’s argument here.
“Lining Up a Thousand Funmakers for an $18,000 Pay Day,” The New York World, 2/4/1910.
Found in “Scrapbook -- Hippodrome Season 1909-1910,” Series VII, box 57. R.H. Burnside Collection, Library of the Performing Arts, New York Public Library.
This illustration from a few years later gives another take on the variety of Hippodrome employees waiting for their pay envelopes. The fellow at the front of the line is Eddie Clark, who plays the male lead in A Trip to Japan. Behind him waits a stage carpenter and overalls. Some performers are clearly still in their costumes — Albertina Rasch wears the leotard and tights from The Ballet of the Jewels, while Hippodrome prima donna Nanette Flack appears in her kimono and elaborate geisha-style wig. Other front- and back-of-house workers share the line. Behind “Miss [Mabel] Dwight,” Trip to Japan'‘s ingenue in her enormous hat, stands a man in a vest and shirt sleeves. I’d guess that he’s maybe a stage hand? The shorter figure behind him, with cap pulled low over his eyes, looks like one of the boy ushers. At the far right, an inset picture lets readers know that if a chorus girl’s pay envelope jingles, she’s been fined. The deduction would most likely be taken for tardiness or absenteeism. I’m surprised that this illustration doesn’t include any of the people from the most-discussed act of this season. Inside the Earth featured Māori performers who traveled from New Zealand to San Francisco by boat and then to New York by train. These performers are fascinating, and their story merits a full blog post of its own. For now, I’ll leave you with this account, written by a New Zealander who discovers that his grandmother was one of the performers.