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Keith/Albee

Pages

: Al O. Bondy correspondence, 1942

: Albee theaters movie photographs, 1938-1965

: Albee Theatre miscellaneous people correspondence, 1941-1943

: Albee Theatre passes and pass lists, 1940-1943

: Albee Theatre patrons comments, 1940-1942

: Albee Theatre patrons injuries and complaints, 1941-1942

: Albee Theatre purchasing, 1941

: Bill Morton correspondence, 1942-1948

: Blanche F. Livingston correspondence, 1943

: Blondes and Redheads ads, April-May 1936

: Bookings for "Life With Father," 1941

: Boston Museum 53rd season, 1893

: Building lease, 1942

: Building maintenance and construction correspondence, 1941-1943

: C. McGerigle correspondence, 1940-1942

: Caricatures of vaudeville performers scrapbook, 1908-1915

: Correspondence on boiler maintenance, 1942

: Criterion Theatre, London, between 1900-1910?

: C.W. Koerner correspondence, 1941-1942

: David Cummins correspondence, November 1941

: E. L. Alperson letters, 1942

: E. Waxberg correspondence, 1941

: Edward F. Albee Stock Company clippings, 1901-1904

: F. H. Lakeman correspondence, 1941-1942

: Fire Chiefs Club invitation, February 1941

: Fred Meyers correspondence, 1941

: Harold J. Mirisch film bookings, 1942-1943

: Harry Mandel correspondence, 1940-1944

: Harry Mandel correspondence, 1945-1948

: Howard Winner correspondence, August 27, 1941

: J. Henry Walters correspondence, July 2, 1943

: J. Walter Thompson Company correspondence, July 10, 1942

: Jack Lamont correspondence, 1943

: John L. Stewart correspondence, April 3, 1942

: Junior League of Providence correspondence, January 1941

: Keith-Albee manager reports, September 2, 1902-September 3, 1903

: Keith-Albee managers' report book 10, December 28, 1908-October 18, 1909

: Keith-Albee managers' report book 2, September 21, 1903-March 14, 1904

: Keith-Albee managers' report book 3, March 14, 1904-November 21, 1904

: Keith-Albee managers' report book 4, November 28, 1904-August 28, 1905

: Keith-Albee managers' report book 5, September 4, 1905-April 23, 1906

: Keith-Albee managers' report book 6, April 30, 1906-February 4, 1907

: Keith-Albee managers' report book 7, February 4-September 23, 1907

: Keith-Albee managers' report book 8, September 23, 1907-March 12, 1908

: Keith-Albee managers' report book 9, March 9-December 14, 1908

: Keith's Opera House clipping book 25, July 15, 1894-May 7, 1895

: Keith's Opera House clipping book 26, August 25, 1895-May 18, 1896

: Keith's Opera House clipping book 27, August 22, 1896-May 1, 1897

Pages

In collections

University of Iowa

Description

Details

Title: Keith/Albee
Contributor: Albee, Edward Franklin, 1857-1930
Keith, B. F. (Benjamin Franklin), 1846-1914
Date Created: 1894/1935
Description: Benjamin Franklin Keith and Edward Franklin Albee became partners in the late 1880s to promote "polite" vaudeville. They lavishly remodeled several theaters on the east coast and began producing a brand of "high class" vaudeville. Crude remarks and risque costumes were censored from performances, and they even attempted to prohibit rude behavior by audiences. Keith was the financial head of the circuit, while Albee was the general manager and owner of several theaters. In 1906, Keith and Albee established the United Booking Office. Every act that sought employment at any of the member theaters had to work through this central office, which in turn charged a five percent commission per act. Thus Keith and Albee expanded their power base. In the 1920s the Keith/Albee circuit merged with a western chain of vaudeville theaters to form the Keith-Albee-Orpheum Circuit. In 1928, $4,500,000 worth of stock was sold to Joseph P. Kennedy's Radio Corporation of America (RCA) establishing the Radio-Keith-Orpheum (RKO). After this merger, motion pictures became the primary form of entertainment, while vaudeville survived only as an accompaniment to the feature film. The Keith/Albee collection primarily reports vaudeville programming in Rhode Island between 1894 and 1935, but it includes unique resources for studying vaudeville throughout the east coast and Ohio with a series of Managers' Reports spanning 1902-1923. The Keith/Albee circuit, as represented in these Reports, involves theaters in Providence, Pawtucket, and Woonsocket, Rhode Island; Boston and Webster, Massachusetts; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Cleveland, Ohio. Theaters in Detroit, Washington, D.C., and New York City also appear with some regularity. The records of Keith/Albee chronicle the expansion of their circuit, changes in its leadership, and the eventual decline of vaudeville. Items dating as late as 1952 are as diverse as usher's manuals to building permits, air raid precautions to price schedules, and cash books to correspondence. The bulk of the collection is made up of 150 oversized scrapbooks (each about 16"Hx12"W and averaging over 250 pages). There are 29,216 scrapbook pages total.
Subjects: Library of Congress Subject Headings: Motion picture industry
Vaudeville
Theater management
Theatrical managers
Subjects: Corporate Bodies: Edward F. Albee Stock Co.
B.F. Keith (Firm)
Archival Collection: Keith/Albee
Keith/Albee Collection
Collection Identifier: MSC0356
Collection Guide: http://aspace.lib.uiowa.edu/repositories/2/resources/2
Host institution: University of Iowa. Libraries. Special Collections Department
Rights Management: Educational use only, no other permissions given. U.S. and international copyright laws may protect this item. Commercial use or distribution of this digital object is not permitted without written permission.
Contact Information: Contact the Special Collections Department at the University of Iowa Libraries: http://www.lib.uiowa.edu/sc/contact
Item Type (DCMI): Collection
Item Type (AAT): scrapbooks
clippings (information artifacts)
correspondence