Thomas Madison Goodin and Family at their residence, the old Judge John Goodin house.
The house belonged to Judge John Goodin pictured separately (born 1836, died 1885).
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Photo: Preacher Man and Wife
Looking for some more images for costume preparation for a photo shoot in July. Here's what I could find (click on image to enlarge):
This first one is Reverend Preston Turner of Colmar, Kentucky, born April 1, 1840, and died July 20, 1905, and married Dorcas Partin, born June 10, 1844, and died July 15, 1909.
Monday, June 18, 2007
For dialect research: Mother Jones
Source: http://www.kentlaw.edu/ilhs/majones.htm
Mother Jones: The Miners' Angel
by Mara Lou Hawse
by Mara Lou Hawse
The elderly woman smoothed her black dress and touched the lace at her throat and wrists. Her snow-white hair was gathered into a knot at the nape of her neck, and a black hat, trimmed with lavender ribbons to lend a touch of color, shaded her finely wrinkled face. She was about five feet tall, but she exuded energy and enthusiasm. As she waited to speak, her bright blue eyes scanned the people grouped beyond the platform. Her kindly expression never altered as her voice broke over the audience: "I'm not a humanitarian," she exclaimed. "I'm a hell-raiser."
And she was. She was Mary Harris "Mother" Jones, and her size and grandmotherly appearance belied her fiery nature. When she stepped on a stage, she became a dynamic speaker. She projected wide variations in emotion, sometimes striding about the stage in "a towering rage." She could bring her audience to the verge of tears or have them clapping and "bursting with laughter." She was a good story teller, and "she excelled in invective, pathos, and humor ranging from irony to ridicule."
Mother Jones's low, pleasant voice had great carrying power. It was unusual because it "did not become shrill when she became excited but, rather, dropped in pitch so that 'the intensity of it became something you could almost feel physically.' When she rose to speak, Mother Jones 'seemed to explode in all directions' . . . and suddenly everyone sat up alert and listened. No matter what impossible ideas she brought up, she made the miners think she and they together could do anything."
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, a nationally known labor organizer, called Jones "the greatest woman agitator of our times." She was denounced in the U.S. Senate as the grandmother of all agitators. Mother Jones was proud of that title and said she hoped to live to be the great grandmother of agitators.
Mother Jones, born in Cork, Ireland, on May 1, 1830, came from a long line of agitators. When she was a child, she watched British soldiers march through the streets, the heads of Irishmen stuck on their bayonets. Her father's father, an Irish freedom fighter, was hanged; her father was forced to flee to America with his family in 1835.
Jones grew up in Toronto, Ontario, where she attended the public schools and graduated from normal school at age seventeen. She seemed to be, according to all accounts, ambitious and adventuresome. She taught in a convent school in Michigan for eight months, then moved to Chicago, where she worked as a dressmaker. "I preferred sewing to bossing little children," she said. She moved to Memphis, Tennessee, again to teach school. And there, in 1861, she met and married George E. Jones, an ironmolder who was "a staunch member" of the Iron Molders' Union.
Jones's biographer Dale Fetherling claims that Mother Jones learned a great deal about unions and about the psychology of workingmen from her husband. And later, when much of her work was with women, she tried to pass on to them what she had learned: "That is, the wife must care for what the husband cares for if he is to remain resolute."
Life was relatively good for Mary Harris Jones until 1867. That year, when she was 37 years old, within one week her husband and their four small children died in a yellow fever epidemic. After the epidemic had run its course, she returned to Chicago where, once again, she began to work as a dressmaker.
But tragedy followed Mother Jones. Four years later, in 1871, she lost everything she owned in the great Chicago fire. That event also changed her life drastically, and she discovered a new path to follow. She became involved in the labor movement and began to attend meetings of the newly formed Knights of Labor "in an old, tumbled down, fire scorched building."
One biographer believes that Mother Jones's interest in the labor movement really began when she sewed for wealthy Chicago families and observed the blatant economic and social inequities that existed. According to Fetherling, she said: "Often while sewing for the lords and barons who lived in magnificent houses on the Lake Shore Drive, I would look out of the plate glass windows and see the poor, shivering wretches, jobless and hungry, walking alongside the frozen lake front.... The contrast of their condition with that of the tropical comfort of the people for whom I sewed was painful to me. My employers seemed neither to notice nor to care."
The early Knights of Labor, with their ideals and their sense of fraternity, fulfilled some need within Mother Jones and fitted well with what she had learned from her husband. According to Fetherling, "Coming, as it did, on top of successive personal tragedies, the experience [with the Knights of Labor] forged an amalgam of compassion and fervor which would serve her well in industrial wars over the next half a century." Wherever there were labor troubles, there was Mother Jones--the "Miners' Angel."
Mother Jones apparently stayed in Chicago, working as a seamstress, for two or three years after the fire. She had no fixed home, but she made Chicago her base as she traveled back and forth across the country, from industrial area to industrial area. When asked where she lived, she replied: "Well, wherever there is a fight." She lived with the workers, in tent colonies or in shantytowns, near the mills or in the shadow of the tipples. As Fetherling pointed out, "In lieu of a family, she would adopt America's toilers, and they would call her 'Mother.'"
During the time she was most active in the labor movement, the country was changing dramatically, from an agrarian economy to an industrial economy. Small enterprises were replaced by large ones.
"The nature of work and of workers was altered. Waves of immigrants and displaced farmers dug the nation's coal and forged its steel. All too often, they received in return only starvation wages and nightmarish conditions. Within these men smoldered the sparks of class conflict which Mother Jones would fan for 50 years. To these workers, she would become an anchor to the past and an arrow toward a better future."
She always worked either for or with the working people, and often she was at odds with union leaders. "Her skill was the invaluable but incalculable one of tending to men's spirits, of buoying them, of goading them to fight even though the battle seemed hopeless."
When there was a strike, Mother Jones organized and helped the workers; at other times, she held educational meetings. In 1877, she helped in the Pittsburgh railway strike; during the 1880s she organized and ran educational meetings; in 1898 she helped found the Social Democratic Party; and in 1905 she was present at the founding of the Industrial Workers of the World.
After 1890 she became involved in the struggles of coal miners and became an organizer for the United Mine Workers, attending her first UMWA convention on January 25, 1901. She had been on the union payroll for the past year. Her earlier work in miners' strikes and organizing had been as a volunteer, not as an employee.
She resigned as a UMWA organizer in 1904 and became a lecturer for the Socialist Party of America for several years, traveling throughout the southwest. Although sometimes she participated in strikes and organized drives for various unions, her main interest was in raising funds for the defense of Mexican revolutionists in the United States who were being arrested or deported.
Mother Jones was one of the founders of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). In 1905, she was the only woman among 27 persons who signed the manifesto that called for a convention to organize all industrial workers. She later left the organization, but she remained friendly with many of its leaders.
Mother Jones left the Socialist Party in 1911 to return to the payroll of the United Mine Workers, as an organizer. The new president, John P. White, was an old friend who agreed that she would set her own agenda. She expected that her talents "would have full scope." In 1923, when she was 93 years old, she was still working among striking coal miners in West Virginia.
She came to national attention in 1912-13, during the Paint Creek-Cabin Creek strike in West Virginia, because of the publicity resulting from frequent violence. Mother Jones remembered the lessons learned from her late husband, and she often involved the wives and children of miners to dramatize a situation. On September 21, 1912, she led a march of miners' children through the streets of Charleston, West Virginia; on February 12, 1913, she led a protest about conditions in the strike area and was arrested.
She was convicted by a military court of conspiring to commit murder and was sentenced to 20 years in prison. Her trial, conviction, and imprisonment created such a furor that the U.S. Senate ordered a committee to investigate conditions in the West Virginia coalfields. However, on May 8, 1913, before the investigation got underway, newly elected governor Hatfield set Mother Jones free. She was 83 years old. Later in 1913 Mother Jones traveled to Colorado to participate in the yearlong strike by miners there. She was evicted from mine company property several times, but returned each time. She was arrested and imprisoned twice: "first for more than two months in relative comfort in Mt. San Rafael hospital, and again for twenty-three days in the Huerfano County jail in Walsenburg, where the conditions of her semibasement cell were appalling."
Mother Jones was especially touched by the "machine-gun massacre" of miners and their families in a tent colony at Ludlow, Colorado, on April 20, 1914, when 20 people were killed. She traveled across the country, telling the story. Members of the House Mines and Mining Committee and President Wilson responded by proposing that the union and the owners agree to a truce and create a grievance committee at each mine.
Mother Jones was notable for attracting publicity and attention from the government for the cause of workers. One of her best-known activities was leading a march of miners' wives "who routed strikebreakers with brooms and mops in the Pennsylvania coalfields in 1902." Another was leading the "children's crusade," a caravan of striking children from the textile mills of Kensington, Pennsylvania, to President Theodore Roosevelt's home in Long Island, New York, in 1903, to dramatize the case for abolishing child labor.
Mother Jones went on to participate in 1915 and 1916 in the strikes of garment workers and streetcar workers in New York, and in the strike of steel workers in Pittsburgh in 1919. In January 1921, at the age of 91, as a guest of the Mexican government, she traveled to Mexico to attend the Pan-American Federation of Labor meeting. According to one writer, "It was the high point of recognition in her role in the labor movement."
In 1922 Mother Jones left the United Mine Workers. She disagreed with the policies of John L. Lewis, and Lewis did not reappoint her as an international organizer. Although she was hospitalized several times, she continued to speak when her health permitted. Her last known public address was in Alliance, Ohio, in 1926, when she was the guest of honor at a Labor Day celebration. Her last public appearance was at her 100th birthday party, May 1, 1930, at a reception in Silver Spring, Maryland. She read congratulatory messages and "made a fiery speech for the motion-picture camera."
Mother Jones lived in an incredible era. As biographer Dale Fetherling points out, she "was born . . . less than 50 years after the end of the American Revolution. Yet, she died on the eve of the New Deal. She was alive when Andrew Jackson was president, and she sometimes quoted from speeches she heard Lincoln make. As an adult she knew the Civil War, the Spanish- American War, and World War I. She rode in automobiles, and she saw the railroads link the oceans. She saw and was seen in films and came to know the everyday use of the telephone, the electric light, and the radio. She watched unions grow from secret groups of hunted men to what she feared was a complacent part of the established order.... It may have been a good time to live in America. But it also was a time in which one needed to fight very hard to survive. That she did."
Mary Harris Jones died in Silver Spring on November 30, 1930, seven months after her one-hundredth birthday. She was buried in the Union Miners Cemetery at Mount Olive, Illinois, in the coalfields of southern Illinois. Her grave is near those of the victims of the Virden, Illinois, mine riot of 1898.
Other links:
National Women's Hall of Fame
UPenn Library Website
Women's History at about.com
For dialect research: Quantrill
William Clarke Quantrill
(1837-1865)
(1837-1865)
Leader of perhaps the most savage fighting unit in the Civil War, William Quantrill developed a style of guerrilla warfare that terrorized civilians and soldiers alike. Quantrill was born in 1837 in Ohio, but little is known of his early life. It appears that after being a schoolteacher for several years, he travelled to Utah in 1858 with an army wagon train and there made his living as a gambler, using the alias of Charles Hart. After a year, he moved to Lawrence, Kansas, where he was again a schoolteacher from 1859 to 1860. But his past and predisposition soon caught up with him and, wanted for murder and horse theft, Quantrill fled to Missouri in late 1860.
Quantrill entered the Civil War on the Confederate side with enthusiasm. By late 1861, he was the leader of Quantrill's Raiders, a small force of no more than a dozen men who harassed Union soldiers and sympathizers along the Kansas-Missouri border and often clashed with Jayhawkers, the pro-Union guerrilla bands that reversed Quantrill's tactics by staging raids from Kansas into Missouri. Union forces soon declared him an outlaw, and the Confederacy officially made him a captain. To his supporters in Missouri, he was a dashing, free-spirited hero.
The climax of Quantrill's guerilla career came on August 21, 1863, when he led a force of 450 raiders into Lawrence, Kansas, a stronghold of pro-Union support and the home of Senator James H. Lane, whose leading role in the struggle for free-soil in Kansas had made him a public enemy to pro-slavery forces in Missouri. Lane managed to escape, racing through a cornfield in his nightshirt, but Quantrill and his men killed 183 men and boys, dragging some from their homes to murder them in front of their families, and set the torch to much of the city.
The Lawrence Massacre led to swift retribution, as Union troops forced the residents of four Missouri border counties onto the open prairie while Jayhawkers looted and burned everything they left behind. Quantrill and his raiders took part in the Confederate retaliation for this atrocity, but when Union forces drove the Confederates back, Quantrill fled to Texas. His guerrilla band broke up into several smaller units, including one headed by his vicious lieutenant, "Bloody Bill" Anderson, known for wearing a necklace of Yankee scalps into battle. Quantrill himself was eventually killed on a raid into Kentucky in 1865.
Even after his death, Quantrill and his followers remained almost folk heroes to their supporters in Missouri, and something of this celebrity later rubbed off on several ex-Raiders -- the James brothers, Frank and Jesse, and the Younger brothers, Cole and Jim -- who went on in the late 1860's to apply Quantrill's hit-and-run tactics to bank and train robbery, building on his legacy of bloodshed a mythology of the Western outlaw that remains fixed in the popular imagination.
Other links:
Encyclopædia Britannica
Legends of America
Quantrill's Raid on Lawrence:A Question of Complicity
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Selling the Cycle: THE KENTUCKY CYCLE as a Blueprint for Promoting Two-Part Plays
(from http://www.artsnet.org/ATHEEJ/cycle.htm)
How can a theatre company best prepare to sell a two-part production like THE KENTUCKY CYCLE or ANGELS IN AMERICA? Longer plays almost certainly require capacity crowds to justify an extended performance schedule and to cover higher production costs. In the case of many university and college theatres choosing to mount a two-part show, the commitment means devoting a substantial portion of a season or academic term -- perhaps an entire semester -- to a single playwright. For better or for worse, the houses carry double the impact on the box office. Advance planning can help ensure success and guarantee income. This paper follows the marketing planning and process of one theatre department's presentation of the complete version of THE KENTUCKY CYCLE by Robert Schenkkan. As a measure of success, it should be noted that a week before opening night, the decision already had to be made to add more performances to the two-week run.
Advance decisions, in fact, remain more important than ever when planning a two-part play. For THE KENTUCKY CYCLE, public announcements began more than a full year in advance - prior to the half-way mark of the previous season and prior to the first renewal notice to subscribers. After agreeing to have Schenkkan's Pulitzer Prize-winning play represent the full second half (spring semester) of the next season, the faculty felt the immediate urge to begin generating a momentum. It was not simply the need to build future audience expectations; it remained crucial to inspire the students to jump on board and embrace the production commitment wholeheartedly. Any major who could not share the excitement and join the tremendous effort needed to mount the play would potentially feel alienated from the degree program for months, and such negativity could ultimately devastate retention, recruitment, and FTE/SCH totals. But students who truly felt they were being admitted on the ground level could identify with the sense of anticipation and willingly agree to rehearse and perform a script which demands over six hours in the theatre. An additional academic benefit came from a joint faculty decision to integrate THE KENTUCKY CYCLE into all upper division theatre courses during the semester of production: students in theatre history, for example, would receive dramaturgical assignments designed to benefit the director, and students in theatre management would chaperone special public events and provide additional front of house support while simultaneously promoting subscription sales for the season following the CYCLE.
But the synthesis of syllabi and stage was not limited to theatre classes. To help promote THE KENTUCKY CYCLE as a university-wide event, theatre faculty identified colleagues from other departments who might be asked to serve as members of an advisory committee. These professors -- with selected administrators -- were invited to a luncheon where theatre faculty presented the scope o the complete project (still a year in advance), distributed a 12-page booklet of ideas, topics, and summaries, and offered copies of the full script to sign out and review. Instructors had been targeted if they taught classes which touched upon any of the various themes addressed in the play, such as women's rights, labor relations, treatment of Native Americans, African-American issues, political or economic structures, especially with regard to coal mining and the environment, and American history in general. Advance planning provided the lead time necessary for faculty to consider including THE KENTUCKY CYCLE as part of their courses. Any faculty who adopted the play would receive two complimentary tickets; any classes required to attend generated ticket reservations.
Ultimately, the largest contribution of the multi-department advisory committee was the formation of two open-to-the-public panel discussions involving scholars from various areas of the university. Few committee members served as speakers themselves, but their advocacy attracted colleagues who were happy to share ideas or present brief papers. The department chair personally invited the university president to participate, and he willingly joined a panel. One panel discussion utilized "viewing history as entertainment" for its theme, while the other considered matters of historical documentation. In addition, funding was secured to invite playwright Schenkkan to campus for three days of class visits, and he generously agreed to give a public lecture on the professional evolution of his work and THE KENTUCKY CYCLE's brief Broadway run. All events were held on the university theatre stage earlier in the semester of production, with upstage portions of the CYCLE set as a background. Publicity for these academically-oriented sessions also promoted the play itself to the outside community - tickets were even sold in the lobby - while professors who initially may not have favored requiring class attendance at a play were more open to making their students come to panel presentations. Theatre Appreciation students had to pick Schenkkan's talk and one other activity; theatre majors and minors were required to attend all three sessions.
Another of the earliest management decisions involved scheduling. A calendar was agreed upon sixteen months before the play opened. Part One would be given on Friday evening and repeated on Saturday afternoon, with Part Two performing on Saturday night and repeated as a Sunday matinee. Tech crews, therefore, were only required to do one changeover per weekend. Patrons could see the entire play in sequence in one day--also appealing to an out of town audience, particularly parents of students--or attend two consecutive days, or even choose to come once each week for two weekends. The full Saturday schedule included a dinner break, and arrangements were made for audiences to eat on campus, adjacent to the theatre, if they preferred; the dinner breaks, of course, also extended to the cast and crew.
In order to make ticket prices more attractive, an early decision was also made to provide a discount to anyone purchasing tickets to both parts at the same time. Patrons had the full choice of performances and could enjoy the security of two reserved seats with a single transaction. Obviously, by giving audiences such a wide range of options, not every person wound up with the exact same seat for both parts. The "same seat" benefit was first offered to subscribers as much as possible, and thereby encouraged making early reservations. Ticket buyers could also order Saturday dinners through the box office.
The first widespread public announcement came through the university's elder hostel program, geared at offering opportunities to continue learning in retirement. This in-house marketing, which involved no major theatre publicity expenses, stimulated advance word of mouth and later provided both block bookings of seats and the eventual conversion of single ticket buyers to subscriber status. The director and other members of the faculty also agreed to present lectures to the retirees who registered for formal programs. Outreach lectures were not limited to the elder hostel groups. A campus notice offered in-class visitations by actors and other company members to any instructor in any discipline, such as an adjunct instructor of Freshman Composition.
The annual season brochure highlighted THE KENTUCKY CYCLE, and subscriptions reached a five year high. And advance planning continued paying dividends during the season. By combining the announcement of special events with the calendar of play performance dates, only one bulk mailing flyer was needed for the entire spring semester. An order blank for tickets appeared on the back, but the front was designed so that it could also be re-printed on heavier stock, on only one side, to serve as a poster. By the time traditional production press releases and PSAs were sent, the majority of tickets had already been sold. The final two dress rehearsals, one of each part, were sold out as previews, and two additional weeknight performances were added prior to the closing weekend. Was the overall experience worthwhile? Freshmen associated with THE KENTUCKY CYCLE were still talking about it their senior year, leaving a positive impression on incoming majors. Reflecting the spirit of Schenkkan's script, history had indeed been made.
Richard Hansen is Assistant Professor of Speech and Theatre at MiddleTennessee State University.
How can a theatre company best prepare to sell a two-part production like THE KENTUCKY CYCLE or ANGELS IN AMERICA? Longer plays almost certainly require capacity crowds to justify an extended performance schedule and to cover higher production costs. In the case of many university and college theatres choosing to mount a two-part show, the commitment means devoting a substantial portion of a season or academic term -- perhaps an entire semester -- to a single playwright. For better or for worse, the houses carry double the impact on the box office. Advance planning can help ensure success and guarantee income. This paper follows the marketing planning and process of one theatre department's presentation of the complete version of THE KENTUCKY CYCLE by Robert Schenkkan. As a measure of success, it should be noted that a week before opening night, the decision already had to be made to add more performances to the two-week run.
Advance decisions, in fact, remain more important than ever when planning a two-part play. For THE KENTUCKY CYCLE, public announcements began more than a full year in advance - prior to the half-way mark of the previous season and prior to the first renewal notice to subscribers. After agreeing to have Schenkkan's Pulitzer Prize-winning play represent the full second half (spring semester) of the next season, the faculty felt the immediate urge to begin generating a momentum. It was not simply the need to build future audience expectations; it remained crucial to inspire the students to jump on board and embrace the production commitment wholeheartedly. Any major who could not share the excitement and join the tremendous effort needed to mount the play would potentially feel alienated from the degree program for months, and such negativity could ultimately devastate retention, recruitment, and FTE/SCH totals. But students who truly felt they were being admitted on the ground level could identify with the sense of anticipation and willingly agree to rehearse and perform a script which demands over six hours in the theatre. An additional academic benefit came from a joint faculty decision to integrate THE KENTUCKY CYCLE into all upper division theatre courses during the semester of production: students in theatre history, for example, would receive dramaturgical assignments designed to benefit the director, and students in theatre management would chaperone special public events and provide additional front of house support while simultaneously promoting subscription sales for the season following the CYCLE.
But the synthesis of syllabi and stage was not limited to theatre classes. To help promote THE KENTUCKY CYCLE as a university-wide event, theatre faculty identified colleagues from other departments who might be asked to serve as members of an advisory committee. These professors -- with selected administrators -- were invited to a luncheon where theatre faculty presented the scope o the complete project (still a year in advance), distributed a 12-page booklet of ideas, topics, and summaries, and offered copies of the full script to sign out and review. Instructors had been targeted if they taught classes which touched upon any of the various themes addressed in the play, such as women's rights, labor relations, treatment of Native Americans, African-American issues, political or economic structures, especially with regard to coal mining and the environment, and American history in general. Advance planning provided the lead time necessary for faculty to consider including THE KENTUCKY CYCLE as part of their courses. Any faculty who adopted the play would receive two complimentary tickets; any classes required to attend generated ticket reservations.
Ultimately, the largest contribution of the multi-department advisory committee was the formation of two open-to-the-public panel discussions involving scholars from various areas of the university. Few committee members served as speakers themselves, but their advocacy attracted colleagues who were happy to share ideas or present brief papers. The department chair personally invited the university president to participate, and he willingly joined a panel. One panel discussion utilized "viewing history as entertainment" for its theme, while the other considered matters of historical documentation. In addition, funding was secured to invite playwright Schenkkan to campus for three days of class visits, and he generously agreed to give a public lecture on the professional evolution of his work and THE KENTUCKY CYCLE's brief Broadway run. All events were held on the university theatre stage earlier in the semester of production, with upstage portions of the CYCLE set as a background. Publicity for these academically-oriented sessions also promoted the play itself to the outside community - tickets were even sold in the lobby - while professors who initially may not have favored requiring class attendance at a play were more open to making their students come to panel presentations. Theatre Appreciation students had to pick Schenkkan's talk and one other activity; theatre majors and minors were required to attend all three sessions.
Another of the earliest management decisions involved scheduling. A calendar was agreed upon sixteen months before the play opened. Part One would be given on Friday evening and repeated on Saturday afternoon, with Part Two performing on Saturday night and repeated as a Sunday matinee. Tech crews, therefore, were only required to do one changeover per weekend. Patrons could see the entire play in sequence in one day--also appealing to an out of town audience, particularly parents of students--or attend two consecutive days, or even choose to come once each week for two weekends. The full Saturday schedule included a dinner break, and arrangements were made for audiences to eat on campus, adjacent to the theatre, if they preferred; the dinner breaks, of course, also extended to the cast and crew.
In order to make ticket prices more attractive, an early decision was also made to provide a discount to anyone purchasing tickets to both parts at the same time. Patrons had the full choice of performances and could enjoy the security of two reserved seats with a single transaction. Obviously, by giving audiences such a wide range of options, not every person wound up with the exact same seat for both parts. The "same seat" benefit was first offered to subscribers as much as possible, and thereby encouraged making early reservations. Ticket buyers could also order Saturday dinners through the box office.
The first widespread public announcement came through the university's elder hostel program, geared at offering opportunities to continue learning in retirement. This in-house marketing, which involved no major theatre publicity expenses, stimulated advance word of mouth and later provided both block bookings of seats and the eventual conversion of single ticket buyers to subscriber status. The director and other members of the faculty also agreed to present lectures to the retirees who registered for formal programs. Outreach lectures were not limited to the elder hostel groups. A campus notice offered in-class visitations by actors and other company members to any instructor in any discipline, such as an adjunct instructor of Freshman Composition.
The annual season brochure highlighted THE KENTUCKY CYCLE, and subscriptions reached a five year high. And advance planning continued paying dividends during the season. By combining the announcement of special events with the calendar of play performance dates, only one bulk mailing flyer was needed for the entire spring semester. An order blank for tickets appeared on the back, but the front was designed so that it could also be re-printed on heavier stock, on only one side, to serve as a poster. By the time traditional production press releases and PSAs were sent, the majority of tickets had already been sold. The final two dress rehearsals, one of each part, were sold out as previews, and two additional weeknight performances were added prior to the closing weekend. Was the overall experience worthwhile? Freshmen associated with THE KENTUCKY CYCLE were still talking about it their senior year, leaving a positive impression on incoming majors. Reflecting the spirit of Schenkkan's script, history had indeed been made.
Richard Hansen is Assistant Professor of Speech and Theatre at MiddleTennessee State University.
Broadway Cast and Awards
Information from IBDB:
The Kentucky Cycle
Royale Theatre, (11/14/1993 - 12/12/1993)
Preview: Nov 3, 1993
Total Previews: 15
Opening: Nov 14, 1993
Closing: Dec 12, 1993
Total Performances: 33
Category: Play, Original, BroadwaySetting: In and around Eastern Kentucky. 1775 - 1975.
Comments: 16 complete, 2-part cycles
The Kentucky Cycle
Awards
1994 Tony Award® Best Play
[nominee]
1994 Tony Award® Best Featured Actor in a Play
Gregory Itzin [nominee]
1994 Tony Award® Best Featured Actress in a Play
Jeanne Paulson [nominee]
1994 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Play
1994 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Actor in a Play
Stacy Keach [nominee]
1994 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Play
Gregory Itzin [nominee]
1992 Pulitzer Prize for Drama
Written by Robert Schenkkan [winner]
Opening Night Production Credits
Produced by David Richenthal, Gene R. Korf, Roger L. Stevens, Jennifer Manocherian, Annette Niemtzow, Center Theatre Group / Mark Taper Forum (Gordon Davidson, Artistic Director; Charles Dillingham, Managing Director), Intiman Theatre Company and The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts; Produced in association with Benjamin Mordecai
Written by Robert Schenkkan; Incidental music by Jerome Ragland
Directed by Warner Shook
Scenic Design by Michael Olich; Costume Design by Frances Kenny; Lighting Design by Peter Maradudin; Sound Design by James Ragland
General Manager: Niko Associates, Inc. (Manny Kladitis, Founder and President); Company Manager: Alexander Holt
Production Stage Manager: Joan Toggenburger; Technical Supervisor: Christopher C. Smith; Production Supervisor: Bonnie Panson; Stage Manager: Tracy Crum
Fight direction by Randy Kovitz; Dramaturg: Tom Bryant; Casting: Pat McCorkle; General Press Representative: Jeffrey Richards Associates; Dialect Coach: Judi Dickerson; Advertising: Serino Coyne, Inc.
Opening Night Cast
John Aylward
Dragging Canoe
Joe Talbert (1792)Rebecca's father
Judge Goddard
Patrick Rowen (1861)Jed's grandfather
Union Colonel
Gus Slocum
Doctor
Preacher
James Talbert Winston (1954)owner, Blue Star Mining Co.
James Talbert Winston (1975)
Lillian Garrett-Groag
Morning Star (1776)
Star Rowen (1792)
Star (1819)
Julia Anne Talbert (1861)Richard's daughter
Lallie Rowen (1890)Mary Anne's mother
Mother Jones
Gail Grate
Sallie (1792)
Sallie Biggs (1819)
Sureta Biggs (1920)Cassius' wife
Lana TollerJoshua's secretary
Katherine Hiler
Rebecca Talbert (1792)a neighbor
Rose Anne Talbert (1861)Richard's daughter
Mary Anne Rowen (younger) (1890)
Lucy
Ronald Hippe
Zachariah Rowen (1819)Patrick's son
Randall Talbert (1861)Richard's only son
Carl Dawkins
Joshua Rowen Jackson (1920)son of Mary Anne
Gregory Itzin
Jeremiah
Richard Talbert (1861)land owner, son of Jeremiah Talbert
J. T. Wells
Andrew Talbert Winstona mine boss
Sheriff Ray Blanko
Stacy Keach
Michael Rowen (1775)
Michael Rowen (1776)
Michael Rowen (1792)
Ezekiel Rowen (1861) Jed's father
Jed Rowen (1890) Mary Anne's father
Gun Thug
Joshua Rowen (1954)President, UMW District #16
Joshua Rowen (1975)
Ronald William Lawrence
Taskwan
Jessie BiggsSallie's son, also a slave
Boatman
Cassius Biggs (1920)miner/bootlegger
Franklin Biggs (1954)owner of Biggs & Son
Franklin Biggs (1975)
Scott MacDonald
Patrick Rowen (1792)Michael's son
Patrick Rowen (1819)
Tommy Nolan
Silusa miner
Scott Rowen (1954)son of Joshua and new UMW district field rep
Tuck Milligan
Sam
Ezekiel Rowen (1819)Patrick's son
Jed Rowen (1861)
Tommy Jackson (1890)
Abe Steinman
Calvin Hayesa local president in District #16
Frank
Randy Oglesby
Earl Tod
Deputy Grey
Sharecropper #1
William Clark Quantrill
Tommy Jackson (1920)husband of Mary Ann
StuckyDistrict #16 security officer
Steve
Jeanne Paulson
Joleen Rowen (1861)Jed's mother
Mary Anne Rowen (older) (1890)
Mary Anne Rowen Jackson (1920)
Margaret Rowen (1954)wife of Joshua
Stephen Lee Anderson
Cherokee Warrior
Rebel #2
Chucka local president in District #16
Ensemble
Michael Hartman
Deputy O'Sullivan
Union Soldier #1
Man in the Woods
Grega local president in District #16
Bob SmalleyBlue Star Mine guard
Ensemble
Philip Lehl
Cherokee Warrior
Sharecropper #2
Ensemble
Patrick Page
Cherokee Warrior
Rebel #1
Mackiea miner
Gun Thug
Mikea local president in District #16
Ensemble
Susan Pellegrino
Ensemble
James Ragland
Guitar Player
Banjo Player
Ensemble
Jennifer Rohn
Ensemble
Novel Sholars
Ensemble
Lee Simon, Jr.
Cherokee Warrior
Union Soldier #2
Jefferson Biggs (1954)son of Franklin
Ensemble
The Kentucky Cycle
Royale Theatre, (11/14/1993 - 12/12/1993)
Preview: Nov 3, 1993
Total Previews: 15
Opening: Nov 14, 1993
Closing: Dec 12, 1993
Total Performances: 33
Category: Play, Original, BroadwaySetting: In and around Eastern Kentucky. 1775 - 1975.
Comments: 16 complete, 2-part cycles
The Kentucky Cycle
Awards
1994 Tony Award® Best Play
[nominee]
1994 Tony Award® Best Featured Actor in a Play
Gregory Itzin [nominee]
1994 Tony Award® Best Featured Actress in a Play
Jeanne Paulson [nominee]
1994 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Play
1994 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Actor in a Play
Stacy Keach [nominee]
1994 Drama Desk Award Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Play
Gregory Itzin [nominee]
1992 Pulitzer Prize for Drama
Written by Robert Schenkkan [winner]
Opening Night Production Credits
Produced by David Richenthal, Gene R. Korf, Roger L. Stevens, Jennifer Manocherian, Annette Niemtzow, Center Theatre Group / Mark Taper Forum (Gordon Davidson, Artistic Director; Charles Dillingham, Managing Director), Intiman Theatre Company and The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts; Produced in association with Benjamin Mordecai
Written by Robert Schenkkan; Incidental music by Jerome Ragland
Directed by Warner Shook
Scenic Design by Michael Olich; Costume Design by Frances Kenny; Lighting Design by Peter Maradudin; Sound Design by James Ragland
General Manager: Niko Associates, Inc. (Manny Kladitis, Founder and President); Company Manager: Alexander Holt
Production Stage Manager: Joan Toggenburger; Technical Supervisor: Christopher C. Smith; Production Supervisor: Bonnie Panson; Stage Manager: Tracy Crum
Fight direction by Randy Kovitz; Dramaturg: Tom Bryant; Casting: Pat McCorkle; General Press Representative: Jeffrey Richards Associates; Dialect Coach: Judi Dickerson; Advertising: Serino Coyne, Inc.
Opening Night Cast
John Aylward
Dragging Canoe
Joe Talbert (1792)Rebecca's father
Judge Goddard
Patrick Rowen (1861)Jed's grandfather
Union Colonel
Gus Slocum
Doctor
Preacher
James Talbert Winston (1954)owner, Blue Star Mining Co.
James Talbert Winston (1975)
Lillian Garrett-Groag
Morning Star (1776)
Star Rowen (1792)
Star (1819)
Julia Anne Talbert (1861)Richard's daughter
Lallie Rowen (1890)Mary Anne's mother
Mother Jones
Gail Grate
Sallie (1792)
Sallie Biggs (1819)
Sureta Biggs (1920)Cassius' wife
Lana TollerJoshua's secretary
Katherine Hiler
Rebecca Talbert (1792)a neighbor
Rose Anne Talbert (1861)Richard's daughter
Mary Anne Rowen (younger) (1890)
Lucy
Ronald Hippe
Zachariah Rowen (1819)Patrick's son
Randall Talbert (1861)Richard's only son
Carl Dawkins
Joshua Rowen Jackson (1920)son of Mary Anne
Gregory Itzin
Jeremiah
Richard Talbert (1861)land owner, son of Jeremiah Talbert
J. T. Wells
Andrew Talbert Winstona mine boss
Sheriff Ray Blanko
Stacy Keach
Michael Rowen (1775)
Michael Rowen (1776)
Michael Rowen (1792)
Ezekiel Rowen (1861) Jed's father
Jed Rowen (1890) Mary Anne's father
Gun Thug
Joshua Rowen (1954)President, UMW District #16
Joshua Rowen (1975)
Ronald William Lawrence
Taskwan
Jessie BiggsSallie's son, also a slave
Boatman
Cassius Biggs (1920)miner/bootlegger
Franklin Biggs (1954)owner of Biggs & Son
Franklin Biggs (1975)
Scott MacDonald
Patrick Rowen (1792)Michael's son
Patrick Rowen (1819)
Tommy Nolan
Silusa miner
Scott Rowen (1954)son of Joshua and new UMW district field rep
Tuck Milligan
Sam
Ezekiel Rowen (1819)Patrick's son
Jed Rowen (1861)
Tommy Jackson (1890)
Abe Steinman
Calvin Hayesa local president in District #16
Frank
Randy Oglesby
Earl Tod
Deputy Grey
Sharecropper #1
William Clark Quantrill
Tommy Jackson (1920)husband of Mary Ann
StuckyDistrict #16 security officer
Steve
Jeanne Paulson
Joleen Rowen (1861)Jed's mother
Mary Anne Rowen (older) (1890)
Mary Anne Rowen Jackson (1920)
Margaret Rowen (1954)wife of Joshua
Stephen Lee Anderson
Cherokee Warrior
Rebel #2
Chucka local president in District #16
Ensemble
Michael Hartman
Deputy O'Sullivan
Union Soldier #1
Man in the Woods
Grega local president in District #16
Bob SmalleyBlue Star Mine guard
Ensemble
Philip Lehl
Cherokee Warrior
Sharecropper #2
Ensemble
Patrick Page
Cherokee Warrior
Rebel #1
Mackiea miner
Gun Thug
Mikea local president in District #16
Ensemble
Susan Pellegrino
Ensemble
James Ragland
Guitar Player
Banjo Player
Ensemble
Jennifer Rohn
Ensemble
Novel Sholars
Ensemble
Lee Simon, Jr.
Cherokee Warrior
Union Soldier #2
Jefferson Biggs (1954)son of Franklin
Ensemble
preliminary pre-production priority list
- Need to research the background of the real life historical figures in the play - Mother Jones, Quantril, etc. so that coach Laura can plan on the dialect for them based on their backgrounds.
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