Daily British Whig (1850), 21 Oct 1916, p. 15

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"work together---as pleasant a family | chief comedian mashes a ple against | {a Chinaman's face, and the browless | | or unpretending crowd which attends | | frankly and vaigely to "see a good | {clean drama." These divisions rare] ' {'sorely inaccurate, but upon 'such as- | Lsumptions men' build theatyes, and | £ ¢ompanies rehearse their actors, and playwrights write plays. Theatrical- ly there are but three spots giving deadly access to the public's brains in the head. in the feet and in the regions between the stomach and the { heart. The latter 1 think, might | roughly |lescribe the target against which the average travelling reper- YEARS AGO! toire company train their crossbows. i "Lena Rivers," "Dora Thorhe," "The - | Two Orphans,' "and all their thou- Ji . | sand-and-one comrades, such as these | THE FIRST BROTHER ADOPTED | companips are accustomed to] A STAGE CAREER { play, represent a fairly close approx- - jimtion, to the actual ideals, aspir- ationis, and notions of mortality lurking in the skull of the average | man or woman. At least they are | healthy and" polite with a plain-as- | femy plot, a Calvinistic denunciation] of dark moustaches, and a halo of] broken hearts and scalding tears| pinned above the heroine's tiara: | Virttie in rags never failed to make women cry--in the theatre----and the click of the duellist's sword resolves the "humble carpenter to spend his] next strike pay on fencing lessons. I| have watched audiences bawl in un-| disguised grief at the picture of poor lean Lena Rivers, -and men stuff] handkerchiefs down their larynx] whet little Eva moans to Uncle Tom Let no Scven of This Ontario Family Followed Lure of Footlights. Now the Family Runs Four Theatric- al Companies--Their Home Is At Christie's Lake Near Perth. Robson Black, of Ottawa, formerly of Kingston, secretary of the Canad- jan Forestry Association, has con- tributed the following " interesting sketch of the Marks Brothers, those purveyors ef popular theatrical am- usement to the Canada Monthly: The 'Marks brothers, seven of them, are all in the theatrical business, and for more than a score of years their repertoire companies have toured the small towns of Ontario to the delight of thousands of pegple whose chances for dramatic entertainment come but seldom. Perhaps many people are| that she is "going there?' not aware that, as Mr. Black tells| one take awgy the notion that the in his article the Mark's brothers | impact of the visiting stock company live, when they are at home, at|jegves no permanent reminder on the Christie's Lake, near Perth, Here jite of a natien for I fancy I know | during "the summer months, they, a Canadian and an American election or two that were decided on the pat- tern of "Dora Thorne," "'Parted At The Altar," or "The Devil's Auction." rest from their labors, rehearse new plays and plan their tours for the fall and winter season, A Humble Beginning, How tliose seven brothers of the Marks quit the festive life of their father's farm near Perth in an end of the story which must be dragged from the past. As often happens in hig families of furm lads, Robert W. the eldest, struck out as a small trader, beating up business for or- gans and sewing machines. The other hoys worked the farm, cut the roots, tended the circus, hoed turnips and Jigger round on the hay rake, at- in other ways experienced the glor- lous uplift that goes with farm life as we know it. One day, Robert W., still vending his five-octaved har- moniacs, came to Maybrook and into that village that same day, came Kane Kennedy, magician, "Myster- ious Hindu from the Bay of Bengal," Down on the snores of Christie Lake, eleven miles from Perth, On- tario, lives Robert Marks, a six foot showman. Before his doorstep spread one of the rarest estates in all Un. tario, an estate of flowing waters, of reattered islands and granite head- lands, of long ghost-walks of silver birch where thie rabbit plays his "conyedy lead" and the hawk signs up for forty weeks of "heavies." This is the place--this Christie Lake-- where the Marks family "of players and managers have grown from. childhood, where their dram- atic companies are assembled. at mid-summer, where the second edi- tion of the Marks' name, adding new patterns to the family heirloom, will probably pass along the enterprise to interminable generations. Around the lake shores the actors have their cot-| .u' his name 'indicates, and Kane tages, their motor boats race the wa-| .on¢0q a hall' and bade the tired- ters in the early morning and the y,ginessman of Maybrook, Ontario, pitch of night, They, fish together, | ; ome right his way. Robert saw the show, recognized the cleverness of the performer and fixed one conclusion in his mind, that Kane Kennedy, rightly managed, could make three times the ate re- as ever tanned and fattened under the summer sky. And now, since the 1ailway came within catapult throw of the big Marks' homie, they are | peter ing | such a remed | signature on the building a great rehearsal hall, ware- house, and painting studio, where the entire Marks enterprise will be housed when the forty weeks of road tour are ended and another forty in process of planning." The Marks' stock companies, which a large portion of Canadians and Americans have known at some time or other, are in many senses the foun- dation stones of theatrical effort in the Dominion. There have been more delectable efforts, as with the gifted and unfortunate Harold Nelson once an idol of Western Canada, but the dramatic companies organized by the Marks family have been the real genesis of Canadian theatrical enter- prise. Although continuity of man- ~ agement in the theatrical business is tragically rare, the brand of "Marks" © in the theatrical world has persisted for thirty-eight. years, developing from the original single venture of ceipts, After the audience left, Rob- ert introduced himself and said: "I own a team of horses and wagon; jou have a tent and a lot of élever bunco. Let's hitch and take fifty- fifty on the profits. That day was the start of the Marks Brothers' enterprise. Robert headed across Ontario by easy stag- «s~--If a stage can be easy---and found imself in the year 1879 on the way to Winnipeg. Nc railways were then in sight of Manitoba. "I could have vaulted across Winnipeg on any clothes~pole,"" as Robert expressed it to me. "It was just a muddy fresh- rigged town that Easteners thought the North Pole and did not care it it moved another thousand. The show | gave in 1879 was the first amusement enterprise to come to Winnipeg. The issue of one of the ttwo weekly newspapers of t day ~ Robert W., into the four tompanies of | gtaieq that "Winnipeg is no Haat r ay "the present day, owned By four bro- {the backwhpds as a show had struck thers, R. W., Tom, Joseph and*Ern-| town." est. Stranger still, profits have floW- ed in until the family fortune repre- sents probably half a million dollars invested, you may be sure, where the moth and rust of the theatrical gam- ble corrupts not even a penny or What The Public Wants. J: In the commonplace designation of + theatre-goers, three divisions are us- ually hit upon as sufficient to pigeon The Wild West. The only' way to get into the Da- kotas from Manitoba was by taking the "flyer" or flat boat down the Red River, and Robert Marks with ditional peoplé to help tlie show out, took chances on the southbound currents of fortune. Even in such was a thousand miles north-west of the entertainer and three or four ad- hole universal taste for amusement. There is the high-brow crowd which attends only when the tickets equal a roast-of-lamb, the low-brows run- times news travelled with surprising swiftness, so that when the flat boat veered into the dock at Grand Forks, N. Dakota, the sheriff of the place with a luxurious moustache hurd- ling over his upper lip ordered Marks ning largely to burlesque, where the Per ve en A cs sm, THE DAILY BRITIS NEW STRENGTH FOR LAME BACK. Letior Tells of Long - looked - for Prescription. Dear My. Editor --1 sufféred form lame back and worn-out feeling. unable to ay erect bl get nd. I ane a able to around. It woul come on at first with erick in an of my back. I took one box of Pierce's Anuric Tablets and my commenced to get better soon alter starting to take them: I have to walk doubled over ing the "Anpuric." It I have ever taken what it is intended to relieve. 1 hope those who are in need il give the "4 Tablets" a trial. wij ove a (Signed) A. G. Dmax=. , Norz: Up to this time, "Anuric" bas not been on sale to the public, bus by the persuasion of many ients and the increased demand for this wonder tablet, Doctor Pierce has ful healin ) finally decided to put it into stores of this country within ste reach of all the drug immedi- E be Docker do on Dr. women, and Dr. Pierce y a by to be ical Didoovery pro years + gents to Dr. V, . Pierce, Buffalo, N. Y., for large package. BA Adena he r y big eee Ly leo have that it will make you feel » different person, EDITOR -- Please insert this letter in | some conspicuous place in your paper. and his company ashore. Marks tried to_balk the order. "You have no hall," he protested, but the sheriff was equal to the chal- lenge. "The townspeople say they won't let you by. If you give the word we'll fit up an opery house in hal an hour." So Marks gave the wor and half the men in Grand Forks car- ried tables and beer kegs into a half- finished store. The tables were stack- ed against one end to form a stage, while the kegs served as seats. Three shows were given that day---the first entertainment Grand Forks had ever seen' When a showman etruck his route through the north-western part of Alberta about 1880, he gambled desperately on a perforated hide. In the majority of thesé raw untamed towns to which the Marks' caravan family made its way, custom decreed that the travelling troupe should be the natural enemy of the drunk- en and well-armed cowboy. In the history of these towns no entertain- ment had been more than half finish ed before one or mare "toughs" started potting at the lamp chim- neys, reducing the house to darkness and chaos in a very few mjsutes. Marks saw he must nip such horse- play in the bud or lose his profits. Before reaching a town he'd secure thé names of the five wildest char- acters known to local annals, and these men he'd seek out, coax into a or good humor with drinks and then request them as an especial honor to act as policemen at the evening's entertainment. With solemn: con- scientiousness those men carried out their duty. Ugly, burly, ill-scarred cut-throats, they stalked up and down the aisles during the performance, swaggering from right to left and if a person in the audience dared even to laugh in the wron lace one of the gunmen was at his e with a significant slap on the shoulder and a grunted innuendo about "fll- ing him full of lead." But Marks solved the showman's problem of keeping order in the bad lands, al- though, as he says himself, "the gun- men kind of spoiled the quiet scenes." A Perforated Hat. Conville, Kansas, '% a.m., and Marks was seated at a table in the only ho- tel, the "Silver Dollar." Then, as since he wore the high silk hat which has distinguished the Marks brothers in their out-of-doors appearances. No one had ever dared to enter Lonville in a plug topper before, but Marks looked on it as a good advertising. Presently he detected a solemn' foot- fall behind him and without an in- stant's warning a pistol was rammed within an inch of the hat and two 4/ -- for a tea or E ? Z rid himself of the art flutter ar hat often co tea or coff A i . Th Sensible Way \ coffee drinker to | daches, biliousness, ev ------ $ - pe reine Ha *> wall opposite. Marks turned with all the calmness he could muster and said: '"'Parduer, please take better aim next time." For an instant the cowboy glowered about him, for he had misgpaken him for. a preacher. "How'll- ye trade hats?" he chal- lenged. The showman hesitated a mo- ment but caught "sight of the gestic- ulating bar-terder half hid behind a partition. "Done!" he declared, and 'they cemented the exchange with a drink. That hat deal proved opportune, for the cowboy was the largest ranch owner in the distrigt and in honor of his plug-hatted guest formed his out-fits into a guard-of-honor to es- cort the Canadian about town. He also insisted that évery employee should buy from Marks from one to five tickets for the performance. The hair-raising period of mining towns and six-shooters" came to ar end about the time that Robert drew his brother Tom info a vaudeville partnership. Where previously they had been taking any trail that led to life at its fiercest and freshest, now they determined to quit bucecan- eering and make the show business as normal as a hardware store. - Rob- ert and Tom worked the variety cir- cuits throughout the Northwest until the fields were white with the stub- ble. That led them to organize a dramatic repertoire company and through the requirements for actors, vaudeville perforsiers for the waits between acts, advance agents and managers, the other brothers of the Marks family were absorbed one by one from the farm back near Perth. In such manner seven beys from the single household leagued them- selves to a theatrical enterprise--a record quite unique in the world of amusement. Now Four Companies. Four companies came into opera- tion as time went on and ambit- ions expanded. With popular gifts foreomedy Tom and Ernest hoed out their own row in easterm.and west- ern Canada and in the United States. Robert W, established a goodly name in the Dominion through his own industry.and the talents. of his wife and star, May Bell Marks, and then struck south for the past ten years through New England. Joseph---an- | entertained nearly io ad. people other of the brethren--operates suc- cessfully in various parts of the country. And always the plans are made and executed under happy co- operation. Any special stroke of good fortune befalling one brother or son or daughter becomes a matter of general family rejoicing. Perhaps that is owing a little to the white-haired mother of the Marks' clan, still in vigor of body and mind, to Whom the children rally once a .year as to their common friend and leader. From this fine old lady, far past eighty years, to the youngest Marks, Robert aged four, is a short inter- val as time is counted but it makes a long lane of travel and adventure I reckon that the one parent comi- pany started by R. W.. Marks has since ft first took the No. 1 company, Mrs. Marks has a repertoire of over 200 long parts in which she is 'letter-perfect" and ready to appear on two hours' sum- mons. A Showman's Philosophy. We were spinning down Christie Lake one ajternoon. Robert Marks was officer-of-the-watch, and I was deck-hand. Ho talked in the easy take-your-time-about-it 'style of _ a lazy summer's day, but to my ears it contained a p good precip- itate of showman's philosophy. "The best time to go into a town with a show is immediately after the declaration of a strike, The average workman meets his chum. 'Bil,' says he~"we're going to win this strike," 'Right you are' says Bill, 'and in two weeks they'll be crawl- ing at our feet.' 'Let's go to the show to-night.' About ten days after a strike begins, the first jubilation wears off and, as a show-manager, I prefer to be some place else. *'There are two kinds of people we try to draw and keep drawing the young man and his girl who want to see every show end with a marriage, and the middle-aged unromantic team of housekeepers who look on marriage as a chestnut and want to see some of the tragedy and clash of fiction. Then, of ¢ourse, every- body loves a comedy. The jest'/is the great universal tomic. Above everything else the | sell tickets to a laugh is on his way to fortune. 3 Melodrama Popular. "The great appetite of the masses of sh today ie for melo- drama. Despite what 'experts' say, melodrama is the ome great peren- nial in the theatrical business. 5 Tor over twenty-five years and they ger towns where the public is made over-fastidious bullets ploughed their way Anto tel 0 OF SCIENCE & bd In twenty generations every per- son has had 131,076 direct ancestors. Japanese have built a factory in China to make paper from rice straw. Among the coin-in-the-slot novel- ties is an electric fan for places. Of Chili's 187,00,000 acres of land only about 23,000,000 can be cultivated. 'The anthracite mines of Pennsyl- vania contain more than 7,000 miles of tunnels. Japanese make a waterproof leath- er with many uses from the hides of sea lions. Eastily detached casters have been patented to aid in moving washing machines. in a course of experiments by French dairymen. '. : A skate strap with a pad for the top of the foot to relieve the pres- sure has been patented. : Manufacturers of that country are planning to establish the first paper plant in Argentine. Quickly adjustable forms have been invented for building concrete steps to save carpenter work. Peru is steadily increasing its pro- duction of gold, which now amounts to about $1,000,060 a year. A California inventor has patented a pan that can be attached to any broom to catch its sweepings. Twenty-two implements can be constructed with the units of a com- bination tool of English invention. Experiments are being tried with an internal combustion ehgine YRi4 is driven by. the explosion of dust The smallest known bird is a Central American humming bird that is about the size of a blue bottle fly. A new toy vehicle is driven by a standing. rider applying his weight first to one lever and then to an- other. Russia * is the only country in which the production of flax fiber has increased consistently in recent years, Within the handle of a new jump- ing rope for children is a recording device to count the number of turns made. South Africa has established a fac- tory for the extraction of rubber from the roots and vines of rubber plants. A metal box into which an incan- descent lamp can be inserted has been patented by an Idaho man for warming beds. The greater part of 4,00,000 tons of herring caught yearly in Japan- ese waters are used to fertilize rice fields. A new electric water heatef that takes current from a light socket can be used to make any faucet yield hot water, never fail to draw except in the big- | Of A vest with lapels that turn up and button to form a throat and furnaces of any nation, 73; compared with Germany's 63. ' The Cong river and its tributaries than 9,000 miles of waterways that are navigable for flat-bottomed steamboats. Both an electrice range and .a re- frigerator are included in a new kitchen cabinet, but are hidden from view by doors when not in use. The seven principal engineering organizations of Germaay have been combined into an association of tech- nical scientific societies. An Illionois faventor dredging ma- hine. literally s upon large feet and 'will travel ground too soft for caterpillar wheels. Glasgow provides its policemen with warm food and tea .when on duty at night by the use of electrical- ly heated plates in signal boxes. '| An additional diaphragm features a new telephone mouthpiece to ab- sorb outside sounds that make tele- phoning difficult in noisy places, An Australian is the inventor of a recording target which shows the course of bullets. in Telution to both stationary and moving objects. A French shoemaker has a machine that makes a plaster cast of a customer's foot and from it forme a last over which his shoes are made, A A machine invented by a Maine man digs potatoes, frees them from fines and earth and pours them into or barrels as it is driven over a steel an brought out a public! Cocoa shells are being fed to cattte! fers with aluminam paint will prevent) the accumulation of deposits that of- i ten come from hard water. To replace the familiar steam roll- er a gasoline machine has been de- veloped which, in addition to 'econo- mizing on fuel gives its driver an un- obstructed view of his work. Swedish 'scientists are producing a new fertilizer by treating feldspart or another 'mineral base of potassium with a suitable amount of carbon and iron in an electric furnace, For softening wallpaper prepara- tory to removing it from walls an In- dianapolis man has invented a steam jet that géts its steam from a heating radiator through a rubber tube. % The world's best cork comes from Spanish and Portuguese trees that are allowed to become 40 years old before the bark is cut, and then it is removed only every eight or ten years. . After many experiments a Pitts- burgh man has invented a musical insrument with which he can make vibrations radiated from the flame of a gas jet reproduce every note on a pipe organ, To permit the miners to work long- er shifts the owners of a German coal mine compress air at the surface of the ground and pipe it to the deepest workings to cool and dry the atmos phere the men breathe. In a new rear signal for automo- biles pressing a button on the steer- ing wheel lights a red light and lifts a semaphore, which is dropped and the light changed to green when the button is pressed a second time. Experts have found that the hair of Japanese women is extremely long, elastic and durable, making it su- perior to all other human hair for commercial purposes, especially for wettving with silk into textiles. A powerful new electric lamp for photographers is enclosed in blue glass, which lessens its infensity as far as « person facing it is concerned without affecting the rays that do the work on photographic plates. So that holes can be bored in under water rocks no matter how rough the water, a Hawaiian engineer bas in- vented a drill standard with a heav- ily weighed bbttom, power being sup- plied from a vessel through flexible connections. Motion pictures showing both front and back views of noted' or- chestra leaders at work, have been taken and combined so that other musical, organizations can be led by them, while audiences can see them as usual at the same time. _ BATHING IN YOUR TRUNK. Invention of Montana Couple Makes * This Possible. The Popular Science Monthly, A combination trunk, laundry bas ket and bathtub is the novel inven- ~tion of Ole C. and Hanan L.°c. Ro- man, Mont. The trunk is made of sheet metal, enameled insula ani au:- side to adapt it for usé xs a bathtub or laundry tub, and it is "io provid- ed with an outlet at thi bottom, to which hose can readily ha attached to draw off the water, Basil wiv- bathtub, the trunk is a claun storage place for laundry. Just a 'suspicion' of H.P. Sauce gives that finishing "touch. which makes your plate of Oysters so enjoy- able. © You try it! 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