Page 95 - Swann Galleries - Printed & Manuscript African Americana- Sale 2308 - March 21, 2013

149 ● (SLAVERY AND ABOLITION.)
STOWE, HARRIET BEECHER-THE
HYERS SISTERS. Uncle Tom’s Cabin.
Letterpress playbill, printed on both sides
181⁄8 x 5 3⁄
4 inches with a large engraved
vignette on each side; creases where folded;
paper evenly toned.
[Bridgeport, CT, 1889] [800/1,200]
A RARE PLAYBILL FOR A PERFORMANCE OF
UNCLE TOM’S CABIN WITH THE HYERS SIS-
TERS. The Hyers Sisters, Anna Madah (1855
- 1929) and Emma Louise (1857 - 1901),
were singer/actresses and pioneers of black
musical theater. With Joseph Bradford and
Pauline Hopkins, the Hyers Sisters produced
the “first full-fledged musical plays... in which
African Americans themselves comment on the
plight of the slaves and the relief of
Emancipation without the disguises of minstrel
comedy.” (Hill. The Hyers Sisters Pioneers in
Black Musical Comedy) We have tentatively
dated this playbill to 1889 when the Hyers
Sisters would have been on the same bill with
The Jubilee Singers. This “double company”
was truly enormous and included the Hyers
Sisters own musical quartette as well as musi-
cians, added to the already large Peck &
Fursman company.
150 ● (SLAVERY AND ABOLITION.)
STOWE, HARRIET BEECHER. Art
Supplement, January 26, 1896. Sheet of
chromolithographic cut-outs for the story
of uncle Tom’s Cabin, from the Boston
Globe, 10 x 71⁄
2 inches, printed on card-
stock. Boston, 1896 [400/600]
A RARE SURVIVAL OF THIS SPECIAL JUVE-
NILE “TOY” FROM THE 1896 BOSTON
GLOBE. The effects on material culture as a
result of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel res-
onated for decades after the Civil War. This
chromolithographic sheet shows each character
from the novel, as well as scenes that a child
could arrange by cutting out the pieces, and fol-
lowing directions that, according to a note on
the sheet, could be found on page 32 of the
newspaper. These chromolithographs were
printed using the heavier oil-based colors that
Currier and Ives often used, and as a result
they are as strong and bold today as they were
116 years ago.
149
150