CABINET CARDS – LOT OF TWO (2) ACTRESS LOTTA CRABTREE – DARLING OF THE GOLD CAMPS

Item Details

Lot of two (2) cabinet cards, 4 ¼ x 6 ½, of Lotta Crabtree. Both are by Napoleon Sarony of New York.

As is condition.They came from a period photograph album of theatrical personalities; unfortunately the cabinet cards had been skinned to the top layer of the mount, and then mounted to the album’s page thicker substrate. They are back to back on the same album page. The seated image is a more uncommon image of Lotta, and has some rippling along the top and bottom of the mount. The standing view has several condition issues: b/l corner missing, vertical teat at top center, horizontal crease b/l corner.   

Lotta Crabtree was an American actress whose early days as an entertainer during the California Gold Rush led to her immense popularity as the darling of the American stage and in England. Crabtree grew up from the age of four in California, where her father moved the family during the Gold Rush of the early 1850s. At the Grass Valley mining camp she met Lola Montez, who taught her a bit of dancing and stagecraft, and in 1855 she first performed before an audience of miners. Crabtree’s lively, diminutive figure immediately captivated the audience, and with her mother she then toured the wild camps of California. In 1859 she began appearing in variety theatres in and around San Francisco, where her singing, dancing, and melodramatic roles, many written for her, kept her in the limelight. Crabtree’s first acting role was in Loan of a Lover, performed in Petaluma, California. She made her New York City debut in 1864 with little success; after three years of touring the country, however, she returned in Little Nell and the Marchioness, adapted for her from Charles Dickens’s The Old Curiosity Shop, and was a sensation. From then until her retirement in 1891, she enjoyed huge popularity at home and in England. Her infectious gaiety, occasionally saucy manner, and perennially winsome, childlike appearance made Crabtree, most often known simply as Lotta, a versatile performer and ranked her in the forefront of the emerging theatre of burlesque extravaganza. From 1870 she toured with her own company in plays that showcased her unique talents. She left the stage in 1891 and lived in quiet retirement at her estate on Lake Hopatcong, New Jersey.