Lime Kiln Club

Last updated

The Lime-Kiln Club was a fictitious fraternal organization of African-Americans created by writer and journalist Charles Bertrand Lewis for the Detroit Free Press in the late 19th century.

Contents

Newspaper weekly

The Free Press was a Democratic weekly paper owned by the Scripps brothers and it was notable in its era for humor, low cost, and reliance on advertising revenue The two-cent price point of the paper (significantly lower than other publications) allowed for widespread distribution to working class audiences. This business model relied on high circulation as a selling point for advertising. [1]

The Detroit Free Press first published the Brother Gardner's Lime Kiln Club in 1878. [2] Author Charles Bertrand Lewis, a Union veteran and staff writer since 1869, was a popular humorist for the paper, wrote under the pen name "M. Quad". [3] Lewis's Lime Kiln Club was a fictional, African-American, fraternal organization featuring negative stereotypes of blacks in an appeal to working-class Democrats during a racially charged era. [1] [2] Lewis wrote his pieces in African-American dialect and spoken by characters with names like Brother Gardner, Waydown Bebee, and Elder Toots. [4] Each Lime Kiln Club episode follows a club debate on issues of politics, economics, and philosophy. [4] The absurdity and ignorance of these discussions served to satirize both African-Americans and politicians. [1] [2]

The column proved hugely popular and it was syndicated nationally [2] and published as a book, Brother Gardner's Lime-Kiln Club: being the regular proceedings of the regular club for the last three years ; with some philosophy, considerable music, a few lectures, and a heap of advice wirth reading,'in 1887 [4] . Charles Lewis ceased writing Lime Kiln Club stories when he left The Detroit Free Press for a higher salary at New York World in 1891. [1] [5]

Adaptations

Vaudeville

The original Detroit Free Press' column was also adapted for vaudeville performance. Evidence in the form of advertisements and a review from Variety magazine in 1909 reveal that the 25 minute performance was well received in New York. [6] The magazine also reveals that the show was put on by George Walker and Bert Williams troupe. This duo achieved fame for their performances in black face under the name "Two Real Coons", a title chosen to distinguish themselves from minstrelry performances by white actors in black face. [7] Their performance of the Lime Kiln Club also featured famed black actors Abbie Mitchell and Tom Fletcher. [7]

Bert William's Lime Kiln Field Day

In 1913, Biograph Studios began production on an untitled film adaption of The Lime Kiln Club directed by Edwin Middleton and T. Hayes Hunter. [8] William's Lime Kiln Field Day proceeded D.W. Griffiths epic The Birth Of A Nation by two years. It stands in contrast to Griffith's film as one of the only surviving silent films with an all black cast. [9] The film followed a day of romance between stars Bert Williams and Odessa Warren Grey. [10] The film was cancelled early for unknown reasons, and in 1938 Biograph donated the negatives to the Museum of Modern Art. [10] In 2014, museum staff reassembled the seven reels of raw footage in order to screen the film publicly for the first time. [11] The negative footage of Bert William's Lime Kiln Field Day screening is notably accompanied by video footage and still images of interaction between the film's black cast and white production crew. [10]

Notes

  1. 1 2 3 4 "Advertising". Central Michigan University. Central Michigan University. Retrieved November 3, 2014.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Kaplan, R (2001). Politics and the American Press : The Rise of Objectivity, 1865-1920. Cambridge University Press. pp. 44–46. ISBN   9780521006026.
  3. ↑ De Puy, W (1896). The University of Literature ... a Cyclopædia of Universal Literature, Presenting in Alphabetical Arrangement the Biography, Together with Critical Reviews and Extracts, of Eminent Writers of All Lands and All Ages. J. S. Barcus. p. 396. ISBN   127682081X.
  4. 1 2 3 Quad, M (1882). Brother Gardner's Lime-Kiln Club: being the regular proceedings of the regular club for the last three years ; with some philosophy, considerable music, a few lectures, and a heap of advice wirth reading. Belford. ISBN   1110384564.
  5. ↑ "CHARLES BERTRAND LEWIS ("M. QUAD")". The Beadle and Adams Dime Novel Digitization Project. Northern Illinois University. June 19, 2002. Retrieved November 3, 2014.
  6. ↑ Rush. ""The Lime Kiln Club"" Rev. of The Lime Kiln Club. Variety July 1909: 14. Internet Archive. Web. 29 Oct. 2014. <https://archive.org/stream/variety15-1909-07#page/n14>.
  7. 1 2 Cohen-Cruz, Jan; Schutzman (2006). A Boal Companion: Dialogues on Theatre and Cultural Politics . New York: Routledge. pp.  185–186. ISBN   0415322936.
  8. ↑ Anderson, Melissa (October 25, 2014). "Melissa Anderson on MoMA's Preservation of Bert Williams Lime Kiln Field Day". Artforum International. Retrieved October 29, 2014.
  9. ↑ "Bert Williams: Lime Kiln Club Field Day". Silent Film Festival. Retrieved 2016-10-03.
  10. 1 2 3 Watson, Walter (October 25, 2014). "Rare Silent Film With Black Cast Makes A Century-Late Debut". NPR. National Public Radio. Retrieved October 29, 2014.
  11. ↑ McClure, Diana. "Interface of Blackface and Black Love". International Review of African American Art. Hampton University. Retrieved November 3, 2014.

Related Research Articles

The year 1902 in film involved some significant events.

Bert Williams American comedian and actor

Bert Williams was a Bahamian-born American entertainer, one of the pre-eminent entertainers of the Vaudeville era and one of the most popular comedians for all audiences of his time. He is credited as being the first Black man to have the leading role in a film: Darktown Jubilee in 1914.

Biograph Company Defunct American film studio

The Biograph Company, also known as the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company, was a motion picture company founded in 1895 and active until 1916. It was the first company in the United States devoted entirely to film production and exhibition, and for two decades was one of the most prolific, releasing over 3000 short films and 12 feature films. During the height of silent film as a medium, Biograph was America's most prominent film studio and one of the most respected and influential studios worldwide, only rivaled by Germany's UFA, Sweden's Svensk Filmindustri and France's Pathé. The company was home to pioneering director D. W. Griffith and such actors as Mary Pickford, Lillian Gish, and Lionel Barrymore.

Abbie Mitchell American opera singer

Abriea "Abbie" Mitchell Cook, also billed as Abbey Mitchell, was an American soprano opera singer. She performed the role of Clara in the premiere production of George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess in 1935, and was also the first to record "Summertime" from that musical.

Jenifer Lewis American actress

Jenifer Jeanette Lewis is an American actress, singer, comedian and activist. She began her career appearing in Broadway musicals and worked as a back-up singer for Bette Midler before appearing in films Beaches (1988) and Sister Act (1992). Lewis is known for playing roles of mothers in the films What's Love Got to Do With It (1993), Poetic Justice (1993), The Preacher's Wife (1996), The Brothers (2001), The Cookout (2004), Think Like a Man (2012) and in the sequel Think Like a Man Too (2014), Baggage Claim (2013) and The Wedding Ringer (2015), as well as in The Temptations miniseries (1998).

The actuality film is a non-fiction film genre that, like the documentary film, uses footage of real events, places, and things. Unlike the documentaries, actuality films are not structured into a larger argument, picture of the phenomenon or coherent whole. In practice, actuality films preceded the emergence of the documentary. During the era of early cinema, actualities—usually lasting no more than a minute or two and usually assembled together into a program by an exhibitor—were just as popular and prominent as their fictional counterparts. The line between "fact" and "fiction" was not as sharply drawn in early cinema as it would become after the documentary came to serve as the predominant non-fiction filmmaking form. An actuality film is not like a newspaper article so much as it is like the still photograph that is published along with the article, with the major difference being that it moves. Apart from the traveling actuality genre, actuality is one film genre that remains strongly related to still photography.

Sam Lucas American entertainer

Sam Lucas was an American actor, comedian, singer, and songwriter. Sam Lucas's exact date of birth is disputed. Lucas's year of birth, to freed former slaves, has also been cited as 1839, 1840, 1841, and 1850.

African-American musical theater

African-American musical theater includes late 19th and early 20th century musical theater productions by African Americans in New York City and Chicago. Actors from troupes such as the Lafayette Players also crossed over into film. The Pekin Theatre in Chicago was a popular and influential venue.

The 49th National Society of Film Critics Awards, given on 3 January 2015, honored the best in film for 2014.

<i>The House with Closed Shutters</i> 1910 film

The House with Closed Shutters is a 1910 American silent drama film directed by D. W. Griffith and released by the Biograph Company. Prints of The House with Closed Shutters exist in the film archives of the Museum of Modern Art, George Eastman House, and the Library of Congress.

T. Hayes Hunter American film director

Thomas Hayes Hunter was an American film director and producer of the silent era. He directed a total of 34 films between 1912 and 1934.

<i>The Bells</i> (1918 film) 1918 film

The Bells is a lost 1918 American silent drama film released by Pathé Exchange. It was adapted from the 1867 French play Le Juif Polonais by Erckmann-Chatrian and an 1871 English-language version, The Bells, by Leopold Lewis. The latter was a favorite vehicle for actor Henry Irving. This silent film stars Frank Keenan and Lois Wilson. The story was remade in 1926 as The Bells with Lionel Barrymore and Boris Karloff.

<i>A Natural Born Gambler</i> 1916 American film

A Natural Born Gambler is a 1916 silent film short, the first of only two films starring Broadway comic and singer Bert Williams. The film was Williams' first two-reel comedy, and was a film that was expected not to disappoint audiences and was highly anticipated. It was produced by the Biograph Company and released by The General Film Company. Williams directed and G. W. Bitzer, also known as Billy Bitzer, who was usually D. W. Griffith's cameraman, was the cinematographer. This is a still-surviving film, featuring Williams in his famous blackface routine. It is an authentic comedic film for its time (1916) in which Williams is still humorous without heavily relying on the popular physical style of slapstick comedy. Special and strategic advertising along with the name Williams had created for himself made it possible for the film to get exposure throughout the country. Most of this exposure came from newspaper prints.

<i>A Wreath in Time</i> 1909 film

A Wreath in Time is a 1909 American silent comedy film written and directed by D. W. Griffith, produced by the Biograph Company of New York City, and co-starring Mack Sennett and Florence Lawrence. At its release in February 1909, the short was distributed to theaters on a "split reel", which was a single reel that accommodated more than one film. A Wreath in Time shared its reel with another Biograph short also directed by Griffith, the drama Edgar Allen Poe [sic]. Original paper rolls of contact prints of both motion pictures, as well as safety-stock copies of the two films, are preserved in the Library of Congress.

<i>Lime Kiln Field Day</i> 1913 film

Lime Kiln Field Day is a 1913 American black-and-white silent film produced by the Biograph Company and Klaw and Erlanger.

Odessa Warren Grey was milliner, entrepreneur, and performer in Harlem, New York. She is best known as the star of the silent film, Lime Kiln Field Day (1913) where she co-stars with Bert Williams.

Charles Bertrand Lewis American journalist and humorist

Charles Bertrand Lewis, better known by the pen name M. Quad, was an American journalist and humorist.

V. Floyd Campbell American illustrator and caricaturist

V. Floyd Campbell was an American illustrator and caricaturist.

Wes Jenkins was an American actor active during Hollywood's silent era. He appears in an untitled Biograph film from 1913 that has been dubbed Lime Kiln Field Day; held by MoMA, the seven-reel clip is thought to be the oldest surviving footage of black actors.

<i>A Sound Sleeper</i> 1909 American film

A Sound Sleeper is a 1909 American comedy film directed by D. W. Griffith and produced by the American Mutoscope and Biograph Company. The short was filmed in one day in the Coytesville borough of Fort Lee, New Jersey, which at the time was a popular filming location for many early motion-picture studios in the northeastern United States. Due to the brief running time of this comedy, it was originally distributed in April 1909 on a split reel with another Biograph release, a longer dramatic film titled The Winning Coat.

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.