I responded too soon. It turns out that the Billy Rose Theatre Collection has
another clipping file on Bowers. The "problem" is that one folder had defined
him as a composer, while this other folder defined him as "vaudeville" (a
vaudeville player).

I'm not going to enumerate the folder because there are dozens and dozens of
articles in it, clipped >from periodicals such as Variety (many clippings),
Milwaukee News, The Player, Show World, Broadway Magazine, a very nice picture
entitled "Frederick Bowers, a tenor, making a record" dated Aug. 13, 1910 (>from
a periodical entitled American...[something]), a New Jersey paper, Boston
Chronicle, New Jersey Telegraph, New York Star, New York Sun, Dramatic News,
Toledo News, the Terre Haute Tribune, Chicago Tribune, Fort Wayne Journal,
Pittsburgh Leader, etc., etc. and so on, basically following him on the
vaudeville circuit, covering the first two decades of the 20th century.
There is enough material in it to construct a pretty good chronology of
Bowers, his acts, who he performed with (including "Don," his dog, who is
featured in a few pictures).

So again, this illustrates the difficulties and rewards of working with files
which one can't find in the online catalog of The New York Public Library for
the Performing Arts.


Bob Kosovsky, Ph.D. -- Curator, Rare Books and Manuscripts,
Music Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
Listowner: OPERA-L ; SMT-TALK ; SMT-ANNOUNCE ; SoundForge-users
--- My opinions do not necessarily represent those of my institutions ---