Wild West in New York
Staten Island | Madison Square Garden | Brooklyn
Madison Square Garden
Buffalo Bill Cody retooled the Wild West show for an indoor season during winter 1886 at Madison Square Garden, employing renowned stage manager Steele MacKaye to write the production. MacKaye created a show titled Dawn of Civilization, with four acts or "epochs." Elaborate special effects transformed the indoor arena into the windswept plains of the West, complete with a tornado.
The New York Times, November 25, 1886
BUFFALO BILL IN DRAMA FOUR WILD WEST EPOCHS AT MADISON-SQUARE GARDEN
Patriotic playgoers crowded Madison-Square Garden last evening to applaud the first performance of Mr. Steele Mackaye's last great drama, which was acted with great spirit and power by Buffalo Bill, several dozen cowboys, cowgirls, and genuine greasers, besides a hundred and fifty Indians of various tribes in full fig and feather.
Mr. Mackaye's drama is divided into four "epochs," named on the bills as follows: 1. The Primeval Forest. 2. The Prairie. 3. The Cattle Ranch. 4. The Mining Camp. The first epoch is supposed to be that preceding the discovery of America. The primeval forest is shown... Two timid deer peer from behind the trees, then come forth, followed by a herd of elk. As they are gathered by the spring, several Indians steal upon them and a shower of arrows is fired. The sun rises. A band of Sioux and a band of Cheyennes meet. The great chiefs, Blooming Thunder and Hole-in-the-Ground hold a pow-wow and make peace. The war dance follows, interrupted by the onslaught of a band of Pawnees under the fierce sachem No-Bugs-on-Me, and a rough and tumble massacre closes the scene.
The second act shows the prairie. A dozen live buffalo are at the water hole. Suddenly Buffalo Bill's wild yell shrills through the silence, and the cheerful pop of the Winchester stimulates the herd in its mad flight to safety. The emigrant train comes on: the prairie schooners and their oxen, burros and mules; the going into camp; the supper and preparations for night.... Darkness comes. All are sleeping. Suddenly a distant glow on the horizon, brightening and widening -- nearer and nearer till the prairie is a sea of rushing fire -- then the wild yell of alarm -- the fighting of fire with fire -- the stampede -- deer, buffalo, mustangs, Indians, and emigrants -- all fleeing together -- a stirring scene.
The third epoch ... is the cattle ranch, illustrating the cowboy in his glory, riding the bucking mustang and lassoing the bounding and bumptious steer. Suddenly comes the curdling whoop of the Comanchee and Kiowas, led by Seven-Fleas, Son-of-a-Gun, Loaded-for-Bear, Busted-Flush, Peach-Blow-Spittoon, Two-Buckets-of-Red-Paint, and other famous chiefs, who go into the hair-raising business with a painstaking enthusiasm which fanned the audience to an uproar. Just at the most exciting point of the massacre, a troop of cowboys arrive and the noble red men are sent to the happy hunting grounds in a body.
The fourth "epoch" is devoted to the incidents of a mining camp.... There is considerable fun, according to the frontier notion of fun, including a duel to the death with revolvers. The lighting-like arrival and departure of the pony express and some rather tame rifle shooting are among the incidents... A dark and dangerous canon is shown. Passing here the stage[coach] is "jumped" by a band of road agents, who go through mail, express, and passengers, with that cheerful skill and celerity for which the Western road agent is famous. The scene shifts back to the mining camp. Thunder is crashing and lighting flashing... Suddenly comes a roar, the tents sway and then are leveled, several dummies are whirled wildly in midair, and then curtain drops upon what is supposed to be the terrific destruction of the camp by a cyclone.
The New York Herald, November 25, 1886
THE WORLD OF AMUSEMENT
"Here they come! Here they come!"
The "they" were a vicious, disgusted looking lot of redskins, mounted upon trim and wiry little ponies, and the speaker, or rather crier, was a youngster with a wonderful pair of lungs, who loved a real, live Indian better than his supper. He stood upon the curb facing the Madison avenue entrance to the "Garden."
The long talked of, anxiously looked forward to Wild West show was parading the streets. It was a collection of fiercely painted, gayly gotten up Sioux, Pawnees, cowboys, vaqueros, et al., which compose what the versatile "Bill" styles the Wild West camp.
...
A vision of flowing locks, flowing trousers, flowing hat brims, and, in fact, everything on the flow style, a clatter of hoofs upon the pavement and a loud murmur of applause, together with a fierce shriek of delight from the curb, and the immortal Buffalo Bill, his "leading man," familiarly known as Buck Taylor and all his feminine stars, six in number, well shaped, natty looking girls, sitting well upon their horses, flashed into view. The "principals" were certainly a fine looking lot, and they "caught on," for all along the line hands were clapped and hats were waved.
...
THE OPENING PERFORMANCE
...Dream first was called "the Primeval Forest of America Before Its Discovery By the White Man"...
...a silver tongued orator..., appeared in a sort of pigeon loft to the left of stage. His words were set in the rich, fanciful setting of Mr. Mackaye's gold tinged vocabulary. Personally, he appeared attractive, but he would have been more enjoyed had he made the heart grow fond by absence. He was a chorus whose lines sadly needed cutting.
"The grand introduction of Indians, cowboys, Mexicans, girl riders and individual celebrities" was very effective and formed quite a novel pageant. The dancing of the Indians, in consequence of their sanguinary inclinations, aroused particular attention. The frescoed sons of the forest tossed off their blankets and the fair sex did not know whether to look with interest upon the dancers or to glance at the roof. Sixty almost entirely nude braves, with their hides tinted according to the latest thing in war paint, danced to the accompaniment of some very weird music.
The New York World, November 25, 1886
THEY ALL LIKE THE INDIANS
Gov. Bill, Gen. Sherman and Rev. Mr. Beecher Go to the Wild West
More than five thousand people filled Madison Square Garden early last evening and waited anxiously to see how the Wild West show would bear transplanting to New York. The Rev. Henry Ward Beecher, with Mrs. Beecher and a party of friends, sat in a box from which a fine sight of the show could be had. Henry Bergh, looking decorously pleased, sat near by, and not far off were Pierre Lorillard, Lawrence Jerome and Major Barrett. Everyone looked at a gray-bearded, brown-haired old gentleman who sat with a party of ladies in one of the western boxes. He was Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman, and a long-haired scout who had seen service under him years ago came around and chatted with the veteran warrior. Gov. David H. Hill was not far away in another box, and hundreds of lorgnettes were leveled at him during the evening.
The curtain rose on a richly painted forest scene and herds of elk appeared. According to the programme they were "going to the pool to drink." One big bull elk forgot his cue, though, and wandered from behind the loose netting that separated the wilderness from civilization. He sauntered slowly down the arena, inspecting the pretty girls in the boxes with critical stares and gazing at the rest of the spectators in a tired way. A Sioux warrior in full paint and feathers trotted out after awhile in pursuit. He came close to the elk, held up his painted arms, and said, "Sh! Sh!" in good English. The elk lowered his horns and charged. The warrior climbed nimbly over the high rail into the nearest box, and badly frightened a pretty brown-eyed girl in a while tailor-made jacket. Then the elk trotted over to Nym Crinkle's box and held up his head to be stroked. A pretty little girl patted it approvingly, and he went on receiving congratulations until a red-shirted cowboy, with curly hair, galloped out and drove him away.
The usual amount of fancy shooting, hard riding and cowboy feats filled out the entertainment.
The New York Times, November 28, 1886
Buffalo Bill's new "Wild West" is fairly under way in Madison-Square Garden. The long waits and hitches in the programme that could not be very well avoided the first night are things of the past. The performance now runs along rapidly and smoothly. All the ponderous machinery used in the working of Matt Morgan's grand scenery is in perfect trim and works to a charm. The patent "hurricane raiser"-- a huge and complicated apparatus that serves to send a gale of wind across the space devoted to the stage with a velocity of 60 miles an hour, and with a roar as if 100 buildings had simultaneously crashed to the ground -- is a feature introduced in the cyclone on the prairie that creates a sensation nightly.
page created on 2.14.06
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