EVENTS

The backbone of this database comes from a search of popular period journals, noting for entry any reference to performance, broadly defined. Weekly national trade and popular culture journals, such as the New York Clipper, provide a backbone of reported events, which can then be corroborated and added to by a search of local dailies and weeklies. This information is supplemented by archival materials as they become available.

BIOGRAPHIES/PERFORMERS & COMPANIES/VENUES/SONGS & ACTS

Entries on the people, groups and places of performance are drawn from a variety of sources, beginning with the periodical literature and archival documents but also including early histories, as well as more recent studies of this phenomenon. A full list of citations accompanies every entry.

In the long run, visits to a variety of local archives will yield a more complete picture of this form of entertainment--or, more correctly, a more complete set of materials from which a picture can be drawn.