STELLA MAYHEW STAGE & VAUDEVILLE ACTRESS 1905 HANDWRITTEN SIGNED LETTER - RARE

Description

We are offering a
RARE
hand-written letter from actress Stella Mayhew on Hotel Rogge, Zanesville, Ohio stationery, dated April 18, 1905, to her mother.  The original mailing envelope is also included, which is pasted on a piece of heavy stock board.
In the letter, Mayhew essentially writes that she is sick with a fever but must perform.  She is tired of the tail end of the season "one-night stands" [we assume she means a show in a different city every night].  She tells her "mamma" that Billie's company....[we assume Billie Taylor, singer and composer, whom she later married]....would be in Pittsburgh at the end of the week at the same time she would be performing there, and aks her mother to come there also.  She says, "I think I'll be well enough acquainted to introduce you".  She ends with, "Company is tired and careless, girls are cross, and even my Christian disposition gets fussy".  Mayhew was actually Jewish, and so we assume she was referring to the "purported" Christian qualities of tolerance, slow to anger, etc.  (From what we read, she was actually baptized as a Roman Catholic in her last days.)  Mayhew lost everything during the stock market crash of 1929, and died penniless at the age of 59 from an infection from an ankle injury.
Stella Mayhew (1875 -1934) appeared in blackface in many shows including: "
On the Suwanee River
", "
La Belle Paree
", and "
The Whirl of Society
".  She continued to perform in dozens of Broadway musical comedies from 1904 to 1930.  She also has four film shorts to her credit.