Harry and Daisy DeGrace vaudeville act collection
Overview
Materials relating to the vaudeville careers of the married performing duo Harry and Daisy DeGrace.
Dates
- Creation: circa 1922-1929
Condition Description
Fragile condition, careful handling required. Some papers are spirit duplicates.
Conditions Governing Access
Collection is open for use.
This collection is shelved offsite. Retrieval requires advance notice. Readers should check with Houghton Public Services staff to determine retrieval policies and times.
Extent
.3 linear feet ((1 box) )This collection documents the careers of Harry and Daisy DeGrace, a married vaudeville duo. Collection includes photographs of the DeGraces, sheet music (including some of their original compositions), lyric sheets, performance programs, performance planning notes, newspaper clippings, advertising material, performance contracts, a letter from vaudeville juggler John Le Claire to Harry DeGrace, and six play scripts stud-bound in cloth wraps.
Biographical / Historical
Vaudeville was a type of live entertainment variety show popular in the United States from the late 19th through the early 20th centuries. Harry DeGrace began his career as a slack line acrobat, and at one time was a performer for Barnum & Bailey. Daisy DeGrace began as a blues and ragtime singer. By the late 1920s, the DeGraces had become minor supporting members of the Bert Smith Revue, a traveling vaudeville troupe.
Arrangement
Arranged as received.
Physical Location
Harvard Depository
Custodial History
Ownership prior to this acquisition is unknown.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
2023MT-57. Purchased from Marc Selvaggio using the Robert Gould Shaw Fund, 2023 March 21.
Processing Information
This collection was processed to a basic level with minimal rehousing, organization, and preservation. (Aurora Charlow, 2023)
- Title
- Harry and Daisy DeGrace vaudeville act collection, circa 1922-1929 (MS Thr 2264): Guide
- Status
- completed
- Author
- Houghton Library, Harvard University
- Date
- 2023 April 13
- Description rules
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard (DACS)
- Language of description
- eng
- EAD ID
- hou03551
Repository Details
Part of the Houghton Library Repository
Houghton Library is Harvard College's principal repository for rare books and manuscripts, archives, and more. Houghton Library's collections represent the scope of human experience from ancient Egypt to twenty-first century Cambridge. With strengths primarily in North American and European history, literature, and culture, collections range in media from printed books and handwritten manuscripts to maps, drawings and paintings, prints, posters, photographs, film and audio recordings, and digital media, as well as costumes, theater props, and a wide range of other objects. Houghton Library has historically focused on collecting the written record of European and Eurocentric North American culture, yet it holds a large and diverse number of primary sources valuable for research on the languages, culture and history of indigenous peoples of the Americas, Africa, Asia and Oceania.
Houghton Library’s Reading Room is free and open to all who wish to use the library’s collections.
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