LOTTA CRABTREE

Charlotte Mignon Crabtree, known on stage as "Lotta", was born in New York City on November 7, 1847.

Lotta made her debut as an actress at the age of 6 at Petalumba, California, where she did song and dance routines. She was so popular with the miners during the California gold rush that they pitched bags of gold nuggets at her feet.

At the Grass Valley mining camp she met Lola Montez, who taught her dancing and stagecraft.

Lotta continued to be a very popular performer until her retirement from the stage in 1891, when she was said to be worth $2,000,000. Lotta was the richest stage performer at the time, and owned a number of hotels and other real estate in Boston, where she spent the last 7 years of her life. She never married and left most of her fortune to charity.

Lotta died at the Hotel Brewster in Boston on September 25, 1924 at the age of 77.

MAUD GRANGER

Maud Granger was born c.1851, and began her career as a celebrated beauty and ended it as a well known character actress.

Miss Granger made her New York debut in 1873 in "Without a Heart" and appeared on stage for many years. Her final appearances were in "The First Years" in 1920 and "Pigs"in 1924.

George C. D. Odell, in his Annals of the New York Stage wrote, "Miss Granger was in her youth one of the most beautiful and most photographed of actresses. Every college man, every sentimental girl, every collector had numerous pictures of her."

Maude passed away in 1928.

MAXINE ELLIOTT

Photograph of Maxine Elliott as "Sylvia" in the "Two Gentlemen of Verona."

Maxine Elliott, was an American actress, born in 1868. She appeared on stage in New York and London beginning in 1895. After touring Australia with her husband, Nat Goodwin, she returned to America and appeared in a number of new plays. In 1908 Miss Elliott had her own theatre built in New York. Just before World War I Maxinne retired to England. In 1920 she returned to the American stage and became one of the great stars of the American theatre.

Maxine died in 1940.

KATE GIRARD

Kate Girard was a well known actress born in 1860 and married to actor and playwright, George Fawcett Rowe, in 1877.

In 1876 Miss Girard was playing the part of Maryanne in the play "The Two Orphans" when the Brooklyn Theatre caught fire resulting in a great loss of life. Luckily Miss Girard escaped unharmed.

In 1876 Miss Girard's father, physically beat the editor of a newspaper. The beating was the result of an unkind article in The Dramatic News, which implied that his daughter, Kate Girard, had lost her mind and was confined to an insane asylum.

Miss Girard divorced her husband in 1879. The grounds for the divorce was her husband's illicit relationship with a woman named Gertie Lonsdale at a house of ill-repute in New York City.

Miss Girard died on March 25, 1885 in New York City.