making its way around Canada, demonstrating Vaudeville's contribution to the modern entertainment industry and teaching the
history of the wildly popular acts that ran from town to town across the country beginning in the 1880's.

"A lot of people really don't know a lot about vaudeville. But it actually has had a really great influence on the entertainment industry that we know today," said Melissa Wakeling, the education and marketing coordinator for Glanmore House.

There were three theatres where vaudeville was performed in the Belleville area, two in the downtown Front Street area, and one at the corner of Bridge and Church streets. 

"The performers featured in the exhibit would have most definitely come to Belleville," Wakeling said.

The exhibit includes a written history of vaudeville in Canada displayed on large scale posters in two rooms of Glanmore House. As well, it contains a collection of short films featuring vaudeville performers and famous acts, typical costumes and props, and the genuine costume of Oklahoma Jack; an American whose claim to fame was his on-stage knife and lasso fights.

"It's a very light, fun topic to learn about," Wakeling said.
In addition to the exhibit, Wakeling is responsible for the School for vaudeville, an educational component which can be co-ordinated with school curriculum for children from Grades four through seven. They learn about the history of vaudeville in Canada, watch short films of popular performers, and get dressed up in costume to perform their own skits on stage.

"The exhibit comes with skits and costumes because we have a school program that's associated with it, the kids explore the exhibit, then they get their skits and their costumes and they practise for a little while, then they come on to this little stage and produce their show for their classmates, it's really been fun," she said.

Vaudeville theatre was the beginning of mass entertainment in Canada, as it was the first form of public entertainment that was affordable to the average person. Many early film, television and radio stars were vaudeville performers and the format for a lot of comedy shows that we know today evolved from vaudeville.

"The thing about vaudeville was that it was for the masses. It was at a time when labourers had the time to search for entertainment, and was much easier for people to afford making it more accessible," she said.

Most vaudeville performers were British or American, but there were some Canadians who held their own even then. The highest paid vaudeville performer was a Canadian named Eva Tanguay, who earned $3,500 a week in 1910, at this time the average industrial worker would have earned $1,000 a year, proof that vaudeville was a lucrative field. Another Canadian vaudevillian was Dan Simons, who came from Peterborough and travelled with a number of vaudeville shows, eventually becoming a broadway actor. Simons was especially famous for his "elastic face."

The name vaudeville is an accidental combination of two French phrases; vau de vie - traditional politically satirical songs, and voix de ville or, voices of the city. It was a form of entertainment that was relevant and amusing to worker and lawyer alike, and was, not to mention, a bargain at five cents a ticket.

Vaudeville began to decline in popularity after Joseph Kennedy, father of former president John Fitzgerald Kennedy purchased RKO Pictures, one of the biggest studios in Hollywood, and began to allow the performers on-air. This significantly reduced the number of patrons at the live shows, because it was free if you had a transistor radio. Silent film grew in popularity and many performers crossed over to the newer medium, performers such as Marie Dressler a.k.a. Tugboat Annie, started out in vaudeville and then became famous in silent films.

Glanmore House is an elegant home which was built for wealthy banker J.P.C. Phillips in 1882-1883 and is open to visitors interested in the exhibit on Tuesday to Sunday from 1 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. until the end of the month.