Looking for Mabel Normand

WHO WAS FERRIS HARTMAN?

by

Marilyn Slater

 There is a sad tale to tell of a great and talented man, his name was Ferris Hartman.  Have you heard of him?  You would have if you had lived in Oakland and had known of the Idora Park Pleasure Gardens at the turn of the last century. This is not a full recounting of his years but perhaps, it might encourage someone to take an interest in him, again; read on. 

 First, the end of the tale; Ferris Hartman died of starvation, September 1, 1931. He was found on the floor of a hotel room of which the rent was past due; he was penniless but too proud to ask for help. When the people of Oakland heard of his plight, it was only after he was taken to a charity hospital. A benefit was mounted but it was too late he was 70.

 He was idolize in the old days by Oaklanders, he and his musical partner Paul Steindorff but Oakland only learned of his need as he lay in the hospital. The vary night of his death the benefit was taking place.  Arrangements had been made for the appearance of Hartman’s California Troubadours, in some of Hartman’s most famous roles, “Ko-ko” in the “Mikade” and in “The Toymaker.” “Wang.” “The Idol’s Eye,” “Wizard of the Nile,” and other favorites were to be played by others. 

 Hartman was on the stage as early as 1897 in a musical comedy called “La Poupee,” and then the musical comedy fantasy, “The Man in the Moon” in the role of Sherlock Holmes in 1899.

           

In 1900, Hartman was living in San Francisco at a theatrical lodging house on Ellis Street and here also lived a 50-year-old window, named Edwinna Davis with 2 daughters.  Both of the girls were actresses, Flora, Josephine. Ferris Hartman was a star, a headliner, and Josephine was just 18, when they married.  It was also in September of 1900 that Hartman appeared at the Grand Opera House in Seattle, Washington in “Ship Ahoy”; the production was also under his personal direction.  A year later, September 1901, Hartman was still in Seattle playing the part of “Polycop” in “The Wedding Day” and one of his signature roles as Johanus Guggenheimer in “The Toy Maker” as part of The Tivoil Opera Company.  He was big, very big in Light Opera.

 

Hartman and his musical partner fled San Francisco in 1906 in a hearse after the city was destroyed by fire, the military was limiting entry into Oakland so stealth was necessary; Steindorff was in the driver’s seat and Hartman traveled in the hearse alongside a coffin.  By the time of the fire, they had already won fame at the Tivoli.  The Tivoli became a school for many early film and New York stage comedians. 

            

 

Josephine was living in Los Angeles with her mother and the couple’s 2 children, Josephine, 4 (named after her mother) and Paul, 6; they also had live-in help by the name of Georgia.  Mrs. Hartman was still acting, her stage named Josie Hart.  They also kept a residence at 595 59^th Street, Oakland.  Hartman also had his 21yearold brother-in-law living with the family. Life was good in 1910.

 

Hartman also affected the style of early film comedy by the work he had done with the members of the Tivoli.  When the Hartman-Standoff combination broke up, Steindorff went on to become the conductor of the University of California choragus. 

Here is where the story becomes important to me, after 6 months tour of the Orient: Manila, China, Japan and Honolulu.  Ferris, Josephine, and their 2 children returned from their travels on the British Steamer “Persia” with the company. 

Hartman told the story of his tour on his return; “Our company was the first to play musical comedy in Honolulu, although they have had light opera there.  In our repertoire were “The Toymakers,’ The Campus,’ ‘The Girl and the Boy,’ and ‘Fairy Tales.’  The girls in our chorus learned the hula dance, and in turn taught the native women how to rag.  The Honolulu maids, however, found they could not get the hula entirely out of their movements, no matter how much rag they add to their dancing.”  They spent 3 weeks in Honolulu.

Then on to more foreign audiences, in Yokohama, their audiences were composed mostly of American and English but in Tokyo, they played to the Japanese. Hartman told how his players believed they were being hissed when the Japanese were only laughing as they showed their teeth and draw in their breath in a sibilant fashion and when a large houseful begins that sort of thing it gets on the actor’s nerves. The Japanese are beginning to use scenery in the theaters although Hartman indicated that it is yet unknown in Chinese playhouses.  Everyone seemed to like the music, girls and dancing.

The Americans at the Cavite garrison in Manila were entertained for 6 weeks.  The soldiers were very appreciated of the visit. 

Then they were off to Shanghai, according to Hartman the population had been fed almost exclusively on a diet of drama from England, musical comedy, to them was a holiday as compared with ordinary days.  The American girls of the chorus were treated like queens in Shanghai, entertained and given all manner of presents; rich furs from Siberian coast, rare laces, beautiful feathers, jade ornaments and other gifts.  It seemed to Hartman that the principal object in life among the Chinese was apparently, to make presents to their friends.  In China, they appeared at Peking and Tientsin.  To travel from Pu Kow to Tientsin, Hartman’s company was the first party from the United States to use the new railroad recently completed by German Builders.  The group returned February 25, 1913

 When the Hartman company walked down the gangplank in San Francisco after being on tour for 6 months, Hartman declared that he and his wife would take a vacation at their home and had no plans for the immediate future.  The members of his company, most live in California have returned to their homes.  Besides the Hartmans, the troupe included Mr. and Mrs. Walter DeLeon, Dixie & Larry Blair, and oh, yes, here it is… Minta Durfee and Roscoe Arbuckle!

Of course, this a little different then the story found in an article written by Wil Rex in Picture Play, April 1916, Rex quoted Roscoe as saying, “I worked in Ferris Hartmann's Opera Company in 1912; Mr. Hartmann is now associated with me in the production of Keystone comedies, you know. Late in 1912, I left his company for a tour of the Orient, which was a big success. I visited Honolulu, Japan, China, Philippines, and Siam, and returned to Los Angeles the last of February, 1913.”

 

The ship manifest of the ‘Persia’ listed China, Japan, etc. via Honolulu, Larry Blair and Dixie, tickets #937 Ϊ Minta and Roscoe were tickled #939 and #940, Ferris, Josephine, and the children tickets #945 and #946, the De Leon’s ticket #s 949 and 950. The numbers are too close not to have been purchased at the same time (the tickets numbers in between are the other members of the company (twenty-something woman). So, I feel that Roscoe was part of the Hartman company.              

"Outside of the few sweet years on the Loop circuit, I spent nine months with Ferris Hartman and "The Campus" company, on an oriental tour. We toured China, Japan, India, Honolulu, the Philippine Islands and even some civilized places. I pasted up notices and appreciations in fourteen different languages and I might have had more if I could have been sure whether the writers in some of the other languages were roasting me or praising me. The tour ended in January 1913. Since then I have been in the pictures”. (Movie Pictorial 13/6/14)

 

IMDb doesn’t list ‘He Did and He Didn’t’ on Ferris Hartman’s credit but he was working on it. 

In 1913 was just the beginning for the Arbuckles when they headed for Keystone, off the stage, and onto the screen.

There were others that owe some of their success to the touch by Hartman’s hand, some names you may know others have faded into forgetfulness, Walter Catlett, the comedian; Walter DeLeon, writer and his wife, Muggino Davies; Christine Nielsen, singer; Ann Tasker, actress; Myrtle Dingwall, musical comedy star; Robert Z. Leonard, film director; Frances White, comedienne; Anna Little, who played with “Broncho Billy” Anderson, Lon Chaney was Hartman’s property man. 

In ‘Fatty and Mabel at the San Diego Exposition’ (Keystone January 1915) there is a memory of the time Arbuckle was with Hartman learning to do the hula.  It is only a memory but it is there.

Hartman was on the train with Mabel Normand and Roscoe Arbuckle in 1915 when they went east and he ventured into film, he was the assistant director of ‘He Did and He Didn’t’, alas his motion picture venture proved a failure. According to IMDb, Hartman made 9 films in 1917, and a couple other credits. He is listed as assistant director of The Waiters’ Ball (1916).