Sunday, November 17, 2019

"Patsy Bolivar" in School - an Innocent History and Etymology of "Patsy"


Billy B. Van as “Patsy Bolivar” in The Errand Boy, Chattanooga News, March 17, 1906, page 13.


The online etymology dictionary, etymonline.com, defines a “patsy” (first known use in 1903) as a “fall guy, victim of deception.”[i]  It is said to be of “uncertain origin, possibly an alteration of Italian pazzo “madman”, or south Italian dialectal paccio “fool.” 

Although it is possible that these Italian expressions may have reinforced the meaning with a small segment of the population, “patsy” is almost certainly derived primarily from a well-known character in a long-running, much imitated comic sketch or skit about an innocent boy who gets blamed for everything bad that happens in his classroom.  Whenever anyone does something naughty in the classroom, the children call out his name; something like, “Who put the tack in the teacher’s chair?” – “Patsy Bolivar,” “Who dipped Jane’s pigtail in the inkwell?” – “Patsy Bolivar.”  It works well, and the teacher repeatedly punishes the innocent Patsy.  But it works too well.  When the teacher asks a legitimate question about history, “Who discovered America?” or “Who was the first President of the United States?” for example, the class reflexively replies, “Patsy Bolivar,” and the deception is revealed.

Both the character (1867) and the idiomatic use of the name as an innocent scapegoat (1872) predate the major wave of Italian immigration to the United States after 1890.  One observer explained the use of the name of the character to denote political scapegoats in 1887.

Who was the historic personage so frequently alluded to in political speeches as “Patsy Bolivar.” C. M. C.

Answer – A party of minstrels in Boston, about twenty years ago, had a performance in which they presented the scene of a country school.  There was a little fellow named Patsy Bolivar, who sat in the corner, who was inoffensive, quiet and generally well behaved.  The older boys took occasion to annoy the master in many ways, and when the pedagogue asked, in a rage, “Who did that?” the boys would answer, “Patsy Bolivar!”  Then Patsy was chastised.  As soon as that was over, some of the older boys would throw a wad of paper at the master’s head, when, raging with anger, he would repeat the query, “Why was that?” Again the answer came, “Patsy Bolivar!”  The phrase, as many phrases have done, spread beyond the limits of the minstrel performance, and when the scapegoat was alluded to, it was in the name of “Patsy Bolivar.”  The “Patsy Bolivar” in politics must be the inoffensive person who is always in trouble brought about by mischievous associates – the one who is always blamed for everything.

Brooklyn Daily Eagle, January 2, 1887, page 6.

This early explanation of “Patsy Bolivar” mistakenly suggests Boston is the original home of the “Patsy Bolivar.”[ii]  This explanation has fooled later researchers who cite the Boston theory as gospel fact.[iii]  Ironically, this mistaken, yet likely innocent, explanation may therefore be considered the “Patsy Bolivar” of all “Patsy Bolivar” origin stories.

Both “Patsy” and “Bolivar,” standing alone, were used idiomatically with reference to the same sorts of characters.  A few early examples of “Patsy” and “Bolivar” even made a direct connection between the new, shortened forms and the original “Patsy Bolivar.”

“I’ve been wearing the fool’s cap without knowing it.  Now I understand why they call me ‘Miss Patsy.’ I’m a regular Patsy Bolivar – I’ve been everybody’s Patsy, and wasn’t wise to myself.  Oh, Mr. Graham, I’m so ashamed!” (1910) [iv]

“Miss Patsy” derives its name from a commonly accepted slang phrase, the innocent victim of repeated blunders, being a Patsy or a Patsy Bolivar. (1910) [v]

“Why, the Bolivar,” explained Larkin, “is the most important part in all knockabout acts.  He’s the fellow who takes all the kicks in the pants and the raps on the head – the Patsy Bolivar; in other words, the fall guy.  Rapping of a fellow over the head will get a bigger laugh than the best comedy line in the world.” (1915) [vi]

This is the first chapter of a series which will tell the unfortunate happenings which follow the life of Patsy Bolivar.  “Patsy” has become the synonym for one in bad luck and poor young Bolivar had more than his share . . . . (1915) [vii]

Gertrude Quinlan as “Miss Patsy,” the “Patsy.” 
 Washington Herald (Washington DC), October 2, 1910, page 19.



Origins

The character of “Patsy Bolivar” first appeared on stage as early as 1867.  The earliest reference appeared in the playbill for a performance of Lloyd & Bideaux’s Minstrels in Hartford, Connecticut. [viii]

FRANKLIN HALL, BRIDGEPORT, CT.
FOR ONE NIGHT ONLY.
SATURDAY, FEB. 2, 1867.
LLOYD BIDEAUX’S MINSTRELS AND BRASS BAND,
THE MONSTER ORGANIZATION OF THE AGE.

. . .
FREEDMAN’S COLLEGE.

Prof. Eastman . . . . M. A. Scott
Dunce . . . . Cal. Wagner
Patsy Bolivar . . . . C. Reynolds
Billy Smart . . . . Johnny Booker
Little French Booby . . . . Gustave Bidaux

Lloyd & Bideaux’s Minstrels tour hit at least Hartford, Connecticut, Buffalo, New York, Detroit, Michigan and Columbus, Ohio over the next several weeks, presumably bringing the show and the character to all of those cities and anywhere in between they would have performed.  Two of the same performers, Gustave Bidaux and Cal. Wagner, brought the same skit, by the same name, to St. Louis, Missouri the next season, presumably also bringing the character of the same name with them and to many more places in between over the preceding two seasons.

Negro Minstrelsy.
. . .
Fred Wilson’s Minstrels, St. Louis, Mo., did a lively business the past week.  Cal. Wagner’s introduction of his brass band was received with roars of laughter . . . .  Gustave Bideaux with the ballads of “The Beautiful Girl of the South” and “The Little Broken Ring,” the performance closing with the burlesque of “The Freedman College.”

New York Clipper, May 9, 1868, page 39.

The name of the skit was topical at the time.  February 1867 came less than two years after the end of the Civil War and assassination of Abraham Lincoln.  There was a movement at the time to establish schools and colleges for newly freed slaves; those schools were frequently referred to as “Freedmen’s schools” or “Freedmen’s colleges.”

In Hampton, Virginia, for example, it was reported that a “large and valuable building in the vicinity of Fortress Monroe, known during the war as Hampton Hospital, has been purchased by Northern contribution, and will be used as a freedmen’s college.”[ix]  The school is now Hampton University.  A similar report from Nashville, Tennessee noted that a “building west of the Chattanooga Depot, heretofore used as a military hospital” had been “formally dedicated as a colored High School.”  The headline read, “Opening Exercises of the Fisk Freedmen’s School.”  The school is now Fisk University.

The last name, Bolivar, might also have been intended as a reference to freedmen, or at least to the type of name a freed slave might choose as their own last name when given the chance after emancipation.  The South American statesman Simon Bolivar, who shared the same last name, was widely known as “El Libertador” – “the Liberator.”

Although some of the humor of the original production was likely had at the expense of “Freedmen” specifically, or Black people generally, much of the humor was universal enough to translate well to non-black face entertainment as well.

As early as 1868, the character named Patsy Bolivar appeared onstage in San Francisco, California in a production entitled “The Fat Boy.”

San Francisco Chronicle, April 20, 1868, page 1.

The plot is not described, but it may have been based on a portion of Dickens’, The Pickwick Papers, an American adaptation of which had recently been published as a chapter, “The Fat Boy,” in an American compilation of Dickens’ writings about children, “Child-Pictures from Dickens,”[x] which was put on sale in Northern California[xi] a few months before Johnny Mack staged his production of “The Fat Boy” in April of 1868. 

Skits featuring “Patsy Bolivar” in school continued to spread under one name or another for decades, with a teacher, a dunce, a classroom full of students and the name of the main character, “Patsy Bolivar,” the constant threads.  In 1871, for example, a troupe calling itself the California Minstrels performed a skit called “High School” Hawaii, with the familiar characters of the Schoolmaster, Dunce, Patsy Bolivar and other school boys. 

Two years later in 1873, another group billing itself as the California Minstrels (although with no apparent overlap of cast) toured Australia with a more simply named skit, “School,” in its repertoire.  M. Ainsley Scott (who had played the Professor in the earliest known version of “Freedmen’s College” in 1867) played the role of Patsy Bolivar. 

The new title appears to be borrowed from Tom Robertson’s more famous play from the legitimate stage, School, which debuted at the Prince of Wales Theatre in London in 1869.  That version of “School” was a modern retelling of Cinderella which took place at a girls’ school; “School,” in turn, was an English adaptation of a recent German play, Aschenbroedel, a modern retelling of the German version of Cinderella, Aschenputtel.  Decades later, in a reverse-everything-old-is-new-again moment, a character named “Patsy Bolivar” appeared in a burlesque satire (Dr. Swine-Tax) of a later musical adaptation of School called Dr. Syntax, which was itself a remake of an earlier musical adaptation of School called Cinderella in School, making modern criticism of Hollywood’s penchant for remakes, reboots and sequels seem tame in comparison.

In the days before film, radio, videotape and electronic storage and reproduction of popular entertainment, popular skits and plays were circulated by licensed touring groups, imitators, remakes and rewrites of the same material.  By some quirk of fate, the character’s name was so popular or familiar that “Patsy Bolivar” (sometimes Boliver or Bolliver) survived through all of the successive reboots, remakes and updates, through dozens of shows with different titles and different antagonists.  The school setting, the general identity of the teacher and dunce, and a few comic touchstones remained the same, but nearly everything else changed in the various productions of the variously-named, “Freedmen’s School” (1867), “The Fat Boy” (1868), “The Boarding School” (1873), “The Old School District” (1876), “A Gentleman’s Seminary” (Australia, 1878), “An Ethiopian Farce in One Act” (1880), “School for Scandal” (1884), “The Country School” (1885), “The Spellin’ Skewl, or Friday Afternoon at Deestrick No. 4” (1891), “Deestrick Skule” (1895), “A Child of nature, or Patsy Bolivar’s Woes” (1895), “Dr. Swine Tax” (1896), “Deestrick 4” (1897), “The District School No. 3” (an all-female cast, 1901) and presumably many other other-named skits performed at various times and places.

Other forms of pre-radio and pre-film entertainment included home and amateur “theatricals.”  Several publishing companies, including the Ames Publishing Company of Clyde, Ohio published simplified versions of professional plays for the home market.  Ames published at least two scripts of alternate versions of the “Patsy Bolivar” skit for the home market, School, an Ethiopian Farce in Once Act, by Newton Field, published in 1880 (said to be based on a script performed professionally in 1878) and The Spellin’ Skewl – or – Friday Afternoon at Deestrick No. 4 (an original burlesque in one scene) by Bert Richards, apparently published in about 1890. 

School includes all of the standard situations and humor, and even lets Patsy turn the tables on his tormentors, in one scene switching places with the Dunce so that when he is unjustly blamed, the Dunce sitting in his seat might be punished by mistake.  Only the synopsis for The Spellin’ Skewl survives, in an advertisement the play in the back of another script. There’s a kiss, a teeter-totter, some “Hokey Pokey,” a pin on the teacher’s chair, spit-wads, and a whistle during class – nothing out of the ordinary.



Beginning in 1898, Vaudeville performer Billy B. Van breathed new life into the character of “Patsy Bolivar,” adding it to his popular act just before the turn of the century, at about the same time the slang word “patsy” (standing alone) is believed to have entered the lexicon.  Van performed as Patsy in his own “Bohemian Burlesquers” troupe as early as 1898, and later brought the character with him to a touring company of Beauty’s Apple in 1889 and 1900, and to The Devil’s Daughter company in 1901. 

 
In 1901, Billy Van introduced a new song with a title that encapsulated the theme of all “Patsy Bolivar” comedies and could have reinforced the use of “Patsy, standing alone.”

Van’s “Everything Falls on Patsy.”

Billy B. Van sang a new song at the Court Street Theatre last evening, entitled “Everything Falls on Patsy,” and he was forced to repeat it six times.  Then he apologized because he did not know any more verses.  The song struck a popular chord, and after both performances yesterday the air was heard on the streets leading from the theatre.  There are some very good songs in “The Devil’s Daughter,” but the new one has them all beaten.

Buffalo Commercial (Buffalo, New York), July 23, 1901, page 8.

Van left The Devil’s Daughter the following year and continued performing as “Patsy” on his own or with other companies.  But The Devil’s Daughter kept the character in its act as well, by plugging a performer named Clarence Wilbur into the role.  There seems to have been some dispute or professional jealousy about ownership of the character, as The Devil’s Daughter billed its version of “Patsy Bolivar” as “Copyrighted.”

New York Clipper, March 22, 1902, page 88.

For his part, Billy B. Van kept “Patsy Bolivar” in his act for the rest of the decade in a series of different skits.  Many of those sketches carried the names “Patsy” or “Bolivar,” alone or in combination, in conjunction with a word or two descriptive of the new situation, for example, “Bolivar’s Busy Day,” “Patsy’s Debut,” “Patsy in Politics”[xii] and “Patsy Bolivar’s Vacation.”[xiii]  The repeated use of the names separately may have reinforced or accelerated the transition of the idiom from the original “Patsy Bolivar” to “Patsy,” standing alone.

In 1906, Billy B. Van’s “Patsy” helped popularize another popular slang expression of the day, “23-Skidoo!” “23” and “skidoo” were both slang expressions in their own right, both meaning “get lost!”  They were frequently used together for comedic emphasis.  

Van did not coin “23”, which had already been a well known slang term for several years, likely derived from the final scene of Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities, in which the knitting women count-off Sydney Carton as the twenty-third person killed at the guillotine that morning.

Nor does Billy B. Van appear to have coined the expression, “Skidoo” or its use in close conjunction with “23.”  “Skidoo” appeared in print at least two years before it appeared in association with his act.  Both words were even used together on stage in George M. Cohan’s Yankee Doodle Dandy and The Rogers Brothers’ Vaudeville act as early as 1904.   For more detail on the early use of “23” and “Skidoo,” see my earlier post, Skedaddle, Skidoodle, Skidoo – the Vanishing History and Etymology of Twenty-three Skidoo!

Nevertheless, the lyrics of a song entitled “Skidoo (For You),” written by Jimmie Barry in 1906, credits Billy B. Van with coining the expression, “Skidoo.”[xiv]

I suppose you’ve heard of the latest word
In the English language
It was coined by a fellow named Billy Ban
To use upon the stage.

It made a hit and has gone the rounds,
You hear it ev’ry day,
And when you’re least expecting it,
You’ll hear some body say.

Chorus:
“SKIDOO” “SKIDOO”
You hear it   every where,
“SKIDOO” “SKIDOO”
It seems to be in the air . . . .

It’s not clear whether Jimmie Barry was mistaken about who coined “Skidoo,” or if Billy B. Van actually did coin it two years before any known written evidence of his use of the word appeared in print.  In any case, Barry’s belieft that Billy B. Van coined the word at least suggests Van’s leading role in popularizing the expression. 

But Billy Van may have actually coined the familiar form, “23-Skidoo!”  The earliest known example of that expression is as the title of a song in an advertisement for Billy B. Van’s production of “The Errand Boy,” in which Van appeared as “Patsy Bolivar.”


Chattanooga Daily Times (Chattanooga, Tennessee), March 18, 1906, page 26.
 
New York Clipper, Volume 4, Number 9, April 21, 1906, page 258.
The gallery gods waxed enthusiastic last night over his “Skidoo” song, and after patiently singing a half dozen verses, the comedian and chorus chanted the song plaintively in the direction of the galleries.  With the “Skidoo, skidoo, 23 for you,” the gods subsided.

Pittsburgh Press, April 17, 1906, page 3.

Billy B. Van also sang a song called “Skidoo” (perhaps the same song) in his next production, “Patsy in Politics.”

Indianapolis Star, April 14, 1907, page 17.[xv]
  The musical end of the show is well taken care of.  There are some good melodies and they are sung with fine effect.  To make them more attractive a bevy of young women sing the choruses and go through dances which please the audience.  Some of the songs that took extra well were “Love is a Wonderful Thing,” “Back Again to Old Broadway,” “Jolly Little Johnnies at the Old Stage Door, “Bolivar Cadets,” “Skidoo,” “Nancy,” “Holding Hands” and “Take Me Back to Paree.”

Boston Globe, October 16, 1906, page 6.

Billy B. Van performed as “Patsy Bolivar” for so long that years later he would later be mistakenly remembered as the one who “originated” the character.[xvi]  But all good things come to an end, and for some not soon enough.  In 1910, despite his long-time success with the character, Billy B. Van “promised” to put Patsy on the shelf.

Billy B. Van has promised to shelve “Patsy Bolivar” forever.

Evening Star (Washington DC), February 20, 1910, page 23.

Hollywood took up the story five years later, in the form of a fourteen-chapter serial produced by the Lubin film studios, one of the earliest serials put on film.  Episode one, “Patsy at School,” followed the familiar plot.


Patsy Bolivar is always in hard luck, and everything he attempts invariably goes wrong. When the careless housemaid substitutes salt for sugar in the sugar bowl, Patsy is thrashed for it by an over-severe parent. When she leaves something on the floor for the master of the house to stumble over he is beaten for that. He has an evil genius, or hoodoo, known as Sykesy, who, finding it an easy matter to commit all kinds of offenses and have the blame thrown on Patsy, works his nefarious power without stint. 

Moving Picture World, Volume 22, Number 13, December 26, 1914, page 1873. [xvii]

The remaining thirteen episodes followed Patsy to college and early adulthood, where he was continually put-upon and abused by his main tormentor, Sykesy, and misunderstood by his family and loved ones.

The Moving Picture World, Volume 23, Number 3, January 16, 1915, page 390.


But in the end, Patsy married his sweetheart on a yacht as Sykesy fell in the water.

The Moving Picture World, March 27, 1915, page 1948. 

Despite his ultimate triumph on screen, the name “Patsy Bolivar” was synonymous with a scapegoat or fall guy from shortly after its debut in “Freedmen’s College” in 1867.


Idiomatic “Patsy Bolivars”

Beginning at least as early as 1872, criminals, great and small, routinely gave their name as “Patsey Bolivar” to shift the blame from their guilty selves onto an innocent, fictional alias.  The dodge might not keep you out of jail, but it could keep your name clean. 

In some cases either the court or the reporters didn’t seem to be in on the joke.  In 1872, for example, when Judge Flippin oversaw the case of the “State vs. Patsy Bolivar, larceny,” in his courtroom in Memphis, there was no suggestion that the name was false, amusing or otherwise noteworthy.

In 1875, one court apparently accepted the name while a reporter caught on to the scam.

There was a big grist this forenoon before the Mayor, but as many of the prisoners were allowed to register such fictitious names as Patsy Bolivar, Saucy Sal, etc, a recapitulation would be unfair to the few that were genuine.

Indianapolis News, June 28, 1875, page 1.

In 1879, a Memphis newspaper had spotted the trend, comparing it to the viral (for its day) “Tom Collins hoax” of a few years earlier.  The use of “Patsy” standing alone at the end of the paragraph suggests how the word “Patsy” might easily evolve from “Patsy Bolivar.”

Little Rock Gazette 16: “Patsy Bolivar is wanted in this city.  The name of Patsy Bolivar is a kind of Tom Collins cognomen.  Patsy is some times a typographical pedestrian and writes for Rowell’s Newspaper Reporter.  Sometimes he is some one else, harvests grain in the North and picks cotton in the South.  He is English, German, American, Irish and colored.  This time he is an American, and robbed a man of fifteen dollars at the depot.  The man is a stranger.  An affidavit was swore out at Justice Howe’s court, and officers are now looking for Patsy.”

The Daily Memphis Avalanche, September 25, 1879, page 2.

The “Tom Collins hoax” was a practical joke believed to have been first pulled by the Mayor of New York City and an Alderman, in which a false name shifts the blame for bad behavior onto an innocent third party.  It was, in essence, a more innocent and less dangerous form of what is called “SWAT-ting” today (the practice of making false reports to the police with the intent of having a SWAT team to an innocent dupe’s house).  But instead of getting the cops involved, the practical joker goads his victim into picking a fight with the innocent third-party.



A joke, said to have been started by Mayor Havemeyer and Alderman John J. Morris, has caused much merriment to the occupants of nearly every saloon, club house, and hotel in the city during the past ten days. . . .

The Tom Collins hoax is worked in this manner: A joker meets a friend and accosts him with “Have you seen Tom Collins?”

“No; who the deuce is Tom Collins?”

Well, I don’t know much about him; but he says he knows all about you, and is telling terrible lies and scandals, showing up your life in the most outrageous manner.”

“Where can I find the scoundrel?”

“He generally hang out at - - - - ‘s saloon,” replies the joker (naming some place where he is known and apt to find confederates).  “Suppose we go for him.”

“All right,” replies the victim, boiling with rage.

On reaching the saloon the joker inquires of the bartender, in a voice loud enough to be heard by persons near, “Have you seen Tom Collins?”

“Yes, there he is,” answers a confederate, generally pointing to the meekest looking stranger in the room.  Then follows this scene, copied from one which actually occurred in a popular lager beer saloon near the City Hall yesterday afternoon:

Victim (with fire in his eyes, walking up to stranger) – What do you mean, sir, traducint my character and lying about me to my friends?

Stranger – You are mistaken, sir; I have said nothing about you.

Victim (egged on by his friends) – You lie, you scoundrel; at the same time making a pass for the stranger.

Then the party break out in a roar of laughter, and declare that nothing but a round of drinks at the victim’s expense will wash out the insult to the stranger.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch, May 13, 1874, page 2 (reprinted from The New York Sun).

In addition to acting as a convenient alias for criminals or others wishing to hide their real identities, “Patsy Bolivar” was regularly used idiomatically to refer to anyone unfairly blamed for something or the other.

The citizens of Oswego, Kansas, for example, felt that their image was unfairly tarnished by areas newspapers referring to a certain criminal ring as the “Oswego Ring,” because members of the crime ring actually came from and operated in several other local communities. 

“OSWEGO RING”

We earnestly protest against the indiscriminate use of the opprobrium “Oswego ring,” as used in the resolutions, published elsewhere. . . . It is no more an “Oswego ring” than it is a “Columbus ring,” a “Montana ring” or a “Chetopa ring.” . . . . [I]t is uncharitable scandal to pronounce our town the Patsy Boliver of the district.

Oswego Independent (Oswego, Kansas), April 4, 1874, page 5.

The “Patsy Bolivar” delegates have returned from the Convention, and are now explaining to the sovereigns why this or that man was not selected as a Congressman. 

Public Ledger (Memphis, Tennessee), September 10, 1874, page 3.


Judge Field is the “Patsy Bolivar” of the California Democracy.

Los Angeles Times, May 23, 1885, page 3.

“Patsy Bolivar” still appeared in print, on occasion (instead of just “Patsy”) as late as 1942.

But Mr. Jingle is quite sure that when Yankee Doodle gets agoing he’s going to town – Hitler’s town, and, no matter what Stalin now thinks, the fellow’s who’ll do the fighting will insist that the boys who kept the Jerries so busy this Summer won’t be made the Patsy Bolliver of the peace.

Brooklyn Daily Eagle, October 11, 1942, page 16.


Real-Life Patsy Bolivars

Despite the generally negative connotations of being a “Patsy Bolivar,” several actual people proudly assumed the name as their own or as a nickname, and not as a criminal alias.  Every example I’ve run across dates to a time after the earliest known reference to the character of “Patsy Bolivar” was developed, so they may have been in imitation of or inspired by the character. 

Two early examples however, both from variety theaters in Memphis, Tennessee, are close enough in time to the earliest mentions of the character, that it is not beyond the realm of possibility that a real-live “Patsy Bolivar” could have inspired the character in some way that is lost to history.

Varieties Theater.

  . . .  We are pleased to learn that Mr. Solomon Cramher (who is a nephew to Brigham Young), now on his way to Salt Lake, has laid over, and will appear in his great contortion act, assisted by Signor Patsy Boliver.

Public Ledger (Memphis), September 17, 1869, page 3.

Variety Halls.

. . . Broom’s Varieties, Memphis Tennessee., is reported to be doing well.  Our Correspondent says: - “Hen Mason takes the stage management on the 12th, as Charley White and Charley Broom have formed a company and partnership and start on a tour. . . .  The party consists of H. A. Kincade and sons, Kate Clair, Sig. Frances, Billy Diamond, D. Donaldson, Paul Snyder, Prof. Williams, W. B. Fish, Patsy Bolivar and Charley O. White.”

New York Clipper, January 22, 1870, page 335.

Later examples, further removed in time and place, seem more likely than not to have been based on the character; a newspaper owner in St. Louis in 1879, for example, or an Irish comedian, one of the “Two Rollicking Hibernians,” in Scotland in 1880. [xviii]

In 1890, a transient railroad tramp named “Patsy Bolivar” battled it out with “Sailor Kid” in a contest to be crowned “King of the Tramps.”  At a convention of tramps at the Nanticoke Pennsylvania coal breaker, it was decided that the two of them would race to make the quickest trip from New York to San Francisco and back, via New Orleans. 

 
“Sailor Kid” won the race by disguising himself as an American Indian to take advantage of the law giving them free passage on any train crossing the western prairies.  “With feathers in his hair, paint on his face and a blanket over his shoulders, [“Sailor Kid”] sped westward on the platform of a lightning express,” while “’Patsy Bolivar’ ‘plugged along’ slowly in freight cars.”[xix]

In 1879, a professional baseball player in Buffalo (then in the National League) was given the nickname “Patsy Bolivar” because he also worked in the theater as treasurer of the Jubilee Singers of Philadelphia, and had played the role of “Patsy Bolivar” in an off-season production of “School.”[xx] The name apparently did not stick.  His more common nick name was “Chick,” and there were no other references to him by that name despite having a long, successful career in the major leagues before and after playing in Buffalo.

But by far the best-known, non-theatrical “Patsy Bolivar” of the day was a professional baseball player and manager named Oliver “Patsy Bolivar” Tebeau (more commonly referred to as “Patsy” Tebeau), who spent nearly a decade and a half in the major leagues; briefly as a third-baseman for the Chicago White Sox (now the Cubs) and for more than a decade with the Cleveland Spiders (primarily as manager), followed by two years as manager of the St. Louis Cardinals. 

Tebeau’s successor as manager of the Cardinals, Patrick “Patsy” Donovan, came by the name more naturally, and was generally referred to merely as “Patsy.”  One reporter, however, referred to him as “Patsy Bolivar” on at least one occasion, either by force of habit left over from Tebeau or just as a one-off joke.

It is not entirely clear how or why Oliver Tebeau took the name “Patsy Bolivar.”  The fact that it rhymes (more or less) with his first name may have helped, and perhaps he was the kind of player or manager who took abuse from umpires or other teams.  A cryptic comment in a short poem about him printed in one of his home town newspapers (he grew up in the Kerry Patch neighborhood of St. Louis, Missouri) hints at a different reason, but without enough detail to decipher the identity of the “famous Patsy Bolivar” from whom he earned his name.

They say you came from ‘Kerry Patch,’
     And, though your name is Oliver,

You earned your nickname when you downed
     The famous Patsy Bolivar.

St. Louis boasts some clever lads;
     You’ll find them where you chance to go,

But when it comes to playing third
     Our man is Oliver Tebeau.”

St. Louis Post-Dispatch, September 30, 1887, page 8.

Oliver Tebeau’s own nickname is not the only nickname he is known for.  “Patsy Bolivar” Tebeau twice managed teams at the moment they were given new nicknames that still survive in major league baseball today, the “Cleveland Indians”[xxi] (although a National League predecessor of today’s American league Indians) and the “St. Louis Cardinals.”[xxii] 

Anyone who doesn’t like
One of those two names –
Knows to whom to give the blame –
            Rightly or wrongly, yes or no,

– “Patsy Bolivar” Tebeau.

Oskaloosa Independent (Oskaloosa, Kansas), February 18, 1898, page 6.





[ii] The earliest association this researcher has found connecting the sketch or the name to Boston is from 1876.
[iii] The explanation was later adopted in full as the definition of “Patsy Bolivar” in Henry Frederic Redall’s alternate encyclopedia, Fact, Fancy, and Fable, a New Handbook for Ready Reference on Subjects Commonly Omitted from Cyclopaedias (Chicago, A. C. McClurg & Company, 1892).  Some sources, including Wikipedia (as of November 2019), cite Redall’s work in support of the Boston origin story.
[iv] “Miss Patsy,” Sewell Collins, The Green Book Album, Volume III, Number 5, May 1910, page 949 (novelized from the acting version of the play by Arthur F. Greene).
[v] Times-Tribune (Scranton, Pennsylvania), August 26, 1910, page 4 (advertisement for upcoming performance of the stage play, “Miss Patsy.”
[vi] “The Bolivar,” Bozeman Bulger, The Saturday Evening Post, Volume 188, Number 4, November 27, 1915, page 14.
[vii] Moving Picture World, Volume 23, Number 1, January 2, 1915, page 90. “Patsy in School” (December 1914) was the first of a fourteen-chapter serial by the Lubin film studio.
[viii] “Clipper Varieties. Comprising Ballads, Songs and Dances, Comic Songs, Old Bills, etc.,” New York Clipper, August 14, 1875, page 156 (from an old playbill for Lloyd & Bideaux’s Minstrels in 1867).  The accuracy of the date and location of the performance listed in the 1875 reprint of the 1867 playbill are verified in a contemporary newspaper notice of the same performance.  Hartford Courant, February 2, 1867, page 5.  The accurace of the personnel listed in the 1875 reprint are verified by advertisements for the same troupe to appear in another town a few weeks later.  Buffalo Evening Post, February 5, 1867, page 2.
[ix] Daily Phoenix (Columbia, South Carolina), January 12, 1866, page 2.
[x] Child-Pictures from Dickens, Boston, Ticknor and Fields, 1868.
[xi] Sacramento Daily Union, January 31, 1868, page 6 (“Roman & Co. send us an elegant book, published by Ticknor & Fields, of Boston, which contains selected chapters from Dickens’ Works under the title of ‘Child Pictures from Dickens.’ . . . The selections are ‘Little Nell,’ ‘The Marchioness,’ ‘Paul and Florence,’ ‘The Fat Boy,’ ‘Tiny Tim,’ ‘Smike’ and ‘Oliver Twist.’”).
[xii] Chattanooga News (Chattanooga, Tennessee, March 17, 1906, page 13.
[xiii] Pittsburgh Press, December 2, 1906, page 33.
[xiv] “Skidoo-For You,” Words and Music by Jimmie Barry, Golden Gate Music Co., 1906, Empire Music Co., Boston, Massachusetts, Johns Hopkins Sheridan Libraries & University Museums, The Lester S. Levy Sheet Music Collection.
[xv] This image of Billy B. Van as “Patsy Bolivar,” with the exaggerated Eton collar, neckerchief and goofy expression, is strikingly similar to images of James T. Powers in an 1895 production of “The New Boy,” the role associated with the advertising image believed to be the ultimate inspiration of Mad Magazine’s iconic mascot, Alfred E. Neuman. See, my earlier posts, “The Real Alfred E.” and “More Real Alfred E.
[xvi] Pittsburgh Press, January 2, 1910, page 27 ([Billy B. Van] is best known to the theater-going public as the creator of the character of “Patsy Bolivar.”).
[xviii] St. Louis Post-Dispatch, December 30, 1879, page 4 (“About 10 o’clock Mr. Patsy Bolivar, a well known journalist, who had buried several newspapers as far back as 1840, made an effort to take possession of the Globe-Democrat office under a Spanish claim, which, he says, was issued to him by Don Miguel Francesca in 1796.”); Aberdeen Journal, June 24, 1880, page 1 (“Cook’s Royal Circus. To-night.  The two Rollicking Hibernians, Mickey M’Guffin and Patsy Bolliver.).
[xix] Anaconda Standard (Anaconda, Montana), October 20, 1890, page 6.
[xx] St. Louis Globe-Democrat, February 16, 1879, page 9.

No comments:

Post a Comment