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Twenty-seven-year-old contralto Adele Rafter (c1876-1911) played the cross-
dressing role of Selim in Mr. Bluebeard. Selim was a
Turkish soldier granted permission by Fatima's
father to marry his daughter. In the 1903
version of Bluebeard, Selim killed Bluebeard and
rescued Fatima.
From
Chicago's Awful Theater Horror:
"Miss Adele Rafter, a member of the company, was in her
dressing room when the fire broke out. 'I did not wait
for an instant,' said Miss Rafter. 'I caught up a muff
and boa and rushed down the stairs in my stage costume
and was the first of the company to get out the back
entrance. Some man kindly loaned me his overcoat and I
hurried to my apartments at the Sherman house. Several
of the girls followed, and we had a good crying spell
together.'" Adele's mother, Annette Bradley Rafter,
joined her daughter at the hotel and they sent telegrams
to her father, rector of an Episcopal church in Dunkirk,
N.Y., William Wallace Rafter. Adele had been born
in Michigan. The family moved to Dunkirk when she
was a young child.
Like many vocalists and musicians of the time, Rafter had begun
her singing career in a church choir where she also
played the piano, organ and violin. In
1901, following two years of grand opera study in
Paris, she joined the Bostonian's company and was
hailed as the first singer with the skill to take
the place previously occupied by
Jessie Bartlett Davis (co-owner in the Iroquois
Theater and wife of its manager,
Will J. Davis). Adele's first prominent
role was as Maid Marian in Robin Hood with the
Bostonians. Other productions in which she appeared
included "Little Johnny Jones, Mary's Lamb and The
Lady from Lane's.
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In the years after the fire In 1908 Adele announced plans
to marry Pittsburgh Bijou theater manager, Richard
M. Gulick in March 1909 but I found no evidence the
wedding took place.
Rafter died following complications from appendix
surgery and her father the following year.
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