|
Composer/violinist Herbert Dillea (1870-1909), the Mr.
Bluebeard company
music director, urged the twenty-six-piece
orchestra to
continue playing even as bits of flaming curtain
fabric began falling on their heads.
Dillea, born Herbert Otho Dilley, became a dentist
as a young man in Ohio. His love of music ultimately
drew him to composing and conducting. His best-known
tune was "Absence
Makes the Heart Grow Fonder." Dillea's
compositions were also used in Ward & Vokes shows
and
Klaw & Erlanger productions,
including Beauty and the Beast and Mother Goose.
Though the official cause of his death was
consumption, his family said he suffered a nervous
breakdown after the fire and never fully recovered.
|
|
His parents were J.B. Dilley and Anna M. (Hutchinson) Dilley.
It should be noted that a description of Dillea's
behavior by Iroquois house director, Antonio
Frosolono,
varied from Dilea's report. According to Frosolono,
Dillea "went out like a shot out of a gun; he went over the stand
and everything. He went under the stage. Then
everybody else got out. I still sat there because I
did not see much danger to myself or anybody else. I
saw the people when they went out, and I heard the
cries, and that is what attracted my attention. I
stayed there until everybody else had gone out of
the orchestra. The time when I thought it was time
to get out was when the bass fiddle and the cello
got to burning."
|
