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拍品專文
Two very rare tickets for Ford's Theatre for 14 April 1865: the fateful performance of the sentimental English comedy Our American Cousin, during which John Wilkes Booth carried out his threat to assassinate President Lincoln.
On the left-hand portion, each ticket carries the bold caption FORD'S THEATRE. FRIDAY. Dress Circle!," with the seat and section numbers beneath. On the right-hand side, the tickets carry the printed signature of "Jas. R. Ford, Business Manager."
The proprietor of Ford's Theatre, John Thompson Ford (1829-1894) owned popular, well-attended theaters in Baltimore, Washington D.C. and Richmond, Virginia. Originally, he had leased the former First Baptist Church and converted it for the purpose, but when it burned, in 1863, he erected a new, specially designed, brick theatre able to accommodate some 2,500 theater-goers. It quickly became a focal point of evening social life in the bustling war-time capital. At 11:30 on Good Friday, 14 April, a messenger from the White House called at the theater to report that the President and First Lady had accepted the long-standing invitation of the Ford family to attend the theater, for that night's performance. John Ford, the proprietor, was away from the city (in Richmond), so his son Harry took charge of preparations for the Presidential visit that evening, furnishing double boxes 7 and 8 with three arm-chairs, a sofa, a walnut rocker and several other chairs. He also decorated the balustrade in high patriotic style, draping it with two American flags and blue Treasury Guard flag, topping it off with a framed engraving of George Washington. When John Wilkes Booth called at the theater that morning to retrieve mail being held for him, he learned of the Presidential visit that night and at 6 p.m. revisited the theater to make his own preparations for the evening. The stage was set, not for comedy, but for tragedy.
The Presidential box occupied by the Lincolns was also located on the dress circle, more or less directly across from the front row seats represented by these two tickets. Although the theatergoers may not have seen the actual shooting, they most certainly would have witnessed Booth jumping to the stage, issuing his defiant, "sic semper tyrannis (thus always to tyrants)" and the subsequent mayhem as the audience began to realize what had just occurred.
Extremely Rare. Precious few tickets from this performance have survived, and they exist in several formats. The first type is similar to the present pair offered, printed in green for the dress circle and yellow for the orchestra. The Harvard Theatre Collection holds a used stub for the orchestra, bearing the green circular date stamp (and assigned to seat B 171), and another stub for the orchestra, also bearing a portion of the date stamp (and assigned to seat C 127) which sold at auction in 2025 (Freeman's, 21 May 2025, lot 108). Two other complete, yellow orchestra tickets are known extant, but while they bear the 14 April 1865 date stamps, they are not believed to have been used. One is part of the Shapell Manuscript Foundation and the other sold at RR Auction (16 April 2026, lot 13). A pair of green dress circle tickets for Friday, but not bearing a date stamp can be found in the Carol M. Highsmith Archive at the Library of Congress.
Ford's Theatre employed two other forms of ticket, one a business-card size pass that admitted the bearer for multiple performances as well as reserved seat forms that specify the date, the customer and the seats to be reserved. According to theater historian George Spaeight the type of ticket offered here, often with a perforation, was just coming into common use in American theatres.1 And it appears that season passes and the like may have been more commonly used by theatre-goers than tickets of this type offered here.
Although the stub is perforated, evidentially, in this instance, the ticket taker chose to slice the tickets diagonally for reasons that are unclear—especially considering that other known examples were cut along the vertical mark. An examination of other nineteenth century theatre tickets in the Harvard Theatre Collection confirms that other tickets were cut in a similar diagonal fashion. However these are the only known examples of Ford's Theatre tickets cancelled in this fashion. The only distinction that might offer a clue is the caption added to the envelope in which these tickets were formerly housed that notes that the tickets were "complimentary." The Harvard Theatre Collection holds a collection of tickets for several Boston theatres, some of which bear a similar diagonal cancellation that also bear similar (and unused) vertical perforations. Spaeight righty notes that the "history of theatre tickets has apparently never been studied and here is a subject waiting for its historian."2
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1 George Spaeight, Collecting Theatre Memorabilia (MPC Moorland Publishing Company, 1988), 103-105.
2 Ibid., 105
On the left-hand portion, each ticket carries the bold caption FORD'S THEATRE. FRIDAY. Dress Circle!," with the seat and section numbers beneath. On the right-hand side, the tickets carry the printed signature of "Jas. R. Ford, Business Manager."
The proprietor of Ford's Theatre, John Thompson Ford (1829-1894) owned popular, well-attended theaters in Baltimore, Washington D.C. and Richmond, Virginia. Originally, he had leased the former First Baptist Church and converted it for the purpose, but when it burned, in 1863, he erected a new, specially designed, brick theatre able to accommodate some 2,500 theater-goers. It quickly became a focal point of evening social life in the bustling war-time capital. At 11:30 on Good Friday, 14 April, a messenger from the White House called at the theater to report that the President and First Lady had accepted the long-standing invitation of the Ford family to attend the theater, for that night's performance. John Ford, the proprietor, was away from the city (in Richmond), so his son Harry took charge of preparations for the Presidential visit that evening, furnishing double boxes 7 and 8 with three arm-chairs, a sofa, a walnut rocker and several other chairs. He also decorated the balustrade in high patriotic style, draping it with two American flags and blue Treasury Guard flag, topping it off with a framed engraving of George Washington. When John Wilkes Booth called at the theater that morning to retrieve mail being held for him, he learned of the Presidential visit that night and at 6 p.m. revisited the theater to make his own preparations for the evening. The stage was set, not for comedy, but for tragedy.
The Presidential box occupied by the Lincolns was also located on the dress circle, more or less directly across from the front row seats represented by these two tickets. Although the theatergoers may not have seen the actual shooting, they most certainly would have witnessed Booth jumping to the stage, issuing his defiant, "sic semper tyrannis (thus always to tyrants)" and the subsequent mayhem as the audience began to realize what had just occurred.
Extremely Rare. Precious few tickets from this performance have survived, and they exist in several formats. The first type is similar to the present pair offered, printed in green for the dress circle and yellow for the orchestra. The Harvard Theatre Collection holds a used stub for the orchestra, bearing the green circular date stamp (and assigned to seat B 171), and another stub for the orchestra, also bearing a portion of the date stamp (and assigned to seat C 127) which sold at auction in 2025 (Freeman's, 21 May 2025, lot 108). Two other complete, yellow orchestra tickets are known extant, but while they bear the 14 April 1865 date stamps, they are not believed to have been used. One is part of the Shapell Manuscript Foundation and the other sold at RR Auction (16 April 2026, lot 13). A pair of green dress circle tickets for Friday, but not bearing a date stamp can be found in the Carol M. Highsmith Archive at the Library of Congress.
Ford's Theatre employed two other forms of ticket, one a business-card size pass that admitted the bearer for multiple performances as well as reserved seat forms that specify the date, the customer and the seats to be reserved. According to theater historian George Spaeight the type of ticket offered here, often with a perforation, was just coming into common use in American theatres.1 And it appears that season passes and the like may have been more commonly used by theatre-goers than tickets of this type offered here.
Although the stub is perforated, evidentially, in this instance, the ticket taker chose to slice the tickets diagonally for reasons that are unclear—especially considering that other known examples were cut along the vertical mark. An examination of other nineteenth century theatre tickets in the Harvard Theatre Collection confirms that other tickets were cut in a similar diagonal fashion. However these are the only known examples of Ford's Theatre tickets cancelled in this fashion. The only distinction that might offer a clue is the caption added to the envelope in which these tickets were formerly housed that notes that the tickets were "complimentary." The Harvard Theatre Collection holds a collection of tickets for several Boston theatres, some of which bear a similar diagonal cancellation that also bear similar (and unused) vertical perforations. Spaeight righty notes that the "history of theatre tickets has apparently never been studied and here is a subject waiting for its historian."2
_____________________
1 George Spaeight, Collecting Theatre Memorabilia (MPC Moorland Publishing Company, 1988), 103-105.
2 Ibid., 105