Leonard Bentley
Piccadilly Circus: 1911
This is a J. Beagle & Co Ltd postcard printed and published in England. Once again, the view shows Piccadilly Circus looking east towards Coventry Street a year or so later. The London Pavilion is still showing music hall acts as well as film shows, top of the bill are “The two Bobs”, Bob Adams and Bob Alden were American vaudeville artistes variously described as singers, comedians and Ragtime duettists. They arrived in Britain in 1910 and found it hard to get work until the manager of the Tivoli Theatre gave them a chance and very quickly they became an established act. They headlined at the London Pavilion several times before the first world war, I think that this is September 1911 because in 1912 the driver of the Cadogan Laundry van was out of a job when the company went bankrupt. In 1911 the two were the first act to introduce Irving Berlin’s “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” in the UK. The act remained in the UK throughout the war and appeared on radio in the 1920s with the tag line, “A laugh or two, a song or two and a joke or two”. Bob Alden returned to the US and died there in 1932, Bob Adams married and owned a club in Maidenhead where he died in 1948. His Billboard obituary credited him with introducing Jazz to Britain. On the right is a banner hanging from a window at the newly opened Jermyn Court Hotel Advertising Restaurant tea rooms, the hotel was sold in 1925 and became the Haymarket Hotel which was famous for being the venue for husbands who provided evidence of adultery for their wives in divorce proceedings.
This is a link to a youtube recording of The Two Bobs:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=glvfkJkwaJY
Piccadilly Circus: 1911
This is a J. Beagle & Co Ltd postcard printed and published in England. Once again, the view shows Piccadilly Circus looking east towards Coventry Street a year or so later. The London Pavilion is still showing music hall acts as well as film shows, top of the bill are “The two Bobs”, Bob Adams and Bob Alden were American vaudeville artistes variously described as singers, comedians and Ragtime duettists. They arrived in Britain in 1910 and found it hard to get work until the manager of the Tivoli Theatre gave them a chance and very quickly they became an established act. They headlined at the London Pavilion several times before the first world war, I think that this is September 1911 because in 1912 the driver of the Cadogan Laundry van was out of a job when the company went bankrupt. In 1911 the two were the first act to introduce Irving Berlin’s “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” in the UK. The act remained in the UK throughout the war and appeared on radio in the 1920s with the tag line, “A laugh or two, a song or two and a joke or two”. Bob Alden returned to the US and died there in 1932, Bob Adams married and owned a club in Maidenhead where he died in 1948. His Billboard obituary credited him with introducing Jazz to Britain. On the right is a banner hanging from a window at the newly opened Jermyn Court Hotel Advertising Restaurant tea rooms, the hotel was sold in 1925 and became the Haymarket Hotel which was famous for being the venue for husbands who provided evidence of adultery for their wives in divorce proceedings.
This is a link to a youtube recording of The Two Bobs:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=glvfkJkwaJY