Anna Hana, American vaudeville comedienne and singer

Anna Hana (active 1912-1935), American vaudeville comedienne and singer. She was married to the American comic juggler, ‘The Great Wieland.
(postcard photo: Relph & Co, photographers, 130A Church Street, Preston, Lancashire, England, circa 1913)

‘RICKARDS’ VAUDEVILLE REOPENS TO-NIGHT.
‘Rickards’ vaudeville will re-open in Perth to-night at the Tivoli Theatre… . Anna Hana, is announces as a ”charming American girl,” but she is something more than that – she is a very accomplished artist, and has won high encomiums in the Eastern States.’
(The Daily News, Perth, Western Australia, Saturday, 7 November 1914, p. 9b)

‘If Clothes Make the Man now much more do they make the woman, especially the vaudeville artist? Everybody recognises that, and the majority of vaudeville performers nowadays strive to excel in dress. Miss Anna Hana is one who pays great attention to her gowns. They are never out of her mind, and whenever she travels they are her one and only thought. It is remarkable, she said the other evening at the Tivoli Theatre [Perth], when discussing the matter, ow easily a box containing the most important part of the wardrobe can get astray. In South Africa, on her way to Australia, she had a narrow escape of losing all her baggage, and her life also. She was travelling from Johannesburg to Cape-town, when the rear end of the train when over an embankment at Hex River. The carriages which were derailed contained soldiers going to the front, and seventeen were killed and fifty-seven injured. Luckily for Miss Hana, she was in the front of the train with her luggage.’
(The Daily News, Perth, Western Australia, Friday, 13 November 1914, p. 7a)

‘One of the most popular artists who ever went over to London from the United States was Anna Hana, who is now at the Tivoli Theatre [Sydney]. Although born in Chicago, she is of English parentage, and spent most of her girlhood in England. She developed into a vaudeville star in America. Four years ago she went to London to fulfil an engagement made some time before, and had the good luck to strike the world’s metropolis at the time when ragtime was just beginning to boom. She was practically the first woman to introduce the syncopated melodies to London, and she immediately caught on.’
(The Sunday Times, Sydney, New South Wales, Sunday, 6 December 1914, p. 6e)

‘The Great Wieland, American comic juggler, and his wife, Anna Hana, comedienne, are sailing for South Africa to be gone nearly a year.’
(The Vaudeville News, New York, Saturday, 3 February 1923, p. 10a)

Dan Agar

a postcard photograph of Dan Agar (1881-1950), English character actor and comedian,
who found fame in 1919 in Australia
(photo: Relph & Co, Preston, England, circa 1918)

Her Majesty’s Theatre, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, Saturday, 20 December 1919
‘MORE BING BOYS.
‘It is but twenty months since The Bing Boys Are Here closed a run of 114 performances at Her Majesty’s Theatre, and now The Bing Boys on Broadway shows the same two cousins, the fool and the knave, once more amusing Sydney audiences as the central figures of a scattered and loosely-jointed entertainments… . Jennie Hartley made the hit of the evening as Emma, a character not much changed from the impudent husey [sic] of two years ago… . Dan Agar was the principal comedian as Lucifer Bing, a quaint and impossible apparition with arched eyebrows, well in contrast with Gus Bluett as Potifer Bing… . Mr Agar’s humour is not very spontaneous, but in the familiar ”The Fact Is” he proved at home, and, warming to his work, captured the house in the topical duet, ”Day After Day,” with his always neat articulation. Miss Hartley joined him in an extra verse in praise of Ross Smith, a tough which delighted everybody and lead to further encores… .’
(The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, NWS, Australia, Monday, 22 December 1919, p. 5f)

The Bing Boys on Broadway was originally produced in London at the Alhambra Theatre, Leicester Square, on 16 February 1918, in succession to similar shows, respectively titled The Bing Boys are Here (19 April 1916) and The Bing Girls are There (24 February 1917).