Weird and Wonderful: The Dime Museum in America

6. Waxworks and Film

6. Waxworks an d Fil m My childish fancy confused the living men and women swarmin g along the street with the lifelike wax-figures i n the showcases. —William Henry Venable Between 1840 and 1900 a mass market in imagery developed in the United States. Owning paintings an d etching s durin g the eighteent h centur y ha d been a sign o f status an d affluence . B y the mid-nineteent h century , how ever , because o f advances in printing techniques , color lithographs decor ated th e wall s o f eve n th e mos t humbl e parlors . Th e Wester n worl d wa s becoming a densely visual environment , an d th e ubiquit y o f images con tributed greatl y t o th e disseminatio n o f knowledge an d th e averag e per son 's perception of the world. Newspapers not only documented bu t illustrated current events, billboards provided alluring images of goods for sale, and the art of photography was flourishing. 1 Th e ques t for greate r realism permeated al l aspects of late nineteenth-century culture . The aesthetic s o f stage desig n change d rapidly , fro m flat, painte d scener y t o three-dimen sional , solid realism . Imaginativ e technician s suc h a s Steele MacKay e an d David Belasc o brough t th e lates t mechanica l device s int o th e theater , in cluding elevato r stages , natural-looking overhea d lighting , electrical light ing boards , an d authenti c props. 2 Dim e museum s provide d provocativ e images of the wonders of the universe, the human body, and faraway places, as well as fragments o f history and current events. The dim e museum was also on e o f th e first institution s t o sho w films , th e quintessentia l optica l spectacle of the late nineteenth century . "Images are more precise and richer" than the written word, John Berger has written in Ways of Seeing.3 Images, however, are not a s exact as words and ofte n ar e deceiving . The y perpetuall y challeng e th e viewer' s sens e o f authenticity: I t look s real , bu t i s it real ? Ca n a work b e genuin e i f it i s a reproduction? The wonderful profusio n o f images may have visually stimu106 W A X W O R K S A N D F I L M lated Victoria n Americans , bu t i t als o propelle d the m int o a worl d o f deceptions, hoaxes , an d humbugging . Phinea s T . Barnu m thrive d i n thi s environment, as did the dime museum. One of the most popular exhibits at any dime museum was the display of life-sized waxworks . Th e operationa l aestheti c o f waxwork s exhibit s wa s "admiring th e perfection o f the fake." 4 Wax tableaux re-created an d rein terpreted figures an d moment s i n tim e fo r a specifi c audienc e tha t wa s amazed b y the remarkable realis m o f the lifelike mannequins . Th e deligh t for the viewer was in being deceived. Standing before th e "Assassination of Julius Caesar" tableau at New York City's Eden Musee, for example , spectators did not critiqu e the fictionalized Roma n Foru m settin g or questio n the theatrica l logi c o f placin g Caesa r o n a stretche r hal f covere d wit h a sheet convenienti y drape d t o expos e hi s sta b wound s (se e fig. 21) . An d who was the unidentified ma n kneeling and weeping by Caesar's side, and who were th e tw o women stretchin g ou t thei r arm s toward hi m i n grie f > They were not mentione d i n the descriptio n o f the scen e provided b y the guidebook.5 Eden Musee patrons were satisfied simpl y to know that all the essential figures—Cassius, Brutus , Marc Antony, an d Caesar—wer e pres ent an d accounte d for . Th e authenticit y o f a historical reproductio n wa s not questione d a...