James Willis Sayre
Encyclopedia
J. Willis Sayre was an American
theatre
critic, journalist
, arts promoter, and historian. A longtime resident of Seattle, Washington
, Sayre was an influential figure in writing and conserving the history of theatre in Seattle.
His father James Mathew Sayre served in the Union Army
during the American Civil War
. His mother, Maria Burrows Sayre, was a field nurse for the Confederacy
. The Sayre family relocated to the Pacific Northwest
sometime around 1890.
At the turn of the century, Sayre left Seattle to fight in the Spanish-American War
in the Philippines
. After his return, he lobbied local officials to rename City Park, located on Capitol Hill
, to Volunteer Park
to honor the volunteers of the Spanish-American War. A 1901 ordinance changed the name.
Emulating Jules Verne
’s Phileas Fogg
, in 1903 he set the world record for circling the earth using public transportation exclusively, completing his trip in 54 days 9 hours and 42 minutes.
Sayre married Pearl Myrtle Shakelford Sayre (January 4, 1884 – May 23, 1978) in 1904. They had one child, Elinore Pearl Sayre (January 21, 1906 – September 12, 1992), who was born in Seattle
, King County
. Sayre lived in Seattle until 1959, when he moved to Santa Cruz, California
due to failing health. He died at the age of 86.
and soon opened Seattle's first theatrical advertising agency. In late 1907, he began his career as a theatrical critic with one of Seattle’s weekly papers, The Argus
. He worked briefly for the Seattle Star
in 1909, then returned to the Seattle Daily Times, where he edited the paper’s theatrical department and wrote reviews. He worked as the manager of the Seattle Symphony
from 1908 to 1924. From 1924 to 1936 he worked as an independent promoter of theatre productions and films and wrote several books on the history of Seattle. One of these books, This City of Ours, was a standard history text in Seattle public schools for many years.
In 1936, he joined the staff of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer
, where he eventually managed the theatrical department. He retired from this position in 1954 after suffering a small stroke.
Over the course of his career, Sayre worked as a theatrical critic and editor for several of the local newspapers and magazines and is known to have handled publicity and advertising for a variety of Seattle theaters including the Grand Opera House
, Seattle Theatre, Lyceum, Palm Garden, Second Avenue Orpheum, Star, Alhambra, Majestic, Mission, Liberty, 5th Avenue Theatre
, Coliseum, Rex, Strand, Pantages, Blue Mouse, and Music Box Theatres. On several occasions, Sayre’s role as an arts promoter and theatrical critic became blurred. For example, while he was the manager of the Seattle Symphony he was also writing for various Seattle newspapers and reviewing Symphony performances. This apparent conflict of interest was not controversial at the time.
Sayre compiled a vast collection of publicity photographs from theatrical performers, dramatic companies, musicians, and traveling shows that played in Seattle as well as theater and musical programs. This collection is housed at the University of Washington
Libraries Special Collection Division.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
theatre
Theatre
Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...
critic, journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...
, arts promoter, and historian. A longtime resident of Seattle, Washington
Seattle, Washington
Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...
, Sayre was an influential figure in writing and conserving the history of theatre in Seattle.
Personal life
He was born James Willis Sayre in Washington, D.C.Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
His father James Mathew Sayre served in the Union Army
Union Army
The Union Army was the land force that fought for the Union during the American Civil War. It was also known as the Federal Army, the U.S. Army, the Northern Army and the National Army...
during the American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
. His mother, Maria Burrows Sayre, was a field nurse for the Confederacy
Confederate States of America
The Confederate States of America was a government set up from 1861 to 1865 by 11 Southern slave states of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S...
. The Sayre family relocated to the Pacific Northwest
Pacific Northwest
The Pacific Northwest is a region in northwestern North America, bounded by the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains on the east. Definitions of the region vary and there is no commonly agreed upon boundary, even among Pacific Northwesterners. A common concept of the...
sometime around 1890.
At the turn of the century, Sayre left Seattle to fight in the Spanish-American War
Spanish-American War
The Spanish–American War was a conflict in 1898 between Spain and the United States, effectively the result of American intervention in the ongoing Cuban War of Independence...
in the Philippines
Philippines
The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...
. After his return, he lobbied local officials to rename City Park, located on Capitol Hill
Capitol Hill, Seattle, Washington
Capitol Hill is the most densely populated residential district in Seattle, Washington, United States. It is the center of the city's gay and counterculture communities, and is one of the city's most prominent nightlife and entertainment districts....
, to Volunteer Park
Volunteer Park (Seattle)
Volunteer Park is a 48.3 acre park in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Seattle, USA.-History:Volunteer Park was acquired by the city of Seattle for $2,000 in 1876 from J.M. Colman...
to honor the volunteers of the Spanish-American War. A 1901 ordinance changed the name.
Emulating Jules Verne
Jules Verne
Jules Gabriel Verne was a French author who pioneered the science fiction genre. He is best known for his novels Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea , A Journey to the Center of the Earth , and Around the World in Eighty Days...
’s Phileas Fogg
Phileas Fogg
Phileas Fogg is the main fictional character in the 1873 Jules Verne novel Around the World in Eighty Days.Fogg attempts to circumnavigate the late Victorian world in eighty days, or less, for a wager of £20,000 with members of London's Reform Club. He takes the wager and leaves with Passepartout,...
, in 1903 he set the world record for circling the earth using public transportation exclusively, completing his trip in 54 days 9 hours and 42 minutes.
Sayre married Pearl Myrtle Shakelford Sayre (January 4, 1884 – May 23, 1978) in 1904. They had one child, Elinore Pearl Sayre (January 21, 1906 – September 12, 1992), who was born in Seattle
Seattle, Washington
Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...
, King County
King County, Washington
King County is a county located in the U.S. state of Washington. The population in the 2010 census was 1,931,249. King is the most populous county in Washington, and the 14th most populous in the United States....
. Sayre lived in Seattle until 1959, when he moved to Santa Cruz, California
Santa Cruz, California
Santa Cruz is the county seat and largest city of Santa Cruz County, California in the US. As of the 2010 U.S. Census, Santa Cruz had a total population of 59,946...
due to failing health. He died at the age of 86.
Professional career
Sayre’s involvement with the theatre began around 1891 when he took a job at the Seattle Opera House folding programs. In 1899, Sayre began working as an advertising director for theater manager John CortJohn Cort (impresario)
John Cort was an American impresario; his Cort Circuit was one of the first national theater circuits. Along with John Considine and Alexander Pantages, Cort was one of the Seattle-based entrepreneurs who parlayed their success in the years following the Klondike Gold Rush into an impact on...
and soon opened Seattle's first theatrical advertising agency. In late 1907, he began his career as a theatrical critic with one of Seattle’s weekly papers, The Argus
The Argus (Seattle)
The Argus was a longstanding Seattle, Washington weekly newspaper. Founded in February 1894 and published until November 1983, it had a satiric bent and was aligned with the Republican Party. The paper was founded by A. T. Ambrose; six weeks later, Henry Chadwick bought a half interest...
. He worked briefly for the Seattle Star
Seattle Star
The Seattle Star was a daily newspaper that ran from February 25, 1899, to August 13, 1947. It was owned by E.W. Scripps and in 1920 was transferred to Scripps McRae League of Newspapers , after a falling-out within the Scripps family...
in 1909, then returned to the Seattle Daily Times, where he edited the paper’s theatrical department and wrote reviews. He worked as the manager of the Seattle Symphony
Seattle Symphony
The Seattle Symphony is an American orchestra based in Seattle, Washington. Since 1998, the orchestra is resident at Benaroya Hall. The orchestra's season runs from September through July, and serves as the pit orchestra for most productions of the Seattle Opera in addition to its own concerts...
from 1908 to 1924. From 1924 to 1936 he worked as an independent promoter of theatre productions and films and wrote several books on the history of Seattle. One of these books, This City of Ours, was a standard history text in Seattle public schools for many years.
In 1936, he joined the staff of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is an online newspaper and former print newspaper covering Seattle, Washington, United States, and the surrounding metropolitan area...
, where he eventually managed the theatrical department. He retired from this position in 1954 after suffering a small stroke.
Over the course of his career, Sayre worked as a theatrical critic and editor for several of the local newspapers and magazines and is known to have handled publicity and advertising for a variety of Seattle theaters including the Grand Opera House
Grand Opera House (Seattle)
The Grand Opera House in Seattle, Washington, USA, designed by Seattle architect Edwin W. Houghton, a leading designer of Pacific Northwest theaters, was once the city's leading theater. Today, only its exterior survives as the shell of a car park...
, Seattle Theatre, Lyceum, Palm Garden, Second Avenue Orpheum, Star, Alhambra, Majestic, Mission, Liberty, 5th Avenue Theatre
5th Avenue Theatre
The 5th Avenue Theatre is a landmark theater building located in Seattle, Washington, USA. It has hosted a variety of theatre productions and motion pictures since it opened in 1926. The building and land is owned by the University of Washington and was once part of the original campus...
, Coliseum, Rex, Strand, Pantages, Blue Mouse, and Music Box Theatres. On several occasions, Sayre’s role as an arts promoter and theatrical critic became blurred. For example, while he was the manager of the Seattle Symphony he was also writing for various Seattle newspapers and reviewing Symphony performances. This apparent conflict of interest was not controversial at the time.
Sayre compiled a vast collection of publicity photographs from theatrical performers, dramatic companies, musicians, and traveling shows that played in Seattle as well as theater and musical programs. This collection is housed at the University of Washington
University of Washington
University of Washington is a public research university, founded in 1861 in Seattle, Washington, United States. The UW is the largest university in the Northwest and the oldest public university on the West Coast. The university has three campuses, with its largest campus in the University...
Libraries Special Collection Division.
External links
- Sayre Database University of Washington Libraries. Over 24,000 photographs of theatrical and vaudeville performers, as well as musicians and motion picture scenes, that played in Seattle between about 1900 and 1955 (some of the materials date back to the 1870s). This database includes the data for all images in the database, but only includes links to digital images that are not under copyright restrictions.
- University of Washington Libraries Digital Collections – J. Willis Sayre Photographs 9,856 images collected by drama critic and theater promoter J. Willis Sayre. They consist of autographed portraits of actors, vaudeville performers, movie stills, singers, dancers, musicians, comedians and acrobats representing American theater history primarily from the 1890s and onward.