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Page 28 The Antique Shoppe March, 2017
EVELYN NESBIT - "LITTLE BUTTERFLY"

By: Roy Nuhn
By the time she was 16, at the turn of the 20th century, Evelyn Nesbit In 1902, photographer Rudolf Eickemeyer was hired by White for a photo
reigned as the most famous and highest paid session with "Kittens" in his apartment. Draped in kimonos and other
model in America. Her youthful sensuality Oriental gowns, Evelyn posed for many pictures.
utterly captivated the nation's leading The best known of these photographs came about when Evelyn, still in a
photographers, artists, and illustrators. colorful kimono and tired after an hour of hard work, fell asleep on a white
It also attracted many lovers. Among them bearskin rug. Eickemeyer snapped the scene and called the result "Little
were prominent architect Stanford White, Butterfly," a name that came eventually to symbolize both Evelyn Nesbit
48, and Harry Thaw, the mentally disturbed and the era.
young millionaire she married. Within a couple of years, close to a dozen different black-and-white
When Thaw murdered White at Madison postcards derived from these photos, were mass-marketed by the Campbell
Square Garden's posh rooftop dinner theater Art Co., then a haven for early pioneer photographers like Eickemeyer. Later
-an event celebrated in novels and movies editions were produced in color, made possible by tinting the printing press
for decades afterwards- Evelyn Nesbit negatives, and then enlarged by adding cards made from the other photos.
became the central figure in one of the most These pin-ups, titled "Posed by Evelyn Nesbit" were re-printed several
sensational crimes of passion in American years later when the Thaw-White scandal had made her into a household
history. It also helped spawn a world of word coast to coast. About a dozen Canadian, British, and American
postcards and other collectibles about her. publishers also sold postcards of her from 1906 to 1910, and beyond.
From 1908 to the 1920s, dozens of penny-arcade card-vending
Evelyn's Story machines, located in America's many Coney Islands and White Cities,
Born in Tarentum, Pennsylvania (some dispensed hundreds of thousands of postcards and plain back cards each
accounts put her birth on Christmas Eve, year picturing "Evelyn Nesbit Thaw." These featured her as "A Turkish
1884, Evelyn began modeling when barely Maid," "The Bride," "Little Red
into her teens. Pleased by her quick success Riding Hood," and in many other
within Philadelphia's art colony, Momma "The Tiger Head," postcard fantasy poses. All were cheaply
decided to take her little girl to New York by Campbell Art Co., from produced monotones, mostly blue
City and the "Big Time." Eickemeyer's photograph. and whites.
Later, in 1902, Evelyn entered show Several illustrated books of
business as a "Floradora" chorus girl. She dubious merit, most of them small-
now fell under the spell of White, who was sized pulp editions, were rushed to
generous and helped to advance her career with his influence. press to capitalize on the public's
After a short time as White's mistress, Evelyn took up with wild Harry seemingly insatiable hunger for
Thaw. A year of frenzied and uninhibited living together on two continents anything about the hottest story of
finally ended up in marriage - but it was an the new century. These books, such
uneasy alliance at best. as The Wonderful Case of Evelyn
Evelyn enjoyed goading Harry into fits of Nesbit Thaw and Harry K. Thaw
jealousy and rage with lurid tales about her (J. Regan & Co., 1906), are now
and White. But she did it once too often. Thaw "The Girl in the Red Velvet Swing," very rare.
became so crazed that on the evening of June press book of the 1955 movie. Nesbit collectors can also turn to
25, 1906, he walked up to White's restaurant Tin Pan Alley. In 1913, the music
table and shot him dead. makers came up with "For the Sake
The press - yellow journalists to the of Wife and Home." The Sheet music cover featured a portrait of Harry Thaw.
quick - turned the trials (the first ended with In 1955, 20th Century Fox paid then 70-year old Evelyn Nesbit $30,000 for
a hung jury) into three-ring circuses. The film rights to her story. Titled "The Girl in the Red Velvet Swing," the movie
national opinion was split; half saw Evelyn starred a young Joan Collins.
as a wronged woman and the other half, as an Life, Look and other magazines ran interesting photo features on Evelyn and
adventuress. the film that year.
After Thaw was judged insane and Posters, press books, lobby cards and stills from this film are legitimate
committed, Evelyn returned to vaudeville Nesbit collectibles, as are the paperback tie-ins from Gold Medal.
and the cabaret circuit. Impoverished - by her Other Evelyn Newsbit memorabilia include the many prints and souvenir
standards anyway, she exploited her name pictures of her sold in retail stores everywhere. Very desirable are the Gibson
and newly found notoriety for big box offices. Girl memorabilia she inspired,
When her by then tawdry career as an such as a Collier's magazine
entertainer began to fade, she started selling cover with her "Eternal
her memoirs to the press - not once, but "Beauty and the Beast," Question" cover. The many
postcard (Campbell Art
several times, each always slightly different. Co.) part of set taken from early 20th-century newspaper
One of the last of these was a 39-part series Eickemeyer's photos. accounts and magazines with
for the New York Daily News in the late photographs and illustrations
1930s. of her are also, eagerly sought.
Evelyn's bittersweet life ended January 17, 1967, in a California Evelyn Nebit may be a bit
convalescent home. Her passing, was well covered by the media, some of modern-day folklore, but
calling her the last relic from America's Gilded Age. she has become a collecting
category for many people
Collectibles fascinated by the model-
To many people, Evelyn Nesbit has always been a fascinating personality showgirl and the world she
and thus very collectable. Among the things sought by such fans are vintage "Little Butterfly," the photo and term that gave Evelyn lived in.
souvenir postcards. Nesbit fame and helped to define an era. Postcard by
Campbell Art Co., part of set first issued in 1902.