Lotta Crabtree

Home > People > Literature and the Arts > Theater: Biographies

Crabtree, Charlotte [Mignon] (1847–1924), actress, singer, and dancer. The petite, redheaded, dark‐eyed beauty, best known simply as Lotta, was one of the most successful and beloved of all American entertainers. Although born in New York, she was taken to California at the age of six. There she was befriended by the celebrated Lola Montez, who taught her to sing and dance. She was soon plying her art in mining camps and small‐town variety houses. Her first San Francisco appearance is believed to have been in 1858 in The Loan of a Lover. Her rise was relatively rapid, and with each year she added new works to her repertory, playlets that allowed her to exhibit the singing and dancing at which she excelled. Crabtree made her New York debut in 1864 in two of these playlets, The Mysterious Chamber and Jenny Lind. The critic for the Herald described her as “a very extended and most versatile talent. She plays the banjo with great spirit, and dances a breakdown in such style as to cause the star of the champion in that line to pale. Added to which Miss Lotta possesses a quick and ready repartee, which she launches at her audience with infinite grace.” Her other New York appearances included The Pet of the Petticoats (1867), Family Jars (1867), and Little Nell and the Marchioness (1867). Among her other famous vehicles, in which she toured incessantly, were Hearts Ease, or, What's Money Without; Musette, or, Little Bright Eyes; The Firefly, or, The Friend of the Flag; and Zip, or, Point Lynde Light. All of these had basically melodramatic parts into which she interpolated her happy musical numbers. Retaining her youthful looks and vigor, she continued performing in these plays until her retirement in 1891. When she died, Crabtree left a $4 million estate. Biography: The Triumphs and Trials of Lotta Crabtree, David Dempsey with Raymond P. Baldwin, 1968.

Crabtree, Charlotte (1847–1924), American actress, known as Lotta. An attractive child, with black eyes and a mop of red hair, she toured the mining camps of Colorado from the age of 8, singing, dancing, and reciting, and becoming a well-known and much loved figure. In 1867 she made a great success in New York as Little Nell and the Marchioness in Brougham's dramatization of Dickens's The Old Curiosity Shop. Throughout her career she preserved a look of youthful innocence, even in her most daring dances and by-play. She was outstanding in burlesque and extravaganza and in slight plays specially written for her, such as Fred Marsden's Musette, in which she toured indefatigably. She retired unmarried in 1891, having amassed a large fortune which she left to charity.

Lotta Crabtree 1847–1924, American actress, b. New York City. A protégée of Lola Montez , she became, while still a child, a favorite in California mining camps with her sprightly singing, dancing, and reciting. In 1867 she scored her first success in New York City in a dramatization of Dickens's Old Curiosity Shop, and thereafter she performed in burlesque and comic pieces, captivating large audiences. She retired in 1891.

Bibliography: See biography by D. Dempsey (1968).