[78-L] Humphrey on DD

[ronald dethlefson]

Harry Humphrey had a second career at a character actor in Hollywood  
westerns as soon as talkies came in.  He used the same western dialect  
as he did in his recordings of Mark Twain's "Buck Fanshaw's Funeral."   
Humphrey has a web site, that you might check regarding his film  
career.  He died about 1947.

Humphrey's Edison Artists' File is at The Henry Ford in the Benson  
Ford Research Center.  He had an active career with Edison and was  
well thought of by Edison, himself.  There is correspondence in the  
file with Edison wherein Humphrey wrote to the Inventor when Walter  
Miller, head of Edison's NY recording studio refused to record  
Humphrey.  He quoted to Edison the positive evaluation that Edison had  
given Humphrey. And Edison ordered Miller to record Humphrey. This  
incident may have taken place when the Edison Co. was beginning to  
record what were called "appreciations" on the flip sides of operatic  
discs. Perhaps Walter Miller had favored John Charles Thomas who also  
recorded a few "appreciations."

Humphrey had a sense of humor.  In his Edison Artists' file is a photo  
of him as a bearded man whom Humphrey identifies on the back of the  
photo as a "New England farmer, not Abraham Lincoln."

Ron D.