Our American Cousin, The play Lincoln was watching when he was assassinated

by Tom Taylor

Overview

According to Wikipedia: "Our American Cousin is a play in three acts by Tom Taylor. The play is a farcical comedy whose plot is based on the introduction of an awkward, boorish American to his aristocratic English relatives. It premiered at Laura Keene's Theatre in New York City on October 15, 1858. The play's most famous performance came seven years later, however, at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865. Halfway through Act III, Scene 2, the character Asa Trenchard (the title role), played that night by Harry Hawk, utters a line that while considered one of the play's funniest, makes little sense out of context: "Don't know the manners of good society, eh? Well, I guess I know enough to turn you inside out, old gal? You sockdologizing old man-trap..." During the raucous laughter that followed this line, John Wilkes Booth, an actor who received his mail at Ford's Theatre but who was not in the cast of Our American Cousin, shot President Abraham Lincoln. "

Product Details

BN ID:	2940000732861
Publisher:	B&R Samizdat Express
Publication date:	12/03/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	NOOK Book
Sales rank:	997,973
File size:	47 KB

About the Author

Tom Taylor is manager of community relations and the welcome center at Unity. He has selected historic images from an extensive collection of photographs and rare real-photo postcards from the Unity Archives to depict the growth and development of this unique Mediterranean-styled village set in the midst of Missouri cornfields.

Table of Contents

The complete script of the comic drama performed at Ford's Theater the night Abraham Lincoln was shot. A facsimile of the oroginal publication.