Rare memento from the dawn of musical theater. This mug belonged to a member of a Beefsteak Club named after Tony Hart and Ned Harrington. They are credited with beng important contributors to the development of the 'musical'. This would be a great gift for anyone invoved with musical theare, comedy or who just like beer and beefsteak. Two of the most popular stars of the American theatre of the 1870s and 80s, was the team of Edward ?Ned? Harrigan and Tony Hart. A New York native, Harrigan made his debut in San Francisco in 1867, singing (to his own banjo accompaniment) at some of the principal stages of the Barbary Coast. From singing and dancing, he worked his way up to comedy sketches, playing an impressive range of character roles: blackface parts**, a Swedish servant girl, Chinese laundrymen, Irish landlords, and so-called Dutch (or German) characters. When Harrigan was 26 he hooked up with Hart, only 16 years old and then calling himself ?Master Antonio?. Born Anthony Cannon, in Worcester, Massachusetts in 1855, he was placed in reform school at age 9 for announcing that he wanted to go into the theatre. He escaped and ran away to New York, singing, dancing and doing odd jobs at circuses, saloons and minstrel shows. By the time he and Harrigan joined their fortunes, Cannon had become famous for one particular number, a tear-jerker called ?Put Me in My Little Bed?, which he sang dressed as a young girl. Audiences were crazy about Hart. It was said: ?Hart caused more joy and sunshine by his delightful gifts than any artist of his time. To refer to him as talented was an insult. Genius was the only word that could be applied. He sung like a nightingale, danced like a fairy, and acted like a master comedian.? From 1876 through 1885, Harrigan and Hart ran the Theatre Comique, where they started out by presenting variety shows with an afterpiece (comedy sketch). One of these The Mulligan Guards (which actually debuted in 1873) became a huge phenomenon, spawning a series of sketches?which then blossomed into full length musical shows, all penned by Harrigan. In essence, for about a decade the two men ran New York?s favorite theatre company?where they wrote, directed and starred in all the shows. At any rate, the day word got around that Harrigan and Hart broke up was a day of mourning in New York City, akin in significance to breakup of the Beatles in 1970.