Edwin Booth
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Edwin Thomas Booth (November 13, 1833–June 7, 1893), born near Bel Air, Maryland, was a famous 19th century American actor. He was the son of another famous actor, Junius Brutus Booth, who named Edwin after Edwin Forrest and Thomas Flynn, two of Junius' colleagues. Edwin's younger brother, John Wilkes Booth, also an actor, was Abraham Lincoln's assassin.
Booth made his stage debut in Richard III in Boston in 1849. In this and his other early appearances, he usually performed alongside his father. Two years later Edwin had his first starring role, this time standing in for his father.
After his father's death in 1852, Booth went on worldwide tour, visiting Australia and Hawaii, and finally gaining acclaim on his own during a performance run in Sacramento, California in 1856. He eventually became recognized as the pre-eminent American actor of his day.
At length Booth became manager of the Winter Garden Theater in New York City, mostly staging Shakespearian tragedies.
In what would later be viewed as an ironic twist of fate, Booth saved Abraham Lincoln's son, Robert Lincoln, from serious injury or even death by pulling him up onto a train platform after Lincoln had fallen. Edwin Booth saves Robert Lincoln (http://members.aol.com/RVSNorton1/Lincoln59.html)
After Lincoln's assassination, the notoriety associated with the Booth name forced Edwin to abandon the stage for a period. His first reappearance afterward was in the Winter Garden in January 1866, playing the part of Hamlet, which became his signature role. The next year the theater was completely burned.
He then built the Booth Theatre, completed in 1869, and continued a renowned acting career until the panic of 1873 caused the bankruptcy of the theater in 1874. Thereafter he went again on worldwide tour, eventually regaining his fortune.
Booth was married to Mary Devlin from 1860 to 1863, when she died. He later remarried, to Mary McVicker in 1869, and became a widower again in 1881.
In 1888 Booth founded the Players' Club in New York. His final performance was again as Hamlet, in 1891 at the Brooklyn Academy. He died in 1893, at the Players' Club that he founded.de:Edwin Booth sv:Edwin Booth