John Henry Jack

American theater-goers in the post-Civil War era would have recognized John Jack more for his supporting roles than as one of the leading stars of the day. He worked with many of those stars, particularly in Shakespearean performances, and he had a few leading roles himself. 

He was fortunate to grow up in Philadelphia, a great city in which to learn the tools of the trade. He got his start at age 16 as a call boy at America’s oldest operating theater, the historic Walnut Street Theatre. He was able to join a company of actors at the Chestnut Street Theatre for the 1853-54 season, but he stayed close to the staff at the Walnut, especially with a man named John Reed.

“Pops” Reed was a backstage fixture there for half a century, directing the “extras” and keeping them quiet while they were behind the curtains. But it was Mr. Reed’s daughter, Adelaide, who was the real focus of John’s attention. They took vows instead of bows in 1854 when the two 18-year-olds were married. Four children were added to their family over the next nine years.

John’s career started coming together as he made friends with actors who were also his mentors, especially Edwin Booth. John worked as stage manager for a time in Richmond for one of Mr. Booth’s productions, and after winning supporting roles beside the veteran actor he was so indebted to him he named his third son Edwin Booth Jack in 1863.

He was still in his mid-twenties when he was proprietor of his own theater in Wilmington, Delaware. When war erupted in 1861 he made the brave decision to close it down and recruit a company of volunteers as part of the Second Pennsylvania Reserves of the 31st Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment. 

Later that year he became 1st Lieutenant in Company B of the 31st Infantry and was promoted to captain after performing heroically while injured at the Second Battle of Bull Run. John re-enlisted on May 26, 1864 as captain of Company A in the 186th Regiment, which spent the rest of the war on guard duty in Philadelphia. 

He returned to his home and his family, and to the stage, which sometimes required  long periods of time away from home. In honor of his recent military service he was often referred to as “Captain Jack.” 

Professionally, he had become a prominent member of Edwin Forrest’s stock company. Also known as a repertory company, this type of actors’ troupe performed at a particular theater presenting a different play each night from a repertoire of prepared productions. That meant John might play in a comedy one night and a tragedy the next. Toward the end of the century the touring company became more prominent, presenting a single production as it traveled from town to town.

In 1868 John was on stage in New York when his beloved Addie died. Fortunately, the children were already used to living with their mother’s parents during the war and while John was away. The Reeds took them in and raised them as their own.

John became most famous after 1869 when he began playing the part of Sir John Falstaff in Shakespeare’s plays, as he literally grew into it. A newspaper account said it was “his great girth of body” that suited him well for the role of a fat, vain, and comic figure.

One of John’s many obituaries from around the country claimed that, in the early 1870s, he was asked by a man named John Firman to be the ward, or guardian, of his London-born actress, Annie. It seems like an odd relationship since she was about 24 years old and no longer a minor. They performed for several years in the major cities of the west coast before marrying in 1877.

Their only child, Arthur Firman Jack, was born in 1879 while they were in Paris. That would explain why the Jack family couldn’t be found in the 1880 census. Later in the decade they stayed several years in Australia.

Other accounts confirm these were not brief tours. They resided a year or more in Wisconsin when Arthur was a baby and John directed community productions at the local opera house in his spare time. They played in Oregon where John felt so at home he joined the Portland Elks Lodge. This ad appeared during the holidays in 1888 for their variety show in Seattle featuring their son.

In the early 1890s John and Annie returned to Oregon and California, then John joined a Philadelphia stock  company. The Academy of Music hosted a benefit performance for John in December of 1894 that became a real family affair. He reprised his role as Falstaff in Shakespeare’s Henry IV where Annie played the part of Prince Hal and Arthur was a young Prince John.

He was in Buffalo, New York in late 1895 with another company. Arthur had moved up to Central High School that fall and turned 16 years old, but he met a tragic end one weekend in November while his mother was visiting her sister in New York City.

Arthur wanted to write a report about “Philadelphia’s first skyscraper,” the 12-story Betz Building, built in 1892 at Broad and Chestnut Streets. He wanted to see the view from the top so he rode the elevator and, while trying to open a bathroom window, he slipped and fell.

He was buried here in a lot in Section 60 that was owned by the Philadelphia Elks Lodge. The mourning was deep and intense, but when that season was over the parents returned to the stage, first in Philly and then in a number of stock companies. In 1899 they published a book of their son’s writings, and the 1900 census listed them as having an apartment in Manhattan.

It should be noted that John’s children from his first marriage were not abandoned by their father. They didn’t enjoy the same relationship that Arthur had, but the Reeds were a closely knit family, and closely connected in the theatrical world. Addie’s brother, Roland Reed, was a popular star of the stage who not only stayed in close touch with John, he employed their son, Edwin Booth Jack, as his agent for a dozen years or more. 

John’s only daughter, Rosalie, acted briefly before her marriage, and son Walter was an actor until he died at age 27. Addie’s other brother, George, was an employee of the Walnut Street Theatre who was like a father figure to Arthur and to all of the Jack children. In fact, Arthur was at the Walnut with George the night before he died.

The couple continued to perform during the first years of the 20th century, with Annie primarily as a vocalist. After a farewell performance in 1907, they moved to the Edwin Forrest Home. That great actor from the mid-1800s left his property in the Holmesburg section of Philadelphia to provide for members of the acting profession after they could no longer draw an income. 

In 1913 John caught the flu and died just a few days later. There was no large crowd at his funeral since his fame had passed just as the older generation of theater-goers had who remembered him. The Philadelphia Inquirer gave this brief mention and obituary, as it also did when Annie died in 1925, joining her husband and son in Section 60. 

A few other residents of the Forrest Home were also buried at Mount Moriah. One whose star shone for decades was Jennie Johnson Stone, whose Notable life story is found here.