Tassels on the Boots. From Elise Holt’s Celebrated Songs

Boston: Koppitz, Prüfer & Co., 30 West St., cor. Mason Street; New York: Wm. A. Pond & Co, 1869. Folio, lithographed cover with hand-coloring. Stitching removed at margins suggesting this was bound in a larger volume, else about fine. Signed by Holt next to the illustration. Near Fine.. A finely executed example of post–Civil War American sheet music lithography depicting stage performer Elise Holt in masculine costume, top hat, and cigar, in a style typical of Boston commercial lithographic production of the period. The imagery situates Holt within the established nineteenth-century tradition of theatrical male impersonation or “breeches roles,” in which female performers adopted masculine dress and gesture as part of fashionable stage personas. Archival records identify Holt as a ballet dancer who later appeared as a burlesque performer and died while touring in 1873 after contracting typhoid fever.[1] She led the Elyse Holt Burlesque Troupe. Photographic evidence held by Digital Commonwealth likewise shows Holt posed in masculine stage attire, indicating that male impersonation formed part of her professional repertoire. The song, sometimes seen as “Tassels on her Boots,” extolls the virtues of women’s clothing. Overall a nice lithographic example of women performing in men’s roles, showing a fairly obscure but widely touring performer whose career was tragically cut short by illness. We find two copies of this sheet, at BYU and Baylor.

[1] “Elise Holt, ballet dancer turned burlesque star,” Kentucky Historical Society Nicola Marschall Collection, https://www.kyhistory.com/digital/collection/PH/id/2477/.