Lola Montez

I know merely that by some means we achieved our entrance to the pit of the old Eagle Street Theatre.

I have heard good citizens of Buffalo complain that since Lola Montez burned down that seat of the histrionic muse, the drama has languished in their city.

Of course, I am not competent to decide in such matters, but that being the first playhouse of any kind I ever entered, I am glad to be able to say that I have never since seen anything in the theatrical line so absorbingly thrilling or so gorgeously magnificent as the old Eagle Street Theatre was to me that night.

The name and plot of the play I have forgotten, but the dark frown of that smooth villain in the third act, where his villainy first began to show itself to my unpracticed comprehension, will never fade from my remembrance.

Very briefly...

In March 1856, Irish dancer Lola Montez, who had the previous month whipped a Ballarat newspaper editor over a bad review, had angry words with her impresario, Mr Crosby, about payment due for her performances.

But Mrs Crosby took exception to this argument, and she attacked Lola with a whip, also grabbing her by the hair and beating her about the head and neck.

Dr. Henry Mount was called in to tend to Lola Montez and to provide a medical certificate stating that her wounds meant she couldn't take the stage that night.

So Mr. Crosby, who was a prized dope, went before the theatre audience with the medical certificate to explain why his star performer wasn't going to appear.

Then he brought his own wife onto the stage, introducing her as the whippress of the whippress of whippers.

Occasionally some distinguished passengers passed on the upward and downward tides of rascality and ruffianism that swept periodically through Cruces.

Came one day Lola Montez, in the full zenith of her evil fame, bound for California with a strange suite: a good-looking, bold woman, with fine bad eyes, and a determined bearing, dressed ostentatiously in perfect male attire, with shirt-collar turned down over a velvet-lapelled coat, richly worked shirt-front, black hat, French unmentionables, and natty, polished boots with spurs.

She carried in her hand a handsome riding-whip, which she could use as well in the streets of Cruces as in the towns of Europe; for an impertinent American, presuming—perhaps not unnaturally—upon her reputation, laid hold jestingly of the tails of her long coat, and as a lesson received a cut across his face that must have marked him for some days.

I did not wait to see the row that followed, and was glad when the wretched woman rode off on the following morning.

rather than adhering to any kind of extreme beauty standard.

So what's happening then by the mid-19th century, you have beauty manuals that come out that talk about removing superfluous hair, one of which was written by an Irish woman called Eliza Gilbert, whose stage name was Lola Montez, which some people might have heard of.

And the reason why is because she claims herself that she was born in Limerick in 1818, but her baptism cert... resurfaced there a couple of years ago a couple of decades ago I should say now

sorry in

historians terms the 90s is only a few years ago but for Lola Montez and it's stated that she was actually born in Grange in County Sligo in 1821 so her birthday was wrong and her place according to her so there's a few camps of people who state that she's from Limerick or from Sligo Most people just say she's born in Ireland.

But she became quite famous as a dancer and an actress right across Europe, led this riotous life, became a Spanish dancer and a courtesan and a mistress of King Ludwig I of Bavaria, who even gave her a title, the Countess of Landsfeld.

Now, she had to move away from Germany during the German revolt in 1848, so... lost that title, but became a lecturer when she was in the US.

Which came first, Locomotion by Kylie Minogue or Live It Up by Mental As Anything? Question three, multiple choice.

Exotic dancer Lola Montez toured the Australian colonies in 1855, 1856.

She was the Tay Tay of her day day, though perhaps a bit raunchier.

Miners in Ballarat loved her spider dance, but local newspaper editor Henry Seecamp described Lola's performance as, quote, "Not only shameful, but indecent." How did Lola Montez respond? A, with a strongly worded letter; B, she sent him a box of spiders; C, she wrote a diss track about him for her next album; D, she whipped him in public.

Question four, who was the first Australian woman to have a number one hit in the United States, and what was the name of that song? Question five, multiple choice.

Before we had Blue Heelers, we had Blue Hills.

So the correct answer is Howzat.

Question two was along the same lines, and the correct answer there is Live It Up by Mental As Anything, which was released in 1985, while Locomotion by Kylie came in 1987.