July, 1912 
a i 
Among the “‘properties”’ 
AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 
239 
UE ALLIS SE BIDE DI EIR LALIT REALE 3 ELE SUP ELED A cemrnnenrmennaegemcnrmmn ay | 
of the pageant the old-time stagecoach with its narrow windows, swinging middle seat and drop steps was prominent 
Tne American Pageant 
By Adelia Belle Beard 
Photographs by the Author 
q| UT-OF-DOOR life, now so popular in Amer- 
ica, may have brought the pageant into 
vogue; or possibly we have imitated Eng- 
land in this revival of one of the oldest and 
simplest forms of the drama, but whatever 
its cause or its source the pageant is most 
certainly here, and we, contributing to it a new life, new 
themes and a wealth of enthusiastic fervor all our own, 
have gone pageant mad. Our country, the eastern part 
especially, has caught the infection in its most virulent form 
and is now in the throes of a new aspiration with a wild 
desire to beat the Old World 
at it own game of pageant 
making. 
Small New England towns 
and villages, some of whose 
inhabitants have never seen 
the inside of a theatre, are 
enthused almost out of their 
traditional New England re- 
serve and are competing 
with one another in the big- 
ness and splendor of their 
out-of-door dramas where 
the dramatis persone is 
made up of the town people 
themselves; shining lights 
among our actors and ac- 
Shee LAL C 
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tresses are offering their services gratis if the pageant is 
given for a purpose of which they approve and certain of 
their requirements are complied with; schools, which now 
accept dramatics as an educational factor of no little value, 
are using the pageant more than the play, and yet people 
are asking: ‘“‘What is a pageant?” 
The writer’s answer to this question is, that a pageant, 
per se, is a story told by a continuous series of living, moy- 
ing pictures, a living panorama produced out-of-doors amid. 
natural scenery and natural surroundings. When the old 
models are followed events are largely represented by al- 
legory, or rather the sub-.- 
jects are, in the main, treated 
symbolically. Like mu ral 
paintings, pageants are mde 
imposing and effective when_ 
they assume a decorative 
form. The grandeur and 
importance of the themes 
frequently chosen require 
simplicity and nobleness of 
treatment and a too realistic 
rendering would belittle 
them. 
From the Twelfth well. 
into the Sixteenth Century 
pageantry flourished in Eng- 
land, frequently in the form 
