Foundations

Scene from Mary Jane's Pa

Predecessor Institutions

Although the Butler University Department of Theatre is considered to have started when James R. Phillippe was hired and became department head, the department had its foundations in two predecessor institutions of the Jordan College of the Arts (JCA).

Drama courses were taught at both the Metropolitan School of Music (MSM), which was founded in 1895, and the College of Musical Art (CMA), which was founded in 1907 and later renamed the Indiana College of Music and Fine Arts (ICMFA).

Affiliation with Butler

In 1924, MSM became affiliated with the University and students could take courses at both institutions. The agreement started as a way for music teachers to meet the Indiana state requirements for teachers, but soon expanded to other areas of study. Students studying to become a music teacher could take their music coursework at MSM and their academic and professional coursework at the University. In 1927, ICMFA announced its own affiliation with the University.

Merger of the two predecessor institutions

On June 19, 1928, it was announced that Arthur Jordan had purchased both the MSM and the ICMFA, merging them into one organization, the Arthur Jordan Conservatory of Music (AJCM), later renamed, in 1949, the Jordan College of Music (JCM).

Icebound (1925)

The Early Years of Theatre at Butler University

Although Butler University students had the option of taking courses at the affiliated institutions, theatre was not absent at the University. In 1901, the English Department produced the Elizabethan play The Shoemaker's Holiday at the English Hotel and Opera House on Monument Circle. In addition to the cast, other students participated as an Elizabethan audience, dressing and acting like artisans, weavers, ballad singers, and tailors, among other professions. The sets were designed to reproduce the Fortune Theatre in London where the play was originally produced. A costumer in Boston, Massachusetts prepared Elizabethan costumes for the performers. The production was met with some resistance as a few of the parents questioned the moral content of the play and even Indiana's State Superintendent of Public Instruction worried the production was distracting students from their studies.

However, amateur dramatic productions continued to gain in popularity on campus and various student organizations, including the YWCA, the YMCA, and the Biology Club, gave productions. The latter group wrote and produced plays to raise money for its scholarship fund. Additionally, plays were produced to celebrate special occassions including May Day, Founder's Day, Geneva Stunts, and Commencement. Soon, theatre organizations developed on campus and the Dramatic Club, formed in 1907, may have been the first of these organizations.

It does not seem that Butler University offered drama courses until circa 1915 when F. Tarkington Baker started teaching a Friday evening course on modern drama and directing productions produced by the Dramatic Club. Baker was affiliated with the University until circa 1917.

In 1921, Rollo Anson Tallcott was hired by the University as the Professor of Public Speaking. Although he taught courses in public speaking, as other faculty in the University had done previously, he also instructed courses in play reading and dramatic reading. After Tallcott's resignation in 1925, dramatic courses continued to be taught by a string of Speech faculty including Claude Sifritt and Evelyn Henderson Fife.

Arthur Jordan Conservatory of Music (1116 N. Delaware St.)

By the 1930s, University drama classes were often taught by faculty who also oversaw theatre courses at AJCM. Additionally, students at the University interested in learning more about theatre could take courses offered at the affiliated institution.

In the 1950s, some drama courses continued to be taught by Speech Department faculty from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences including Howard Grigsby who oversaw the amateur theatrical group the Butler Student Players. Additionally, JCM faculty including James R. Phillippe and Marguerite Carlson Adkins continued to teach at both institutions.

Drama history booklet (circa 1972)

JCM Merger with Butler University

In 1951, Jordan College of Music (JCM) merged with Butler University and was officially known as the Jordan College of Music of Butler University, although it continued to be known as simply JCM.

Within a few years of this merger, the amateur dramatic club, the Butler Student Players, was dissolved by University administrations and personnel cuts were made in the Speech Department in an effort to center the focus of theatre at the University under the direction of JCM. Classes continued to be held at the JCM campus until 1962 when Lilly Hall opened and classes could be held at the University.

In 1979 the College was renamed Jordan College of Fine Arts (JCFA) and the name was changed again in 2012 to Jordan College of the Arts (JCA). Drama courses were offered by the Drama Department, but the name was changed to the Theatre Department circa 1979-1981. More recently, the Department's name was changed again to the Department of Theatre.

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