Frank Chanfrau

Francis S. Chanfrau (1824 – October 2, 1884), known as Frank Chanfrau, was an American actor and theatre manager in the 19th century. He began his career playing bit parts and doing impressions of star actors such as Edwin Forrest and of ethnic groups.

In 1848, he appeared as a Bowery b'hoy named Mose in A Glance at New York. The play became a record-breaking hit, due largely to the Mose character, and Chanfrau spent most of the rest of his career playing that role. In later life, Chanfrau appeared regularly in Kit, the Arkansas Traveller and Sam. His wife, Henrietta, was a well-known actress who usually performed under the name Mrs. F.S. Chanfrau.

Chanfrau was born to French parents in New York City; he grew up near Essex Market. As a boy, Chanfrau saw a performance by Edwin Forrest and decided to become an actor himself.

Various legends arose during his career to explain his later choice of roles. One, related by T. Allston Brown, claims that in his youth Chanfrau frequented a small restaurant called the Broadway House on the corner of Grand Street, where he would order a daily plate of corned beef for six pence. One day, a printer at the New York Sun named Mose Humphrey sat down by him and yelled out his order: "Look a heah! gim me a sixpenny plate ev pork and beans, and don't stop to count dem beans, d'yr heah!" Chanfrau would later adopt this persona of the Irish Bowery b'hoy and popularize it on stage.

Another version, related by A.E. Costello, says that Chanfrau witnessed Mose Humphreys in a street brawl:

Whatever the ultimate source of his fireboy impression, Chanfrau was a gifted impersonator from a young age. He took the stage as a young man doing an impersonation of Forrest and a string of minor roles while touring from theatre to theatre with various companies. Brown says that he "played every dialect known to the stage, except the Welsh." Chanfrau became a member of the house company at Mitchell's Olympic Theatre in 1848. There, a friend and playwright, Benjamin A. Baker, wrote A Glance at New York. The play is a collection of jokes, short skits, songs, and other scenes centered on a country bumpkin from Connecticut who is guided through New York by Chanfrau's fireboy character. The two proposed it to Mitchell, the theatre manager, but he rejected it.

...
Wikipedia