Woman of the Century/Corinne Kimball

KIMBALL, Miss Corinne, actor, born in Boston, Mass., 25th December, 1873. She is widely known by her stage-name, "Corinne." She is the daughter of Mrs. Jennie Kimball, actor and theatrical manager. CORINNE KIMBALL. Corinne is a genuine child of the stage, as she has been before the footlights ever since her earliest years. Her father was an Italian naval officer, to whom her mother had been married but a few short months, when he died of malarial fever. Corinne's life has been eventful and romantic, but under a mother's watchful care and guidance it has been bright and happy. Being an only child, she has had the advantage of the lavish attention which usually falls to the lot of those who are so fortunate as to be the sole heir Originally her mother had not the slightest intention of placing her on the stage. It was led up to by a combination of circumstances. In 1S76 a grand baby show was held in Horticultural Hall, in Boston, and Corinne was one of the infants placed on exhibition. She created a marked sensation, caused not only by her great personal beauty, but also by her ability to sing and dance prettily at the age of three. She received the prize medals and diploma. The attention she attracted caused her mother to accept an engagement for her to appear in Sunday-evening concerts in conjunction with Brown's Brigade Baud. She was billed as the infant wonder and created a furore, and her great success in these concerts determined her mother to keep her on the stage. She next appeared in the Boston Museum as Little Buttercup, in a juvenile production of "Pinafore." The opera was very successful, running for one-hundred nights, and Corinne was the hit of the presentation. At the conclusion of that engagement she was starred in the production through the New England States and Canada. Her next success was as Cinderella in the opera of that name. Then her mother became her manager anil has so continued ever since. Judging her from her past successes, Mrs. Kimball placed her in comic opera. She sang in "The Mascotte," "Olivette." " Princess of Trebizonde," "Chimes of Normandy" and "Mikado." She played the principal parts in all of these, and memorized not only her own role but the entire operas, so as to be able to prompt every part from beginning to end. Then Mrs. Kimball, thinking to save Corinne's voice, from her twelfth to sixteenth year put her in burlesque. Her success in that line of work was much greater than expected, and consequently she has remained in burlesque. In "Arcaia" she first established herself; in "Monte Cristo, Jr.," she attracted attention and won the title of "Queen of the Stage," in the great New York "Morning Journal " voting contest, over the heads ol such artists as Lillian Russell, Fay Templeton, Marion Manola and others of equal note. Another and late success was in the character of Carmencita, the Spanish dancing beauty, in an elaborate burlesque production of "Carmen."