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The “Electric Girls” Visit Americus: Late 19th Century Girl Power On The Vaudeville Stage
by Zac Monnier, Staff Writer
On January 28, Dr. Susan Bragg stepped off the GSW campus to present at Sumter Historic Trust’s Council Club Speaker’s Series. The evening started off with a warm welcome from the Trust’s President, Amber Stovall. A board member of the Trust, Charles Crisp, then presented on the organization’s preservation efforts for a historic home at 301 W. College St. Next, Retired State Senator George Hooks presented a framed state flag from the Georgia Capitol Building and gave a brief history of its journey to the possession of the Trust.
Dr. Bragg was introduced to the audience by another Trust board member, Dr. Glenn Robins. Dr. Bragg’s presentation focused on a group of teenage girls who made great waves across the United States in the mid-1880s as they presented their ‘mysterious forces’ to baffle and amuse the public. Americus had the distinct pleasure of welcoming one of these vaudeville stars, Lulu Hurst, in 1884 and 1885. The Americus Times Recorder commented on her looks, meekness, youthfulness, and country girl accent. But Lulu, like other electric girls, designed her performance to put big, strong men down…often literally. This was a visible display of agency and self-autonomy in an age where girls were told to be background characters. Her 1885 performance was even given as a benefit for high school girls to support the development of a local library. These girls may even have looked up to Lulu as an example & guide. Lulu retired that same year, going to Shorter College, an all-girls college at the time, and later wrote a tell-all autobiography in 1897. The biography was made of two parts; first a travel log, then an expose of all the tricks she used in her traveling act.
Dr. Bragg closed out her presentation by reminding the Trust that community history often fails to focus its lens on women and girls. Community history should recall that without these key players, no history could be made at all. Where are the girls?
