Harry Van Hoven — Vintage Press Agent & Show Business Photograph

Description

Harry Van Hoven (1883–1936) was one of those wonderfully colorful characters who lived behind the scenes of American popular entertainment. A press agent, publicity man and promoter, he worked in New York and Baltimore theater and amusement circles, promoted Carlin’s Park, worked with wrestling impresario Jack Curley and was associated with everything from boxing and vaudeville to publicity for aviator Eddie Rickenbacker. Billboard singled him out as early as 1922 for his extraordinary ability to get stories into Baltimore newspapers, noting that his publicity appeared with a regularity that other press agents could only envy.

And that’s what makes this photograph so much fun: Van Hoven is shown doing the job. Cigarette hanging from his mouth, telephone receiver in hand, papers scattered across the desk and a newspaper propped beside the typewriter, he looks exactly like the old-school press agent he was. Van Hoven later became associated with the great 1920s flagpole-sitting craze through his promotion of “Shipwreck” Kelly, and contemporary accounts show that he spent decades manufacturing attention for entertainers, attractions and spectacles. It’s a battered working photograph of a largely forgotten but fascinating figure from the machinery of American show business.

A terrific original image of an old-school publicity man at work—and a wonderful piece of American entertainment and press history.

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