Hit-The-Trail Holliday

Hit‐The‐Trail Holliday (1915), a farce by George M. Cohan. [Astor Theatre, 336 perf.] Billy Holliday (Fred Niblo), a celebrated New York barman, comes to a small New England town to help open a new hotel. But when he has a falling‐out with the local liquor magnate, he turns prohibitionist. Billy campaigns so vigorously that he puts the local bars and breweries out of business and even wins the hand of Edith Holden (Katherine La Salle), the minister's daughter. Many saw this play as a spoof of Billy Sunday, the leading evangelist of the day, and no doubt Cohan intended a comparison. But the original story was based on a bookmaker named Peter De Lacey, whose business was shut down after racing‐track interests forced his patrons to bet at the tracks and who then successfully crusaded against the immorality of the tracks, closing them down.