17 Facts About DeWolf Hopper

William DeWolf Hopper was an American actor, singer, comedian, and theatrical producer.

DeWolf Hopper's father was a wealthy Quaker lawyer and his mother came from a noted Colonial family.

DeWolf Hopper's paternal grandfather Isaac Hopper was a Philadelphia Quaker, and conductor of the Philadelphia station of the Underground Railroad.

DeWolf Hopper was called Willie as a child, and then Will or Wolfie, but when he set out on an acting career he chose his more distinguished middle name as his stage name.

DeWolf Hopper made his stage debut in New Haven, Connecticut, October 2,1878.

DeWolf Hopper had a loud bass singing voice and made his mark in musicals, beginning in Harrigan and Hart's company.

DeWolf Hopper achieved the status of leading man in The Black Hussar and appeared in the hit Erminie in 1887.

DeWolf Hopper helped make the comic poem famous and was often called upon to give his colorful, melodramatic recitation, which he did about 10,000 times in his booming voice, reciting it during performances and as part of curtain calls, and on radio.

DeWolf Hopper released a recorded version on phonograph record in 1906, and recited the poem in a short film made in the Phonofilm sound-on-film process in 1923.

In 1889, DeWolf Hopper became founding president of the Actors' Amateur Athletic Association of America.

DeWolf Hopper always was a baseball crank, long before the public knew anything about it.

Bald from childhood, DeWolf Hopper wore wigs both on and offstage.

DeWolf Hopper appeared in several silent motion pictures, two examples being Don Quixote and Casey at the Bat.

DeWolf Hopper appeared in a few short sound films, including one in 1923 when he actually recites Casey at the Bat in an experimental sound film produced by Lee De Forest's Phonofilm process.

DeWolf Hopper made a Broadway appearance in White Lilacs.

DeWolf Hopper then did Radio City Music Hall Inaugural, and played Dr Gustave Ziska in The Monster.

DeWolf Hopper's funeral was at the Little Church Around the Corner, in New York City.