Includes: Over 7000 pieces of correspondence, photographs, programs, and printed ephemera from the 1940s to present, housed in 7 bankers boxes. With carbon copies and originals of correspondence from public relations firms, programs for shows, and photographs and negatives of publicity and performance photographs. * 13 scrapbooks, which include 10 large scrapbooks (17x14"), bound in black cloth. Each with approximately 75-100 leaves with materials mounted to them such as Opera programs, newspaper clippings, photographs, telegrams, and magazine covers. * 4 photograph albums and 1 three-ring binder housing dozens of black and white photographs each. * Hundreds of loose photographs of Thebom, including several turn-of-the-century early family photographs. * 11 certificates framed for display, including many signed by important dignitaries. * Shoebox housing hundreds of family correspondence to Thebom. * An autograph album bound in leather, which contains autographs of famous entertainers, such as: Kirsten Flagstad (1938); Jeanette MacDonald (1938); Bing Crosby (1938); Irene Dunne (1938); Efrem Zimbalist (1937); Alvin Gibbs (1939); Marian Anderson (1939); and many more. * 2 carrying cases (the size of bankers boxes) full of 35 mm. slides. * Approximately a dozen miscellaneous audio tapes. * Many more miscellaneous items.
A lifelong archive of one of the great operatic mezzo-sopranos of the postwar era, pertaining mostly to her professional career as an opera singer and director. Blanche Thebom was raised in Canton, Ohio where as a youngster she sang in the church choir and occasionally during her college and early working years. In 1938, while traveling with her parents by ship to Sweden, she was heard in an on-board concert by an accompanist to Marian Anderson who urged her to study opera. Thebom then studied with famed mezzo soprano Edyth Walker who traced her singing technique directly back to Manuel Garcia and Maria Malibran. She was soon discovered by impresario Sol Hurok who urged her to sing professionally where she debuted with the Metropolitan Opera in 1944. She sang with the Met for 22 years in 356 performances, in 28 roles in 27 works. Her Blanch Thebom Foundation helped launch the careers of many young opera singers, and she was called upon to judge auditions for the Met. Thebom was the first American to sing at the Bolshoi Opera in the USSR in 1957, where "there were so many ovations that I couldn't count them", and made many tours to sing abroad under U.S. State Department sponsorship. Ms. Thebom was associated with the Institute of International Education which administered the Fulbright Scholarships, serving on its board, and heading the Music & Arts Committee. Ms. Thebom sang with every major opera company throughout Europe, South and Central America and has always been known as one of the greatest singing actresses in the history of opera. The beautiful mezzo-soprano was the only American artist to sing before Queen Elizabeth II during her Majesty's U.S. visit and Sweden's Queen Louise presented her with one of that country's highest decorations, the Order of Vasa. In addition to her operatic performances and tours, Ms. Thebom appeared as a soloist with 3 major orchestras in Carnegie Hall, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Symphony of the Air and the New York Philharmonic. When she sang in the first concert ever presented in Asuncion, Paraguay, the militia had to be called out to keep order until she announced that she would repeat the program for those who were not able to gain admittance to the first concert. After retiring Blanche Thebom moved to Atlanta and became the director of the Southern Regional Opera. She subsequently spent the last years of her life in San Francisco where she was involved with many aspects of the San Francisco Opera and it's young student singers. Thebom was also noted for her beautiful hair, the tresses of which stretched to 6 feet. On October 23, 2010 in New York, Bonham's will have offered at auction her fabulous collection of fine jewelry. This vast archive of material which she carefully kept, chronicles the life of Blanche Thebom with early family material, as a young girl and student and follows her singing career from its beginning to her later life in San Francisco.