The Shadow of Giants
1990 · Morgan County Courthouse, Jacksonville, Illinois
The Shadow of Giants (© 1990) is a history play by Ken Bradbury and Robert L. Crowe. It is an immersive courtroom drama: the audience gathers in the hallway of the Morgan County Courthouse as a banjo player performs and a newsboy hands out copies of The Morgan Journal (which double as the program), then files into the courtroom to watch a trial unfold in Jacksonville, Illinois, in March of 1854.
At the heart of the case stands Abraham Lincoln, brought in from Springfield for the defense in the real battery suit Selby v. Dunlap before Judge David A. Woodson. Newspaper editor Paul Selby has sued the wealthy Colonel James Dunlap for $10,000 after Dunlap beat him with a walking stick. As Lincoln cross-examines the witnesses, reporter Collin Stewart narrates the history of the town's "giants." Between courtroom scenes, Lincoln befriends two local boys, Freddy and Willy Viera, teaching them that real giants grow where there is room to grow — that they are standing "in the shadows of giants." The jury finds for Selby but awards only $300 of the $10,000 sought.
The show is laced with period folk and gospel music — Amazing Grace, Shenandoah, Dueling Banjos, Down Yonder, and dozens more — performed before the show, between scenes, and through intermission.
Songs
The two surviving "Songlist" cue sheets are period folk and gospel numbers, played live (banjo and harmonica) before the show and at intermission.
Pre-Show
- Do Lord (mainly in G)
- Cotton Fields
- You Get a Line
- Amazing Grace
- Sunshine
- I Saw the Light
- Sweet Bye & Bye (alt. songlist: "Dance with Angels")
- Power in the Blood
- Victory
- When the Saints Go Marching In
- Will the Circle Be Unbroken (one songlist adds "Daddy")
- Dueling Banjos (period banjo number)
- Foggy Mountain Breakdown (period banjo number)
- Bill Bailey
- Tom Dooley
- Kum Ba Yah
- Ghost Riders (alt songlist)
- Tell Me Why
- Coming Round the Mountain
- Shall We Gather at the River
- This Land Is Your Land
- Railroad
- Riverside (top of one songlist)
To begin Act I
- Oh, Susanna (harmonica)
- Cotton Fields (reprise)
Intermission
- Down Yonder
- Waiting for the Robert E. Lee
- Darktown Strutters' Ball
- Shenandoah
- Camptown Races
- Too-Ra-Loo-Ra-Loo-Ral (Irish Lullaby)
- Church in the Wildwood
- Alabama Jubilee
- Beer Barrel Polka
- Liechtensteiner Polka
- Red Wing
- Baby Face (alt songlist)
- As the Deer (alt songlist)
- Mansion Over the Hilltop
- When Irish Eyes Are Smiling
- Five Foot Two (one songlist only)
Cast
The cast below is the character/role list drawn from the script, exactly as the script gives them. One named performer survives in the archive: Judith Beiderbecke, a well-known Jacksonville-area actress, appeared in The Shadow of Giants (Ridge bios journal).
- Collin Stewart — reporter / narrator, Chicago Tribune
- Abraham Lincoln
- Judge David A. Woodson
- Edgar Simmons — bailiff
- Colonel James Dunlap — defendant
- Paul Selby — plaintiff, editor of the Morgan Journal
- Freddy
- Willy Viera
- Lizzy
- David Smith — attorney for the plaintiff
- General Murray McConnel — attorney for the plaintiff
- J.L. McConnel — attorney for the defense
- William Brown — attorney for the defense
- Joel Catlin — witness
- Dr. Samuel Adams — witness
- Rogers — court clerk
- Newton Bateman
- William H. Herndon
- Foreman of the jury
- 1st Juror
- 2nd Juror
Production Notes
- Title page: "THE SHADOW OF GIANTS — © 1990 by Ken Bradbury & Robert L. Crowe."
- An original historical courtroom drama dramatizing the real 1854 Morgan County case Selby v. Dunlap, set in the Morgan County Courthouse, Jacksonville, Illinois, in March 1854.
- Site-specific, immersive staging: the play opens in the courthouse hallway with the audience as the crowd; a newsboy hands out copies of The Morgan Journal that are actually the printed program (with the program on page two).
- A banjo player performs in the hallway from 20 minutes before curtain; banjo and folk/gospel music accompany the pre-show, intermission, and the audience's movement between the hallway and the courtroom.
- Structure: Act I, Scene 1 (Courthouse Hallway), Act I, Scene 2 (Courtroom), intermission, Act II (Courtroom).
- Director: the semi-annual production of the Bradbury–Crowe play at the Morgan County Courthouse was directed by Sylvia Burke (Ridge bios journal).
- Honor: the play won the Lincoln Library Award for Drama (Bradbury & Dr. Robert Crowe); Paul Findley's article describes it as "the Lincoln Courtroom Drama."
- Broadcast: The Shadow of Giants aired on the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) in 1994. The Foundation archive holds reel 1 of the two-reel television broadcast master — slated "shadow of giants, reel 1 of 2" for the west-central Illinois public television stations WMEC/WQEC/WSEC, produced by Scott Mulford and presented by The Heritage Cultural Center, under the on-air title The Shadow of Giants: Mr Lincoln Comes to Jacksonville. The telecast was underwritten by Jacksonville-area sponsors including Cannell & Associates, Gordon Implement Company (Deere Power), A.G. Edwards & Sons, FANCO, and GTE.
- Documented run: Ken's journal records two performances of The Shadow of Giants in Jacksonville on April 3, 2004, with Ken and "Chuck" hanging and focusing the lights between the two shows.
- The full production cast (actor names) is still being recovered for the archive; aside from Judith Beiderbecke, the names of the performers are not yet documented. A recording survives and is preserved above.