Tribute to Frank Marshall: America's Geppetto

From vaudeville through the advent of television and beyond, America loved puppets and puppeteers. Such memorable characters as Charlie McCarthy, Jerry Mahoney, Danny O'Day, Farfel the Dog, and countless others, gave joy and laughter through good times and bad. No one created more of these "dummies" than Frank Marshall, an early victim of polio who overcame his disability through the art of carving. This essay offers Frank Marshall's biography and includes Marshall's own 1931 catalog of puppets, seldom seen by the public, providing a unique insight into this artist and his unparalleled work.