Photographers
D. H. Simon Studio
New York, New York

Sitter
Miriam Kressyn, March 4, 1910 - October 28, 1996

Date
unknown

Type
Portrait

Medium
Photograph

Credit Line
Yiddish Theatrical Alliance

Testimony
"She immigrated with her entire family to America and settled in Boston, where she attended a summer school and afterwards high school. She sang in choral classes and attended singing classes ... She won a contest of the best student-singers in the New England Conservatory in Boston, and received a scholarship of five-thousand dollars to travel abroad to study music.

While the actors Julius and Anna Nathanson were appearing in Boston in Freiman’s “Golden Bride," they heard her sing quite by accident. He invited her to join the chorus in his theatre, where she sang a solo in “The Golden Soldier." She stayed on as a member of the chorus. In forthcoming guest roles, she played a serial role (a nurse) with Max Gabel in “Bridal Gown” and afterwards as a young boy in “The Bandit” with Ludwig Satz, and in “Three Brides” with Leon Blank. She had a walk-on in a children’s presentation of ”Shulamis”, but didn’t yet consider this to be her career since she was determined to become a lawyer and was preparing to study at Northeastern University.

In the evenings she continued to sing in the chorus for one season playing incidental roles. She then performed in the “Cabaret Symphony”. She was brought back to Yiddish theatre by Hymie Jacobson, who heard her sing and rehearsed with her, preparing for them to sing together in “Gypsy Duet”. She soon appeared in a more prominent role in Rumshinsky’s ”Get Married”. She traveled around appearing with Aaron Lebedeff and Hymie Jacobson in the Lawndale Theatre, having equal billing with them ..."

Source of Testimony
Zalmen Zylbercweig -- "Lexicon of the Yiddish Theatre," Volume 3, p. 2371, 1959.