Author: Dunlap, William
Biography:
DUNLAP, William (1766-1839: WBIS)
By turns (sometimes simultaneously) painter, businessman, theatre manager, and dramatist, he was born in Perth Amboy NJ, the son of Samuel and Margaret (Sargent) Dunlap. The family moved to New York City in 1777. Though blind in one eye from an accident at school, Dunlap learnt to paint and established himself as a portraitist at the age of sixteen. He was sent to London from 1784 to 1787 to train with Benjamin West but perhaps learnt more about the theatre than about painting in those years. In 1789 he married Elizabeth Woolsey, with whom he had two children. He wrote his first script in 1787. From 1796 to 1805 he was a partner and manager of a professional acting troupe, the American Company. In the course of his life he wrote about seventy plays and adaptations, and was a great advocate for American playwrights. Other literary projects included the founding of a literary magazine, the Monthly Recorder (1812); a biography of Charles Brockden Brown (1815); and a pioneering History of the American Theatre (1832). (ANBO 30 Sept. 2018) HJ