1894 by Edward Drobinski - HTML preview
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Page 93
did not attract much attendance, and lost money for Anson. In the fall of 1908, Anson assembled a semi-pro football team, also called Anson's Colts. Although the football team won the city championship, they were not a financial success.
Anson's few successful ventures included a combination billiards hall and a bowling alley he opened in downtown Chicago in 1899.
Anson was named vice president of the American Bowling Congress in 1903, and led a team to the five man national championship in 1904. Anson was forced to sell the billiards hall in 1909 when faced with mounting financial problems that led to his bankruptcy. Anson was also an avid golfer.
Anson began acting during his baseball career. In 1888, he made his stage debut with a single appearance in Hoyt's play “A Parlor Match” at the Theatre Comique in Harlem. He also played himself in an 1895 Broadway play called “The Runaway Colt,”
written to take advantage of his fame. Later, Anson began touring on the vaudeville circuit, a common practice for athletes of the time, which lasted up until about a year before his death.
He first appeared in vaudeville in 1913 doing a monologue and a short dance. In 1914, George M. Cohan wrote a monologue for him, and in 1917, Cohan, with Chicago Tribune sportswriter Ring