Background
George Handel Hill was born on October 8, 1809 in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. He was the son of Ureli K. Hill, a Boston musician, and his wife, Nancy Hull. His brother was Ureli Corelli Hill.
George Handel Hill was born on October 8, 1809 in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. He was the son of Ureli K. Hill, a Boston musician, and his wife, Nancy Hull. His brother was Ureli Corelli Hill.
Hill obtained his schooling principally at Bristol Academy, Taunton, Massachussets.
At the age of fifteen Hill ran off to New York and found employment in a jeweler's shop. Soon he was serving as a super in a nearby theatre, and when in 1825 he saw Alexander Simpson in a Yankee role, his future specialty was determined. He made his initial appearance as a "Down-East" interpreter in an entertainment of songs and stories at Brooklyn in 1826. Following this he obtained his first regular position, that of low comedian with a strolling company, which gave him little opportunity to develop his chosen line.
After giving entertainments at Buffalo and New York, and playing at Charleston and Savannah, he was engaged as a minor actor by the Arch Street Theatre, Philadelphia, in 1832. Here he was given his first real chance to delineate a Yankee character, and he leaped to stardom almost over night. Brief runs at Baltimore and Boston preceded his appearance on November 14, 1832, at the Park Theatre, New York, the leading playhouse of America.
He was now in demand for starring engagements all over the United States, and "Yankee" Hill soon became one of the most popular comedians in the country. Naturally he had a host of imitators and was the inspiration of numerous Yankee plays. He spent the season of 1836-1837 in Great Britain, scoring a distinct hit at Drury Lane, London, and the other principal theatres of the United Kingdom.
A year later he was again abroad, acting in Great Britain and giving two Yankee entertainments in Paris. In 1840 Hill leased the Franklin Theatre, New York, and, naming it Hill's Theatre, exploited himself in his favorite parts for one short and unprofitable season. Two years later, when he opened Peale's Museum as Hill's New York Museum and gave programs of Yankee readings and lectures, he met with another failure.
About 1846 he took up the practice of dentistry in New York, thus putting to use a course in surgery which he had pursued some years before. Having purchased a country residence at Batavia, New York, he lived there from 1847 on, filling such engagements as his health, ruined, it is said, by dissipation, would permit. On August 20, 1849, although seriously ill, he gave an entertainment at Saratoga Springs, and there he died a few weeks later.
Hill was a man of few gifts and of limited mentality.
In 1828, at the cost of a promise to forsake the stage, Hill married Cordelia Thompson of Leroy, New York, but when he proved a failure as a country storekeeper, he was released from his promise and returned to his profession at Albany.
