Henry E. Dixey

Henry E. Dixey, born Henry E. Dixon on January 6, 1859, in Boston, Massachusetts, was an American actor and theatre producer whose stage career spanned from 1868 to 1926. He died on February 25, 1943, in Atlantic City, New Jersey, following a traffic accident.

Dixey began performing in Boston at the age of nine, joining the variety stock company at the Howard Athenaeum in 1868. The following year, he took on the role of Peanuts in Augustin Daly's play Under the Gaslight at that same venue. His career encompassed burlesques, comedies, and operettas, and he also maintained a magic act under the name Dixey, the Magnificent.

His Broadway career ran from 1895 to 1926 and included appearances in a range of musicals and plays. Among his most notable Broadway credits were the musical Adonis, in which he starred, as well as the plays Thoroughbred and A Tragedy Rehearsed. He also appeared in The Two Orphans, She Stoops to Conquer, and The School for Scandal. The role most closely associated with Dixey was the lead character in the burlesque musical Adonis, which he performed from 1883 to 1885, with occasional tours following that run.

Beyond the stage, Dixey worked in silent films beginning in 1908, when he played the title role in David Garrick. He subsequently appeared in Chelsea 7750 in 1913 and Father and Son in 1916.

On May 19, 1885, Dixey was among a group of gentlemen present when Robert Emmet Odlum, brother of women's rights activist Charlotte Odlum Smith, jumped from the Brooklyn Bridge and was killed. Dixey used his gold stopwatch to record the duration of Odlum's fatal jump, which he timed at three and a half seconds.

Dixey's wife was Marie Nordstrom, who had performed in plays written by her sister Frances Nordstrom. Their daughter was children's publisher Ursula Nordstrom.