Tom Shows were stage plays and musicals based on the 1852 novel Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe. The novel depicts the harsh reality of slavery. Due to the weak copyright laws at the time, a number of plays based on the novel were staged.
Even though Uncle Tom's Cabin was the best-selling novel of the 19th century, far more Americans of that time saw the story in a stage play or musical than read the book. Some of these shows were essentially minstrel shows, which utilized caricatures and stereotypes of black people. "Tom shows" were popular in the United States from the 1850s through the early 1900s.
Read more about Tom Shows: The Shows, Productions, Diluting The Message of Stowe's Book, Influence
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