H1 – The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog

H2 – The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog

H3 – The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog

H4 – The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog

H5 – The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog

H6 – The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog

Two Union soldiers during the Civil War are each fleeing past lives: Toliver Holmes is a fugitive slave, and Sarah Rosetta Wakeman is disguised as a man to get away from family discord. These two main characters’ theorized experiences are told in Toliver & Wakeman, an original play by Assistant Professor of Theater Kyle Bass. The play premiered in 2022 at Franklin Stage Company (Franklin, N.Y.) and was presented at Brehmer Theater during family weekend in October.

Following the success of Bass’ Possessing Harriet (2018) — a production set in Peterboro, N.Y., portraying the escape of an enslaved woman — the Franklin Stage Company commissioned Toliver & Wakeman with funding from a New York State Council on the Arts Support for Artists Grant.

My family is very connected to upstate New York, and the area is rich in histories, including those of abolition and, relatedly, slavery,

Kyle Bass, assistant professor of theater

“My family is very connected to upstate New York, and the area is rich in histories, including those of abolition and, relatedly, slavery,” says Bass, whose course offerings in the fall semester featured CORE C186: Black Upstate New York.

Olivia Larson ’25 as Sarah Wakeman and Donovan Stanfield as Toliver Holmes
Toliver, a character inspired by Bass’ great-great-grandfather, flees to New York and changes his name to avoid capture. When he is later mustered into the Union Army’s 26th Regiment of Colored Troops, his wit and thoughtfulness distinguish his character.

Wakeman, on the other hand, is a young white woman born in rural upstate New York. She disguises herself as a man to flee family discord, enlisting into the Union Army as Lyons Wakeman.

“My family is very connected to upstate New York, and the area is rich in histories, including those of abolition and, relatedly, slavery,” says Bass, whose course offerings in the fall semester featured CORE C186: Black Upstate New York.

Though these two real people never met, Bass’ play brings them together in conversation. “To position a once-enslaved — now Union soldier — Black man with a white woman who is disguising herself as a man to join the Army gives us a picture of America, the image that it’s a country of many stories,” says Bass.

After the performance, there was a talkback about the play with Bass and Diane Ciccone ’74, who is Bass’ second cousin. “In the ’90s, she privately published a book about the history of our family that was the bedrock of my research,” says Bass, who lectured alongside Ciccone at Yale University’s Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery in 2022 to discuss historic and dramatic interpretations of their family knowledge.