CHAPTER 334

An Act to require the State Library Board to erect at Pungoteague in
Accomack County an historical marker commemorating the first re-
corded public performance of a stage play in the United States.

(H 7]
Approved March 29, 1958

Whereas, the play entitled “The Bear and the Cub” was performed on
August 27, 1665, at the tavern of Thomas Fowkes in Pungoteague in Acco-
mack County; and

Whereas, such performance of “The Bear and the Cub” was the first
recorded public performance of any play within the present boundaries of
the United States; and

Whereas, the historic and cultural significance of this Virginia first
should be appropriately commemorated ; now, therefore,

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1. § 1, The State Library Board is hereby directed to have prepared and
erect prior to January one, nineteen hundred and fifty-nine, in commemor-
ation of the first recorded public performance of a stage play in the United
States, an historical marker in an appropriate location on the highway
nearest the site of the old Fowkes’ Tavern, which later became Cole’s
Tavern, at Pungoteague in Accomack County, the cost of which is not to
exceed one hundred fifty dollars.