The International Puppetry Museum (IPM),formally The Conservatory of Puppetry Arts (COPA) is dedicated to promote, to preserve and to advance the international art of puppetry. supports and enriches the diverse communities of Southern California through outreach programs that blend performance, exhibitions and education.
A main objective of IPM is to insure the preservation of the Alan Cook collection. We are in negotiations with a major museum in Southern California as a permanent home for the most representative puppets as
well as the library of book. IPM volunteers are diligently working on photographing the puppets and cataloguing them.The books and ephemera are being catalogued as well.
INTERNATIONAL PUPPETRY MUSEUM formerly The Conservatory of Puppetry Arts (COPA)
1062 N. Fair Oaks Avenue - Pasadena, CA 91103
phone - fax: 626-296-1536 Note this Website is Under Development and is a revision of www.COPA-Puppets.org
The company was organized in Detroit in 1922 by William Duncan and Edward Mabley. They met during high school. They discovered a mutual interest in the theater and puppetry. In 1923, The King of the Golden River was produced. Catherine Reighard dramatized many of the early plays for marionettes. Her book, Plays for People and Puppets, which was published in1928, included five plays; Jack and the Beanstalk, TheKing of the Golden River, Rumplestiltskin, Pierre Patilin and Aladdin.
Among the puppets represented in this IPM collection are characters from; Peer Gynt, (which contained 44 marionettes and 11 scenes. It was the most ambitious puppet production in the annals of American puppetry). The Wizard of Oz, built in 1940 for General Electric at the New York World’s Fair. Mrs. Cinderlla also built for G.E. Also in the IPM collection are puppets from the 1930 production of The Glowing Bird, written by Edward Mabley. a number of marionettes from the 1931 production of Legend of the Lightning and the 1936 production of The Taming of the Shrew. There are also puppets from She Stoops to Conquer and Ferdinand the Bull.
