He toured with P. T. Barnum as a roustabout,[2] then, in 1885, he partnered with Benjamin Franklin Keith in operating the Bijou Theatre in Boston, Massachusetts.

[1] In 1900, Pat Shea of Buffalo proposed to Keith and Albee that they should set up a shared booking arrangement for vaudeville similar to the Theatrical Syndicate.

They called a meeting in May 1900 in Boston of most of the major vaudeville managers, including Weber & Fields, Tony Pastor, Hyde & Behman of Brooklyn, Kohl & Castle, Colonel J.D.

When performers tried to form a union, he set up National Vaudeville Artists and made membership in it a requirement for booking through his company.

[6] Radio Corporation of America bought his company and formed RKO Pictures ("Radio-Keith-Orpheum") and turned the Orpheum vaudeville circuit into a chain of movie theaters.