Choir tour of 100 years ago sounds familiar
(This story was written in celebration of Augustana's sesquicentennial in 2010.)
Great music, a little mischief and stories of 1912 not so different from today
A train connected Rock Island and Chicago in 1912, but it was a slow one. It took the boys of the Wennerberg Chorus of Augustana College six hours to make the trip.
They had an entire car to themselves and their spirits were running high that March day as they set off for a three-week spring concert tour through Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. The chorus was celebrating its 11th anniversary, having been founded in 1901 on the occasion of a memorial concert for Gunnar Wennerberg, a Swedish composer well known and loved in America.
In the May 1912 Augustana Observer, chorus member Sigfrid Blomgren ’12 writes a lively account of the tour. One gets the feeling on the first page that chorus trips probably haven’t changed much in the last century. The boys had nicknames for each other and for their accoutrements, and humor was the rule of the day. Having only 15 minutes to dress for their first concert, they hurriedly climbed into their “bird suits” while Dip couldn’t find his socks, Foxy couldn’t get his collar to stand up straight, and Sam desperately tried to locate a comb to make his unruly hair behave. Poor Foxy had his share of troubles that first concert; he didn’t make it to the stage on time and missed the performance.
Hunger, then as now, was an important consideration. In Cadillac, Mich., the boys had to break up into small groups to get fed in the local restaurants. They drew straws at each establishment to determine who would get to eat at that particular place. The last group of six was so hungry by the time they found a lunch-room that “none of us to this day know what we had.”
Crossing the lake at Ludington presented more adventures. After boarding the steamer and singing some impromptu sea songs, the boys portioned out their sleeping arrangements and then, hungry again, astonished the Irish cook by eating everything laid before them which included, “sliced cold beef to rhubarb sauce, then from catsup to sponge cake, from dry bread to coffee.” The next day, a gale rocked the boat, and the boys experienced their first bout of sea sickness.
Male company was fine, more than fine, but if appealing members of the opposite sex happened along, all the better. When the chorus sang in Ishpeming, Mich., which means “Heaven,” the boys “noticed the superiority in numbers of the fair sex. The name Ishpeming perhaps accounts for this circumstance.”
Aside from two members of the chorus almost getting left behind at the Orphans Home in Mishawaka and the entire group being briefly considered for admittance to the State Insane Asylum in Manistique, they all arrived safely back in Rock Island.
Lest you think that the Wennerberg Chorus neglected the fine points of singing during their grand tour, here is what the Davenport (Iowa) Daily Times wrote about their homecoming concert: “That their singing reached the expectations of all and that they did full justice to the most enviable reputation which they gained during their recent tour of Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan was readily attested by the enthusiastic applause which they received and the numerous encores to which they were compelled to respond.”
Who says talent and skill can’t go hand in hand with having a good time?
— Margi Rogal
Reference Librarian