Allan Walzak takes a step back into the AK region 100 years ago: Imagine the only way you know something about the outside world was by newspaper or from a book or magazine. What did you do for entertainment? You jumped on a trolley or bus to go somewhere, played parlor games, or had friends over to play piano. Or, [instead] you could go see professional entertainment; and that was Vaudeville. Now keep this in mind: the Three Stooges came out of Vaudeville. That fact alone makes anything about Vaudeville of Utmost National Importance!

Allan Walzak is President of Vandergrift's Casino Theatre and Restoration Management (CTRM.) The group has nothing to do with casinos or gambling, but they are betting the hand dealt them--the Casino Theatre's rich Vaudeville history--is an ace in the hole that will lead to a full house. The Casino Theatre, historic Vandergrift's cultural centerpiece, is expanding to include, "The American Vaudeville Museum andTheatre." Movies, television and radio came directly from Vaudeville, as performers cut their teeth there then later worked in these fields as the technology matured. Vaudeville entertainment was birthed at the close of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th. Think about it:

There is no TV. No video games. No cable. No MP3s. No computers. No radio. Silent movies are just about to start appearing. "Talkies" will not appear until the 1920s. America is slowly becoming more affluent. There is a little more leisure, a little more time, and maybe, just maybe a little more cash to spend on this new thing called entertainment. But it was rare you had time and weren't working, and rare you had the cash, and even rarer you had both. But when that happened, you went down to the local theater and saw the shows made for the common man. But the common man had lots of different tastes: song, dance, poetry, comedy, drama, music, magicians, speeches, cowboys and the occasional goofy routine—like the Three Stooges.

Vaudeville answered that. Allan Walzak says, "Vaudeville meant variety and that you weren't going to be sitting and watching something more than 7-10 minutes before something new came on…They even had the 'hook' [to pull acts off the stage] when the act was no good and the audience got bored!" Sounds like an early, primitive remote… But Vaudeville was more than just acts. It was atmosphere. "It was nice lighting effects, comfortable seating, and a place you saw your friends and a good social place, a thing of belonging," says Walzak. "Vaudeville filled all those things."

It certainly has filled the past 100-plus colorful years of the Casino Theatre's history, with performers like world-boxing champion Bob Fitsimmons, Willliam Jennings Bryan (of the Scope Monkey Trial), composer Hoagy Carmichael, the Lone Ranger, Tex Ritter, President William H. Taft (when he was on the Supreme Court,) the Three Stooges. And most recently, Mickey Rooney and Maynard Ferguson dropped by for a visit.

"The American Vaudeville Museum and Theatre" at the Casino Theatre envisions reflecting those days both in exhibits in their own museum rooms as well as throughout a real, live, working Vaudeville-era theater. Volunteers have transformed the theater itself into a beautiful piece of living history after more than 10 years of renovation and constant hard work. One elegant box seat inside the theater is restored while another is nearly 40 percent restored, down to the historically-correct plaster flourishes.

Walzak and other volunteers have been giving tours for a while. "I do probably a couple a week. It might be for individuals or groups--we've had groups come back for reunions and staged things for them. If people want tours, we can arrange tours with one of our trained volunteers," he says. "This [the theater and stage] is really where it happened. People can come and stand on the same boards, see where audiences sat all dressed up, actors dressed in real vintage vaudeville-era dressing rooms, and pill-box hated bellhops used to say, 'Please remove your hats ladies' [so people behind could see.]" Wow… Imagine standing where the Three Stooges stood!

With Vandergrift Borough recently moving their offices out of the Casino Theatre complex--after over 100 years--room has opened up for the new American Vaudeville Museum. Currently, work is concentrating on remodeling the Borough Secretary's former offices. The Vaudeville Museum's artifacts from the period are likely to be on display here, though Walzak says there is still a lot of planning going on.

"The immediate goals are to collect items pertaining to Vaudeville. We have an open invitation to people who have items they could donate like props, the clothes they wore, photos (signed or unsigned), books or resources. They may find it good to have what 'Uncle Charlie' did in the 1890s thru the 1920s, his 'cane dance' [for example] on display in a museum." Allan also says CTRM is looking for people who have stories about the Vaudeville era, even stories their grandma told them. The stories will be video taped or put into writing, or both.

If you have information to contribute to the American Vaudeville Museum and Theatre at the Casino Theatre in Vandergrift, you may reach them by phone at 724-568-5000 or by mail at: Casino Theatre Restoration and Management, PO Box 202, Vandergrift, PA 15690. It is located at 145 Lincoln Avenue in Vandergrift. Find them on the web at http://www.casinotheatre.org and be sure to get your tickets for all-time Jazz Great Maynard Ferguson on April 12th, in his second trip to the Casino Theatre.

And be sure to join us on the web at http://www.alle-kiskitoday.com/webcasts/1691 , coming in just a few days, and watch this month's Our Local Heritage program: an online video tour of the Casino Theatre. I can't guarantee the Three Stooges but I'll be there… Nyuk nyuk nyuk

The Stage: Think about who has been here at the Casino in the past century

The American Vaudeville Museum At The Casino Theatre In Vandergrift

Everything is elegant here, even the Ladies Lounge

A finished box seat, one of two

Part of the front lobby

The balcony is magnificently restored

Another view of the Ladies' Lounge

Theatre seats in the balcony relect the care given to the smallest details

Another view of the American Vaudeville Theatre at the Casino Theatre in Vandergrift

The original electric panel behind the stage, which still worked shortly before renovations began

Even the walls in the balcony are exqusite and well-thought out