Ralph E. Williams could have handled jazz too!

Dad is in couple second from left. My, who is his date for the formal affair?

"Definitely tops," we see at the top of a billing for the Leroy Ellickson dance orchestra. The orchestra had instrumentation much like a modern day jazz band. We see Ralph E. Williams with his trumpet. The photo makes me wonder if he could have incorporated some jazz into UMM's early chapters of music. It was taken in the 1930s at the University of Minnesota.
Williams organized several dimensions of exciting music in UMM's early years. The college scene probably wasn't ready for serious jazz. The term seemed to suggest, well, not the most dignified artistic environment. We remember the scene in "The Glenn Miller Story" before the man got famous, when he and his squeeze visit a rather raucous nightclub where Louis Armstrong is performing. Artistic? Well yes, to the max. But the serious adherents of college-level music would be averse.
Even when the situation started changing, the word "jazz" was largely avoided. Morris High School with director John Woell had its "stage band." Eventually such groups unabashedly embraced "jazz," and today we have jazz band concerts at our high schools. UMM got its toe in the water with jazz in the late '70s. Finally with the triumphant return of James Carlson, who had taken the Seattle trip with my father's choir in 1962, we had quite the ambitious jazz program. The stature grew.
Carlson's UMM Jazz Festival took on fabled proportions, perhaps even to the extent of causing jealousy on campus. Ahem, my perception only. Today the Jazz Festival lives on although it's scaled back. We haven't seen much of Carlson over the recent past. I always called him Jim rather than the more popular "Doc."

Ralph Williams flashed his trumpet with "Swifty" Ellickson one night when Glenn Miller was in the neighborhood. The Ellickson orchestra was playing at a U of M "Sunlite" dance. Cedric Adams wrote that "a tall, dark and handsome chap" made his way into the room: the iconic Glenn Miller, eventually to be played by Jimmy Stewart in the movie. Glenn's "squeeze" was played by June Allyson, remember? (Harry Morgan was the piano player.)

U of M musicians, 1937 - Dad at second from right in standing row.

My father Ralph recalled getting a chance to talk with Miller. Miller's orchestra was playing at the Nicollet Hotel. Miller would unfortunately not survive World War II. Some mystery accompanied his death. The most accepted theory, weighed against some rather exotic ones - heart attack in a Paris brothel? - is that the small plane he was in was destroyed by planes discarding bombs. It was over the English Channel under foggy conditions. The movie just shows Stewart waving with a smile through the plane window just before takeoff.
 
All dolled up at the U!
Note the photo at the top of this post, a rarity where Dad's romantic interest is someone other than future wife Martha! Oh my. The occasion is the 1938 University of Minnesota Junior Ball. The quite formal event - note the corsages - was at the Lowry Hotel in St. Paul. It is hard for me or any long-time friends or family, to be sure, to internalize Dad with someone other than Martha. But, maybe people older than me wouldn't be so surprised.
I would know nothing of what happened before the 1950s! Looks like a very nice young lady who is with Dad. Would love to know her name and background. The scrapbook also includes a press photo of this event where Dad is visible.
We have a postcard that Dad sent to his mother Carrie in 1937 from Ann Arbor, Michigan. Carrie was a widow, having lost her husband Martin in 1933 to cancer. Dad graduated from Glenwood High School in 1934. He earned money for his U of M experience by working summers at Glacier National Park. He picked up the nickname "Tex" there. He spent considerable time on horseback during the day. At night he donned formal attire to ply his musicianship.
Dad's scrapbook includes a mass photo of "University of Minnesota bands" for Homecoming, October 26 of 1935. All this vitality belied how the U.S. had fallen into the grips of the Great Depression. John Dillinger had his heyday in this time period. My father gained attitudes typical of those who endured the Depression - valuing every nickel, never discarding anything.
The U of M band director was Gerald R. Prescott. I see a concert program from January 26, 1939, where Dad's name is in the trumpet section. Here's a letter to the editor from an Evanston IL resident: "I would like to congratulate the Minnesota band on the splendid sportsmanship it displayed at the Minnesota-Northwestern game by playing the Northwestern song at the end of the game. As a Northwestern alumnus I appreciated this 'good sportsman' gesture and I am sure my feelings are shared by all other Northwestern men who were at the game." (I should have "persons" in parenthesis.)
 

This must be Winston Jewson, drum major

Newspaper likens musicians to the gridders
Oh my, I have come to a page in this treasured scrapbook where I can fold out a full-page newspaper spread. It's on the University of Minnesota marching band and its hard work. "Football practice you seldom hear about," the headline for the spread reads. Underneath: "When the U of M band leads fans through school songs and cheers, and shags itself into designs on the football field at Memorial Stadium, one doesn't think about the long hours of preparation those fellows go through."
A large photo at the top was taken on game day: musicians in a big formation (looks like a star). The drum major in his resplendent white is in the middle. The photo you see at right here shows the drum major during the Ann Arbor trip in 1937. According to U of M band history online, we discover that this individual is almost certainly Winston Jewson. It's probably 99 percent.
The photos appear to be taken on Dad's camera. Like Dad, Winston lived to a very advanced age. This I discovered through an online obituary. Dad made it to 96 and Mr. Jewson to over 100! Both relished life throughout, I'm sure. Their musical zest no doubt contributed to longevity!
A photo at the bottom of the newspaper page shows the band in "the old pine tree formation." There's an "action" photo of director Prescott shouting out some instructions.
"Each afternoon the band goes down by the river where a field has been chalked off like a football field. That's where they work out their drills."
 
The macro picture was grim
The world events of the time had developments just as significant as the U.S. Depression. I turn over this feature spread and see on the other side, coverage of the Nazi ascendance. America was uncertain how or if the world conflict was going to draw us in. There is a large photo headlined "Goose stepping into Sudeten Land." More description: "Hitler's army of occupation marches into Rumberg, a Czechoslovakian city in the Sudeten area acquired by Germany under the terms of the Munich four-power agreement."

Dad at center assists in "initiation" for the band trip!

We see many of the town's citizens give the Nazi salute - eerie to see now. It foretold so much conflict, conflict that would draw my father as a U.S. Navy lieutenant into the Pacific theater. There the foe was the "Japs" as they were called with a term infused with prejudice. We heard them called "nips" in the "McHale's Navy" TV series. It's why re-runs are rare. The Germans? Well I suppose it was "Krauts."
I remember when Dad died and his obit appeared, our neighbor Lyle Rambow called and said "man, he did a lot of things." Well, his generation was certainly called upon. My generation? Well, we listened to Paul Revere and the Raiders. Seriously, I think my parents envisioned me as some sort of musical wellspring but no, I scratched the surface only, despite one or two things on my resume that might look good.
I started out on the French horn where I was surprised to discover it was a girls instrument? Why? Still seems strange. Del Sarlette must have smiled when he emailed a photo from long ago: me with all girls beside me with French horns. I played trumpet in marching band and was able to "morph" into trumpet, Dad's "ax." But I was nothing like him. I could pretend I was good under the right circumstances, that's all. I would have been better off never having been given that opportunity. I should have signed up for choir and just tried for 'C' grades. It would have been a blessing not to have to lug an instrument around. Del scanned all the photos you see with this post. Del's father Walt played bass fiddle in the original UMM orchestra. All the photos are priceless.
 
Video from the 1930s
I found a YouTube posting that appears to show the 1937 University of Minnesota marching band at a game, lasts only 12 seconds. Dad would be in there somewhere. Here's the link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=159eTHzXOgQ

How we remember Ralph E. Williams in Morris MN

The best was yet to come, yes
Dad would come to our "jewel in the crown" University of Minnesota-Morris, for the institution's first year in 1960-61. We were "the little engine that could" here in Motown, on the prairie. "Fresh air!" Eddie Albert would say (in the opening to TV's "Green Acres").
Dad was the only music faculty in the institution's first year. What could be more exciting than to launch this endeavor? I was six years old. Miss Feigum's kindergarten class. On day 1, I paused and hesitated outside the school building, scared to go in. My parents had to prod me. I have shown similar fear considering asking a woman on a date. My father must have done it for the gala Junior Ball at the U of M. And, with a woman other than Martha if that can be conceived. Again, how wonderful it would be to know that young lady's name and hometown.
We mustn't let all these memories disappear into the sands of time. I wish I could to back in time and try to persuade Dad that it would be "hip" to start some sort of jazz ensemble in the '60s! Remember one of the "Back to the Future" movies where the Michael J. Fox character renders rock 'n' roll before the genre's time had come? The crowd of young people was restrained, apparently puzzled, and the Fox character said something like "you'll really go for this someday."
Maybe the audience at Edson Auditorium here would have reacted the same way to Ellickson's stage band music. But I love to close my eyes and imagine. Jim Carlson struck when the iron was hot in 1978. My father got involved in seemingly everything but jazz. 1960-61 was a dream come true for a lifetime music practitioner and educator. Me? Well, as Alex Karras said in "Blazing Saddles": "Mongo just pawn in game of life."
- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com