ON DECEMBER 4, 1956 CARL PERKINS, WHO HAD A BIG HIT WITH HIS SONG “BLUE SUEDE SHOES” WAS RECORDING SOME NEW SONGS AT SUN RECORDS IN MEMPHIS, TN. SAM PHILLIPS, THE LEGENDARY FOUNDER OF SUN RECORDS WANTED TO FATTEN UP THE INSTRUMENTATION ON THE SESSION AND SO HE BROUGHT IN A YOUNG MUSICIAN THAT HE HAD JUST SIGNED TO PLAY PIANO. HIS NAME WAS JERRY LEE LEWIS.

P2 P3 TRAVELING WITH ALLEN LAMERS - 72 YEARS & COUNTING! P5 FLAME OF

FRIENDSHIP PARTY PICS

SEASON | YEAR

Women’s HealthC L I N I C

A N E W S L E T T E R D E D I C AT E D T O G R O U P S , O R G A N I Z AT I O N S A N D F R I E N D S O F T H E F I R E S I D E T H E AT R E

“Everybody loves the music of these great artists but the show also reveals a compelling human story about success, loyalty, and the challenge of making life choices.” – Ed Flesch

MAY 2016

SAM PHILLIPS’ INFLUENCE ON ELVIS P7 AN ELEGANT

AUTUMN SOIRÉE!

Johnny, Jerry Lee, Carl AND Elvis!

Yes, THE Jerry Lee Lewis. He was virtually unknown outside of Memphis at the time. Sometime in the afternoon a former Sun records artist named Elvis Presley stopped by with his girlfriend to visit Phillips. He came into the studio to chat with Perkins and before you knew it Perkins, Presley, and Lewis started singing songs they all knew. They were joined by Johnny Cash, who also recorded for Sun, and had come by earlier to listen to the Perkins recording session. As the four of them talked and sang the recording engineer, Jack Clement, decided that he’d better record the jam session.

Phillips quickly called up the entertainment editor of the Memphis Press-Scimitar who came over with a photographer. Next day he wrote an article about the session under the headline “The Million Dollar Quartet”.

The tapes sat around for years after Sun Records was sold in 1969. They were

rediscovered in 1981 and released in Britain and the legend was born.

In 2007 Floyd Mutrix and Colin Escott wrote a stage musical based on the famous recording session. It’s played in Chicago, on Broadway, in the West End in London, and enjoyed a wildly successful National Tour that ran for a number of years.

Now we get the chance to present this unique, one of a kind musical at The Fireside and I’m really excited. Everybody loves the music of these great artists but the show also reveals a compelling human story about success, loyalty, and the challenge of making life choices. I am putting together a great cast who will sing and play their own music as they bring to life these giants of entertainment. You really don’t want to miss this production which, in its own way, will become as exciting and memorable as the original jam session.

It’s no wonder Sam Phillips became known as the “Father of Rock ‘n’ Roll” after discovering the talents of both Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. Trained as a DJ and a sound engineer he opened his own studio in 1950. His recording company, Sun Records, produced more rock ‘n’ roll records than any other record label of its time.In his simple, one-room studio, Phillips looked for innovation, not imitation. He encouraged

his young artists to experiment with their personal style. Here’s some early advice he gave to Elvis Presley,

“Elvis, son, I don’t record singers, I record souls. I can tell without askin’ you’re up from Mississippi. I can tell you and your folks are good people, but you ain’t never had nothing. I can tell the other kids looked down on you. Look me in the eye boy . . . can you play that git-tar and let me hear some a’ THAT? I wanna hear your soul boy.”

Sam Phillips was actually looking for an artist that could popularize the negro music to the white population. When he had Elvis record “That’s All Right” he knew he’d found his man. Later that year, however,

with his studio in danger of running out of money Phillips sold Elvis’ contract to RCA. Over the next year Elvis’ career took off with songs like “Heartbreak Hotel,”

TV appearances including the Ed Sullivan Show, and his first movie, “Love Me Tender.” In an era when milk cost 97 cents a gallon and gas was 22 cents, Elvis Presley had sold $120,000,000 worth of records and merchandise by 1960. To say he was “popular” hardly says enough.

You’ll hear more of Elvis’ story as well as Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee Lewis who make up the rest of the Million Dollar Quartet. That one night in Memphis was the four legends-to-be only performance together; a cultural flashpoint that captured the birth of rock ‘n’ roll and has come to be known as one of the greatest rock jam sessions of all time. Join us this fall as we recreate it just for you!

MILLION DOLLAR QUARTET CAPTURES THE INFECTIOUS SPIRIT, FREEWHEELING EXCITEMENT, AND THRILLING SOUNDS OF A SINGULAR MOMENT WHEN FOUR OF POPULAR MUSIC’S EXTRAORDINARY TALENTS CAME TOGETHER FOR A ONCE-IN-A-LIFETIME EVENT. THE PLACE WAS SUN RECORDS’ STOREFRONT STUDIO IN MEMPHIS. THE MAN WHO MADE IT ALL HAPPEN WAS SAM PHILLIPS.

Hospitality never goes out of style!

Here’s a scene from the show and a picture from the actual event!

ALLEN LAMERS LEADS THE STAFF OF 1,600 AT LAMERS TOUR & TRAVEL,

FOUNDED BY HIS PARENTS IN 1944.

In September of 1944, the late Lyle Lamers was quietly running his farm while his wife was teaching school. Back then, when a woman was expecting she was required to stop teaching. So when Lyle was asked to drive school bus, and then asked if he wanted to buy the bus, he said, “I s’pose,” and Lamers Bus Lines was born, along with their first son, Allen. Lyle ran the farm and the bus company while Ellen drove the bus. Allen grew up learning both businesses and as a young adult he farmed and fixed buses. Later on he built a terminal in Green Bay where they had 18 buses and the company kept expanding from there. Lyle continued to drive bus until age 72 and passed away in 2012.

Allen and his brother, Kevin officially took charge of the business in 1992. Allen’s late wife Carol had been key to setting up the offices and getting everything running smoothly. He always felt she was the brains of the operation, he was just the braun. Today three of their five children work in the business with him. His wife Elaine, pictured with him here, has experiene in tour planning as well through her work at Affinity Health.

While Kevin handles the business end of things, Allen spends his days on the road. Their network of bus terminals pretty well

covers the state of Wisconsin with 35 locations in-state as well as one in Northern Michigan and one in Florida. They’re not just in the major cities, either. Yes, they have terminals in Milwaukee, Green Bay, Wausau, and LaCrosse, but they also have them in place to cover the rural areas such as Darlington, Elcho, Juneau, Muskego, and Spring Green. “Wisconsin’s been a great place to do business,” Allen noted. “You really get to know and enjoy serving the people of these communities.” Wisconsin is indeed well served with their 110 motorcoaches, 1,200 school buses, and a staff of 1,600. In addition to school buses and motorcoaches they also serve customers with medical transport vans and limousine service.

Allen literally spends most of his days on the road traveling from terminal to terminal, delivering parts to the mechanics, meeting with the office staffs, and helping with scheduling or decisions that need to be made. When questioned about why the top dog is out delivering parts he replied, “There is no top dog, I just work to support the staff. We’ve got a lot of long term employees and it’s just great to have everyone working together.” Their head mechanic has been with the company for 42 years and three others have 34, 36 and 39 years of service!

Allen’s introduction to The Fireside came back in the mid-1960’s when The Fireside was a popular supper club. The company had been providing transportation for the Wisconsin Council of the Blind for many activities and once a year their members came together for a banquet at The Fireside. The largest group was nine coaches from around the state. “I knew then that The Fireside was really a family oriented place. This group was made to feel more than welcome,” Allen recalled. “It’s just a real nice experience.” We’re pleased to work with Lamers offices in Milwaukee, Wisconsin Rapids, Menasha and DePere and of course many groups use them for charter service when they come here as well. It’s rare not to have a Lamers coach in the lot on a busy group tour day.

There are a lot of parallels between the Lamers story and the Fireside story. Both have humble beginnings, strong leadership, impressive growth and success, long time loyal staffs, and eventual transitions to the second and third generation of family management. We were proud to honor Allen Lamers with a Flame of Friendship Award at this year’s Group Leader Appreciation Event. He was completely surprised and humble in his acceptance - all the more reason why he deserved it!

“Wisconsin’s been a great place to do business!”

– Allen Lamers

GROUP LEADER PROFILE

Learning from each other

BEHIND THE SCENESIN THE BOX OFF ICE

At the Associate Preview for our production of PETER PAN this February, Charlene Garcia was recognized for 20 years of service to The Fireside! “It doesn’t seem like that long,” she said. “It’s been a lot of fun and the Klopcics have been very good to me.” Charlene, in turn, has been very good to The Fireside and our guests.

A real “people person,” Charlene’s favorite thing about being a member of the group sales team is the ability to communicate with all types of people and personalities. “I just really like people,” she said! In addition to taking bookings and helping groups plan their trip she’s responsible for entering all of the payments and is also our primary telemarketer. She describes her territory as “coast to coast, Canada to Florida” and it truly is.

While most of our business comes from the Midwest we’re always thrilled to host groups from across the country. To get those groups Charlene has to sell them on coming to Wisconsin or even Northern Illinois and help them find other interesting things to fill a tour - something that’s not hard to do in Wisconsin with the great wealth of opportunities we have here. She loves overcoming someone’s skepticism about there even being a place like The Fireside in a small town in Wisconsin, but all it takes is getting them here once and they’re hooked!

Charlene started her Fireside career working evenings and weekends in the Box Office while also working full time as a church secretary. This was after a 30 year career with Chicago Northwestern Railroad in downtown Chicago, the last seven of which she did while commuting from Fort Atkinson!

She and her husband, Richard had decided when their children were high school age that they wanted a more small town experience for them and chose Fort Atkinson for its location as it allowed a relatively easy access to the train into Chicago. After retiring from the railroad she also worked for a few years at the University of Wisconsin - Whitewater where Richard also worked. In Chicago they owned a ceramic business that did both production runs and customer orders which Charlene helped to paint. Being an opera lover and a big fan of the Chicago Opera, Charlene’s favorite custom order was to make 150 plates for their production of CARMEN, one of which gets broken at each performance. Famous Tenor, Placido Domingo, loved the sound of their plates so much he insisted she and her family be invited to the show as his guests where they watched from the front row and had a tour backstage with him afterward. What fun!

So add Certified Ceramic Instructor to her list of credentials which include experience in Accounting, Human Resources, Management, Dispatch, and Logistics, all before starting her work in Sales for The Fireside. While trying to sort out and keep straight her various jobs it became apparent that for her entire adult life she’s almost always had more than one job at a time, and you can take out the “almost” when you count “mom” a full time job!

Charlene’s favorite Fireside shows include EVITA, THE SOUND OF MUSIC, and MILLION DOLLAR QUARTET - which she hasn’t even seen yet. She knows enough about it to be sure she’s going to love it, including rave reviews from everyone she knows who has already seen it. (If you’re not booked yet, just give her a call and she’ll set you right up!)

Charlene’s oldest son works for American Airlines in Charlotte, North Carolina and her daughter works in law enforcement here in Jefferson County. Her younger son was killed in a car accident shortly after he graduated from high school and she lost her husband nine years ago after a long battle with cancer. She misses them every day but keeps busy with her work here and helping to raise her three wonderful grandchildren. If you look closely, you’ll

see that the oldest one in the back is wearing his Fireside bus staff uniform. Hopefully the others will follow his lead when they’re old enough to work.

It’s been a great life and a great Fireside career and she’s not done yet. Give Charlene a call if you need any help with your booking or finding other things to fill out your itinerary. She has a wealth of knowledge and is eager to share it!

Meeting Your Group Sales Team - Charlene Garcia

APRIL 16, 2016

Flame of Friendship Awards

VICKI MATUS AKNATIVITY CHURCH, GREEN BAY, WI

2016 Flame of Friendship Honorees

ALLEN LAMERSLAMERS TOUR & TRAVEL, GREEN BAY, WI

Grand Prize Winners!

PICTURED WITH RICK AND RYAN KLOPCIC

Grand Pri e Drawin Winner : Roger Prindiville of St. Charles Seniors in Geneva, IL (CROCK POT Triple Dipper Lazy Susan Warmer); Julia Terwilleger of American Trust & Savings of Dubuque, IA (Folding Party Wagon); Rick Volz of the Fond du Lac, WI Knights of Columbus (WEBER Deluxe Gas Portable Grill); and Diane Wurm with State Bank of Freeport, IL. (Grand Prize of a Fireside VIP party!) Congratulations to all!

DONALD S. KENNEDYRESTAURANT CONSULTANT

ELM GROVE, WISCONSIN

MORE FUN FROM THE FLAME OF FRIENDSHIP AWARDS PARTY!

with Chef Mike

Inside theKitchen

For MILLION DOLLAR QUARTET I am excited to debut a new soup to all of our guests - Butternut Squash Soup. Butternut Squash is also known as Winter Squash. It’s a summer growing annual fruit but differs from Summer Squash in that it’s harvested and eaten in the mature fruit stage, when the seeds have matured fully and the skin has hardened. Butternut Squash has a yellow skin and the orange flesh inside has a sweet, nutty taste similar to that of a pumpkin.

To make the soup, I start by steaming the squash until it becomes tender and then puree it, add it to chicken stock that we also make here, and then add onions, heavy cream and some brown sugar. I’m excited to see the response we get from this new soup and hope you’ll let me know how you like it.

This show also features one of our most popular entrees, the Roast Boneless Pork Chop served with our Herbed Crouton Dressing, whipped Yukon Gold Potatoes with a rich Pork Gravy, Creamed Sweet Corn, and a ramekin of our specially crafted Cinnamon Apple Sauce.

To finish off the meal, enjoy our Triple Layer Carrot Cake made with Cream Cheese Frosting served with Homemade Butterscotch Ice Cream. YUMM!!

Executive Chef

Jean’s Corner of the World

GROUP TRAVEL T IPS & NEWS

For personal help with any of your bookings, call me at 800-477-9505 or email jean@firesidetheatre.com.

BIG NEWS: We are working hard to finish the 2017 Season so if you have not already heard that news you will shortly! I am positive it will be a season to remember. We are all about memories, right?

MILLION DOLLAR QUARTET: All I have heard about Million Dollar Quarter, or MDQ, as we like to say, is one superlative after another. You read that it is Charlene’s favorite and she is never wrong! Reading Ed and Rick’s articles makes me want to book a group.

FLAME OF FRIENDSHIP AWARDS: For those who were able to join us for the Awards Party April 16th, I hope you enjoyed yourselves as much as we enjoyed hosting you. I don’t know how Chef Mike outdoes himself each year with the menu. There were a lot of smiling faces in the dining room and exiting the theatre after SISTER ACT which is

Box Office and Sales Manager

exactly the result we want. Thanks again for all your hard work and dedication.

As a note for those that might want to join in the fun next year, if you sell two different shows for 2016 coming with a minimum of 42 for each show you will earn an invitation to next year’s gala event. Every level you reach above that, up to becoming an Executive Producer coming to ALL seven shows with a minimum of 42 for each, earns you more gifts and a chance at a wonderful drawing. It is our way to show our appreciation for all you do.

NEW FOR 2016: Ever got on the bus then had requests for a menu change or find out as you pull into the Fireside parking lot of a food allergy? You don’t have to worry about this again! Our amazing kitchen staff can now accommodate last minute changes easily and in a timely manner from the table. Instead of trying to call us, simply let the guest discuss the dietary issues with your server. Voila’ problem solved.

You may still call in requests but even then the servers, who are the experts, will review needs at the table and inform the kitchen based on that discussion. The important dietary restrictions to call in, if you know them, are the guests who have very serious allergies requiring special handling of food or a list of issues that may need Chef Mike to review in advance.

As always we are here to help but this change should make it easier for you and better for the guest! Yeah!

2016Season

You can find an order form for 2016 promotional material on the “Groups” page of our web site.

BOOKINGS ARE STILL AVAILABLE FOR ALL 2016 PRODUCTIONS!

JustCall

Jean!

THE MIRIAM WEBSTER DEFINITION OF SOIRÉE IS “AN EVENING PARTY OR GATHERING, TYPICALLY IN A PRIVATE HOUSE, FOR CONVERSATION OR MUSIC.” YOU CAN MAKE ANY EVENT A SPECIAL SOIRÉE WITH THIS GORGEOUS NEW MERCHANDISE FROM GRASSLANDS ROAD, ONE OF OUR FAVORITE GIFT COLLECTIONS. ITS RICH, WARM TONES CREATE AN ELEGANT AUTUMN DECOR SHOWCASING COPPER, SILVER, AND GOLD METALS.

Planning For An Elegant Autumn Soirée

VIS IT OUR GIFT SHOPS

Stemless wine glasses, metal bowls, and leaf dishes in gold, silver, and copper pair elegantly with ceramic pieces edged in gold. They’ll give your party a very welcoming look. Be sure to check them out when you’re here this fall.

SAVE NOW! CALL 800-477-9505 WWW.F IRESIDETHEATRE.COM

Visit early to get the best discount! MILLION DOLLAR QUARTET

Featured Menu September 8 - October 30, 2016Served Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday Matinees, Saturday Evening and Sunday Midday

Butternut Squash SoupGarnished with Fresh Chives

Freshly Baked Breads from our Artisan Bakery

Roast Boneless Pork ChopHerbed Crouton Dressing with Sauerkraut and Jones Original Recipe Sausage. Served with Whipped Yukon Gold Potatoes glazed with rich Pork Stock Gravy,

Creamed Sweet Corn, and a ramekin of our specially crafted Cinnamon Apple Sauce.

Triple Layer Carrot CakeWith Cream Cheese Frosting and Homemade Butterscotch Ice Cream.

Coffee, Tea and Milk

THE FIRESIDE, INC.1131 JANESVILLE AVENUEP.O. BOX 7FORT ATKINSON, WI 53538 MAY 2016

PRSRT STDU.S. POSTAGE

PAIDTHE FIRESIDE

THE FIRESIDE, INC.1131 JANESVILLE AVENUEP.O. BOX 7FORT ATKIIKINSONSON OSOSONSNSON,N,N,N,NN,N WIWIWI 535553553553555 3383833333

• In addition to the Featured Menu, try our Sunday Brunch, Thursday Evening Signature Buffet or five course dinner on Saturday nights.

• Groups of 18 or more are $67.95 (Sat. Evening $71.95) plus tax.

• Save an additional $3.00 per person when you book a performance from September 8 - October 2, 2016.

• Ask about our Incentive plan for Wednesday & Thursday matinees.

• Arrive at 10:30 a.m. for Matinees, 2:30 p.m. for the Sunday Midday, 5:15 p.m. for Thursday and select Friday Evenings and 4:45 p.m. for Saturday Evening.