note:  footnote numbers follow each section. Please feel free to ignore the internal document numbers in the footnotes, these pertain to my personal filing and indexing system

Phillip Dahlberg (this link includes photos of Phillip Dahlberg)

"...Daddy was the black sheep of the methodist Dahlberg Family.  When he refused to study for the ministry but, instead, became a musician, he was more or less thrown out on his own. That was OK with him. He loved music and the joy it brought him and others.  he loved the vaudeville acts and, as he kept the beat with his drums, he memorized jokes and funny gestures.  Dad's comic machinations were part of our poor but happy home life.  He could take a straw hat and roll it down his arms in three magic flip-flops...He also played tricks, which were pretty funny except sometimes to the people they were played on. I remember hearing about one he played on my mother, who must have been pregnant with me at the time because it was in the Waukegan era, when dad played in a pit orchestra with jack Benny, violinist, and Cora Salisbery, pianist, at the Barrinson Theatre.  Dad told Mom that she could get in free--just mention his name.  One time she decided to try it, to save the ten or fifteen-cent ticket price.  The girl in the ticket booth said she'd never heard of him.  Funny? Not to her. Not at the moment1 Daddy had not gone beyond the Elementary grades. He could have been educated further if he hadn't refused to go into the ministry as his parents wished.  Instead he hollowed into the "sinful theatre", banging away at his multiple drums, marimbaphones and all other instruments except strings and horns.  Hum a tune, and he could play it on the piano. he never had a formal music lesson but wound up later in life on the staff of the Wisconsin College of Music." 2 "Those days of glamour and joy impressed the two of us small girls, though Mother didn't so label those times. She recollected in later years that Daddy was always bringing home vaudeville celebrities, including the famous comic of films, Buster Keaton, and his family, who were then billed as the Five Keatons. 3

[aka OLE Dahlberg]

Pre-WWI - Rex Theater in Racine, drummer: when he needed a violinst he would send for Jack Benny, who came from Waukegan to fill in. Benny was a teenager then; it was just before he went on a vaudeville tour.

(What was the depression like?) "Many families were on welfare, which my parents were too proud to accept.  My father, with his musician's hands, "heaved coal" which mean he delivered it to basement.  He belonged to a pre-depression bowling team which re-named itself "The Coal Heavers" in his honor (25 cents a game--considered extravagant). A family down the street was "on welfare" and my brothers complained that they wished we were because that family got free peanut butter, raisons and cocoa." (Later on page three of the same letter Alice writes down "Family Sories" ) "Your grandfather Phillip J. Dahlberg, was always called "ole" one reason being that when he entertained his friends, he would recite poems in Swedish dialect, one I remember about an "Oatsmobile (Oldsmobile) that "fed too tam many oats." He and an Irish friend decided they would go to Chicago and try out a comic Vaudeville act in hopes of getting on stage. They faced a rough audience (as did others who tried out) who threw tomatos and eggs at them until they were hooked off stage with a big shepard's crook. He was a self taught-musician, playing different sized drums and stringed instruments such as a mandolin, banjo, guitar, triange, marimbaphone and zylophone, etc., all used later when he played in "pit orchestra" in front of the vaudeville acts. He played at dances and entertainments, and we used to get in free, each member of the family carrying a different instrument.  It wasn't the depression, but "talking pictures" that put most muscians out of work.  They coulden't give music lessons because pupils coulden't afford them. With all five kids we would take trips from Racine to Waukegan (25 miles) in our old second hand "tin lizzie" and each was an adventure. We had to go through Zion City a town governed by a religious fanatic named Wilbur Glenn Voliva. The road through town was nicknamed "the rocky road to Dublin", with ruts and rocks endangering the axels. No booze, smoking, or dancing allowed, and you could not wear a dress without sleeves withoug being arrested.  And it was a speed trap.  My dad was stopped, and he said he drove with in the limit, ten miles per hour, but the volivite said he was going faster. He took a look in the car, asked "Are all those children yours?" then tore up the ticket.  Thats enough rattling on. Except to mention that when "Ole" played in the Barrister Theatre in Waukegan, about the time I was born, 1910, he was part of a three-peice orchester, Benny Kabelski (later Jack Benny) and a pianist named Corra Salisberry.  Before Jack Benny went on the road my dad had him come to Racine to fill in at the now long gone Rex theatre... My father was the black sheep of a very strict Methodist family, and because he did "sinful" things like being in the theater, dancing, etc.  was disinherited. A younger brother, Raymond went into the ministry, which is what they had wanted "Ole" to do."4 5  Phillip Dahlberg was in Great Lakes Vaudeville and played the drums with Jack Benny. 6

1920 Census: Head of Household: Phillip J. Dahlberg; wife is Katherine Dahlberg; Children Alice Dahlberg (age 9); Phyllis Dahlberg (age 4); Phillip, Fr. age (6 months); and DAHLBERG, Gustav (FATHER) age 64, Immigrated from Sweden in 1888; citizen 1898; also listed is Harry DeYoung age 21 (Katherine Dahlberg's youngest step brother)8

Sunday Nights at Seven, Jack Benny Biography

page 11 & 13

Cora Salisbury played piano

Barrinson Theatre closed in 1912 (Alice was two years old) Internal Document 655) Photo from Racine Archives (Possibly Racine Journal Times?)

Racine Park Band: Horlick Athletic Field - August 21, 1943; Belle City Malleable Iron Co. Army-Navy "E" award ceremony

Philip Dahlberg is behind the large drum in the center (standing)

(Internal Document 853)

Phillip Dahlberg Death Certificate: b. 06 Mar 1885, age at death: 60; Birthplace: Chicago, IL; Occ: Repair man: Father Name: Gust Dahlberg (Sweden) Mother Name: Ricko Stonequist (Sweden) Burial date Sept 10, 1945; Graceland Cemetary in Racine WI.; Address of deceased: 1517 Quincy Avenue;date of death September 7, 1945. Immediate cause of death: Coronary embolism.W.C. Hanson, MD: Racine, WI9

Phillip Dahlberg Obituary: Phillip Dahlberg was born in Chicago, Illinois: March 6, 1885

Lived in Racine for 33 years; He was a drummer; He played in an orchestra with Jack Benny in Waukegan; He also lived in Chicago, Peoria and Rockford, Ill.; After moving to Racine he played for a number of years with the Orpheum theater orchestra and other orchestras; (also in Alice's memoir);He played with the "Bezucha Brothers and Ole" band; Member of the Racine Park band; Atebery's Band drummer (have photograph); Executive on the bord of Muscians Union No. 41A.F. of M. for 11 years; Instructor for the Boy Scout Drum Corps; Drum Instructor for the American Legion Post 76

He went to Paris with the Racine American Legion Drum and Bugle Corps. (1941-1952)

Drum instructor for the Sons and Daughters of the V.F.W. in Kenosha.

Member of Grange Avenue Methodist Church; Life member of the Belle City Lodge No. 92; Alderman on the Racine City Council; 11 ward; member of Case local 180; employment manager at H & M Body Corp.; at time of death employed at J.I. Case Co.7

Timeline:

1900 Census with Gustas(v) Dahlberg and "Mary" Dahlberg

1903-1906:

Illinois, Cook County, Chicago: worked with his step father (Gustave Dahlberg) as a carpenter and on Chicago Northwest Railroad in dining car. [Alice Sankey. "Hey Dont Write Me Off". Unpublished Manuscript.]

1906 Worked as drummer in Majestic Theatre In Peoria, Illinois

Employed at wire mill as a time keeper at the time of his marriage to Kate (Katherine DeYoung).

1906 Nov 11 Katherine DeYoung marries Phillip Dahlberg (Katherine was under age and so Lena Kramer gave permission)

(newspaper article: undated from Phyllis scrapbook)

1906 Nov 13 Member of Cubs; recording secretary and member of Cub's Quartet

(newspaper article: undated from Phyllis scrapbook)

1906-1928 (in Racine, WI)

Aprox. date Ole catches a prowler but gets a brick in the head

member of Herr Fritz' German Band

(newspaper article: undated from Phyllis scrapbook)

1910 Played in pit orchestra with Jack Benny (Benny Kabeliski); Cora Salisbery at Barrison Theater in Waukegan, IL

1911 Played at Majestic Theatre in Waukegan

1914 lived on State street in a flat: Ole heard from relatives in Stockholm, Sweden. A relative left him $500.00; and bought a diamond ring, lost the stone and put in a red stone which he gave to Kate, who kept it for years with other valuables in a small metal box.[Alice Sankey. Hey Don't Write Me Off]

1916 lived at 1517 Quincy; Orpheum Theatre, Earl Gere's Masonic Orchestra [Alice Sankey. "Hey Dont Write Me Off". Unpublished Manuscript]

1920 Census: 34 years old; occupation listed as paymaster for auto manufacturing

1928 November 13: Wedding anniversary 22; celebrated with Allen theatre management friends. (newspaper article)

1928 Mainstreet Theatre indoor Ball team, played out door baseball (newspaper article)

1930 lived with Katherine at 634 North County Steet in Waukegan

1930-1940 Drum instructor for Gere conservatory (Alen Gere): Ole worked as in instructor for the Americal Legion Drum and Bugle Corps of Racine, which later won the sorld championship among drum and bugle corps.  He traveled to France with the Corp.

1931 Nov 13 lived at 1517 Quincy and celebrates 25 anniversary, drummer at Orpheum Theatre (newspaper article)

1937 Feb 5 Receives a certificate from Boy Scouts for two years of Drum and Bugle corps (scanned on CD)

Footnotes:

1 Sankey, Alice "Hey Don't Write Me Off" Unpublished Manuscript, page 18.

2 Sankey, Alice "Hey Don't Write Me Off" Unpublished Manuscript, page 22.

3 Sankey, Alice "Hey Don't Write Me Off" Unpublished Manuscript, page 21.

4 Letter from Alice Sankey,  Feb 6. 1991(764 Markham Street, Toronto, ON Canada M6G2M5 to Gwynn Socolich

5 Sankey, Alice "Hey Don't Write Me Off" Unpublished Manuscript

6 Interview with daughter, [Alice Sankey's Daughter:] 1992,( Internal Document 5)

7 Phillip Dahlberg obituary. Hillsboro, Wisconsin paper dated September 13, 1945 and Racine, Wisconsin.

8Phillip Dahlberg Household, 1920 Census,WI, Racine County, Racine, Internet. Carlsbad Public Library, Heritage Quest. (Internal Document 469)

9Dahlberg, Phillip J. Death Certificate: City of Racine, State of Wisconsin ( Internal Document 880)