Stanwood fashion show borrows ideas from history

Published 10:41 pm Thursday, April 17, 2008

Those naughty, naughty folks in Stanwood are having a good giggle, wondering who will portray Gypsy Rose Lee at a fashion show?

Let’s hope she has a long, very wide, boa.

For you young’ens, in the mid 1920s, Lee was a well-known stripper.

The Stanwood Area Historical Society vintage fashion show and tea is planned for 2 p.m. Saturday at Floyd Norgaard Cultural Center, 27103 102 Ave. NW. Vicki Tanner will present models from Stanwood and Camano Island wearing fashions from 1885 to 1985, accompanied by music appropriate to the decade.

Models will dress as famous people from history, books, movies and television shows, such as Jane Russell, a movie star and bombshell whose cleavage in the 1946 film “The Outlaw” caused censors to faint; Dawn Wells, Mary Ann from the television show “Gilligan’s Island”; Al Capone’s squeeze, complete with a tommy gun, and Queen Elizabeth II.

Tickets are $12 at the door.

For the sedate, feign shock and politely turn your head during the show, sip tea and listen for your raffle ticket number to be called.

Be nice. It’s all right if Roy Strotz’s wife, Darlene, wins a bingo game or two.

He doesn’t get paid to call the numbers, from B-1 to O-75, when it’s Bingo Night in Silvana.

Money raised helps maintain Viking Hall, 1331 Pioneer Highway in Silvana. A session starts at 4 p.m. Sunday at the hall.

Buy-in costs $10.

Why not go to a snazzier bingo game in a big town?

“Come here,” Strotz says. “Support the community.”

The three blackout games will pay out between $50 and $75. Pots vary according to the admission fees collected.

Strotz, who owns Country Feed in Silvana, says his wife wins a game now and then and no one complains.

How did he learn to call all of those numbers?

“It’s not hard, he says.

It used to take half-dozen volunteers three weeks to run the annual Stillaguamish Valley Genealogical Society and Library garage sale.

They’ve compressed the shopping deal like a turkey loaf and are running three smaller sales this year.

Buy stuff to benefit the roots organization from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. today and Saturday at 28230 Highway 9 NE in Arlington.

Fewer and fewer members wanted to spend the entire end of the summer setting up, hauling tables from a barn and running the sale, said Michele Heiderer with the fundraising committee.

Stock up.

“It’s getting harder and harder to find a thrift store to take the leftovers,” she said. “Two years ago, we paid more than $300 in dump fees.”

Fun Fact: Frank Hammer, 90, of Arlington, not only eats at the Blue Bird Cafe in Arlington, he donated the diner’s wall clock. It’s a bird clock and a different bird sings every hour.

He eats breakfast at the Blue Bird twice a week, Mondays and Fridays, always having scrambled eggs and sourdough toast.

He splits the sausage patty with his cocker spaniel, Sam.

“He waits for it in the car,” Hammer says. “He knows what’s in the little white box.”

Columnist Kristi O’Harran: 425-339-3451, oharran@heraldnet.com.