Local 15 History      1    2    3    Next

The following article from the 1913 Seattle Union Record was written by Roy Pinkham, one of the founding members of Local 15, who was "Here When Puget Sound Was Only a Whisper and Mount Rainier a Hole in the Ground".

It was in the year of 1893 when Local No. 15 was organized. Previous to that time the number of Stage Employees in Seattle was limited to a very few.

Those that had steady employment worked for managers that did not realize the importance of reliable stage employees and the result was that they had to work for whatever they could get. In 1884 I worked for Mr. Frye and Beede, at Fry's Opera House, at First and Marion street. I was stage manager, lithographer, bill poster, stage carpenter, propertyman and run the furnace. I also worked in Fry's drug store at odd times and received $40.00 a month and thought it was good money at that time.

When we had more than two shows a month I would get terribly rushed and would have to get Kerski to help me and pay him $1.00 a day.

Shows generally played from one to three nights. It was a rare thing for a show to play a week. What few extra men worked a show received 50 cents a performance and generally a lot of boys worked to see the show.

In 1885 we thought we had worked long enought for 50 cents and struck for 57 cents a performance. The manager would not pay it and tried to work the show himself with help of the ushers. They tried it one show and then we all went back to work on the next show and received 75 cents a performance. We did not have any trouble after that. We all got together and called ourselves the "Stick Together Club".

Things were not very prosperous here in the show business until after the fire of 1889, when several theatres opened up and there was an opportunity for men at fairly good salary.

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