Willowbrook Ballroom
Encyclopedia
Dance
Dance is an art form that generally refers to movement of the body, usually rhythmic and to music, used as a form of expression, social interaction or presented in a spiritual or performance setting....
ballroom
Ballroom
A ballroom is a large room inside a building, the designated purpose of which is holding formal dances called balls. Traditionally, most balls were held in private residences; many mansions contain one or more ballrooms...
and banquet facility located in Willow Springs, Illinois
Willow Springs, Illinois
Willow Springs is a village in Cook and DuPage Counties, Illinois, United States. The population was 5,027 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Willow Springs is located at ....
along Archer Avenue. It was founded in 1921 by John Verderbar and named Oh Henry Park. Today, the ballroom continues to host ballroom dancing events with a live orchestra weekly. The Willowbrook Ballroom has its original 6000 square feet (557.4 m²) "floating" maple dance floor.
The Willowbrook Ballroom is often cited as the last place Resurrection Mary
Resurrection Mary
Resurrection Mary is a well-know Chicago area ghost story. Of the "vanishing hitchhiker" type, the story takes place outside Resurrection Cemetery in Justice, Illinois, a few miles southwest of Chicago....
danced before her death. Her ghost is said to appear at the ballroom at times, dancing with the patrons.
History
Founded in 1921 by John Verderbar, an industrious AustriaAustria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
n immigrant. Verderbar purchased 5 acres (20,234.3 m²) along wooded Archer Ave. He planned to build a peaceful weekend home.
His son, Rudy Verderbar, was one of the throngs of young people who danced at the nearly 400 ballrooms and dance halls that thrived in the Chicago area during the mid-to-late 1910s. After dancing in an outdoor pavilion in Michigan
Michigan
Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....
, Rudy waged a relentless campaign to scrap the idea of a summer home and build an outdoor dance pavilion. After some research, his father agreed, and in 1921, the all wooden Oh Henry Park was built. It proved so popular, in 1923, the open-air pavilion was enlarged and a new 10-cents-a-dance policy was implemented. The ballroom was supposedly named after the Oh Henry candy bar, manufactured in Chicago by the Williamson Candy Company, who paid Verderbar for the naming rights.
In 1930, the pavilion was destroyed in a devastating fire. Verderbar quickly assembled a team of 200 carpenters to construct an enormous outdoor dance floor in time for the next Saturday night. The remaining ten weeks of Oh Henry’s 1930 dance season drew even bigger crowds due to massive publicity touting the romantic aspects of "dancing under the stars."
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
-era cost of $100,000.
As Big Band fever spread throughout 1940s America, the Oh Henry Ballroom, now with air conditioning, became a major force in the Midwest’s entertainment industry. Even during the Second World War, typical weekly attendance was about 10,000 dancers. The ballroom’s popularity was reason for Chicago bus lines to be rerouted to provide direct service to and from the ballroom.
Willowbrook Ballroom attracted the best bands of their times including Ozzie Nelson
Ozzie Nelson
Oswald George "Ozzie" Nelson was an American entertainer and band leader who originated and starred in The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet radio and television series with his wife and two sons.-Early life:...
and his orchestra in the 1930s with lead singer Harriet Hilliard. The 1940s orchestras of Harry James
Harry James
Henry Haag “Harry” James was a trumpeter who led a jazz swing band during the Big Band Era of the 1930s and 1940s. He was especially known among musicians for his astonishing technical proficiency as well as his superior tone.-Biography:He was born in Albany, Georgia, the son of a bandleader of a...
and Count Basie
Count Basie
William "Count" Basie was an American jazz pianist, organist, bandleader, and composer. Basie led his jazz orchestra almost continuously for nearly 50 years...
played the ballroom, and singer Helen O'Connell
Helen O'Connell
Helen O'Connell was an American singer, actress, and dancer.Born in Lima, Ohio, O'Connell joined the Jimmy Dorsey band in 1939 and achieved her best selling records in the early 1940s with "Green Eyes", "Amapola," "Tangerine" and "Yours"...
graced the stage, later so did Wayne King
Wayne King
Wayne King was an American musician, songwriter, singer and orchestral leader. He was sometimes referred to as "the Waltz King" because much of his most popular music involved waltzes; "The Waltz You Saved For Me" was his standard set closing song in live performance and on numerous radio...
, Guy Lombardo
Guy Lombardo
Gaetano Alberto "Guy" Lombardo was a Canadian-American bandleader and violinist.Forming "The Royal Canadians" in 1924 with his brothers Carmen, Lebert, and Victor and other musicians from his hometown, Lombardo led the group to international success, billing themselves as creating "The Sweetest...
, Sammy Kaye
Sammy Kaye
Sammy Kaye , born Samuel Zarnocay, Jr., was an American bandleader and songwriter, whose tag line, "Swing and sway with Sammy Kaye", became one of the most famous of the Big Band Era.-Biography:...
, Jimmy Dorsey
Jimmy Dorsey
James "Jimmy" Dorsey was a prominent American jazz clarinetist, saxophonist, trumpeter, composer, and big band leader. He was known as "JD"...
, Bob Crosby
Bob Crosby
George Robert "Bob" Crosby was an American dixieland bandleader and vocalist, best known for his group the Bob-Cats.-Family:...
, Dick Jurgens
Dick Jurgens
Dick Henry Jurgens was an American swing music bandleader, who enjoyed great popularity in the late 1930s and early 1940s....
, Glenn Miller Orchestra
Glenn Miller Orchestra
The Glenn Miller Orchestra was originally formed in 1938 by Glenn Miller. It was arranged around a clarinet and tenor saxophone playing melody, while three other saxophones played the harmony...
and Harry James
Harry James
Henry Haag “Harry” James was a trumpeter who led a jazz swing band during the Big Band Era of the 1930s and 1940s. He was especially known among musicians for his astonishing technical proficiency as well as his superior tone.-Biography:He was born in Albany, Georgia, the son of a bandleader of a...
.
In 1955, as ballrooms across the country scaled down or closed, the Verderbars set out on a course to further expand their operations. A 20000 feet (6,096 m) addition installed new kitchens, a restaurant and a private room for parties and banquets.
In 1959 the entire Oh Henry complex was re-named Willowbrook Ballroom. The 1960s were bringing record crowds to the ballroom, but toward the end of that decade, the public’s taste in entertainment underwent a radical change and fewer people took up ballroom dancing.
Willowbrook Ballroom survived by having contemporary bands share the stage on the same evening with the top ballroom bands. Sunday afternoon Tea Dancing began and is ongoing to this day.
As popular music changed, the entertainers on Willowbrook’s stage also changed, particularly on Friday night. Chubby Checker
Chubby Checker
Chubby Checker is an American singer-songwriter. He is widely known for popularizing the twist dance style, with his 1960 hit cover of Hank Ballard's R&B hit "The Twist"...
played the ballroom as did The Cryan' Shames
The Cryan' Shames
The Cryan' Shames is an American garage rock group from Hinsdale, Illinois. They originally formed as The Travelers, with founding members Tom Doody , Gerry Stone , Dave Purple of The Prowlers, Denny Conroy and Jim Fairs from The Roosters, Jim Pilster , and Bill Hughes...
, The Association
The Association
The Association is a pop music band from California in the folk rock or soft rock genre. During the 1960s, they had numerous hits at or near the top of the Billboard charts and were the lead-off band at 1967's Monterey Pop Festival...
, The Buckinghams
The Buckinghams
The Buckinghams are an American Sunshine Pop band from Chicago, Illinois. They formed in 1966 and went on to become one of the top selling acts of 1967. The band dissolved in 1970 but reformed in 1980 and continue to tour throughout the United States....
, Otis Day and the Knights
Otis Day and the Knights
Otis Day and the Knights was originally created as a fictional band to perform in the movie National Lampoon's Animal House. They are best known for their version of "Shout" and "Shama Lama Ding Dong". Otis Day was played by DeWayne Jessie. Robert Cray was one of the members of the band in the...
, The Village People, and Martha Reeves
Martha Reeves
Martha Rose Reeves is an American R&B and Pop singer and former politician, and was the lead singer of the Motown girl group Martha and the Vandellas. During her tenure with The Vandellas, they scored over a dozen hit singles, including "Jimmy Mack", "Dancing in the Street" and "Nowhere to Run"...
.
In 1997 the Verderbar family sold the Ballroom to Birute and Gedaminis Jodwalis. The Willowbrook Ballroom is located at 8900 Archer Avenue, Willow Springs, Illinois, 60480.
In 2000 The Willowbrook Ballroom was profiled as one of America's "Glorious, Historic, Legendary, Treasured Ballroom Dance Floors" in Amateur Dancers magazine. . Criteria for being profiled as an Amateur Dancers magazine's "Finest Floor" is:
- A minimum of 3500 square feet (325.2 m²) of danceable wood flooring, sprung preferred.
- Sufficient room for 300 or more dancers.
- Adequate sound and heating/cooling system.
- Currently operating with a 25 year history or more.
External links
- Willowbrook Ballroom website
- Street map from Google Local or Yahoo! Maps