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In 2009, Fox Broadcasting Company put singing and dancing back on the map with the popular TV series Glee. However, this craze is not as new as some may think: F&M has had a Glee Club since the fall of 1884.
According to Hullabaloo Nevonia, a book dedicated to detailing student life at F&M, the class of 1885 had great musical talent and formed the College’s first official Glee Club. By 1890, the club began touring around the greater Philadelphia area, and by 1891, they were touring throughout the Midwest. In the 1920s, Glee Club had become one of the most popular organizations on campus; when the time came each year for tryouts, there was fierce competition among students.
Although Glee is often associated primarily with singing, F&M’s club grew as the years went by, eventually adding skits and comedy. Some of the most memorable comic relief seemed to even be unintentional. Members of the Glee Club during the 1920s recalled one moment when “a volunteer briskly rolled up that curtain, catching the conductor’s tails and almost lifting him off the floor” (Hullabaloo 188). The Glee Club notes the audience was in stitches.
Just like the hard-working students of Glee’s William McKinley High School, who practice everyday for a shot in a prestigious competition, the 1942 F&M Glee Club got the chance to participate in a national contest. The results were never recorded in the Oriflamme yearbook, but no doubt the school had high hopes for their beloved Glee Club.
Because of its overwhelming popularity, different offshoots of the Glee Club emerged over the following years. Some of these include ensembles accompanied by the festive Mandolin Club and Guitar Club, as well as the formation of an elite group called the Glee Club Quartet. As with most aspects of campus life, club participation suffered during war times. However, it came back stronger than ever in the 1950s, and by the 1956, there were seventy men who sang in the Glee Club. Although Glee Club in its entirety did not survive the 1960s, it came back again with a new modern theme in 1968, which we know of today as the Poor Richards.
Information about F&M’s Glee Club provided by F&M Blue & White Society.
