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Transcript of conversation

November 1, 2024

Polly:

I’m with my classmate Andrea Axelrod for another one of our stories with friends, so people can have a glimpse into what we're all doing. Andrea and I actually were together this summer; we attended a 100th birthday party for our other classmate Liz Titus’ mother, which was really great. At the time I asked her if she would do this, and she told me a great story, so I'm going to let Andrea tell you this story that revolves around Winter Study.

Take it away Andrea!

Andrea:

Thanks, Polly. When we did Winter Study, I don't know if they still position it this way, but Williams said, well, it was a month to do non-traditional things, and learn about things in a non-traditional way, and, boy, does this story exemplify that. Some things that could never have been written into the curriculum.

I was one of sixteen singers in the Williams College Chamber choir under Ken Roberts. And sophomore year our Winter Study was a performance, 10 concerts in 21 days in Europe. We went to Salzburg and Linz and Bern and Strasbourg and Vienna, but one of the most memorable evenings was in Nuremberg.

I was one of four altos, but there were three of us; we called ourselves the Three Altos, as though we were the Three Musketeers: Deb Gross, Kiki Lundberg from class of 7'6, and myself, and we three really stuck together and hung out together. We went to a rathskeller in Nuremberg, and I still remember It had a sign that said, “With Charlie Keeler and the Hammond organ." We went to the rathskeller with our tour guide, who was this adorable red-headed graduate student from Vienna, and the bus driver--our nontraditional lesson number one--who had taken a number of us to our very first porno film. It was called “Sex and Violence in Hamburg.” All I can say is it didn't matter if you didn't understand German.

We were soon joined at this rathskeller by another American, who was a military intelligence officer at a nearby American base. We're listening to Charlie Keeler and the Hammond organ and then he asked for requests. So we sauntered over and we told him what we wanted to sing, and he said, “Ladies and gentlemen, we have these lovely American girls to sing “Schmuck Gets In Your Eyes.” So we sang that great Jerome Kern song, and soon everybody was asking for more from the three of us, and within 20 minutes we had sung our way through Oklahoma and Carousel and Brigadoon and My Fair Lady, and Charlie Keeler, he knew all these songs, but we could tell that he was soon growing tired of us.

A person in the audience came over to me instead, and I remember the person had a kind of like Texas updo, strange features, but really good hair, and the person said to me, “You know, you have a beautiful voice. It is a lovely voice; you sound. . . you know who you sound like? You sound just like Mario Lanza." As soon as she said that, she fell down dead drunk. Some other person comes running over with the pitcher of water; pours the pitcher of water over my admirer on the floor, pulls off a wig. . . it's a guy, I realize. Oho, this is also my first cross-dresser; I am learning things this Winter Study.

Within seconds there was a fist fight in the bar, the military intelligence officer comes over with our bus driver and the tour guide and says, you girls get outta here immediately, there's going to be military police in here very soon and so we left.

So that was my first official showbiz story I guess, and a lesson that you can learn many things in many places.

Polly:

I'm having such a good time doing these little interviews and hearing stories from people, so I hope I hope our classmates will look on the website and find these interviews.

Andrea:

I hope Deb Gross can verify the story; I told it to her and she said, "That happened?" Now every time I see Mario Lanza in a movie, I think we have so much in common.

Polly:

That's great, thank you so much. Are you going to come to Reunion?

Andrea:

Yes, I am, oh and also I'm helping put together the cabaret evening dinner show, so if anybody wants to sing, play an instrument, do dramatic monologues; whatever, they should get in touch [at this link].