After a half-century, melodrama Lumber Queen returns to Muskegon

Nearly half a century after its debut, the five-act melodrama The Lumber Queen is returning to the stage, with the goal of becoming a catalyst for community connection and local history education.

The original production opened in 1975 during Muskegon’s Seaway Festival. Director Mike Vogas says he and two friends wrote the play to celebrate the city’s logging heritage and give families a chance to cheer, sigh, and boo together. 

“Fifty years ago, I asked two friends of mine, one a Chronicle writer and the other a high school music teacher, to help me create a family-friendly musical play about my new home, Muskegon, Michigan,” Vogas says. 

“I had just moved here from New York and thought this was a marvelous place. Having created Muskegon Children’s Theater, an improvisational effort for seven years, the idea of Lumber Queen grew from that effort and celebrated the community’s rich logging history.”

Community effort sparked play’s return

Vogas recalls how the revival almost didn’t happen. 

“A man who had played the lead in the original came to me and said, ‘Mike, do you still have the music and the script?’ I said, ‘Yes, it’s sitting here on a shelf waiting for you,’” Vogas says. “He tried to produce it last year but couldn’t get it done. When he asked if I could produce it, I called him back three days later and said the logistics and cost were too much.”

Then opportunity struck. 

“Someone who is now my choreographer said, ‘My family just bought a marvelous old church building. Why don’t you go look at it?’ I called back and said, ‘Oh, it’s going to happen.’”

Performances are set for Oct. 3 and 4 at 7:30 p.m. and Oct. 5 at 3 p.m. at The Stage at the Corner, 280 W. Muskegon Ave. Tickets are $10 and available through the Muskegon Lumber Queen Facebook page. 

Community leaders, Rotarians, and donors rallied to raise $20,000 to produce the show. 

“I had a friend who is a philanthropist and a real go-getter,” Vogas says. “He asked how much we needed and then went to the community. That’s how we raised the money.”

Cheers and hisses

Set during the 1880s lumber boom, The Lumber Queen follows logging foreman Fred Hansen as he battles scheming rival Harry Dawson to save a critical shipment of pine logs and win the heart of Annie Sorensen, the sawmill owner’s daughter. 

“It’s a melodrama,” Vogas says. “You get to cheer for the good guy and boo for the bad guy. There’s a lot of audience participation.”

Casting turned out to be as community-driven as the fundraising. 

“It’s a melodrama. You get to cheer for the good guy and boo for the bad guy. There’s a lot of audience participation.”

Mike Vogas, Director of The Lumber Queen

“I had no idea who was going to come out,” Vogas says. “We got 30 marvelous folks at the audition, some who were in the original production 50 years ago and several who are acting for the first time. I even have an industrialist who owns a company taking a lead role for the first time.”

Recorded music will be performed by the 20-member West Shore Winds. 

Vogas sees the project as more than entertainment. 

“It’s absolutely a community event,” he says. “This story brings the history of Muskegon to the forefront and makes everybody a part of the legacy it represents.”

Vogas has donated the script, music, and supporting materials to the Lakeshore Museum Center so schools and community groups can stage their own productions free of charge. 

“It’s a community legacy that everybody will be proud to be a part of,” Vogas says. “The show opens and closes with a theme song called Muskegon Town. The lyrics are printed on the program so everyone can join in.”

Vogas hopes the revival not only delights theatergoers but also inspires future productions that keep Muskegon’s logging history and its tradition of grassroots creativity alive.