Back in the early months of 1956, the village of Roseville was in the
process of becoming a civic entity. It had just gone through its first
seriously contested election campaign, and a young upstart named Dick McGee
had been elected to the village council.
A year or two before, a man named Ed Litman had founded a newspaper he
called The Rose Tribune, and the first Roseville civic organization, known as
the Roseville Businessmen's Association, had been started. A doctor had
come up from Fairmont, Minnesota, with the intention of opening an office in
the new village.
This move meant the end of his place in the Fairmont Barbershoppers, one
of the worst aspects of the move. On seaching St. Paul, he phoned his
friend Doug Stark, who worked in a drug store in White Bear. This phone
call constituted the first suggestion of a Barbarshop chapter in Roseville,
or, for that matter, in any Twin City suburb.
An idea is a long stretch from the founding of an organization. However, this
idea had a few advantages. Doug Stark had a very fine tenor voice, and,
moreover, he had been a member of a trio of druggist-singers who had done
considerable entertaining in the Twin Cities. He also had a lot of
friends, including some people who lived
in Roseville.
One of these was a drug salesman named Bob Shaffstall, who one day
appeared at the doctor's new office with his samples and the announcement
that he had just been talking to Doug Stark. This was the real
beginning of the chapter, for it led to a meeting a week or two later of
seven men in the basement of St. Christopher's Church. In addition to
Stark, the doctor, and Shaffstall, there were four men, one of whom was a
recent acquaintance of the doctors. The other three were members of the
church and friends of Shaffstall. The seven agreed that they would meet
weekly to sing and to get others to sing. The chapter was on its way.
The course of events in the weeks following the first meeting was undoubtedly
the first crucial point in the history of the organization. For an
organization of more than 25 people to come from six or seven, there had to
be a serious intention on the part of each of the seven to show up the
following week, and not to come alone. Those weeks saw consistent
meetings, with the consistent appearance of the originals with their
friends. Some of the originals disappeared, to be replaced by
others. However, in the course of two months, a group of 15 men were
singing "The Old Songs".
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