May 5, 2002 By Glenn Tunney 9 min read

In the late 1930s, that announcement was often heard over big floor model radios sitting in living rooms throughout Fayette County. As listeners gathered around their radios, the modulated voice of WMBS radio announcer Jack McMullen informed them that another evening of big-band music was about to start.

For the featured band, the Johnny Vass Orchestra, it was the beginning of a musical reign over local dance floors that would span nearly 60 years.

Orchestra founder John Vaselenak, who is now 86 years old, lives with his wife, Lee, on Delaware Avenue in Uniontown. Today’s article is the first of a series in which John will share with us the story of the Johnny Vass Orchestra.

John has lived in the Uniontown area for most of his life, but he was born in Juniata, the son of John and Meri Ferrence Vaselenak.

“My dad, John Vaselenak Sr., was from Portage, Pennsylvania,” John explained. “He was a good baseball player. In fact, Pat Mullin’s father and my father both pitched for Juniata, and that’s where I was born.”

John Vaselenak is tall, and one glance at a photo of him standing next to his father reveals the source of his height.

“My dad was a great big man,” said John. “He would hold his arms straight out from his sides and stand still. Then, my late brother, Victor, and I would chin ourselves on his arms, and those arms never moved. He was very strong.”

“What did he do for a living?”

“Dad was an assistant mine foreman, so our family moved around a lot.

“We lived at Edenborn three times, twice at Bittner, twice at Smock and once at Maxwell, where my dad put in the haulage while he was pit boss there.

“In 1928, when I was around 13, we left Edenborn. Dad had been the assistant foreman there, but he moved the family to Detroit, where he worked for Hupmobile and Ford. Eventually, we returned from Detroit and settled in Bitner for a second time. Then, when a house became available in the patch at Smock, we moved back there. That is where I lived when I attended Uniontown High School, and it was while I was in high school that I formed the orchestra.”

“I know that you directed the orchestra, but did you also play an instrument?”

“I’m an old, broken-down piano player,” John chuckled. “I took lessons from one of the piano teachers who traveled around to the patches giving lessons. The fellow who taught me was Jack Bainbridge.”

“You were still in high school when you started your orchestra. How did that come about?”

“I was a student at Uniontown High School. There was another orchestra in Smock, and they would let me fill in whenever the regular piano player, who was much older than I was, wasn’t available. I was young, and, of course, I felt that I played better than he did, so I figured that I should be the regular piano player in that band.

“Well, they wouldn’t let me do that. So, although I was still in school, I was able to find musicians, some of whom were also from Uniontown High School, who were willing to play in my band. We began to practice at my house.”

“Why didn’t you call your band the Johnny Vaselenak Orchestra?”

“While we were rehearsing at my house at Smock Hill, the fellows were discussing what we were going to call the band. We needed a name, because we were scheduled to broadcast on a radio station in Washington, Pa. One of the fellows said, ‘Everybody calls you Vas. Let’s call it the Johnny Vass Orchestra.’ So, we did.

“We began broadcasting nearly every week in Washington. Then, we left there and were on a station in Greensburg for a while. When WMBS went on the air in Uniontown in the late 1930s, we started broadcasting with them. George Silver’s band and our band were the first two orchestras to broadcast over WMBS.”

“Did your whole orchestra go into the studio at those radio stations?”

“Yes. The WMBS studio was located upstairs in a building on Peter Street, and we would carry our instruments and equipment up to the studio for the broadcast. In fact, it was WMBS announcer Jack McMullen who made up the slogan, ‘Music With Class With Johnny Vass,’ and that became our permanent motto.”

When John Vaselenak graduated from Uniontown High School in 1935, he was extended an invitation to audition for entry into Duquesne University’s music program. But the nation was in the depths of the Great Depression, and, for John, the critical question was not whether he had the talent. It was whether he had the money.

“When Duquesne contacted me,” John said, “I didn’t have the funds to pay the tuition, so I was not able to go to Duquesne.”

Over the next several years, Johnny Vass and his Orchestra became well-established in southwestern Pennsylvania. The band was often featured at a night club near Uniontown called the Lucky Star Inn.

“By 1937,” said John, “we were playing at the Lucky Star Inn on a regular basis. It was in Hopwood on the right side of Route 40, just before you started up the mountain. The Lucky Star Inn was very popular, and there was really no comparable place between Hopwood and Pittsburgh except Bill Green’s famous night club on Route 51, where Sammy Kaye got his big break.

“I was 21 years old, with a successful orchestra, but I knew I needed a steady job. I came to know a gentleman named Mr. Malosky from Royal, because he and his wife came dancing every Saturday night at the Lucky Star.

“Mr. Malosky was the mine superintendent at Royal, and, with his help, I was able to get a job at the Royal mine.”

“Is that the same mine where your dad was working?”

“No. When our family first returned to Smock, Dad was hired as a coal cutter at Red Line. Eventually, they promoted him back up, though.”

“Had your dad tried to get you a job in the mine before that?” “Absolutely not,” John declared. “My dad never wanted me to go into the mine.”

John entered the mine at Royal for the first time on a Wednesday morning. One week later, the mine whistle blew. Someone had been hurt. The next day’s newspaper told the story.

“John Vaselenak,” the article read, “21-year-old Smock Hill resident and an employee of the H. C. Frick Coke Company, was reported as resting comfortably in the Uniontown Hospital today following his admission Wednesday evening suffering injuries received in a mine accident.

“Vaselenak, director of the popular ‘Johnny Vass Orchestra,’ was caught in a fall of slate in the Royal mine Wednesday afternoon with a fellow workman, George Fowler, 29, of Royal. The musician suffered back injuries and a possible fracture of the left arm, while Fowler received a head injury and abrasions of the face.”

“My dad had gone to work at Red Line around three that afternoon,” John remembered, “and I had not yet returned from the mine. When they called him at Red Line and told him what had happened to me, he came straight to Royal, where he found me badly injured but conscious. I remember that he was crying, and as I lay there on the stretcher, he said to me, ‘If your back wasn’t broken, I’d break it for you!'”

It was the nightmare of every coal miner who has ever watched a son enter the mine.

“So, you only worked inside the mine for that one week?”

“That’s right. Wednesday to Wednesday. And believe me, Dad didn’t have to worry about me going back.”

“How long did it take you to recover from those injuries?”

“I had a back injury, and my left arm was broken. My upper body was in a cast like this” – John held his left arm out rigidly from his side – “for about 18 months.

“After I was discharged from the hospital, I visited the doctor often. When I was well enough to earn some money, they gave me a job on the outside of the mine at Royal.”

The Johnny Vass Orchestra continued to perform during John’s recuperation, but until he healed, his own participation was necessarily limited.

“The company let me work at that job outside the mine until the doctor gave me my final clearance, when I had full use of my hands again. Then Mr. Malosky, the mine superintendent, called me into his office.

“‘John,’ he said, ‘you have to go back into the mine.'” “‘Nope,’ I answered him, without hesitating. ‘Not me.’ And that was it for my coal mining career.”

It was 1938.

The winds of war were blowing in Europe, while in America, the economic depression that had been plaguing the nation was beginning to lift. John now devoted his full energy to his band, spending many late hours writing special arrangements for his 10-piece orchestra.

But just as the orchestra was beginning to make its mark, fate stepped in, and the Johnny Vass Orchestra became one more casualty of World War II.

Next week, John recalls how after a silence of nearly 15 years, the big-band sound of Johnny Vass and his Orchestra was reborn.

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Comments about Glenn Tunney’s weekly articles may be sent to Mark O’Keefe (Managing Editor – Day), 8 – 18 East Church Street, Uniontown, Pa. or e-mail mo’keefe@heraldstandard.com . Glenn Tunney may be reached at 724-785-3201. To read past articles on the Web, go to http://freepages.history.rootsweb.com/~glenntunneycolumn