I was inspired by Gene Cohen’s longitudinal study on Creativity and Aging (Cohen, 2006), which showed improved physical, mental, and emotional functioning in elders who participated in weekly arts activities over the course of three years in three different American cities.
I have also been fascinated by Helga and Tony Noice’s work on the use of instruction in acting techniques for the improvement of cognitive functioning and memory in older adults (1999, 2004). Beginning in the summer of 2007 I facilitated a drama group for residents who live at Meadowlark Hills Retirement Community in Manhattan, Kansas. Meadowlark subscribes to culture change and person-centered care. A full range of life options and services for residents are available from independent cottages and apartments to assisted living services for individuals with medical problems and with differing levels of dementia care issues.
The drama group was called “Acting for Fun” and focuses on projects chosen by the participants. Anyone in the Meadowlark community is welcome; however, the group has appealed most to retired professors who are very cognitively alert and physically able. These are not individuals who have had training or previous experience with theatre, but who are interested in challenging themselves to try something new. The group met once a week on Thursday afternoons from 4:00-5:00. All of the Meadowlark acting troupe were in their 80’s and 90’s.
The first summer we created a very popular improvisational Mystery Dinner Theatre that was performed in The Prairie Star, the Meadowlark Hills restaurant. One of the drama group members had recently bought and donated a number of square, wheeled metal carts for residents to transport groceries from their cars to their apartments. Unfortunately, the carts had started to disappear, and everyone was very perturbed about this. In rehearsal I had each actor create an outlandish fictional character who had an outrageous motive for stealing a cart, and we practiced how they might talk, move, act and react. At the performance I was in role as the “new activity director” with cordless microphone in hand and introduced each character to the diners as the first course was being served. Through our improvisational conversations, their personalities and motives as potential thief were established. Then each character sat at a different dining table and enticed the other diners to suspect the other characters. Questions for the suspects were written down on clipboards at each table and after dinner the suspects were called up to the front and interrogated. Much laughter and outrageous behavior ensued. The audience then voted on which one they thought was guilty. This became a very enjoyable way to play with a serious issue that was on the minds of the entire community. As a result of the performance the carts began re-appearing in the facility.
At the request of the actors, who loved connecting with “younger people,” I brought my students from Kansas State into the group during the 2007-2008 academic year. In addition to creating and recording a radio play, we focused on creative drama to develop creativity and acting skills. In the spring the actors who preferred a structured purpose said they wanted to do dramatic projects with an intergenerational focus that could engage the wider Manhattan community. Other requirements for projects included that there be no memorization and no tragedy involved.
The academic year of 2008-2009 one of my graduate students taught storytelling and guided each group member in the creation of an original story – either fictional or about growing up during the Depression. She took them into elementary school classrooms to share their stories with the children. This was a very popular, but a very individualized project, and meant that for the first time the group did not have a chance to interact as an ensemble. So in 2009-2010, we decided to create an original one-act play through improvisation that we could develop and perform together.
The most challenging aspect of our original play was deciding what it should be about. I attempted to generate ideas and characters by having the actors write or dictate monologues based on pictures of interesting characters. This revealed important themes that individuals in the group were interested in; however, there were no apparent connections between the characters leading to a story that could be brought to life through drama. Next I tried telling folk tales centered on the developmental issues of older adults (Chinen, 1989), followed by the creation of original folk tales along similar themes. While we created two wonderful tales which explored the growth and channeling of wisdom, the Meadowlark actors unanimously said they were not interested in continuing to dramatize either of these stories. This, they adamantly insisted, was because they were not wise and had no interest in creating a play to serve as a vehicle that would demonstrate the lessons of life to anyone of any age. I suggested that wise people typically say they are not wise and only fools think they have wisdom, so perhaps they did, indeed, have some important ideas to share. But they stubbornly folded their arms, shook their heads “no,” and insisted they did not want to develop this idea further.
Frustrated, I went back to the proverbial drawing board and had everyone write down one historical character who they admired and would like to portray in a play. These characters immediately suggested a wonderful scenario to me. Thomas Alva Edison, Amelia Earhart, Dale Evans, Annie Oakley, Teddy Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt were all in the mix. Two sessions were spent improvising the scenario while I recorded the improvisations and transcribed them. Because of all of the acting training they had had the past three years, everyone was able to get into character and invent very believable and humorous dialogue for the character they wanted to be. We read through the improvised script and made changes, additions, and deletions. Everyone had parts that were as large or as small as they desired. We did, in fact, have two people who wanted to participate, but not have any lines. K-State students were cast as younger versions of the characters for flashbacks and the “non-famous” supporting players.
The revised script became our rehearsal guide. No lines were required to be memorized, but actors reviewed their scripts between weekly rehearsals in order to remember the order of what happened. Soon the structure of the play was within everyone’s memories and the lines became relatively stable from rehearsal to rehearsal. Staging was kept simple with minimal props, costumes, and set pieces.
The troupe performed twice in February in the Meadowlark Hills Community Room. Our first audience was the K-State Arts and Aging class which included college students and Meadowlark residents. Everyone enjoyed themselves immensely. Students in our audience were amazed that actors in their 80’s and 90’s could remember and perform a 30 minute play. Meadowlark residents were proud of their peers. A second performance just for the Meadowlark Hills community was held two weeks later. As the actors finished their bows, Bill Johnson, who played Thomas Edison, the hero of the play, called me up on stage and told the audience, “I don’t know how this woman gets me to do things I have never done before in my life – but she does!” Then he turned to me and said, “So what are we going to do next year?” I shrugged my shoulders and said, “I don’t know! You’ll tell me!” And they will.
IN SEARCH OF AMELIA: A play in one act
CHARACTERS (in order of appearance):
PIDGE EARHART, younger sister of Amelia Earhart
MINA EDISON, wife of Thomas Edison
THOMAS ALVA EDISON, inventor
HENRIETTA GREENE, Thomas’ assistant
YOUNG AMELIA EARHART
JO (JOSEPHINE), Airplane Mechanic
PAULINE, Airplane Mechanic
DALE EVANS, Western Heroine
ANNIE OAKLEY, Frontier Sharpshooter
AMELIA EARHART, aviation pioneer
(played by same actor as plays PIDGE)
TEDDY ROOSEVELT, U.S. President
FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT, U.S. President
ELEANOR ROOSEVELT, First Lady, wife of FDR
WOMEN IN GRASS SKIRTS
SCENE ONE: The House and Lab of Thomas Edison. PIDGE EARHART knocks at the front door. MINA EDISON answers.)
MINA: Good morning.
PIDGE: Are you Mina Edison, Thomas’s wife?
MINA: Yes, I am.
PIDGE: My name is Muriel Earhart, but my friends call me Pidge. I would like to talk to your husband about my sister Amelia.
MINA: He is busy in his laboratory, but come in and I will see if he might be able to talk to you.
PIDGE: Thank you.
MINA: Now, what is the subject you want to talk about?
PIDGE: I want to ask him about inventing something that will help me find my sister Amelia. You know she was one of the first women to fly an airplane and she was lost at sea, but I think she’s still alive.
MINA: Please, have a seat. Let me see if he’s available.
(PIDGE sits on a chair near the entryway, and MINA goes into the laboratory.)
MINA: Excuse me, dear. Amelia Earhart’s sister is here. She wants to talk to you about a plan to find her. Do you have time to see her?
THOMAS: I would be very happy to talk to her. I’m not sure how I can help her, but I’ll try.
MINA: Alright, I’ll invite her in.
(MINA goes back to PIDGE.)
MINA: He’ll see you now. (She leads PIDGE back to the laboratory.) Pidge, this is my husband, Thomas Edison.
PIDGE: How do you do? I’m Pidge Earhart. My sister was Amelia, the famous aviatrix.
THOMAS: Yes, I remember Amelia. I think I met her at one time. She was a wonderful pilot.
PIDGE: Yes, she was. A brilliant one.
THOMAS: And you think she still might be alive?
PIDGE: I think she is surely. I believe she is on one of islands in the South Pacific.
THOMAS: I think it would be interesting to discover something that would find her. I’m thinking that we could devise something using radar and a locator of some kind…a global positioning device might have to be part of it…I think to do this I’ll need something that’s unique about Amelia that the device will pick up and I don’t know exactly what this might be…
PIDGE: Are you needing her DNA? We still have some of her hair from an old hair brush
THOMAS: No. No DNA. I’m not a biologist. I’ll need something that is unique about her appearance or her body movements.
PIDGE: I’ve got pictures of her all over.
THOMAS: Pictures are still. I need something that would have motion to it that would be characteristic of her and would represent her.
PIDGE: How about home movies? I have some of those.
THOMAS: That would be great! Send those over!
PIDGE: Could you start working on it right away?
THOMAS: Right away! I’m very interested in this project. I’ve made many inventions and this seems like it would be good one.
PIDGE: Thank you so much, Mr. Edison. It’s been a pleasure to meet you!
THOMAS: I’m glad to have met you, too, Pidge.
PIDGE: I’ll see myself out, Mrs. Edison.
MINA: Oh, OK.
(PIDGE leaves. MINA turns to THOMAS.)
MINA: I don’t know about this, Thomas. Do you think that you have a chance of doing something like this?
THOMAS: Yes! There are a lot things I can use – radar, GPS, things like that.
MINA: But Amelia Earhart’s been gone for a long time, and nobody has seen her.
THOMAS: That makes it all the more interesting! That’s the challenge! When we find her it’ll be quite an invention! It could be used to locate other missing people.
MINA: But you are working on so many projects right now. What about that global warming project?
THOMAS: Well, I’m not so sure there is such a thing. I mean can you explain global warming with the weather we’ve been having the last couple of days?
MINA: Well, no. But what about the AIDS program those people asked you to help with?
THOMAS: I’m not a biologist. AIDS is really not in my field.
MINA: Well, what is your favorite project?
THOMAS: Right now my favorite is to find Amelia Earhart.
MINA: OK, if that’s what you want to do, I’ll be behind you all the way. You know I believe in you.
THOMAS: I appreciate that.
SCENE 2: Several weeks later, THOMAS and HENRIETTA, his assistant, are in the workshop working on his new invention.
HENRIETTA: Mr. Edison, I have the home movie that Ms. Earhart sent over ready to view.
THOMAS: Oh, good, let’s take a look at it. I’ve connected a motion detector and GPS to radar to create a tracking device. Let’s see if we can characterize her movement profile from that movie.
HENRIETTA: Yes, sir.
(“Home movie” of AMELIA EARHART is acted out on the other side of the stage. YOUNG AMELIA is checking out her airplane before taking off. The plane can just be suggested with chairs.)
YOUNG AMELIA: How does the plane look?
JO: So far, so good, but we have a few last checks to do before we can let you go. Let’s see, everything is tightened up…ready to go…(to PAULINE) Ah, did you check the fuselage?
PAULINE: I did, I did. It looks great.
JO: Perfect! Any thing else you want us to look at, Miss Earhart?
YOUNG AMELIA: No, it looks beautiful. Thank you.
PAULINE: Fly safely.
JO: We are looking forward to seeing you on your return.
YOUNG AMELIA: Thank you.
PAULINE: Ah, before you go, we do need to know about your flight plan. Just to kind of get an idea of where you’ll be…
YOUNG AMELIA: Yes, let me get my chart out. (She gets it out.) So here we are. What I’m going to do is to fly west all the way to China. And once I get to China, I’m going to fly south and I’m going to go a little bit this way and West again and I’m going to hit the South Islands.
JO: Wouldn’t it be quicker just to go straight this way?
YOUNG AMELIA: I want to go around and see a number of places.
JO: Where you are going to stop to gas up?
YOUNG AMELIA: I’m going to stop here in California and I’m going to stop off again in these islands over here, and I’m going to stop off in China.
JO: OK. And do you speak Chinese?
YOUNG AMELIA: No.
JO: Well, good luck.
PAULINE: Just stay safe, Miss Earhart, ‘cause you don’t know all these people and…you’ll be by yourself.
YOUNG AMELIA: Oh, I’ll be fine. I’ll radio in and let you know where I am.
PAULINE: Well, we’ll be here.
YOUNG AMELIA: Thank you! Good-bye.
JO: We’d better get out of the way. She’s going to need room to taxi.
PAULINE: Right.
(MECHANICS exit. YOUNG AMELIA gets into the plane and waves from the cockpit. The film “ends,” AMELIA freezes in place, and lights come up on THOMAS and HENRIETTA.)
HENRIETTA: Did you notice anything, Mr. Edison, about her specific movements or mannerisms that we could use?
THOMAS: Yes, I think there are some characteristics there that we might be able to use.
HENRIETTA: She was very specific with her scarf. Did you notice that?
THOMAS: I noticed, I noticed.
HENRIETTA: So if she wore her scarf like that then, she probably still does that now. Would your new device be able to detect something like that?
THOMAS: I’m not sure. You see, that is cloth and I’m not sure that the radar would pick it up. I think I’d rather focus on her specific body movements.
HENRIETTA: She had her left hand on her hip a lot. And her wave was really unique, too.
THOMAS: Another thing, her body profile is something that we can utilize. She’s tall, very tall.
HENRIETTA: And she’s flowy, too. Watch the way she walks to the plane. Let’s back up the film and take another look at that.
(The film “rewinds.” MECHANICS and AMELIA walk backwards to the goodbye scene.)
JO: Well, good luck.
PAULINE: Just stay safe, Miss Earhart, ‘cause you don’t know all these people and…you’ll be by yourself.
YOUNG AMELIA: Oh, I’ll be fine. I’ll radio in and let you know where I am.
PAULINE: Well, we’ll be here.
YOUNG AMELIA: Thank you! Good-bye.
JO: We’d better get out of the way. She’s going to need room to taxi.
PAULINE: Right.
(The MECHANICS exit, YOUNG AMELIA waves again, and the “film” freezes on that “frame.”)
THOMAS: She has a nice long stride. Very mobile hand. Nice wrist action when she waves.
HENRIETTA: So I think we’re getting somewhere. I think we’ll both be happier when we find out if this thing works or not.
THOMAS: The objective is that the radar waves would beam into different vicinities and the signal would tell me something about what’s on the island and where she’s at…I think that there’s a possibility that this device will work.
HENRIETTA: Oh, good! When can we test this device?
THOMAS: Did you finally get your pilot’s license renewed?
HENRIETTA: Yes, I did.
THOMAS: Then let’s go now! No point in delaying!
HENRIETTA: OK!
(YOUNG AMELIA exits. HENRIETTA and THOMAS cross to the other side of the stage and get in the plane with the motion device.)
HENRIETTA: Don’t forget to fasten your seat belt.
THOMAS: OK. I’m ready.
HENRIETTA: Here we go!
(They take off and start scanning the islands. Short musical interlude to show the passage of time.)
HENRIETTA: We’ve been flying for close to ten hours…do you see anything yet?
THOMAS: I see an island over here that I have some interest in. Could we zoom down on it and get closer?
HENRIETTA: Yes, sir!
(Down on the island they see a figure waving at them as they fly by.)
THOMAS: There’s someone down there! I’m picking a wave here…a very specific wave… that’s being activated by the device.
HENRIETTA: Maybe we should land! I think we found her!
THOMAS: This is a pretty small island, so be careful!
(They land. It’s a little bit rough.)
HENRIETTA: OK…OK, we’ve landed. Shall we go talk to her?
THOMAS: Yes!
HENRIETTA: I’m excited!
(THOMAS and HENRIETTA get out of the plane and go to meet the woman.)
DALE EVANS: Howdy! Welcome to the island! I’m Dale Evans.
THOMAS (a little disappointed): Oh. Well, we’re glad to meet you, Dale Evans. I’m Thomas Edison.
HENRIETTA: And I’m his assistant Henrietta. Do you mind if I ask what you are doing on this island?
DALE EVANS: I have a summer home here, and I would be very happy to have you as my guests.
HENRIETTA: Thank you!
THOMAS: We’re here looking for Amelia Earhart. The signals we were getting from your activity, we thought you were her.
DALE EVANS: Well, I’m not, but there’s a lady down over the mountain who is a little ole gal…I don’t know her name. Maybe she’s Amelia.
THOMAS: Can we meet this lady?
DALE EVANS: We’ll have to be very careful how we go at it. She’s got a gun! So you’ll have to have somebody with you that she knows.
HENRIETTA: Does she know you?
DALE EVANS: She knows me by sight. And I would be very happy to take you. Do you ride horses?
HENRIETTA: I do.
THOMAS: Me, too.
DALE EVANS: If we walk it’ll take a long time, but there’s a trail that you can take with horses that is shorter.
HENRIETTA: (mischievously) Is it a happy trail?
DALE EVANS: Oh, of course! All my trails are happy ones!
THOMAS (to HENRIETTA): Do you think the airplane will be alright here?
HENRIETTA: Sure. We’ll lock it up.
(HENRIETTA locks the plane and ALL pantomime getting on horses. They sing as they “ride.”)
ALL: (Singing) Happy trails to you until we meet again. Happy trails to you keep smiling until then. Happy trails to you till we meet again.
ANNIE OAKLEY: Hold it right there! What are you doing on my property?
DALE EVANS: Well, Ma’am, they came in an airplane looking for Amelia Earhart, and I was telling them about how you’ve lived over here by yourself, and we decided that wanted to come over and visit with you.
ANNIE OAKLEY: I don’t know any Amelia Earhart.
DALE EVANS: You didn’t hear anything about a lady having an airplane crash?
ANNIE OAKLEY: I don’t get the newspaper, and I don’t pay attention to that stuff.
HENRIETTA: So, you’re not Amelia Earhart?
ANNIE OAKLEY: No, my name’s Annie. Annie Oakley. Who are you?
HENRIETTA: I’m Henrietta Greene, Assistant to Mr. Thomas Edison. (She indicates THOMAS.)
ANNIE OAKLEY: And what’s your business here, sir?
THOMAS EDISON: Well, I have a new device and we’re trying to find people with it. It’s kind of like radar and a little like television and by using it, I know what I see is the real thing.Right now we’re looking for Amelia Earhart. So, do you have any ideas about where I could find her?
ANNIE OAKLEY: I haven’t seen her around here.
THOMAS EDISON: I’ll be dogged.
HENRIETTA: Have you seen any airplanes in the neighborhood?
ANNIE OAKLEY: Oh, there are airplanes all the time. Goin’ overhead, scarin’ the horses.
DALE EVANS: How long have you been on this island?
ANNIE OAKLEY: Oh, I’ve lost track. (Thinks about it, then shrugs.) Too long. I got marooned here a long time ago. I don’t remember when exactly. I sure would like to get back home.
HENRIETTA: We’ve got extra seats in the airplane. We could take you back with us.
ANNIE OAKLEY: OK. Sounds good. Let’s go!
HENRIETTA: But, do you have to take your gun?
ANNIE OAKLEY: Yes! It’s part of my personality! I take my gun everywhere with me!
HENRIETTA: Could you maybe take the bullets out?
DALE EVANS: Well, sometimes when you ride over these mountains you run into animals you don’t want to argue with…
HENRIETTA: Oh, I see!
ANNIE OAKLEY: I’m a crack shot – I can take care of any mean animals if we run into ‘em. That’s the way I make my livin’.
(ALL pantomime getting back on their horses and sing another chorus of HAPPY TRAILS as they ride back.)
ALL: Happy trails to you until we meet again. Happy trails to you keep smiling until then. Happy trails to you till we meet again.
(THOMAS, HENRIETTA, and ANNIE get into the airplane and take off. DALE waves from the ground.)
HENRIETTA: Don’t forget to fasten your seatbelts!
ALL: Bye, Dale!
DALE EVANS: Bye! Come back and visit real soon! Hope you find her!
HENRIETTA: Doin’ all right back there, Annie?
ANNIE OAKLEY: I’m fine.
HENRIETTA: Are you picking up anything on your device, Mr. Edison?
THOMAS EDISON: Not yet…oh, wait, I’m picking up a cluster of people on that island over there.
HENRIETTA: Shall I land?
THOMAS EDISON: Please, do.
HENRIETTA: OK. Downward I’m going.
(They land and get out of the plane.)
HENRIETTA: Shall we investigate? Annie, would you like to come?
ANNIE OAKLEY: I’ll just stay here with the plane.
HENRIETTA: OK.
(HENRIETTA and THOMAS walk over to TEDDY ROOSEVELT.)
THOMAS EDISON: Well, I’ll be! Teddy Roosevelt, my old pal! Hello, Teddy.
TEDDY ROOSEVELT: Thomas! Good to see you!
HENRIETTA: Hello, Mr. President. I’m Henrietta, Mr. Edison’s Assistant.
TEDDY ROOSEVELT: Bully! Nice to meet you! What are you doing here?
THOMAS EDISON: We’re looking for Amelia Earhart.
TEDDY ROOSEVELT: I know another man who was looking for her, too. He was a famous pilot – they named an airport after him in Indianapolis…Eddie Rickenbacker
THOMAS EDISON: What did you learn from him?
TEDDY ROOSEVELT: Well, he explored all these islands, but he never found anything. He was disappointed. At any rate, it’s a pleasure to see you.
THOMAS EDISON: I have a device that if we see a person who looks like Amelia, I can identify if it really is her. Are there any other people on this island?
TEDDY ROOSEVELT: There are some women in grass skirts who live on the other side of the island.
THOMAS EDISON: Let’s go find them! Maybe I can determine if Amelia is with them.
TEDDY ROOSEVELT: When you get back, we’ll have cocktails. Franklin and Eleanor are here, too. Right now they are taking their afternoon naps.
THOMAS EDISON: OK, sounds good. We’ll see you later.
(THOMAS EDISON and HENRIETTA start off. WOMEN IN GRAS SKIRTS dance on. One of them is AMELIA EARHART. THOMAS focuses his device on the women.)
THOMAS EDISON: I think I’ve got her! Look!
(HENRIETTA looks into the device.)
HENRIETTA: Wow! It really looks like it could be her. Look at her fluid movements! And that wave! It’s unmistakable!
AMELIA EARHART: Look! We have company!
WOMAN #1: Aloha!
WOMAN #2: Aloha!
WOMAN #1: Welcome to the island.
AMELIA EARHART: You’re new on this island, aren’t you? I haven’t seen you before.
THOMAS EDISON: I’m Thomas Edison, and this is my assistant Henrietta. What is your name?
AMELIA EARHART: They call me Nano-wachow.
WOMAN #1: Yes, that means “Lovely Woman.”
HENRIETTA: Nano-wachow – it’s nice to meet you.
THOMAS EDISON: How long have you been on this island?
AMELIA EARHART: A long, long time. I came by airplane all by myself.
WOMAN #1: My father said you’ve been here since the 30’s.
WOMAN #2: Yes, she still lives in the airplane.
THOMAS EDISON: Did you crash on this island?
AMELIA EARHART: No, I landed on the island, but then the plane wouldn’t start again. It was out of gasoline, and there’s no gasoline here.
THOMAS EDISON: Why didn’t you radio for help?
AMELIA EARHART: My radio broke during my flight.
THOMAS EDISON: Does the name Pidge mean anything to you?
AMELIA EARHART: Yes, that’s the name of my little sister.
THOMAS EDISON: I have a device that I invented, and I’d like to do one final test, if you would agree.
AMELIA EARHART: Of course.
HENRIETTA: I’m going to ask you ladies to please do another lovely dance for Mr. Edison and me.
ALL WOMEN and AMELIA: We’d love to!!
HENRIETTA: Mr. Edison, would like to do the honor of flipping the switch of the device?
THOMAS EDISON: Oh, yes.
(He does and the WOMEN start dancing.)
THOMAS EDISON: We have to be able to compare your movements with our archival records of Amelia Earhart.
HENRIETTA: Look – it matches her, but it doesn’t match them.
THOMAS EDISON: My conclusion is that you are Amelia Earhart.
AMELIA EARHART: Yes, I am.
THOMAS EDISON: Do you want to go back with us to civilization?
AMELIA EARHART: Oh, we are very civilized here!
THOMAS EDISON: Oh, of course. I mean, wouldn’t you like to go back to Atchison, Kansas to see your family?
AMELIA EARHART: Could my friends come with me?
THOMAS EDISON: Sure. If they would like to come.
WOMAN #1: I would go.
WOMAN #2: I would like to go, too.
AMELIA EARHART: And we can all be together!
(ALL go back to TEDDY’s place where he has cocktails ready along with ANNIE OAKLEY, FDR, in a wheelchair with his dog FALA on his lap, and ELEANOR ROOSEVELT.)
TEDDY ROOSEVELT: Looks like you found her!
THOMAS EDISON: Yes, we did!
(MINA EDISON enters.)
MINA EDISON: Thomas!
THOMAS EDISON: Mina! What are you doing here?
MINA EDISON: I was listening to what was happening on the radio and missing you, and so I came out to visit!
TEDDY ROOSEVELT: Bully!
THOMAS EDISON: You’re just in time! We found Amelia! Amelia, this is my wife Mina.
AMELIA EARHART: Nice to meet you, Mrs. Edison.
MINA EDISON: My, you are the mirror image of your sister Pidge.
AMELIA EARHART: People have always said that about us.
TEDDY ROOSEVELT: Bully! I think we should celebrate with a toast!
ALL: To Thomas Edison and his device!
THOMAS EDISON: To Amelia Earhart and her adventure!
TEDDY ROOSEVELT: And to me! Bully!
(ALL clink glasses and drink their cocktails.)
ALL: Happy trails to you until we meet again. Happy trails to you keep smiling until then. Happy trails to you till we meet again.
CURTAIN
REFERENCES
Chinen, A.B. (1989). In the ever after: Fairy tales and the second half of life. Wilmette, IL: Chiron Publications.
Cohen, G.D., Perlstein, S., Chapline, J., Kelly, J., Firth, K.M., & Simmens, S. (2006). The impact of professionally conducted cultural programs on the physical health, mental health, and social functioning of older adults. The Gerontologist, 46(6), 726-734.
Noice, H., Noice, T., Perrig-Chiello, P & Perrig, W. (1999). Improving memory in older adults by instructing them in professional actors’ learning strategies. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 13(4), 315-328.
Noice, H., Noice, T. & Staines, G. (2004). A short-term intervention to enhance cognitive functioning in older adults. Journal of Aging and Health, 16(4), 562-58.