Penn Home resident and life-long Fishtowner Joe Walker has had a love for drama, theater and acting dating back to his days at North Catholic High School.
“I was looking around for something to do in school. I was not an athlete but there were all sorts of clubs,” Walker said. “I saw a notice about a rehearsal for a Christmas play. They were looking for stage hands so I figured I’d get involved with stage crew.”
By his senior year, Walker had a featured role in Blossom Time and received North Catholic’s drama prize. Though he loved acting, duty called and Walker was drafted into the army for WWII.
“When I got drafted I had no trade— the only jobs I ever had were unloading freight cars,” Walker said. “They didn’t know where to put me. The interviewer said in desperation, ‘well what are you interested in?’ I said theater.”
So Walker was placed into a special service unit that would entertain soldiers and boost morale, as well as help organize soldiers to make their own productions. The first things the new unit did were write scripts, rehearse them and put on little shows in Fort Meade, Maryland. As the war escalated, the unit, Walker included, got sent overseas to England.
“I was with some professional actors, comics, singers and musicians— some people who really knew the business,” Walker said. “We traveled, a whole show in the back of a six-by-six truck, which was a two and a half tons. We had a piano, a set of drums, a bass fiddle, an eight-man band, all of our props and little costumes we had a made.”
The group got quite a bit of experience, performing up to four shows a day for GIs who could appreciate a bit of humor to help them laugh during the conflict. Walker and his companions warmed up audiences for Bing Crosby and Bob Hope when they came to perform for GIs in Europe.
“So many guys came up to us after the show and said that they really enjoyed it,” Walker said. “They applauded us because we did what they wanted to hear.”
After the war, Walker hoped to pursue a career in acting and joined the Screen Actors Guild. Ultimately, he had to work to support his family but did manage to get a few roles in television and film. He worked on a local film production that aired in the Lancaster area as well as a film that he shot while working for Philco in Houston for a period of time.
“In Houston there was a casting call,” Walker said. “So I say, ‘what the hell,’ and go. I made the movie but never saw it, it was only used locally. A friend of mine wrote me a letter when I got to back to Philadelphia from Texas saying that everyone over there was surprised when they saw me on television, they didn’t know I was an actor.”
Walker continued to act back in Philadelphia with a group called the Philo Patriots, a Catholic theater group that performed family and church friendly plays. Walker acted with this group in two or three shows a year for a number of years.
Additionally, through connection with the Society Hill Theater, Walker was also in that playhouse’s first union production. Later in his life, after retiring from working, Walker joined a Shakespeare repertoire company playing Romeo’s father in Romeo & Juliet, Bottom the weaver in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Katherine’s father in The Taming of the Shrew.
Now a Penn Home resident, Walker recently brought his love for theater to the Penn Home as he helped organize “The William Penn Theatre” there. Residents performed a series of one-act plays by Philadelphia author and playwright Gil Sokolow, who is also a good friend of Walker’s.
To Walker, who is a sharp as can be at 90-years young, it’s the quality of a script that makes a play. To give credit to Walker, the script of his own life can be considered a pretty quality story as well.
