Jack Short and May Dalziel, appearing as the comedy duo Pa and Ma Logan.
Jack Short was born in Dennistoun 1896, son of a foreman in Blochairn Steelworks. By the age of ten he was performing with the Dennistoun Minstrels. He ran away from home to join a marionette theatre in England and worked string puppets, before returning to Scotland c 1914 to set up a repertory-style company in Falkirk called The Jack Short Players.
May Dalziel was born in Glasgow, 1901. When the couple first met in Helensburgh she was becoming well known as Sweet Mary Argyle, the Street Singer (although she was not a street singer, it made a good showbiz story!). May became the star attraction in Jack's Concert Party in Helensburgh. The couple married and May and her sister Ella became part of Jack Short's Starlights in the early 1920s before the couple developed their act as Pa and Ma Logan. In 1947 they began to appear in a variety act with four of their children as the Logan Family.
Reference: STA JLC PH 18
Glasgow University Library, Special Collections
Keywords:
accordionists, accordions, comedians, entertainers, Logan Family, music halls, Pa and Ma Logan, performers, singers, theatres, variety