Percy Irvine Yarick

This story is part of a series on “gender impersonators” on the early Vaudeville stages of Bellingham. Originally written and Published in the Betty Pages September 2023 issue.

For years I’ve been obsessed with the Jim Warwick collection of vaudeville performers at the Whatcom Museum and attempting to research some of the performers depicted. Among some of my favorites are those of “impersonators” whom I have been writing about in previous articles for the Betty Pages.

One such performer is pictured in a photograph in the collection wearing an off-the-shoulder gown trimmed with lace and a long necklace, holding what appears to be a small bird. The catalogue description indicated that printed below the photo was the name ‘Percy Irvine Yarick.’”

It was my luck that this vaudevillian had a very distinctive name and performed using the same name assigned at birth. These factors made finding Percy’s story slightly less challenging than for the many vaudevillians who used stage names.

Born in 1881 in Erie County, Ohio, the middle of three male children born to William Judson and Cora (Husted) Yarick. Percy’s mother filed for divorce from her blacksmith husband in 1899 on the grounds of drunkenness and cruelty.

Percy moved to Toledo and worked as a traveling salesman, hawking ladies’ hats. Soon his name appeared on vaudeville bills and I like to imagine he wore some of his wares, while traveling with a stock company around the country.

Percy teamed up with another female impersonator who went by Lou Lalonda. Percy and Lou were billed at Bellingham’s Grand Theater on Holly Street in September of 1905. At the time of their performance in Bellingham, papers described them as “two pretty young ladies who easily win applause.”

In 1907 Percy and partner were arrested in Montana for “running their horses through the streets.” The paper explained, “These two fellows made their living by assuming women roles and doing singing and dancing stunts at the Topic. It is said that while in female guise they led numbers of men, strangers in the city and graders from the camps, to buy them drinks and give them money… Both of them wore good clothes and strutted the streets in daytime with a great air of respectability.”

Apparently “one of them was nearly always seen with a cigar sticking in the corner of his mouth,” though appearing “very effeminate in his manner.” When is a cigar just a cigar? Here in Bellingham at the scandalous Trocadero Theater cigars were used as a timer, men could pay 25 cents to sit with a “lady” as long as it took her to smoke one of the cigars.

Off-stage, cross-dressing generally came with harsh consequences and it certainly “took balls” for Percy and Lou to attempt this in rural Montana in 1907. The two forfeited a cash bond of $25 each and left the city.

Returning to the Midwest in 1908, Iowa papers announced “The star attraction in vaudeville at the opera house next week will be Percy Yarick, a Wauseon boy who has made himself famous as an impersonator, singer, dancer, and comedian… His many friends will be pleased that he has succeeded so well in his chosen profession,” describing the duo’s $3000 wardrobe and the most expensive act ever brought to the city, stating “They make up like real girls and act so cleverly that in many ways they excel the genuine.”

They even inspired the next generation of vaudeville impersonators, as just a few months after the papers announced that two teenage sons of well-known local businessmen were imitating Yarick and Lalonda’s act “in a manner even funnier than the original.”

By 1910, “the great female impersonators” Percy and Lalonda announced a brand-new act. Unfortunately the following year Percy was struggling with Tuberculosis, and the duo went to Michigan where Percy’s grandmother ran a lodging house. They booked performances at the local Star Theater, but Percy’s health took a turn for the worse and he was hospitalized. The papers said that “his teammate” Lou Lalonda stayed for some time, only leaving when it was thought that Percy’s health was improving. It did not, and Percy Irvine Yarick passed away at age 29. The news was telegraphed to Lalonda in Chicago and he immediately returned to care for the remains. Percy’s body was shipped to his family’s plot in Ohio for burial.

In 1912, the name Lou Lalonda resurfaced in newspapers advertising “Lew Lalonda and Howard Yarick, impersonators of the divine sex.” It seems likely “Howard Yarick” was a stage name taken by another performer hoping to ride on the reputation already established by Percy. The new Yarick and Lalonda duo doesn’t seem to have lasted, as I found no further mentions after 1913. Perhaps Lou tried to carry on without his longtime partner but found it just not the same. “Lou Lalonda” appears to have been a stage name. Perhaps “Lou” decided on a new moniker.

At a time when many vaudevillians performed under stage names, sometimes more than one, it is interesting that Percy Irvine Yarick kept his birth name and proudly autographed his promotional photographs with it. A round of cigars in memory of Percy Irvine Yarick.

You can help support the Betty Pages by subscribing on Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/TheBettyPages