WILKES-BARRE — The Luzerne County Arts and Entertainment Hall of Fame has announced the inaugural class of 2023 and the inductees will be honored Oct. 14, at a dinner at Mohegan Pennsylvania.
Tickets for the event are $100 and will go on sale soon. Details will be announced, so save the date.
The Luzerne County Arts & Entertainment Hall of Fame was formed in 2022, with a news conference announcing the formation that was held in October in the lobby of the F.M. Kirby Center for the Performing Arts on Public Square.
The organizing committee issued the following list of inductees:
Arts category:
• Adrian Pearsall, architect and furniture designer.
• Barbara Weisberger, founder of the Pennsylvania Ballet.
• C. Edgar Patience, coal artist who took the ordinary piece of coal and sculpted it into something extraordinary.
• George Catlin, Native American painter.
• Hammond Edward “Ham” Fisher, comic strip writer and cartoonist.
• Sue Hand, artist, best known for her artworks in watercolor and her hexagon-shaped historical illustrations of mining.
• Jack Palance, actor.
• Santo Loquasto, production and costume designer for stage, film and dance.
Entertainment category
• Lee Vincent — formed the Lee Vincent Orchestra after returning from World War II and rose to prominence shortly after playing locally and nationally.
• Joe Nardone & The All Stars — devoted his entire professional life to music.
• Mel Wynn & the Rhythm Aces — perhaps the most impactful band on the local music scene in the 1960s and 1970s. Melvin Samuel Wynn, the front man for the Rhythm Aces, was known for his electrifying on-stage presence.
• Eddie Day Pashinski — has dedicated much of his life to music.
• Jimmy Harnen — a native of Plymouth and, with the song “Where Are you Now,” he is the only artist from Luzerne County to score a Top-10 hit on the Billboard Hot 100.
• Breaking Benjamin — explosive modern-rock band has sold over 19 million albums in the United States and have earned three platinum albums and two gold albums.
• Bobby Baird — took his first trumpet lesson 88 years ago and his career has spanned nine decades. The well-known area entertainer — best known for Bobby Baird and the Dixieland Band.
• Brunon Kryger/The Kryger Brothers — played polka music from 1937 until 1996 locally and nationally.
• The Buoys — one of the first acts from Luzerne County to land a national recording contract and have national success.
• The Badlees — this critically-acclaimed roots-rock band was signed to two national recording contracts and scored national hits with the songs “Angeline Is Coming Home” and “Fear of Falling.”
