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Bubble show will kick off HCTPL reading program

Huntington City-Township Public Library invites the community to attend the "Fizz Boom READ!" summer reading club kickoff celebration at 2 p.m. on Saturday, May 31, at the main library, featuring "Bubble Lady" Alice Plasterer Stickler.

Attendees will witness Stickler's bubble-making abilities in action, with bubble blowing and bubble tricks - she may even put a child inside a giant bubble.
After the performance, attendees will get a chance to blow bubbles as well and may begin checking out books for summer reading club credit.

Stickler is carrying on the family bubbling tradition of her father, Eiffel Plasterer, who could be called the father of bubble performing in the United States.

Plasterer, who was known as "Professor Bubbles" and the "Bubble Wizard," started experimenting with soap film as a chemistry and physics teacher at Huntington High School in the late 1920s and early 1930s.

Stickler spent her lunch hours helping him set up. Her first bubble demonstration was in 1944, as a senior in high school.

The bubble show became a family affair, with first Stickler's mother and aunt and Stickler's brother in a supporting role.

Over 60 years of performing, Plasterer and his family of assistants gave more than 1,500 performances for schools, community groups, science center bubble festivals and on the television shows "You Asked for It," "Real People," "The Dick Cavett Show" and "The Tomorrow Show."

In 1977, after Stickler moved back to Huntington, she took her brother's place and traveled with her father on three trips to New York, two trips to California and a trip to Seattle, WA. Together they appeared on "Late Night with David Letterman."

After her father's death in 1989, and with the encouragement of friends and family, Stickler decided to continue the Plasterer bubble blowing tradition herself.

This program is free and no registration is required to attend.

The HCTPL main library is located at 255 W. Park Drive, Huntington.

For more information, call the children's department at 356-2900.