Black Hills Gold & The Vaudeville Musician

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Heather, a travel blog reader, recently sent us an interesting email. She had been sorting through a collection of antique sheet music and other belongings that had been in her family for years.

Among them was an old poster dating back to the 1930’s or early 40’s. The poster was from the Black Hills Jewelry Shop, owned by E.O. Lampinen, and formerly located at 48 Sherman Street in Deadwood.

After a little digging and some help from the folks at the Deadwood Historic Preservation Center, we found out that the poster has quite the past. It belonged to a man named Frank Ernest, who as far as we can tell, was a traveling vaudeville musician.

Ernest, it seems, performed all over the country, including the once famous Gayety Theatre in Detroit. At some point during Ernest’s travels he made his way into the Black Hills and bought his wife, Sarah Ernest, some Black Hills Gold jewelry from E.O. Lampinen’s store.

Now Lampinen, you see, was one of the early pioneers of Black Hills Gold manufacturing and owned the store, but also the Black Hills Gold Manufacturing Company. As you can see on the poster above, most prices of Black Hills Gold jewelry at that time were in the $3 – $5 range.

On the back of the poster is a hand-written note indicating that Frank Ernest, the musician, spent a whopping $6 at Lampinen’s Deadwood store!

The details of Frank Ernest and his wife trail off after his purchase in Deadwood, but the story of E.O. Lampinen’s Black Hills Jewelry Shop continues. Years later, in 1944, Lampinen sold his business to an area entrepreneur named Ivan Landstrom. The sale included all tools, molds and equipment from the store and the manufacturing company.

Ivan Landstrom moved the business to Rapid City and created the now world-famous Landstrom’s Original Black Hills Gold Creations company. Fast forward about 50 years; in 1995 Landstrom’s acquired the F.L. Thorpe jewelry company, also of Deadwood.

Thorpe was one of the other original Black Hills Gold manufacturers and he and Lampinen were actually one-time business partners. The acquisition of the Thorpe company effectively made Landstrom’s the sole owner of all of the original Black Hills Gold designs.

Landstrom’s still operates in Rapid City and is open year-round for tours of the facility. Tours are given daily at 10:00 a.m and 1:00 p.m. If you go, be sure to ask about Lampinen, Thorpe and the others who helped make Black Hills Gold the unmistakable design that it is today.

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This wonderful article and graphic is reprinted with permission by the author, Joe Rainboth. Joe writes articles in the Black Hills Travel Blog. Our heartfelt thanks to Joe for graciously allowing us to share this wonderful article.

Joe is a resident of Spearfish, S.D. He grew up in the tall-corn state of Iowa, where he developed an early interest in all things outdoors. After high school he moved to Vermillion, S.D., where he earned his bachelor’s degree in public relations and advertising. During his college years, two things caught his attention: the beauty of western South Dakota’s Black Hills and a girl from those Black Hills. After graduating from college, Joe traveled across the country as a recruiter for the University of South Dakota. He saw the sights from Pittsburgh to Las Vegas and everywhere in between, but it was the Black Hills (and the girl) that kept drawing him back. He and wife moved back to the Black Hills in 2008. He's an avid hiker, mountain biker and road cyclist whose future plans include trying to fit a pair of kayaks into the spare bedroom.