[Dixielandjazz] R.I.P. Ginger Dinning

[Robert Ringwald]

I remember the Dinning Sisters when I was a kid. My parents really liked them and had their records. I always wondered what happened to them. 





Virginia Lutke, Part of '40s Musical Sister Trio, Dies

by Jay Levin

Bergen Record, October 18, 2013

Virginia Lutke, who as Ginger Dinning performed with her sisters

in the 1940s harmony trio the Dinning Sisters, died Monday at a

nursing home in Oakland.

Mrs. Lutke, who lived in northern New Jersey, including

Ridgewood, for much of her married life, was 89.

The Dinning Sisters -- Ginger and her identical twin Jean, and an

older sister, Lou -- were similar in style to the Andrews

Sisters, and the groups' careers overlapped.

Farm girls from Oklahoma, Ginger, Jean and Lou signed their first

commercial contract in 1940 to sing on the NBC radio network.

They were staples on "National Barn Dance," a country-music

program broadcast from Chicago, and signed with Capitol Records.

In 1948, the Dinning Sisters had a top-10 hit with "Buttons and

Bows"; the song achieved greater popularity that year when Bob

Hope sang it in his movie, "The Paleface." The sisters did not

appear in the movie, but they were featured in several Westerns

just after World War II.

During their career, Ginger, Jean and Lou were chaperoned by an

older brother. There were nine Dinning siblings in all.

The act ended in the late 1940s when the sisters began to marry.

Ginger and her husband, Harry Lutke, settled in New Jersey. Harry

Lutke had a construction contracting business and Virginia Lutke

was busy raising their seven children. She occasionally performed

in plays mounted on the stage at Ridgewood High School and sang

in a barbershop quartet but was mostly out of show business, said

her youngest child, Kevin Lutke.

Kevin said his mother was humble about her days with the Dinning

Sisters and left it to her son, Buddy, who died in 1994, to

collect Dinning Sisters memorabilia.

Lou Dinning died in 2000. Jean Dinning, who wrote the young-love

tragedy song "Teen Angel" in 1959, died in 2011.

Mrs. Lutke is survived by her husband, of Oakland, and their

children: Gary Lutke of Lake Lure, N.C., Steven Lutke of Highland

Lakes, Janice Lutke of Oakland, Mark Lutke of West End, N.C., and

Joan Hillman and Kevin Lutke, both of West Milford. She also is

survived by a sister, Dolores Edgin, of Nashville.

Visiting will be Monday from 2 to 4 and 7 to 9 p.m., with a

service at 8, at C.C. Van Emburgh Funeral Home, Ridgewood.

-30



-Bob Ringwald K6YBV
www.ringwald.com
916/ 806-9551

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