Friday evening’s performance of Randy Otto as Winston Churchill at the Bowlus Fine Arts Center provided the perfect opportunity to recognize 50 years since the creation of the Sleeper Family Trust. After all, Alan Sleeper, the Iola native who established the trust in remembrance of his parents and brother, was a committed scholar of the statesman.
Friday’s event was the second of the Sleeper Trust’s annual Speaker Series, which features engaging lectures on a variety of topics.
Bowlus director Mandy Moyer paid tribute to the Sleeper family during the show’s intermission, presenting Alan’s daughter, Barbara Sleeper Hulsizer, with a certificate of recognition. Hulsizer’s son, Noah, and granddaughter, Echo, were also in attendance.
“Thank you for your enduring support of the arts in our community,” said Moyer, who recognized that because of the Sleeper Family Trust’s financial support, the Bowlus was able to stay open during the pandemic. In turn, said Moyer, the Bowlus “was able to bring in new patrons who still support our shows.”
Moyer noted that the Sleeper Family supports a variety of community arts initiatives in town, including Iola Reads. Jim Gilpin, a trustee of the trust, explained that the Sleeper Family Trust’s financial support supports much more than just the Speaker Series, allowing the Bowlus to continue offering a stunning variety of performances at affordable prices.
The Hulsizers were treated to a special dinner beforehand in the Creitz Recital Hall courtesy of chef Austin Honaker of Cozy’s Grindhouse. Trustees of the Sleeper Family Trust were invited, as were members of the Gilpin family. Jim’s parents, Howard and Helen Gilpin, were best friends of Barbara’s uncle and aunt, John and Virginia Sleeper.
ALAN SLEEPER was the grandson of Lyman Sleeper, who in 1886 established Sleeper Furniture Company and Mortuary, a longtime Iola business. In 1902, Roy Sleeper joined the business, followed by Alan’s older brother, John.
John, a mortician, died in 1960 in a car accident, returning home from taking the body of Tom Bowlus to Kansas City for cremation.
It’s in recognition of his extended family that Alan Sleeper in 1975 established the Sleeper Family Trust for the Bowlus Fine Arts Center. In 1994, the estate of John’s widow, Virginia Sleeper Creitz, contributed significantly to the trust.
Alan graduated from Iola High School and then attended the University of Kansas, where he studied history and obtained a law degree.
In World War II, he served on a Navy flagship in North Africa during the invasion of Italy and France.
When he returned home, he married Sara Fair, a fellow classmate at KU. The couple relocated to Fair’s hometown of Alden, Kansas. Alan joined his father-in-law in the farming and ranching business, a life he neither trained for nor had any experience, but which he learned to love.
Alan died just short of his 95th birthday in 2012; Sara died in 2019 at the age of 101.
Barbara Hulsizer lives in Lexington, Mass., where she had a career as a landscape architect. Noah and Echo live in Portland, Oregon. Barbara’s brother, Jim Sleeper, is in Santa Fe, N.M., a retired doctor of oriental medicine.
FRIDAY EVENING also provided an improbable reunion for two long-lost classmates. Noah and Stephen Gilpin both attended New York City’s School of Visual Arts. The two graduated in 1999 with degrees in illustration but hadn’t seen each other since.
Stephen and Noah spent much of the dinner catching up. Noah had taken daughter, Echo, on a visit to KU’s campus in Lawrence earlier that day. Echo, a senior in high school, is considering attending either the University of Utah or KU. Stephen just laughed; his son Farel is also thinking of becoming a Jayhawk.
