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Tradition To Return To Old Overton Gym

	By Vernon Robison Moapa Valley Progress Published October 29, 2008 A long lost (but not forgotten) Moapa Valley personality will return to Overton on Saturday, November 1. After many years of absence, the Pocket Lady will make an appearance at the Old Fashioned Good Time Fall Carnival event being held at the Old Overton Gym on November 1 from 5:00-8:00 p.m. Three decades ago, the Pocket Lady was an important established Halloween/Fall tradition in the community. She was in high demand during the month of October. She appeared at all kinds of community fall festivals, church carnivals, and school parties.		Ramona Crane as the Pocket Lady in the late 1970s. Also pictured is her daughter Denna (left) and Ginger Munzelli (right).

	The Pocket Lady wore a full-length bright orange skirt that was covered with over 100 small pockets. In each pocket was hidden some treasure: a toy, candy or prize of some kind. The Pocket Lady always wore a tall hat with a long-haired wig, and painted her face differently each time. She would walk around and work the room in any event she attended. As she walked, she would call out in a high voice,"Pick, pick, pick; anywhere you want to pick!" Kids would immediately congregate around her. For the price of a single carnival ticket, each child could pick her pocket. They had a chance to reach into one of the pockets and take a prize. Logandale resident, Ramona Crane, played the part of the Pocket Lady for 15 years. She began playing the part at a school party when her oldest daughter Denna (Anderson) was in Kindergarten. She continued as the Pocket Lady during the time that all of her children were in school."I went through all of my kids and even continued doing it a little further than that," Crane said."Halloween season was always a busy time." There is some dispute where the Pocket Lady originally came from. The way Crane remembers it, the skirt was made by Logandale resident Marilyn McMurray. According to Crane, just a year before her debut as the Pocket Lady, McMurray had made the skirt and played the part in the Kindergarten classroom. The next year, McMurray handed the skirt and the role off to Crane and a legend was born. The skirt was originally fashioned with a simple elastic waistline. Trouble was, once the pockets were filled up, gravity would take its toll, Crane said. So she fitted the skirt with a rope waistline that held the skirt up. The original skirt is long gone. No one knows for sure what ever became of it. Crane said that she passed it down to other people interested in playing the part and it eventually disappeared. But to revive the tradition, Logandale resident and Old Overton Gym Board Member, Chris Green went to work to procure a new skirt. Green went to Deann Smith and Donna Green of De De & Me Creations. The two women got very excited about creating a new Pocket Lady skirt that would match an even outshine the old one. "I'm very excited about coming back and being the Pocket Lady again," Crane said. In planning Saturday's event, there was reportedly some reluctance among other Old Overton Gym Board Members about the decency of having children actually reach into the pockets of the Pocket Lady to retrieve prizes. It was suggested that, rather than a skirt, the Pocket Lady should push a cart around the room with pockets on it. But Crane would have none of this. "I'm not going to go around pushing a cart around," she said."I was the Pocket lady for 15 years and the only person who ever goosed me was Louise Doty." Saturday's Old Fashioned Good Time will be a fun trip down memory lane from 70 years of community activities in the Old Overton Gym. The Old Gym is providing a multitude of inexpensive family activities reminiscent of days gone by such as: bake sale, popcorn and carnival booths. The Rotary Club will be cooking a hamburger/hotdog dinner. Those signing up for Old Gym membership will get dinner free for their families. The dinner will be on sale for others as well. "It should be a great time for the whole family," said Chris Green.

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