The Andrews Sisters the group was formed, and 12 when they won first prize at a talent contest at the local Orpheum Theatre in Minneapolis, where LaVerne played piano accompaniment for the silent film showings in exchange for free dancing lessons for herself and her sisters. Following the collapse of their father's Minneapolis restaurant, the sisters went on the road to support the family. They started their career as imitators of an earlier successful singing group, the Boswell Sisters, who were popular in the 1930s. After singing with various dance bands and touring in vaudeville with the likes of Leon Belasco (and his
The Andrews Sisters tunes sung by the Andrews Sisters and some of the more obscure tunes such as "Well Alright" and "South American Way" as well. In 2008 and 2009, the BBC produced "The Andrews Sisters: Queens of the Music Machines", a one-hour documentary on the history of the Andrews Sisters from their upbringing to the present. The American premier of the show was June 21, 2009, in their birthplace of Mound, Minnesota. In 2008, Mound dedicated "The Andrews Sisters Trail". The sisters spent summers in Mound with their uncles Pete and Ed Solie, who had a grocery store there. Maxene Andrews always