FLAGLER COUNTY, Fla. (July 10, 2023) – While it was over a decade ago that the name was changed, the Flagler Auditorium’s rebrand to the ‘Fitzgerald Performing Arts Center’ was long overdue.
So much more than just a high school auditorium, the Flagler Auditorium serves as a training facility for students who will one day enter the professional arts and entertainment industry, through the Flagler Schools’ curriculum at Flagler-Palm Coast High School.
“We’re on a high school campus and we’re very proud of that because our training here, we’re the ultimate classroom for the arts,” said Amelia Fulmer. “We want to stay that way. But we also realize that when people drive by, they think we’re just part of the high school.”
The Flagler Auditorium is also a regular stop for national touring acts since the first show in 1991, attracting some of the most sought-after performers over three decades according to Amelia Fulmer, Director of the Flagler Auditorium, who has helped continue moving the facility forward.
“If we’re going to elevate the auditorium, we’re going to have to continue to review what it is, and how it was brought here. We have to strengthen our partnership with the school district and the community, and get people to support us, not for the shows on the stage, but for what we are, and establish trust that we are for excellence,” said Fulmer.
With the rebranding comes a history lesson. Created through a bond issue at the urging of Flagler County School Board members, it was a tragic passing that led to the venue being named after one of the leading members.
History Shared by Flagler Auditorium Staff: Dennis Fitzgerald
“Mr. Fitzgerald served the Flagler County School Board for eight years and was deeply committed to advancing music and performing arts education programs in the area. For over 20 years, his wife, Alana Fitzgerald, has taught singing and music to individuals and choirs at schools and churches throughout Flagler County. Dennis and Alana Fitzgerald were one of the first families to relocate to Palm Coast. Dennis, a vice president of the ITT group in charge of amenities, helped start Mother Seton’s Men’s Club and was a member of the Knights of Columbus and the Rotary Club.
This kind and compassionate individual found joy in engaging with children, whether watching them play tee ball or baseball or participating in swim teams. Finding that the Flagler School District, predominantly comprised of rural areas, wasn’t providing the best opportunities for his children and others during their transition to town, this timid “worker bee” volunteered and served on the school board for an entire decade. He and his fellow Board members dramatically changed the county’s education landscape. To meet the demands for the school’s arts programs and provide entertainment for the growing community, they fought to get a bond issue passed to build the Flagler Auditorium and Arts Center, which would serve both purposes effectively. Unfortunately, in 1996, Dennis was repositioning a piano for a spring festival at Flagler Palm Coast High School when he suffered a heart attack and died. Alana has since taught music at Buddy Taylor, Bunnell, Wadsworth, and Flagler Palm Coast High School and was named “Teacher of the Year” in 1997. Alana still accompanies the choir at Flagler Palm Coast high school regularly! Many of Alana’s former students have become music educators at the k-12 and college levels. Several of them have made a name for themselves in the music industry.
This wonderful couple and their lovely family have significantly impacted Flagler County’s arts and culture education. Their enthusiasm and leadership in our county’s education system has been highly inspirational. We are indeed grateful to have this family support our journey!”
The Rebrand: Welcome to ‘The Fitz’
Plenty of venues have nicknames, and the Flagler Auditorium is no different. Shortened to ‘The Flagler’ by performing acts and their booking agents, Amelia Fulmer loves the idea of not only sharing the history of the (Dennis) Fitzgerald Performing Arts Center, but the unique identity that will be established as a result.
“To our community, that’s been coming here for 32 years, we will always be the Flagler Auditorium. We’re not changing our name, we’re just rebranding so that people in conversation will talk about going to ‘The Fitz’ or the Fitzgerald Performing Arts Center, in the same way they might go to the Kravis Center or The Amp,” said Fulmer.
“Everybody in the community finds their way to the Flagler Auditorium, but people from out of town don’t always find it. We do have some confusion because people will think we are Flagler Playhouse. People will come here because they think they are at Flagler College’s auditorium, which is the Lewis Auditorium at Flagler College. So, we’re thinking it might help us a little bit with that confusion and what show is where.”
The name also adds a certain legacy of prestige for the next generation who find employment at venue as they complete school and build their resume.
“I think that legacy has already begun. We have people working in the field all over the world. We have the musical director of Tootsie graduated from here. We have students singing in groups, we have student teachers, we have a lot of music educators. We have two students that are going to the Savannah College of Art and Design that learned technical theater here and they’re very successful, and in their college careers have already been given leadership roles,” explained Fulmer.
“We’ve raised a lot of future stagehands. Sometimes when you think about performing arts you think about the singer and the dancer and the vocalist, but you forget all of the support required. We teach them really young to respect the stagehand and respect the backstage. There is no show without an audio technician, a lighting technician, and there’s a lot of safety that goes into that. We’re very proud that we train those people, and they’re actually finding good work. We have some very neat stories we can tell about alumni.”
“By making Fitzgerald Performing Arts Center a name, it helps them because when you say you were 16 years old and you worked in our box office, you worked in the box office of a performing arts center. That’s going to help them in the long run,” she said.
Modest, Fulmer doesn’t take all the credit for the success of the performing arts center. She continues to upgrade the offerings and ensure future sustainability, implementing new ideas since taking the helm.
“You could say that I’ve been fortunate that I get to enjoy the shade of the trees that were planted before I got here,” she said. “If you look at it that way, I’m not elevating, I’m able to move ahead, move forward, because the people before me looked upstream. We’ve had terrific board members, we’ve had people that really thought ahead.”
“We are the Flagler Auditorium and we will always be the Flagler Auditorium. But, we’re rebranding the professional shows to Fitzgerald Performing Arts Center to give us a little bit more of an identity. There’s lots of auditoriums around but we’re the Fitzgerald Performing Arts Center. We’re excited about using it to go over the history of Palm Coast and how Palm Coast was put on the map, and to also look at all the people that contributed.”
For more information, visit www.FlaglerAuditorium.org.
