Bo Black guided Summerfest for 19 years
She was Milwaukee’s one and only, the irrepressible, unconquerable Elizabeth “Bo” Black.
Black presided over Summerfest, taking it from a local extravaganza to an international juggernaut, giving Milwaukee something out of the ordinary, a glitzy, gottabe-there event that lured the biggest names in music.
“She was a pistol, pal, she was a pistol,” said her husband of 20 years, former Milwaukee Brewers manager Tom Trebelhorn.
Black, who had been in declining health for several years and was in hospice care in recent days, died Friday
morning at her home in Scottsdale, Arizona. She was 74.
“I think she was ready to go,” Trebelhorn said.
Trebelhorn said Black will be long remembered for her influence in building Summerfest.
He called her “a dynamic administrator of probably the greatest family neighborhood venue in the history of the Midwest. She provided terrific entertainment at a reasonable cost. She loved the ethnic festivals, celebrated the diversity of the city.”
“It’s so sad,” said Blake Lindemann, one of her three children. “She was a colorful, firecracker of a lady.”
He said she moved to Arizona when she left running the Big Gig in 2003, but Milwaukee was always on her mind and in her heart. She loved the diversity and excitement of Summerfest and kept track of what was going on there.
“She always made everyone feel special, whether it was the Summerfest board or the janitor who was just picking up trash on the grounds,” said Stephanie Anderson, one of Black’s two daughters. “That’s a remarkable quality that I hope my kids take from her.”
Black was born in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1946, daughter of Joseph and Betty Mae Bussmann. She grew up in nearby Clayton, Missouri, part of a very large family.
Black first came to Wisconsin to attend the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she was the homecoming queen. She moved to Milwaukee with her first husband, William Black, when he got a job in the Milwaukee County District Attorney’s Office.
Black first worked at Summerfest as administrative assistant to Summerfest director Henry Jordan in 1974-’75. At the time she was named executive director of Summerfest in October 1983, she was a member of Mayor Henry Maier’s staff.
Black quickly became the face of Summerfest, and remained so for two decades.
In her 19 years as director, attendance at the 11-day festival had grown from 712,054 to over a million in 2001 and 2002. Total net revenue reached nearly $11 million in 2002.
In September 2003, the Summerfest board voted to not renew Black’s contract. Even after she left the job and moved to Arizona, she remained identified with the Big Gig: In 2007, a few months after she had a stroke, the festival named the grounds’ centerpiece fountain the Elizabeth Bo Black Children’s Fountain.
Black is survived by her husband; her three children, Stephanie Anderson of Pelham, New York, Kellyn Lindemann of Scottsdale, Arizona, and Blake Lindemann of Los Angeles; her brother Joseph A. Bussmann Jr.; and her four grandchildren, Grace, Jack, Brewer (“Brew Crew”) and Brady.
Piet Levy and Chris Foran contributed to this story.