THE JETS Move Closer To Becoming Pop's Next Family Dynasty

People Weekly July 14, 1986

Down in the dressing room at the old Warner Theater in Erie, PA., the worlds only Tongan-American rock band, the Jets, is getting ready to attack the stage. Fans of the band, made up of eight brother and sisters whose parents emigrated from the South Pacific's tiny kingdom of Tonga, cant wait. "This is the biggest thing that's happened in Erie in 21 years, " says one devotee, who's lived exactly that long. "I hear the Jets music all over town. They're going to be famous!

Don't bet against it. The eight oldest of Mike and Vake Wolfgramms 14 children (two by adoption), the Jets specialize in a funky brand of bubble gum pop that's made Crush On You a Top 5 single. Their debut album, The Jets, is No.29 on Billboards Top Pop Chart, a follow up single, Private Number, is poised for takeoff, and with a national tour under way, the group hopes to become as well known as such famous musical families as the Jackson's and Osmond's before summer's out. That's not as farfetched as it sounds.

Signed to a multimillion-dollar, seven album record deal with MCA, the Wolfgramms, Leroy, and Eddie both 20, Eugene 19, Haini 18, Rudy 17, Kathi 15, Elizabeth 13, and Moana 12 have a 10 year plan for stardom that includes a TV-sitcom pilot and a cartoon series. "When the Jets are done," declares manager Don Powell, 41, "I want them set for life."

Eight years ago, the family seemed set on an uncertain road to musical obscurity, performing as a Polynesian revue in Hawaiian restaurants throughout the Midwest and Canada. Traveling in an unheated van and napping in highway rest areas, the family survived on bologna sandwiches, water and ambition. "My children learn to survive, how to work," says father Mike, 42, a beefy optimist whose English still lurches, after two decades in the U.S. "They learn it takes hard work to make it."

A carpenter in Tonga ( an archipelago that is the last of the ancient Polynesian monarchies), Mike moved with his wife, Vake, to America in 1965. Settling in Salt Lake City, Mike, a Mormon, supported his ever-growing brood by working in a grocery store and doing lawn work, while his older boys formed a pop band that played family parties. By 1978, when Mike quit his job, the future Jets were in formation, with Vake singing lead vocals. Mike decided to buy a van, outfitted it with folding chairs and chauffeured his musical clan from date to date. After a Minneapolis hotel they were booked into went bankrupt in 1981, they settled in the city and found local gigs. " Dad always said one person would know to get us to the top, " says group percussionist Eugene. That person was Powell. A former Motown manager who once worked with the Jackson's, he had quit show business to help run his families successful auto dealership in Minneapolis and had no interest in getting back into the pop music world. But Powell changed his mind in 1984 when he caught the family act, which was now straight pop rather then ersatz Don Ho. "They were magic," Powell says. "Not yet polished, but they worked the audience like no kids since the Jackson's."

Powell put up $850,000, part of which financed a four song demo recording and got the family out of the van and into a luxurious tour bus. "It's a big risk in this business," Powell says, "but when you make it, and the Jets are going to make it, the money comes in bushel baskets."

The Wolfgramms will take the money (a 10 bedroom house in Minneapolis is planned for next year), but "family is most important," says Vake, a vivacious 39 year old who, since calling her own stage career quits in 1981, travels with the Jets as creative consultant and spiritual adviser. "In Tonga," she says, "we believe children are a gift." Bible study sessions doubling as family meetings are held on the road each week, says Vake, who creates the kids costumes and sees to their continuing education through correspondence courses and tutoring. (The two oldest boys are high school graduates.) "We talk about problems, then we try to change the problems, so the kids will go through the week with a lighter, happier feeling."

Stuck at home with relatives, most of the younger, nonperforming Wolfgramms eagerly await the day when they can join their siblings onstage. Next in line for takeoff is 11 year old Jennifer, who accompanied the family to Erie. "I  can't wait to be a Jet," she exclaims backstage. "I love this!" Whether the Jets ever equal the Jackson's as a musical dynasty remains to be seen. But with six other children, including 4 month old Donny, who, Leroy says, "cries in tune," the family talent pool is hardly running dry.

Convening in the family room, all 14 kids watch TV with manager Powell (on the love seat at rear), dad Mike (on the couch at left) and mom Vake (with her back to the camera). Powell is always welcome in the house says Eugene, because "he's pretty funky for a white boy."

                                                                                        Written by Steven Dougherty, reported by Margaret Nelson