Last November, my friends, Anita and Ken, and Bob and I started to plan a trip to New York to celebrate Anita’s birthday in late 2016.

She had become intrigued with reports about a new musical, Hamilton, that had just opened on Broadway and wanted to see it while we were there. It was about Founding Father, Alexander Hamilton, and incorporated rap style story telling as well as more traditional musical production numbers. We easily found tickets on Ticketmaster for August of 2016.

As the months passed, hype about Hamilton grew along with stories of skyrocketing ticket prices.

 

 

August arrived and Anita and Ken drove in from Wisconsin to stay with me the night before we left for New York. We discussed the Hamilton mania over dinner.

 

 

We agreed to see what riches our tickets would fetch on the resale market. The first thing I did when we returned home was call Bob. I knew he’d be on board.

 

 

Bob hung up to work his connections while I checked options on Ticketmaster and Stub Hub. Much to our surprise, resale tickets were readily available for less than $50 over what we paid for them. In fact, after the ticket broker’s fee we would have actually lost money on the sale.

Our hopes of windfall profits dashed, we headed to New York to keep our date with Hamilton.

Was Hamilton worth the wait and all the hype? Well, it may not have been “two inches of compacted limestone screenings” great, but it was very, very good.

 

 

And it was refreshing to see the young crowd that it attracted. It made for a different theater going experience.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We enjoyed discussing the play for the rest of the evening and were still talking about it the next morning. Anita and Ken were inspired to add a visit to Hamilton’s grave to their itinerary in lower Manhattan. While there, they observed a guide perpetuating the Hamilton Ticket Urban Myth to a group of unsuspecting tourists.

 

That’s Hamilton!