The Board of Directors of Peninsula Players Theatre, Wisconsin’s oldest professional theater, recently honored Jerry Zaug for his 30 years of service as a board member. Upon his retirement from the theater’s board in October, Peninsula Players Theatre’s Board President, Sara Glenn, presented Zaug with a plaque for his 30 years of volunteer service and dedication to philanthropic giving. Zaug served through the theater’s first major capital campaign to build a new stage house and audience pavilion in 2005-2006 and during the recent campaign for new intern and staff housing.
Zaug grew up in New London, Wisconsin, and graduated from the University of Chicago in 1961 with his MBA before taking on a management position at Zaug’s Inc., a vending company established in Appleton by his father, Roger, in 1938. Zaug’s Vending supervised the food service at the EAA Air Shows in Oshkosh for many years. In 1971, he became president of Zaug’s Inc., which offered “Everything from soup to nuts at the drop of a coin.”
He has been a member of the Appleton, Green Bay, Manitowoc-Two Rivers, Oshkosh and Door County Chambers of Commerce and was former president and director of the Wisconsin Innkeepers Association and the first vice chairperson of the National Automatic Merchandising Association (NAMA).
In 1989, Zaug and his immediate family opened the County House Resort in Sister Bay and remained a consultant for Zaug’s Vending. Shortly after moving to Door County, he became an active member of the theater’s board as treasurer, as well as a board member and treasurer of the Door County Visitor Bureau. In recent years he also joined the Door County Housing Partnership, Inc. board and serves as treasurer. Zaug started his vocation as a treasurer as an infant when he would share his buggy with the coins his mother collected and brought back to the family business.
Peninsula Players Theatre is America’s oldest professional resident summer theater. It is unique in the country for its diverse productions, continuing loyalty to a resident company, and beautiful setting of 16 wooded acres along the cedar-lined shores of Green Bay. In the past 89 years, the theater has become a Door County landmark and cornerstone arts institution, attracting audience members nationwide. To learn more about Peninsula Players Theatre, visit www.peninsulaplayers.com.