edicate an historical marker last week for the East Texas Serenaders (ETS), musical pioneers from the 1920s with roots here and in Lindale.

Participants actually got to hear some of their iconic tunes by a group from California that’s all about preserving American rural, roots music.

Skillet Licorice members were beyond excited when the Mineola Landmark Commission delayed the marker dedication to coincide with their already-planned visit to Texas.

Last Monday afternoon, they played a couple ETS tunes after member Elise Engelberg along with Mineola’s Sue Wisdom (whose father worked with one of the ETS members at the Mineola post office) did the unveiling honors.

The group then performed a concert Tuesday at the Historic Select Theater featuring a number of Serenader tunes. They described that they could not be more excited to be playing the “Mineola Rag,” a Serenader classic, in Mineola.

As was often the custom, some of the ETS songs took on geographic references, such as the “East Texas Drag,” “Meadowbrook Waltz” for the area of southwest Fort Worth, the “McKinney Waltz” and the “Del Rio Waltz.”

The name Skillet Licorice is a take off from another band of that 1920s and ‘30s era music from Georgia, called the Skillet Lickers.

As Matt Knoth explained, this band is not exactly Skillet Licker but Skillet Licker-ish.

Knoth is the guitarist, as well as the husband of Elise, who is the fiddler. Clinton Ross Davis doubled on banjo and second fiddle while Rowan McCallister performed on the mandolin and Michael Brown, a Texan, played stand up bass.

Mayor Jayne Lankford said the Serenaders played music because they loved it. They were just ordinary people, not making history. But their story is a part of uncovering Mineola’s history.

“It’s important to tell our stories,” she said.

The marker is located on the north side of W. Commerce St., just east of Line St. Another music-related marker is planned in the area for Jack Rhodes, who wrote several 1950’s-era hit songs and operated the Trail 80 Motor Courts and a recording studio in Mineola.