Growing up Sixties… By Jack Coll

GROWING UP SIXTIES

A Few Random Thoughts and Memories

By Jack Coll

1-9-2016

I often wonder why music groups and solo performers like Bill Deal and The Rhondels, Tommy Roe, Gary Lewis and the Playboys and The Turtles with all their hits why I can’t find a dial on my radio that plays their songs. Did anyone else grow up tuning into WFIL and WIBG Radio listening to songs like “This Diamond Ring,” “Everybody Loves a Clown,” “Sure Gonna Miss Her,” “May I,” “I’ve Been Hurt,” “She’d Rather Be With Me,” “You Baby,” “Let Me Be,” “Sweet Pea,” “Hooray For Hazel,” or “Dizzy.” I know not exactly hard Rock and Roll, but fun songs, maybe a few more later.

I remember John Kennedy getting shot, I wasn’t old enough to comprehend the announcement but everybody alive when it happened remembers it. If you were catholic sitting in a classroom on that Friday afternoon you more than likely also remember it. I attended St. Helena’s School located at Fifth and Godfrey Streets in Philadelphia. Sitting in my third grade class when the announcement came over the loud speaker, (a little static as I remember it) our class prayed the rest of the day until we were sent home.

Most kids growing up in Conshohocken might remember the Washington Fire Company whistle which sounded every night at six o’clock meaning they had to be home for dinner, in Philly when the street lights went on at dark that meant that your ass had better be on the front porch of your row home, depending on how late you were determined how many nights you got grounded. (Being grounded as a kid on the move was like death)

As a young teen I played in a number of garage bands, as a guitar player one of the must songs at that time was being able to play a song called “Classical Gas,” it was an instrumental song highlighted with a guitar, anyone remember the song, better yet anyone remember who did it, a guy named Mason Williams, look it up, you’ll remember it. Mason Williams went on to be the lead writer for Saturday Night Live in 1980.

In 1963 I was ten years old and remember the Kennedy Assassination, I also remember going to a lot of Phillies games at Connie Mack Stadium at 21^st and Lehigh Avenue with my step-father, I was an avid baseball card collector and remember watching guys play like Drysdale, Musial, Mays, Clemente, Marichal and Koufax, I hated them all, in my world they were the enemy, only members of the Phillies team were great ball players no matter how bad they were.

By the mid 1960’s I remember racial tensions growing in the city and watching American Bandstand on TV, but I don’t remember Castro, the Cuban Missile Crisis, or the Bay of Pigs. I was too young to pay attention to Birmingham, Selma, or Martin Luther King when he delivered the “I Have a Dream” speech at the Lincoln Memorial during the march on Washington but I do remember seeing black and white images on TV of black people getting blasted with water from fire-hoses, didn’t understand it all but I remember seeing it on TV.

We recently hosted a Christmas dinner at our house with about a dozen family members, I looked up at one point and noticed five of them had cell phones in their hand and thought, “you would have never seen this in the sixties.”

Anyone else remember a great group out of Philadelphia called “The Kit-Kats” with songs like “Let’s Get Lost on a Country Road,” and “That’s the Way.” I was also wondering if any senior members of our society sit home and listen to a number of 60’s rockers on their CD player like “Paul Revere and the Raiders,” “The Dave Clark Five,” “Herman’s Hermits,” “Peter and Gordon,” just mentioning Peter and Gordon hit a memory, I think Peter Asher produced Linda Ronstadt back in the 1980’s.

As a kid growing up in the sixties it seemed like Vietnam was just always there, according to our television news we were winning, we were winning, we were winning, but the announcement never came that we won, to this day that has always been very sad for me, millions of kids from across this so-called great nation of ours came back from that war scared one way or another. Whenever I see a Vietnam Veteran I feel obligated to go up to them and say “You Won,” I was always concerned that they wouldn’t know what the hell I was referring to and just think I was crazy.

I listen to “today’s” music, I like, there are a lot of good lyrics still being written, but when I reflect back to the 1960’s and 1970’s, especially the early to mid-1970’s a lot of really great lyrics were being written and sung by artist like James Taylor, Bernie Taupin, Carol King and so on, however today nobody writes-em’ like that. I remember a song by Neil Diamond called “If you Know What I Mean.” The lyrics in that song were just sexy, if you listen to the song, “I took a drag from my last cigarette, (with a timely pause) I took a drink from a glass of old wine, I could close my eyes and I could make it feel real, just one more time, (then the drum kicks in, bump, bump, bump,) Can you feel it babe, can you feel it babe, (his voice grows stronger) It was another time, it was another place, do you remember it babe. (The music comes up, Neil’s voice gets stronger) And the Radio played like a carnival tune as we lay in our bed in the other room and we gave it away for the sake of a dream in a penny arcade, IF YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN”

I never really knew just what the hell he meant but man the lyrics were intoxicating.

I remember watching the six o’clock news seeing a city called “Watts’ on fire thinking that was some other country. How silly of me, I thought the Hells Angels were really cool, I didn’t know anything about Malcolm X, it wasn’t until years later that I really understood what his life was all about. By the late 1960’s I was coming of age where I really started to understand a lot more about life and world events started to mean something to me. When Bobby Kennedy was killed in in 1968 I remember thinking “My God, There gonna kill all of them,” referring to King who had been shot two months earlier, Malcolm X a few years before King and John Kennedy before him.

In the sixties everyone had an out, a way to forget about the ugliness in the world if only for a few minutes, for some it was drugs, it seemed like the Haight-Ashbury crowd preferred sex and the good Lovin-vibe, I preferred music. Every time ugliness happened I always thought about Barry McGuire’s song “Eve of Destruction.” The song started out with, “The Eastern world, it is exploding, violence flaring and bullets are loadin, your old enough to kill but not for voting, and even the Jordan River has bodies floatin and you tell me, over and over and over and over again, ah, you don’t believe we’re on the Eve of Destruction.” A few verses later Barry belts out “Think of all the hate there is in Red China, then take a look around to Selma Alabama, you may leave here for four days in space, but when you return it’s the same old place, the pounding of the drums is the Pride and Disgrace, you can bury your dead but don’t leave a trace, HATE your next door neighbor but don’t forget to say grace and tell me, over and over and over and over again, you don’t believe we’re on the eve of destruction.”

Barry’s lyrics were always very powerful to me.

I sometimes wonder who else drove a real piece of crap of an automobile when they turned sixteen and thought it was the greatest car on the face of the earth. The first car I bought was this piece of crap Pontiac station wagon with a push button transmission on the dash. I paid fifty dollars for it. I made two payments of $25.00 each. Man, I remember thinking if I just painted the dashboard with a bright blue metallic glossy paint every man, woman and child throughout the Upper Merion region would think that my car was the coolest thing anyone had ever seen, and to this day it was.

When the Beatles came to America and performed on the ED Sullivan Show it meant something to millions of Americans, I wasn’t one of them, just too young I guess. I do remember playing out in front of the row home that I lived in on Widner Street in the Olney section of Philly and all the neighbors gabbing about how terrible a parent this lady was up the street was allowing her daughter to go to the Beatles concert, it wasn’t the Beatles they were upset with, it was the five dollars she spent for the ticket, apparently that was an absolute disgrace at that time, five bucks.

I moved to the Hughes Park section of Upper Merion Township in the summer of 1964, although I had gone to Connie Mack Stadium before we moved, (I remember seeing Dick Allen play third base) I never remember going back once we moved. In Hughes Park we lived a kid’s life playing pickup baseball and football games at the “Corn Field” once located on Crooked Lane, now the site of townhouses.

I remember hearing conversations in my house about a guy named Lenny Bruce, I never gave it any thought. I remember both Cassius Clay and Muhammad Ali, funny growing up in the sixties I never thought he was all that tough, In the early 1990’s I spent a day with Ali, he was looking at buying into a chain of restaurants and I got a call from the newspaper to cover the story. After spending several hours with Ali and horsing around with him I walked away knowing, understanding why he was the Greatest.

I don’t remember much about Any Warhol, the plane crash that made Peggy Fleming a United States Gold Medalist, I don’t remember anything about Bobby Hutton’s death or Mayor Daley’s orders “Shoot to Kill” arsonists in wake of riots over Martin Luther King’s assassination.

Sometimes I wonder why a lot of “One Hit Wonders” don’t get a lot of air play even though their one hit was huge like “Double Shot of My Baby’s Love” by a group called “The Swingin’ Medallions.” Anyone remember a girl named Robin Ward or Barbara Lynn, probably not, but if you heard their songs you would get to drift off for a few minutes, Robin Ward sang “Wonderful Summer,” that went something like, “I want to thank you—-for giving me—the most wonderful summer—–of my life.” Barbara Lynn sang this soulful tune in the sixties called “You’ll Lose a Good Thing,” one worth punching up on the computer.

I was sorry to see on Sunday December 27, 2015 that Steven Wright passed away, not the comedian but the lead singer for a 1960’s band “The Easybeats.” Their one hit was a big one that kinda defines the sixties with “Friday On My Mind.” I always liked the way Stevie could drag out the lyric “Monday Morning feels so sad, everybody seems to naaaaaag me,” then a funny line, “Coming Tuesday I feel better, even my old man looks good.” George Young played guitar in the band, who was the older brother of AC/DC’s Angus and Malcolm Young.

I always loved those one hit wonder bands, but I also liked bands who’s one or two big hits were not their best song but the one recognized like Sam The Sham and The Pharaohs. Sam the Sham was well known for “Wooly Bully” but I always liked “Lil’ Red Riding Hood” a lot better. The Box Tops were well known for “The Letter” and “Cry Like a Baby.” I always liked “Soul Deep,” “Sweet Cream Ladies Forward March” and “Neon Rainbow a lot better.

I remember the moon landing, half of me was celebrating the fact the other half of me wondered about the ga-zillion dollars that would have fed the world over for life, still don’t understand the big deal about landing on another planet, we’ve already screwed up the planet we live on. I remember Woodstock, I had an offer to go, refused, I was busy making $2.45 an hour pumping gas and didn’t want to miss a day’s work.

The sixties weren’t kind to the music world, Jimi, Janis and Morrison, there was Mama Cass, actually 1970)Sam Cook and Otis Redding, King Curtis, (actually 1971) and of course Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones, they all made early exits along with about a dozen others.

Were you one of the “COOL People” in the sixties, if you were you might remember some of the great slang words of the day, code words that older people couldn’t understand. We didn’t like you if you were a “Candyass” meaning wimp or uncool. That “CAT” got it all together, he knows what’s going on. You got any “Bread,” That guy’s a “GAS,” I “crashed” early last night, That’s a “clean” looking Ford, We spent the night “Cruising,” Let’s “Cut Out,” “Split,” I had to “drop a Dime” to get a-hold of him, “FAR OUT,” self-explanatory, “She’s as Fine as Wine,” you betcha, That thing’s got a “Four on the Floor,” He’s a “Flower Child,” Man that was “Hairy,” That car is “Bitchin” complete with “Birth Control Seats,” (Bucket Seats) Them guys had a “Chinese Firedrill,” (only saw it once on 202 outside the Valley Forge Diner) Let’s “Burn Rubber,” I gotta hit the “Midnight Auto Supply” tonight, That guy’s “Outta Sight,” “Right ON,’ I “Scored” last night, I got “Shotgun,” Check out the “Skirt” over there, I stretched out and was able to “Cop A FEEL,” Do you “DIG,” as in “Can You Dig It,” Yea. I got it “Five Finger Discount,” Let’s go, it’s the “FUZZ,” She’s a “FOX,” It was “Groovy.” Had enough, OK a few more, cause I’m cool!

That guy’s a “HUNK,” I gotta take a “WIZ,” Ya wanna a “TOKE,” nice “Threads,” I flipped him the “BIRD,” we were going at it last night “Swapping Spit,” She’s too “Stuck-Up,” Whatta-ya say we go check out the “Submarine Races,” (No such thing as a submarine race, if you need further explanation forget it!) She might be a “Stone Fox” but she’s “STONED,” “SOLID,” as in I got it, think MOD SQUAD, Let’s “Split,” That girl might be a “Slut” but she’s “Stacked,” “LATER,” “Lay-it-on-me,” Let’s “Burn Some Rubber,” pull up and let me “MOON” that SOB, “Outta Sight,” She’s “On The Rag,” “Don’t Sweat It,” did I do “FAR OUT” yet, it’s worth repeating, “FAR OUT,” I thought she was gonna go “All the Way,” Yo, “Hang Loose,” let’s “Haul Ass,” I am “Bummed Out.” That’s enough!

It’s kinda funny, the older we get and the things that cross our minds, it’s a Sunday night, I’m running a business, taking care of a family, thinking about how to pay all the bills, should I get a new car this year to replace the 15 year old gas guzzler I have. I’m nearing completion of two more books on Conshohocken, mentally working on a book for Valley Forge National l Park with a lot of help from a couple of friends, promised books on Norristown, Swedesburg and Bridgeport, two slideshows to put together for up-coming events, spent most of the day in bed with an unknown bug of some sort and all I could do was sit down at my “daughter supplied laptop computer” and write GROOVY, things that crossed my mind pertaining to the 1960’s.

Well, while we’re at it lets finish with something we’ve all read in one form or another, I didn’t author this but always enjoy reading it!

Think of what we’ve gone through,

Born in a fifty year span from the 1930’s thru the 1970’s

For starter’s we survived being born to mothers, who smoked and or drank,

and some who even toked on a joint or two while pregnant.

Following childbirth we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs

With bright colored lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and

When we rode our bikes we had no helmets, not to mention the

risks we took hitchhiking.

As infants & children we would ride in cars with no car seats,

Booster seats, seat belts or air bags while all the while one or both,

Mom and dad smoked camels in the front seat.

Kids riding in the back of pick-up trucks

With dad yelling out the window to sit-down.

We drank water from the near-by polluted creek and out of garden hoses,

Not bottles.

We ate candy-bars, the big ones, cupcakes, white bread, and real butter,

We drank cool-aid, 95 percent sugar and five percent flavor not to mention

The ice-cream truck consumption.

WE never got fat because we spent our days and nights outside running around and playing.

We’d be gone all day, playing and no one could get a hold of us, screw the cell phone.

Kids of yester-year never had PlayStations, Nintendo’s, X-Boxes, no video games at all, we didn’t have 150 channels to choose from on cable, no video movies or DVD’s, no surround-sound or CD’s,

What we had was friends, and all our friends could be found outside!

Most of us got hurt or injured in some fashion or another, we fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth, and the funny thing is no ever filed lawsuits from these accidents.

We were given BB guns for birthdays, made up game with sticks and tennis balls.

Little League had try-outs and not everyone made the team.

Those who didn’t make the team learned to deal with disappointment.

Imagine that!

If we broke the law, parents didn’t bail us out with the threat of a law suit against the police department. For goodness sake our parents sided with the law!

During those 50 years many of us took an ass-kicking but produced some of the brightest minds in the history of mankind. Risk-takers, problem solvers and inventors.

We fought for our freedom, we experienced failure, success and responsibility,

Let us finish with a quote from Jay Leno:

“With hurricanes, tornados, fires out of control, mud slides, flooding, severe thunderstorms tearing up the country from one end to the other, and with the threat of bird flu and terrorist attacks, “Are we sure this is a good time to take GOD out of the Pledge of Allegiance?”

“Can You Dig It!”