[78-L] Pepsi--WAS: Alvino Rey and The Kings

[Steven C. Barr]

see end...
From: "Geoffrey Wheeler" <dialjazz at verizon.net>
> I think most of us can hark back to those youthful days when life for a
> growing child was much different. We were more active and interactive;
> we expended lots of calories; males were more likely to be outside and
> active in good weather and far less likely to be inside watching
> television or listening to the radio (although I must confess there
> were days when I was in a chair and ready at 4:45 for the first
> 15-minute episode between then and 6:00 p.m.) I remember hearing Dick
> Tracy on the radio before the war and wondering why a man would be
> calling a woman “baby.” I and my friends walked to and from school,
> except in inclement weather. During my school years, I was never on a
> school bus. Even when I had my driver’s license, I would still walk to
> visit friends who lived sometimes two or three miles away.
>
> The youth I am acquainted with today don’t exercise, don’t read except
> what they have to, subsist on junk food, watch infantile kiddie shows
> on television, have more health problems that were unimagineable when I
> was a youth, and are constantly texting or talking to their friends by
> mobile phone, not in person. As a child, I was not allowed to use the
> family phone. Period! Why would I have to call somebody I had or would
> see in school? When I was in high school, if I did call someone, I was
> limited to no more than 5 minutes, except if it concerned school..
>
Waynesville, Ill's. was a VERY small (and apparently shrinking further?)
village in central (literally!) Illinois. My "playground" was a vacant lot
across the street from both my family's home and my grandmother's
(where I "lived" back then!). We used to hold softball games (of sorts)
there as long as the weather allowed (April through November); the
town lost its high school in 1956, and I regularly rode a school bus
(often a 1946 Studebaker!) seven miles to McLean, Ill's...where I
attended McLean-Waynesville High School!

Once I finally learned the art of riding a bicycle (effectively impossible
in Chicago, where I lived until mid-1954...?!), I used to explore ALL of
Waynesville (about 10 streets...?!). As well, "fast food" didn't exist
(nor would they have locations in Waynesville...they STILL don't?!)...
so I dined upon whatever either my family or my grandmother
offered for meals. Our phone was on a party line...our "ring" was
one long and two shorts (my family and my grandmother were on
the same party line!).  There was an elderly lady on our line, who
picked up her phone and listened whether or not it was her ring;
you could always hear he clock ticking in the background...?!

After late 1962, I finally had a girlfriend...and we spent hours each
day on the phone to one another! I have NO idea how much time
was thus occupied...but I suspect we provided significant amounts
of financial support to the General Telephone Company...?!

Thus the story...?!

Steven C. Barr