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COMSUBBBS
Posts: 3202
Location: Alexandria, Virginia | Subject: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
A very kind shipmate reminded me of Ms. Brewers wonderful contribution to the golden memories of our youth...to her songs we "tossed another nickel in the nickelodian...", we waited "Til I waltz again with you...." and we learned that Teresa didn't want "a richochet romance...". We all remember sitting in Toddle Houses, Howard Johnsons...a million mom and pop cafes, auto maintenance bays in filling stations, locker rooms. bus stations, listening to the old Bendix, Philco or Hallicrafters living room consoles or the car dashboard radio tooling down the highway. She illuminated our dating years...she graced the nations airwaves with her lighthearted, effervescent songs and she typified an era that history may conclude was our finest hour. She represented the LEAVE IT TO BEAVER years, when those of us who never knew anything but service in conventional submarines, were reading Edward L. Beach Jr, behind Trig Books in study hall, watching Admiral Thomas M. Dykers roll out the weekly SILENT SERVICE television flypaper and John Wayne in OPERATION PACIFIC and Cary Grant in DESTINATION TOKYO flashed a prophecy of our future across the silver screen in hundreds of movie houses from coast-to-coast. It was an era were teenagers went steady, and the giving of your letter jacket to a girl was a meaningful commitment. It was a time where you drove out to the goodie bushes...a location out on the local boondocks, known only to you, Cindy Lou, God and every sherriff's deputy in three counties...and you listened to Teresa Brewer, Doris Day, Jo Stafford, Rosey Clooney, Dinah Shore, Pattie Paige. Margaret Whiting, and so many many more, while you did your damndest to get past blouse buttons and bloomer elastic. It was a time when they sold Royal Crown Cola, the great, great granddaddy of RC...they sold Grapette, NEHI, Orange Crush, Double Cola and 7-UP....when hambugers came with one patty and most french fries were hand cut....Walgreen's, Rexall and most local drug stores had "lunch counters" where you could get limeades, great chicken salad sandwiches, fountain Cokes, phosphates, chocolate sundaes, root beer floats and the best bowl of what was then called "dime store chili". Girls wore skirts, blouses and saddle shoes...Only Tugboat Annie and women who were in the circus had tattoos...smoked pipes and cigars...and thongs and visable fanny cracks had not been invented. Every home had boxes of church offering envelopes and church bulletins from past services. Jazzel McKensie and "Snooky" Lansen were known by millions as was Rochester and the Great Gildersleeve. A big night on the town consisted of two rounds of Putt-Putt golf, a visit to the A&W Root Beer stand and the late show at the Route 58 Drive-In to see THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON and another two hours of steaming up the windows and monkeying with blouse buttons and bra hooks. It was an era when Magnavox TV's came with rabbit ears that only worked when you made weird Reynold's Wrap aluminum foil homemade signal trappers...sort of tinfoil mystic catchers mitts for invisable transmission hoodie-doos. Teresa Brewer was singing her wonderful songs while Rin-Tin-Tin was doing long division and breaking secret codes....Commando Cody was flying through the air with what looked like a giant percolator on his back and controling his personal supersonic flight with a box that resembled a household toaster on his chest with two black dials....Kids watched Hoppy and his horse Topper...and went to the RED GOOSE shoe store and BUSTER BROWNS to stick their feet in the floroscopic x-ray contraptions and watch their green toe bones wiggle around....The only naughty magazines were found in barber shops and they were ESQUIRE and POLICE GAZETT and the ladies undie section of the Sears and J.C. Penny catalogs was about as racy as it got except for the nekkit wimmin in NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC who were usually wimmin up the Orinoco River where bust development was measured by the vertical yard. And through it all we listened to the little lady with the powerful voice....Thanks Dave...And Teresa....Here's to, til I waltz again with you. With deep respect and admiration DEX |
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Master and Commander
Posts: 1262
Location: Va.Beach,Va. | Subject: RE: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
Scouse me while I park my walker and wind up the vicktrolla.Damn,we're old! Thanks Dex.lol  |
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Master and Commander
Posts: 1324
Location: Oxnard, CA | Subject: RE: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
I remember Giselle McKensie and Snooky Lanson on the Lucky Strike Hit Parade. Also listened to Arthur Godfrey when he fired Julius LaRosa on the air. Do you remember Peter Potter's Jukebox Jury?
Thanks Dex, thanks for the memories.
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Master and Commander
Posts: 1012
Location: NE Florida | Subject: RE: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
Plunk your magic twanger, Froggy. Ah, yes.
DBF
Coyote
Edited by Coyote 2007-10-21 10:31 PM
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COMSUBBBS
Posts: 3202
Location: Alexandria, Virginia | Subject: RE: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
John, Listened to Arthur Godfrey on the radio. When I saw him on TV, he didn't look like the fellow my imagination had created to go with his radio voice. Same with Marshal Dillon on GUNSMOKE....Arthur Godfrey had an Irish singer named Carmel Quinn...She sang "Whistling Gypsie"...I've never gotten the song out of my mind and sing it in the van when I'm driving by myself. As for "Twang Your Magic, Twanger, Froggie"...remember Midnight the Cat and Smiling Ed...and Buster Brown Shoes..."I'm Buster Brown, I live in a shoe...This is my dog Tige...Look for him in there too."?? GREAT MEMORIES. DEX |
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COMSUBBBS
Posts: 2561
Location: Rapid City, SD | Subject: RE: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
I always thought that Julius LaRosa was an excellant singer, but I do remember that he was fired on the air. I didn't hear that program, so never knew the reason for the firing. Why did that happen?
Oh - something personal. My daughter was very young whan Arthur Godfrey was on the radio, and she couldn't say "Arthur," so she called him "Awful Godfrey." Strangely, years later, she married a person whose last name was Godfrey. That marriage lasted five years, because he really was "Awful." Love, they say, is blind.
Cora |
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Master and Commander
Posts: 1324
Location: Oxnard, CA | Subject: Julius LaRosa
Arthur Godfrey wanted to be in complete control of his radio/television programs. This included controlling the professional lives of his singers. Julius LaRosa had a lawyer, an agent, and all manner of people whom Godfrey had to deal with. Godfrey didn't like it. On the program, Godfrey asked him to sing a song. When LaRosa was through, Godfrey announced that That was LaRosa's swan song on the program, and that he was moving on to bigger and better things. Period. End of discussion.
And that was it. Now we seldom hear of Julius LaRosa, and even less of Arthur Godfrey. |
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Master and Commander
Posts: 1455
| Subject: RE: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
I remember seeing the Godfrey show live in NYC. He also had a home on Cape Cod that one of my Uncles helped build. In his Summer place he was a warm and friendly person who most townies liked. I have to tell you that a young lad sitting through the show was about as much fun as sitting on hot coals. But boy did the elders eat it up. That had this poor sap running back and forth in front of the audience with cardboard signs telling everyone when to clap, cheer, etc. I guess now they do it with electronic boards or just have tracks to fill in when they edit the show since not much is really live anymore. Also went to see Perry Como in NYC. His show was better as it had more music. He had a home on Long Island near the Merchant Marine Academy and went to the public beach just like everyone else and was never "unavailable" to his fans. Many would say each generation thinks theirs is the best. But I cannot remember there being near as much life stress as is now. |
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COMSUBBBS
Posts: 3202
Location: Alexandria, Virginia | Subject: RE: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
Tom, Late in his career, Godfrey purchased a rather large farm between Leesburg, Virginia and a little community called Waterford, Virginia. I don't know if the farm was his primary residence, but he was quite generous to the town of Leesburg...At the time, Leesburg was a quiet, sleepy town with a very intrenched old stock group of stand-offish extremely well healed and clanish folks. Godfrey, according to the local paper, became a mover and a shaker up there. I never saw him, but knew many people who did. A lot of people with vast resources live in Loudon County...the Kennedys, Tab Hunter (if he's still around), Robert Duvall...Duvall used to own and run a restuarant in Plains, Virginia. It had a model train track suspended from the ceiling and a little Lionel train ran around between rooms. Little kids...one and two year olds would figure out which holes the train disappeared through and would watch it leave...then turn in their highchair and watch the hole where it would reppear....They would have very serious expressions, that would turn to a mile wide smile when the little engine came puffing through the hole. Robert Duvall loved the little kids. I remember that Arthur Godfrey was brought to you by Lipton's Tea and Toni Home Permanent....When you were home sick, you got to listen to Don McNeil and the Breakfast Club, Arthur Godfrey, Queen for a Day, the Lux Theater of the Air, the Camel Cavalcade of News, with Robert Trout (John Cameron Swazee didn't show up until TV came in.) ...Sky King, with Penny and the Songbird...Sky King was brought to you by Peter Pan Peanut Butter...you saved up the inner jar seals and mailed them off to some box number in East Bubblegum Michigan with the requisite coins taped to a piece of cardboard and after what seemed a bloody eternity, you recieved a Sky King decoder ring. They came with compass, secret compartment, whistle, the complete Morse Code and Chinese lucky sign stamped on the side. A Sky King decoder ring embodied all the latest kid technology and was a second grade playground showstopper. Within twenty four hours, the damn thing had made its' way into the upper drawer in Miss Finny's desk to join your yo-yo, Prince Albert can full of hard won marbles, three lead soldiers, hand carved Boy Scout neckerchief slide, Asprin tin with dead black widow spider, a small bloodstained flag, Uncle B.D. took off a dead Jap and and a womans girdle hose fastener clip picked up on the way to school...All of this loot was to be returned at "the end of school"...but you never saw it again. Always wanted to marry a second grade school teacher because I knew they had a basement overflowing with Looney Toons funny books, Sgt. Preston Klondike Big Inch Land Company deeds that came in Quaker Puffed Wheat and Puffed Rice boxes...Camp King jack knives...Duncan Yo-Yos with twenty thousand packs of official Duncan Yo-Yo strings....Twenty tons of Red Dot popcycle bags...twenty tons would get you a Daisy pump gun....a bunch of genuine cowboy cards....some whiskey bottle corks....fifteen skate keys that fit Union steel street skates....several rusty railroad spikes....and fifteen million metal CrackerJack prizes. Children born to second grade teachers had the keys to the kingdom. Some teachers failed to recognize the very important objects that were extremely valuable in playground trades....Miss Finny...who at about twenty two, was known as Old Lady Finny...once confiscated my SPAM can key necklace and threw it in the trashcan. That sonuvabitch was the sacred identifying symbol of the After School Secret Cowboy Club....You had to have one to identify you to members who might arrive from England, Australia, Mongolia or Hattisburg, Mississippi. Also listen to Straight Arrow, Superman, Our Miss Brooks, The Great Gildersleeve, Gunsmoke, Gangbusters (with Norman Schwartzkoph's Dad), Martin Keene Tracer of Lost Persons, Sam Spade, FBI in Peace and War, the Green Hornet, Inner Sanctom, the Shadow, and Tom Mix....The fellow who played Little Beaver on the radio, didn't have the same voice as Robert Blake who played Little Beaver in the movies....When did Manny, Moe and Larry become Larry, Moe and Curly?? I always got the Three Stooges mixed up with the PEP Boys. Also thought that Gropey and Dumpie were guys in the Seven Dwarfs.....most future diesel boat submariners did. DEX |
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Crew
Posts: 69
Location: Irwin, PA | Subject: RE: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
No one, absolutely no one, can mind dump like you Dex. I am even remembering things that happened before I was born. |
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Master and Commander
Posts: 1431
| Subject: RE: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
Gogi Grant and "The Wayward Wind"
Frankie Lane and "Ghost Riders In The Sky"
Lonny Donigan and "The Rock Island Line"...... Does Your Chewwing Gum Lose It's Flavor On the Bed Post Over Night"?
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COMSUBBBS
Posts: 3202
Location: Alexandria, Virginia | Subject: RE: A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
RCK...WOW!! Gogi Grant....Vaughn Monroe....Back in the late fifties, Armed Forces Radio had a broadcast that came on about 2000 Zulu on Friday evening. Since AirLant had to be home for the weekend cookouts, Little League games, PTA spaghetti dinners and crawling into bed next to a warm perfumed creature of the opposite gender, excercises FINEXED at that time and we hit the surface...The 2000 Zulu (8PM) Armed Forces Radio program at that time had RACING WITH THE MOON sung by Vaughn Monroe as a theme song. When we hit the surface we tuned the RBO to AFR and sho nuff there was Old Vaughn....When we got to UQC word that the excercise had terminated, someone would inveriably yell, "Let's park this rusty bastard on the roof and see if that sonuvabitch is still "racin' with the moon." Thanks for the return of that memory....Frankie Lane sung MULE TRAIN...The guys in the Maneuvering Room popping the sticks would always break into MULE TRAIN when they got the word to "Make turns for home". I hope the guys riding the pixie powered stuff today are storing up similar memories for the cold winter nights when they join the Polident and Metamucil gang. GHOST RIDERS IN THE SKY...Gary "Cowboy" McLaughlin introduced a lot of us to the Sons of the San Jauquin...that boys and girls was one helluva lasting gift. They do a great rendition of GHOST RIDERS. RESTLESS WIND...How many two-bit pieces did you toss in a gin-mill juke box to punch up that one? Looking back...none of it seems that long ago. Remember the gate sentries asking, "Hey sailor, where's your hat?" "Damned if I know, last time I saw it, it was making the rounds perched on top a big busted barmaid." We never knew it at the time...because to us the future didn't run any farther than the pick up date on the laundry ticket in our pocket...We never realized we were harvesting golden memories. DEX |
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A Shipmate, kickstarted memories of Teresa Brewer
