I started high school band in the 9th grade but from the minute Band Director Keebler Mills assigned me to play the clarinet I was certain of one thing. I would never learn to play the clarinet. First, the clarinet is only sexy to cobras and second, playing an instrument takes dedication and lots of practice. I have always leaned toward dabbling. I find an interest and work at it furiously until I achieve some mediocre success and then I am done.
All during high school, my two best friends were band geeks. The term “geek” was not used at the time but the type has not changed. I was just a regular geek. I loved and still love music. I don’t have a trained voice: there are those who say it is not even housebroken. Nonetheless, we three sang Kingston Trio and Beach Boy songs until we convinced ourselves that we were great performers. People who heard us were glad that John and Chuck had good voices and that I sang softly.
At Fort Mill, we had a Junior – Senior Prom like many small schools. The sophomore class was responsible for decorating the gym and providing entertainment. The theme during our sophomore year was “Moonlight and Roses” and my class spent hours draping the entire gym with light blue and silver crepe paper and covering crescent moon shapes with aluminum foil. To begin decorating, a grid of wires was strung from side to side and end to end of the gym. When crepe paper was strung across the wires, the effect was to create a false ceiling about eight feet high. It seemed the thing to do at the time but today I wonder a couple of things. First, how much money was spent on crepe paper for every prom? and second, how did we escape being engulfed in a blazing inferno of paper decorations.
Two entire days were dedicated to decorating the gym and because I was tall, I became a crepe stringer. The Thursday before the Friday Prom, we were about halfway through decorating when Trudy Bolin Heemsoth and I were called to the Office. Our class’s high school rings had arrived. My class, the class of 1966, had redesigned the school ring, changing the symbolism and adding a blue stone. The previous ring had been all gold with the school symbol cut into it.
Trudi and I were told the rings were to be given out Friday but as class officers, we could pick up ours immediately. We were the hit of the day when we walked into the gym holding out our hands like we were newly engaged. Judging from the ooh’s and ah’s, the new design was a hit.
Back to the band geeks. The school orchestra would provide some of the music for the prom and sophomores would perform songs related to the theme. I was involved in all of the chorus songs and made up one-fourth of a quartet that sang “Lida Rose.” No, you’ve never heard of it unless you have seen the musical The Music Man. Look it up…you have the technology. Chuck had the voice for a solo and John played trombone in the Blue Notes, the high school band orchestra.
From that point, whenever anyone needed a little free talent, we guys were right on point. The year was 1965. The Beatles were causing riots of fandom everywhere they went and so the Fort Mill High Junior Follies had to include at least one Beatles cover song. We were there and we had the hair. Along with a friend who was a drummer and a backstage bass and guitar player, we faked our instruments and charged through “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” and “Please, Please Me.” We felt pretty okay about our performance but then came the night of dress rehearsal. When we began, all the girls in the class charged up to the stage screaming and we were transported far beyond our worth. We were, for that shining moment, superstars. What high school boy doesn’t want that feeling. We bask in the light we are given. Worth saying again and a source of much joy.
The Beatles and the British Invasion were well under way and my classmates could do the Jerk, the Twist and all the variations. Our hearts, however, were South Carolinian, our roots in Motown (which we called “Soul”) and our dance was the shag. (No, not the British slang for sex) For those who have misplaced the joy of dancing, the shag is a slowed-down version of the jitterbug and was developed to its heights in Ocean Drive Beach in beach clubs like the Pad.
We learned to shag early. Flash back to the seventh grade. Mom and Dad were good friends with Tommy and Carlene Rogers. They would go for dinner to the Rogers’ house and Connie and I were dragged along. Their daughter, Pam, was a year older than me, a freckled brunette beauty, and the best dancer in town. She was way out of my league and dated high school boys but when we were at her house, she would put on songs from the Drifters or the Tams and teach me to shag.
My popularity at Teen Canteen soared. The Fort Mill Golf Club sponsored this teen social on Saturday nights for seventh and eighth graders. The primary chaperone was Mr. Case…yep, Uncle Bubber, who had sent me out of class for my second paddling by Pete Reynolds. Most guys my age had never danced or were bravely trying to learn but my skills had been polished. Girls who were tired of practicing dancing with doorknobs at home flocked to dance with me. More than once, I learned that this was not necessarily a good thing.
Two kinds of guys showed up at Teen Canteen. I was one of those who went in and danced, ate the cookies and drank the Kool Aid but there was a darker side. There was a group of guys who never went inside. They came to smoke and fight. They would hang around at the edges of the light and wait for someone they didn’t like to come outside.
Those of us on the inside waited until we were pretty sure that our parents were outside waiting for us in the car. Then we would cross the phalanx of warriors and be on our way. A miscalculation meant at least threats and often a fight. Middle schoolers love watching a good fight and would encourage any disagreement until it erupted into a shoving match. Heaven help anyone who danced with a girl one of the fighters had his eyes on. Guys on the inside quickly learned who was dangerous to dance with and I am sure there were girls who wondered why they weren’t asked to dance. The girls had no idea that one of the outside fighters had marked them as his territory. I escaped many fights by the skin of my teeth.
While In high school, we had dances after home football and basketball games. Most of the fighters had been left behind in middle school or had dates and were focused on them. Dates were to a pizza place or drive-in restaurant. Oh, we would sneak a beer now and then at the Dutch Mill where they had curb service and asked no questions.
It was not until the summer after my senior year that my friends and I would venture out to a nightclub. There was one place in Rock Hill where everyone went to dance. The Fiesta was a small club (more appropriate terms are joint or dive) on Cherry Road that seldom had a band but had the best jukebox in town. (A jukebox, for the uninitiated, was a stand-alone pay-per-play record player that might have a hundred songs.) In the summer of 1966, the cost of music was three songs for a quarter. Songs like Smoky Places, What Kind of Fool, Stand By Me, and Stay got lots of play time.
The Fiesta was a very strange blend of preppies, rednecks, and serious drinkers. While the groups kept mostly to themselves, there was very little friction. Other than the serious drinkers, everyone was there to dance and talk. We would always go to the Fiesta as a group. Several of us would load into cars without any pairing up and dance with different partners for each dance. Lots of little romances came and went within our twelve or so regulars but they were secondary to the group.
We were preppies…our generation created the look and few of us left it except to occasionally dip our toes into the bizarre clothing styles of the ‘70s and ‘80’s. We wore the khaki pants, the India madras plaid shirts and the Bass Weejun shoes. It was the uniform of our individuality.
We knew the Fiesta was our high school swan song. We would never all be together again. Even during the summer, someone would occasionally peel off to start college early. It was not the endless summer we wanted it to be. With the fall of 1966, our halcyon days ended. New and exciting adventures were beginning.
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