E-MAIL MEMORIES, PAGE 13
Frostop Butterburgers with ice cold Birch Beer in that weird megaphone-shaped container! Mona Lisa Island in City Park, and concerts at the Warehouse. Paying some little kid a quarter to "watch your car" during the Warehouse shows. Thanks for the memories!
BOB:
Cap Humble is in business on the Northshore advertising a car dealership.
Doug Christian is out of radio and into computers (a wise decision) last
I heard. Forgot all about New Orleans Night People on 26. Eric Tracy hosted
that one as I recall. Ruthie and Harry are still lurking around. No, Harry
the Singing Mailman never recorded, to my knowledge. See, there IS a God!
I was a student at St. Francis Xavier Elementary on Metairie Road (I must have been 10 or 11 at the time), but even back then the Beatles were THE THING!
I remember that during a routine weekday recess prior to the concert, a crowd of kids -- I mean a BIG crowd of maybe 40 or 50 (and this was unprecedented) -- were gathered around the pay phone in the school yard because someone had Ringo on the phone from his motel room at the Congress Inn on Chef Menteur Highway!
I never got to talk on the phone myself -- I was stuck at the back of the crowd -- but I have no doubt that given the relatively unsophisticated security common at that time, one of my schoolmates had indeed managed to find out where the Beatles were staying and had actually gotten through to them.
Another thought -- the long defunct Congress Inn was probably equivalent to today's Hampton Inn (being generous!). Can you in your wildest imagination picture any celebrity today staying at a mere motel during a major tour??
BOB:
Ringo must have been loafing and watching the telly when the phone rang!
It's a wonder one of the girls there at St. Francis didn't take the phone
for a souvenir. By the way, Hugh Dillard (Captain Humble) told me he was
trapped in the next room at the Congress Inn with George Harrison and couldn't
get out with all the screaming "birds" outside the door in the
parking lot. BTW, as I recall, none of the major hotels here in N.O. wanted
to house the Beatles because of disruption, so they were forced to stay
in the boondocks of Chef Highway while visiting New Orleans for their concert
in 1964.
It is told that you can't go back to the old days, but our memories can. Thanks - Y.
BOB:
We had our 1963 De La Salle graduation ceremony in the Municipal Auditorium
as well. What a thrill finding out our guest speaker turned out to be...Julius
LaRosa...who was in town appearing at the Blue Room. I'm still winding down
from that one!