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MEMPHIS, TN. -My deepest thanks goes out to Escoe for answering a question that has long been bothering me. Who started the dances at Bradley's.Escoe has sent us the first of what I hope to be many stories relating to the dances and bands of Huntsville during our teenage years. Eventually I hope to group all of these memories and photos into a special web site that will preserve them for the future. But I can't do it alone, so follow Escoe's lead and send in your own contributions.We're going to start with bands and dances, and it that goes well, we might expand it to movies and hangouts - but don't send those stories yet.I'll be busy this week watching the Memphis Tigers make another run in March Madiness. If you don't have a team to root for, you can always root for the Tigers with me.Please include your class year with your e-mails.
My first car was a 1956 Chevrolet BelAir two-door hardtop, "The Mean Green". It was not mean but it was green. Purchased new in 1956 as our family car, the original paint was two-tone mint green and white.After it's useful life in that function, it became the repository of a full-race 327 cu. in. engine and roared down dragstrips across North Alabama. The '56 body had too long a wheel base and was too heavy for racing, so the engine and transmission was moved to a stripped down light weight 1955 Chevy body. That is when the "Mean Green" became mine. I rebuilt the 265 engine from the '55 and put it and the 3-speed transmission in the '56. It did have a floor shift (Hurst conversion) since there was already a hole in the floorboard from it's racing days. The Mean Green proved to be very tempermental and was slightly better than walking. Had to keep my tool box in the trunk and several dates consisted of doing car repairs while my date held a flashlight. I remember one time I had to use a young lady's chewing gum to seal a vacuum leak. After I went in the Navy in 1968, my parents sold the Mean Green. The only photo I could find was taken after a big snowstorm in January, 1968.I have owned another '56 Chevy. In 1969 I had the only pink 1956 Chevy on the island of Guam (photo attached). The photo is of me and the car in front of my (pink) residence in Tamuning. Guess where I got the pink paint (for the car).
I’ve wanted to write a story about the dances, bands, and Bradley's, etc. for a long time but just haven't had the time until now. I will try to jot some things down for you, since you’ve asked us to send you some memories of the bands and dances we remember.Did you know that there were 16 of us girls from the ‘65 and ‘66 classes who formed a club called the "Amber Ashes"? The only reason that the club existed was for us to raise money so we could go to Daytona on Spring Break. We did many things to raise money like selling Stanley products, donuts, and having car washes.Well, that group was also the group that started holding all the dances at Bradley's Cafeteria.I remember finding the basement of the cafeteria on the North side of the Court House Square and talking to the manager about renting it for a dance the first time. I can't remember for sure what we paid for it, but we also rented an off duty cop as well. Of course the band we hired for the first dance was the Continentals. I think we charged 25 cents a ticket to get in but it might have been 50 cents. Later the price went up to $1.00. You had to pay at the top of the stairs before you could go down to the dance in the basement, but the music could be heard all around the square on those quiet nights, since everything else was closed.We held one of our car washes at the old Miracle City on the Parkway one Saturday and a car load of guys came through. Naturally we chatted with them and found out they were from Birmingham and had a band. One thing led to another and before we were through talking we hired them to play at our next dance. That's how Bobby Grant and the "Jesters" came to town. Later on Bobby moved to Huntsville and joined the “Tiks” and eventually married Becky Bush.By the way, the “Continentals” became the “Fantasticks” when they went to play at a state fair in Kentucky (or somewhere) and later shortened the name to the Tiks to make it easier.Another band we employed for a dance we sponsored at the Aquatic Club was the "Weejuns" out of Florence. I remember because they also had a drummer named Jerry. I can't remember his last name but he sure was cute!! One fun thing about the “Continentals” was that you never knew who was going to show up to play with them. They would occasionally have "guest" players such as Don Walker on keyboard or Harold Tuck on guitar in addition to Johnny, Sam, Bill, Jimmy and of course, our own Jerry Brewer! We all had sooo much fun and it was all clean fun. We had all heard of dirty dancing but when I watch the movie now there is no way any of us would have been able to show our face if we danced like that!! As risque as we got was to sing along with "See That Girl Dressed In..." and "Nuts Hot Nuts".Remember "Long Tall Texan", "Are You Alright? (Hell Yeah!)", "Rebel Rouser" and when Jimmy would sing "Talk To Me"! The closest thing we got to dirty dancing was our favorite dance - the "Dog".Everything else got thrown together with it...what fun!! The band was a mix of guys from Huntsville High and Lee but most of our dance crowd was just Lee in the beginning, but it soon grew to include many Huntsville High and Butler students as well.
Bands of the SixtiesHuntsville Bands