American Watersheds 1 & 2: A Magical, Mystical, Musical, and Historical Journey

By Gregory Clark

American Watersheds combines education and entertainment in a trilogy. This first edition contains both parts 1&2. The series highlights leaders who changed history Politically or culturally in the era in which they lived. This is all done by the author telling personal stories or those of a relative or close personal friend.(Greg is related to 3 Presidents and offers stories of 5 Presidents never told before in books) The author is related to Martin Van Buren who invented mass media, celebrities and outsider populist candidates who selected who we elected. This begins a 200 year history of media. The study of media manipulation continues in both the stories and the revisionist history of The Battle of Running Bulls Flint Sit Down Strike 1936/37. Through research and stories from the author's Grandfather, Chief Organizer of the Strike, the true story is finally told. This singular event is called the "strike heard round the World" and gave birth to the first successful labor unions in America. It also gives birth to the American middle class, Civil Rights and Women's Rights. Grandfather Gil Clark moves on to be the President of the Teamsters when his enemy Walter Reuther becomes President of the United Auto Workers Union. In a twist of irony the author's other Grandfather on his Mother's side is his enemy in the Teamsters yet both are great American Watersheds. They negotiated the best union contracts in Teamsters history. Upon leaving the Teamsters Gil Clark became a pioneer in Cable TV with the first Microwave and Cable TV company in Michigan established in Petoskey 1954. It becomes the family business continuing the history of media. Also, the family invests heavily in a future technology company which brought us media tools used today like Google translate, voice to text, text to voice etc. The Media history culminates in modern social media and how it is causing real world events today.
For music lover's the series is a gold mine of stories and rare music links to great American and English music. Meet the greatest studio musicians. The stories often come with a fun movie link. By staying with the format of personal stories or one from a close personal friend or relative, the stories include the Stars from Motown, New Orleans, Michigan Rockers, New York and Nashville. Also, both the stars from the 1960's and the Political Activists are covered as are modern activists. This is the only textbook to highlight many of the great American Women activists, most are completely overlooked by most historians.
Science is another theme which emerges many times. We meet America's greatest spy and scientist who designed the first Space Shuttle and even saves the world form nuclear destruction two times! Other modern scientists who have developed future technologies are introduced. This will in some ways be the first book of modern science which will cause all other science and medical textbooks to be rewritten as it shows that all matter is energy and no density exists as proven by a new technology which makes inflammation and swelling disappear in minutes.
Art is another stop along the Magical Mystical Musical and Historical Love Tour.
Much is learned through autobiographical stories. Ultimately the series makes the case that Love is the answer to everything both personal and political. Love and Power to the people defeat any army. It is also a book of Mysticism. The current recent history reflects the author's belief that faith and history cannot be separated. Ultimately all the stories are meant to help people find their own personal purpose. It helps young students to realize each and every person can become an American Watershed right in their local community. Non stop comedy and Entertainment will make this one textbook which students will enjoy rather than dread. The final part is explosive as the writer becomes an American Watershed while writing the stories of change agents of the past.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Feb 19, 2018
• ISBN: 9781543926606

Book preview

AMERICAN WATERSHEDS

PART I

THE EARLY YEARS

THE FAMILY AT GRANDMA OSBOURNE’S COTTAGE

Chapter one:

IN THE BEGINNING

The first words out of my mouth were yeah, yeah, yeah. The Beatles. Leaping forward, I was two years old. I had my own Beatles 45s with my own kid’s player. I can still see my beloved 45s: I Feel Fine, She Loves You and I Saw Her Standing There. I remember them. What I most remember was learning about electricity. I tried to put the little wall plug in the wall. I put one tiny little thumb on the one metal thing sticking out of the plug. I then grabbed the other one with my index finger like any intelligent child would. I then plugged it into the light socket.

I was instantly electrocuted until Mom pulled me off the wall. It is these early lasting impressions which often stay burned into the deep hard wiring of long term memory. No harm was done, no matter what some might say. Even after this, it took me fifty two years to realize that Love is the answer to everything. Yeah, Yeah, Yeah

The politics of Love and Power to The People are the answer to every seemingly complicated problem. This includes the current political situation in America. America wants change this election year. It is a year like no other before in America. Only Love, truth and understanding can set the mind free and save America now. In the end, it was the only thing which could save me as well. My Native Teachers taught me early that in a civilized society, no man should tell another man what to do. They also said there is no need to argue about religion if it is between you and God. Most excellent advice as I look back. Touch The Earth by TC McLuhan and the words of the wise old Chiefs had a big impact on my later teenage years. This is just my story.

My earliest memories were life until four years old on Edwards Street in Flint, Michigan. The street included my family, my Grandparents, Godparents and their kids. We all lived along a two block stretch of the street. It made for plenty of fun and adventure for my young age. When my younger sister was born I was so excited I rode my bike in the street and was hit by the family car. I was ok. I was excited about my new sister. I picked myself up and shook it off. Then I ran to see my new sister. This does bring to mind another incident where my brother and I were in the back seat of the old family 60s Chevy. Back then if you pulled the door handle the lock popped open. My brother was pulling the handle and watching the lock pop up. However, this time the door flew open and Gil flew out. A lady swerved her car sideways and prevented us from being run over. Why and how I wound up going too is still subject of family speculation. I do love to follow Gil.

When I was four my family moved to the Petoskey, Michigan area. Our first stop was a log cabin in the woods. My father was taking a ground floor job in my Grandfather Clark’s Great Lakes Cable TV. My Grandfather Gil Clark had a Cable Company up and running in 1954. He also built Sault Saint Marie.

We moved there in 1966. It was really cool as it seemed I was living in one of those Lincoln Log cabins we used to assemble as children. It was only a short stay. I don’t remember too much about it other than my brother attempting to limit my exploration. He told me that if I went over the steep hill, I would fall off the end of the world. It worked for a while too! At least until one day I saw my brother go over the end of the world! The family moved to a brick house in town with four bedrooms and a basement. It even came with a two car garage with an apartment above. My parents planted a row of Emerald Green Arbor Vitae trees which seem to grow with us. Our elementary school was just down the street.

I remember my parents having parties with their friends and playing old 45s. The records had their own thin little closet only slightly wider than the 45s themselves. I used to go through the stack of records three feet tall and read the labels and think about the songs. My brother was born 52 Sundays before me. We would have been born on the same day if it were not for the leap year. As an activist today, I take pride in being born on the only day that instructs you to act. March Fourth.

Gil was and is special in many ways. He had a boatload of brains and talent. He also had an extreme tendency for rebellion. I was the middle child. I often avoided the family conflict created when Gil would test the authority. His hair is a good example. Any attempt to cut his hair would be grounds for war. He was such a handful. The first grade teacher retired after a year with Gil. The rebellion seemed to subside as we entered high school. Gil was trying to play guitar since shortly after birth.

He did some really mischievous stuff. He had some run-ins with my Dad. I even took Dad’s side a few times. My poor little sister tried to stay out of the crossfire. One time Gil and I were fighting. He had a giant meat clever and was holding it menacingly in my face. I was hanging backward out the window. I was on the verge of falling two stories. That was when we heard little sister say, that’s it, I just called Dad. Looking back she might have said Mom, but I heard Dad. We both turned to her and said what did you do that for! She looked at me and said, "Well you were hanging out a second story window backwards about to fall. He did have a giant knife. I replied, I had everything under control!

It was pretty well understood when it came to fighting, I had the edge on Gil. I inherited some kind of hand speed or something where other people seemed slow. Luckily, I made it to Love without really hurting too many people in my life. I feel my father and grandfathers fought their way to freedom and power with fists. This allowed me to be born that one day I could fight for Justice through Love and Power to The People. It did take me fifty-two years and a Vision of Love to finally understand that anger and violence achieve nothing. Love is the answer, what is the question? This is one of my current Love Tour Media slogans. I am not glorifying violence with these many hair raising tales. They are just good stories and often important history.

Gil was like a computer demanding input. He scoured the record collection of every hippie in town. Gil went so far as to steal records from Giant Way Grocery and Superstore. It came to him that he could put a record in a pizza box and then just buy a pizza for a dollar. That way he bought a pizza and a record for a dollar. However, my dad is very keen and somehow he figured it out. He took out his frustration breaking the records one by one. Gil needed input and there was no internet or music TV. Gil called our lone town radio station WJML and asked them to play a Janis Joplin song. He was told no because she died of a drug overdose! I should have asked if Elvis would be banned if it happened to him, because drugs killed him!

I viewed Gil as some kind of retired radical by the time he went to high school. He was trying to assimilate. However, in 9th grade he got a bad break from a hater basketball coach. He is to this day the best ball handler I have ever seen play basketball. As a child he had this crazy skill of pushing the ball around his back and through his legs while running at full speed. The ball never seemed to be in front of him. It was around his back and through his legs and around his back endlessly as he drove you to the hoop and scored on you. He could pick up a basketball from anywhere and look at the basket and swish it. It was pure raw talent.

Coach Charlie Wilson cut Gil from the team in ninth grade. He never broke a single rule. In our town of five thousand people, no one really got cut from sports teams. The coach cut Gil and kept the disabled kid on the Team. It was an act of pure hate. I went looking for that coach a few times when I got older. Now I am glad I inflicted no pain. Love is still the answer to everything. I had to practice to be good at basketball. I found other people to play as playing Gil could end in a fight. It usually did in fact. I did love to watch him play. Mom wanted us to be active. I ran track, played baseball and football. Skiing became my favorite winter activity in High School.

My parents and grandparents were the model of Franklin Delano Roosevelts Rugged Individualism and the pursuit of the American Dream. No one was born with a golden spoon in their mouth. The family prospered through hard work and creative thinking. On my dad’s side, "I am related to 8th President Martin Van Buren (Uncle) and distantly to the Roosevelts. Our family tree has been authenticated to the year 800. At present we have a break in data. I can only claim a portion of the family tree.

I still have legendary Leader Rollo the Viking, King of Normandy 911-927. Rollo was born in 846 and died 932. This relates me to many more Kings. The most notable would be William the Conqueror, the First King of England. In fact, before a data break, I was related to nearly every King and Queen in European history. I can no longer claim this. I really hope to find another link to get those relatives back. I lost Saint Margaret which related me to David and Solomon. I would like that branch of the tree back. It seems I am getting help too. The current Monarchy of England also get their Royal lines from Rollo the Viking. Rollo’s remains are being dug up for the purpose of getting the family tree authenticated through DNA. Through Rollo the present Monarchy is related to most of the other Royalty of Europe. Here in America, Royalty does not mean much. As my Grandpa used to say, That and fifty cents won’t get you a cup of coffee since McDonald’s raised the prices.

I recently have learned some interesting things about my Great Uncle Martin Van Buren. This series is a study in media and its manipulation. Martin Van Buren was born in 1782 and died in 1862. He would say he lived in a technology boon. Martin was the first American to use mass media to promote a Populist President. He was the first President Born in America after we declared our Independence. He defeated the Status quo and elitists. I have nothing against the great leaders who preceded him.

Martin figured out he could write and print newspapers and distribute them through the newly evolving transportation network of trains. He shaped American views on Andrew Jackson to get him elected. Trains would allow mass communication. Today we enjoy information in the click of a button or a flip of a switch. Martin ran an outsider campaign for Andrew Jackson to break the Party free of elitists who selected the leaders to be elected. That is very similar to what is happening this year, over a hundred and eighty years later. Social networking has become the new mass media. I have done things to build a social media with a global reach of hundreds of millions of people. Great Uncle Martin Van Buren and I saw opportunity with a change in technology.

The other thing I like about Martin Van Buren is he was an organizer who could blend in with the common worker at the saloon. His father ran a saloon. He was able to cross ethnicities and class. He could blend in anywhere. He was always a sharp dresser. He used his charm to become a successful Organizer and Lawyer. He became a delegate at age eighteen as a Jefferson Republican. He went on to be Senator and Governor. He was successful in his idea of creating a celebrity.

Andrew Jackson rewarded him well by appointing him to posts of Secretary of State and Vice President. Jackson tried to make him an Ambassador to England. However, the Senate rejected him. He went on to become the 8th President instead after Jackson. He would also run for President as minor party candidates. These parties were named Barnburner and Free Soil Party. Martin sided with anti-slavery abolitionists. He started the Democratic Party. He exited to promote the idea that people should not own slaves.

Democrats recently did a mass exit called Demexit. This was a response to the present Oligarchy. Mostly it was a revolt against the corruption and racist policies of Hillary Clinton and President Obama. This will further the causes of smaller parties. Bernie Sanders Democrats currently are trying to once again tear down a two party system replete with corruption as status quo. It is their hope that smaller parties will now become big enough to contend with the current Democrat and Republican parties. More voters are now independent than in either major Party.

My parents built a really cool tri-level house at the end of the street a couple blocks from our original house when we reached high school. We had the first large screen TV and the first movie playback machine called Beta. It had superior sound quality on fat tape. The format wound up losing out to the VHS tape. We had a great party house with an old nine foot slate pool table from the early 1900’s.

We had a sound proofed music room for relaxing. It was a small room in the basement with a bean bag chair where you could listen to albums. We had large heavily padded earphones with great sound. Best of all we had Rock Movies at home long before Satellites and premium movie channels. There was no video music TV in the 1970s.

My Dad worked in Detroit on the weekends when Gil and I were in high school. We had a killer party house with never ending Rock movies and the Parents were away. We tried to franticly clean the place before my parents made it back home on Sunday, We watched movies like The Last Waltz, The Beatles Let it Be, Neil Young Rust Never Sleeps and The History of Rock and Roll to name a few must see movies. The house had great audio equipment. It was good to be a child of a telecommunications family.

The boys in our class were close. My cousin Jeff Talarico and best bud Glen Young had many great adventures and times together. Glen today is a popular high school English teacher and journalist for the local newspaper. My sister was considering placing her kids in Petoskey schools later in life. The principal bragged on their star teacher Glen.

Glen had an incredible sense of humor. One of my favorite stories about him was seeing him along the side the road on a cold Michigan morning. It was one of those below zero degree mornings. He was wearing a rain coat. His legs were bare and only appeared to be wearing shoes. It was early in the morning shortly after daybreak. I was out delivering the morning newspapers. I was thinking what the heck is he doing? As a car passed he whipped open the rain coat fast to flash the car. The joke was he was wearing brightly colored Hawaiian shorts and an infectious smile. It was a harmless and hilarious prank. He loved a good laugh, or maybe I should say a lot of them! Comedy was his joy.

In high school we drove the Vice Principal nuts by putting for sale signs on his lawn. He lived right on the street that led to the high school. He must have been really stressed about people asking him about it because at Assembly he said to the whole school, whenever I catch whoever puts those for sale signs on my lawn! Glen and I even went to the same college the first two years and lived together. Mischief and pranks continued. He supported Anderson while I was supporting Reagan. We never debated but we loved our pranks.

Let me say at this juncture the 1970’s were a happy, laughing era and there was a lot of weed smoking. I do not condone anyone taking up weed, alcohol, cigarettes or any other drug which could become a vice or lead to health problems. My saying is if you do not already have a habit, why would you start? Today I fight to free marijuana prisoners from prison. I work for medical marijuana legalization for sick people.

Those years were a period of freedom and communalism. People in the North had never even seen hard drugs like heroin. Cocaine was very expensive in the 1970s and it was not a threat. It is important that people know my old hippie friends lived their whole lives to old age and never suffered any mental or physical harm from marijuana. The AARP study running since the 1960s says the same. However, I could start my own graveyard of people who died from alcohol and now pills.

I spent many days with my friend Scott Hayes hanging out at his house and listening to music. Mostly, we never stopped playing one-on- one basketball to the death. We would run to his upstairs for breaks with music and maybe a puff. Then we would be right back fighting the endless war. I should start the story of Scott and me becoming friends where it starts. Scott has a heart of gold but he had a problem with mood swings. This would seem one part chemical imbalance and one part issues stemming from his father leaving when he was young. I say this only because the series ultimately is about the Power of Love and Understanding which leads to growth, freedom and peace.

Scott and I were on the seventh grade basketball team. We were both at the Friday night high school basketball game. I walked by him and said hello and he responded with a flurry of insults. I said we should meet at halftime to fight. We did and it came to a point where Scott was done and vulnerable and I had him pinned down.

Rather than beat on him while he was down, I just let him up. He was grateful. We then watched two much older and bigger guys fight. It was really scary as the one guy had been burned up in a fire and he had his opponent on the ropes. He too was letting the guy go promising to fight him the next day. This guy was more terrified than I was watching it. This poor guy had a story of not only having been in a tragic fire but had no one to visit him in the hospital or give him love. It was a heartbreaking story.

As scary as he was screaming at this guy, I could see in an odd sort of way he was letting the guy off the hook too. It devastated both Scott and I to the point where we said why don’t we just be friends and forget all this anger and violence? This poor guy gets credit for helping me make a best friend and I pray for his peace if he is alive today. The story of all true beauty being in the soul is the story of part three of the series.

I fear Scott never did get all his demons put to rest. Then again, where there is life there is hope. I learned to understand his occasional bouts of anger and to never harbor any bad feelings over something he might say in his depressed and raging moments. They seemed to pass pretty quickly. It culminated in a hilarious incident at summer basketball camp. We both traveled to Alma College for the week. We went to a basketball camp put on by the Milwaukee Bucks. There was one player from the team and daily games with teaching. They had a nice cafeteria at the school. There were four different lines to go through. One each for your entrée, salad, drinks and dessert.

Scott and I roomed together in the dorm. We were both a little hungry but we had a rule that it is better to be late for lunch than to ever interrupt a Genesis musical piece in the middle. We held the early works of Genesis as sacred. We were both waiting and I could see the darkness had come over Scott. As soon as I said anything I would be hit with a barrage of insults and anger.

I knew it and I knew how bad he needed to release the anger somehow. I decided I knew how to avoid the verbal abuse which I was about to endure. I would just say nothing. It was a risk when I said let’s go to lunch when the long progressive music piece ended. I sighed in relief when he just angrily said let’s go.

We arrived at the cafeteria to find a very long line of people waiting for their entrée. However, the other lines were short so I said heck with this, let’s go through the short lines and come back to the entrée line. As we cut through the long line to get to the short ones, a guy thought we were cutting in line. He barked there is no cutting in line. Oops. The guy had spoken to Scott who was now a pot of anger about to boil over. Without even looking Scott turned and unleashed a huge punch knocking the guy down hard enough that he had no desire to get up and do anything about it. He really decked the guy. We had our lunch and made it back to the room where I inquired, Do you feel better now? He looked like the kid who just got caught with his hand in the cookie jar. He explained, "There are six hundred kids at this basketball camp. I just happened to have just punched the one guy I am assigned to for the week. He is the other guard on my team. Somehow, we heard God laughing. Scott had to contemplate how he was going to apologize to the guy.

Thirteen year old boys do go through a period of hormone changes and frustration. Rob Tyner explained it to me like this. There is a dog who can see a bone through the fence. He wants to get at it but he is blocked by the fence. The dog doesn’t even know what he would do with it if he had it. Yet he is frustrated all the same. This might account for a period where my pals seemed to go through a short angry period. I had to fight with a few of them to keep a certain amount of respect. Even my beloved friend Glen and I had a fight one day. That pretty much proves the theory as he really doesn’t have a mean bone in his body.

Mr. Bufey was a seventh grade teacher trying to reckon this period of puberty. I remember him saying in class that it amazed him that boys would get so mean and pick on each other when they turned thirteen. He was talking to a thirteen year old. I really knew what he meant. I could see it myself. By the time we reached high school in the ninth grade, it seemed the frustration had passed for all the boys. My favorite basketball story was Scott and I scored some pure Orange weed that looked and tasted remarkable. We had a game that night so we decided it would be alright if we just had a couple bong hits before we went to the game. We started having a little too much fun. We wound up taking seven bong hits each.

Needless to say, my eyes were the color of the weed by the time we arrived at the Gym. High school basketball had big turnouts in our town. We had very limited entertainment. This was before satellites, internet and all the forms of entertainment we have today. Our little movie Theatre in town had one movie. There were none of the multiplexes we have today. Burger Chef was our lone fast food burger restaurant.

The Junior Varsity coach took one look at me and shook his head. He had been almost pro or something. He decided to make an example of me and shouted Clark! Get out to the top of the key! Scott suspected he was in trouble too. I moved to the top of the painted circle. He said now back up, back up. I was now at the NBA three point line.

He whipped the ball at me as hard as he could and yelled shoot. I swished it. He did it again. I swished it again. Out of the corner of my eye I saw my friend Scott’s face. It was pure terror. He came in with me. He knew his fate rested on me making those shots. The coach said move to the right. He drilled the ball at me again. Now left. I made the first 38 in a row and 39 of 40. The coach defeated and befuddled just said go sit down. Not bad for a 6’1" kid who was maybe 130 pounds soaking wet. I never could have repeated the performance. I was in the perfect zone somehow between adrenaline and orange bliss.

My dad hated it when my brother and I would fight as he had five sisters. He would have loved to have had a brother. Upon hearing of a fight after basketball, my dad would come home to kick my butt. I would say what about Gil? He would say Gil lost the fight so I even the score. He was right. When we were young he would try to be as fair as possible. If one got in trouble he would just punish us both. There were not all these child rearing experts we have these day. Truth is, we were better for it. From his tough city upbringing the little town of breathtaking beauty on little Traverse Bay was a place that not too much could go wrong. There was absolutely no crime at all.

I remember riding in the Cable TV truck as a child and every person in town waved as you passed. My Dad treated everyone the same from the Mayor to the old Native American we came upon in modest clothing. I took note of that. Petoskey is a different place where people honestly know nothing of racism, class or even which kids had better grades. The town had one Black family and they were well liked. Thank goodness they were nice people as they became our only frame of reference to black people. It was common for people to say racism is stupid. We know black people and they are very nice. The whole town had met exactly one black family. That may sound crazy but it is true. We were hundreds of miles from the sprawling urban Cities and suburbs and all those isims.

Gil was cut from the basketball team even though he followed every rule his freshman year. Not to mention he was the best player in his class. This led him to a different sort of rebellion. His focus became playing guitar, writing and learning songs. We have fond memories of music, friends and endless parties on beaches and other party spots. The Clark brothers had a reputation going into high school as some kind of free spirited troublemakers. My early English teacher and Journalism teacher Ted Townsend reflected on our reputation on his last day as a teacher. He taught Gil and I English and Journalism.

Ted said, I looked at my class list. Not only was I getting one of these Clark brothers but two in the same class! He confided the teachers were horrible gossips and had made Gil and me out to be some kind of James brothers or something. He went on to say he was pleased we were not as bad as our reputation. Ted said he couldn’t believe how bad the teachers gossiped. Small town talk and gossip were the one detestable attribute in a small isolated town. Looking back, it was Ted who showed me how I could be a radical and get away with it.

He said by writing Satire for the newspaper, I could say just about anything. Satire by definition allowed freedom. Ted was immensely respected by everyone. He was a skinny and not very tall. He had this infectious little smile that had a tendency to sneak through his pencil thin mustache. He had charisma too. Ted was not the kind of guy to bow to pressure or censorship. The school administration I no doubt inflamed. Truth is, the Vice-Principal and the Principal had it coming.

I guess I may have pressed the envelope because Ted said I could say anything. I proceeded to make the principal Hitler and the Vice Principal Stalin or Amin, I can’t remember which. It was a full page satire titled A Day In the life of Joe Student. It was just comedy with elements of truth in it. I did a part two of the story but the interim Journalism teacher pulled the story. She was afraid to tell me. I leafed through the paper and saw my story was not there. For a minute I was mad. But then I said, Betsy, if you pulled that story to get this job….cool. She pulled me outside and said it was true. I said cool. You are great and I like you. In hindsight, I should have started a campaign against her and she would have been awarded the job.

In truth, I am getting a little nervous later in life that being friends with a change agent can potentially cause a career change. Lord knows I hope I didn’t get Ted too. I think he moved on to a job for the hospitals. I followed that story up by surveying how many kids in the school would admit they smoke weed and how often. This was the heady 1970s. Fully fifty percent of the students admitted to some use. I do give myself credit on sample size. I surveyed the entire school. The school helped me distribute the surveys as they probably were as interested as I was.

When I feel like holding back on telling things which I would rather not, I think of the World’s Greatest Rock and Roll writer Lester Bangs. His be honest and unmerciful approach works well with my other theory that God has lightning and can incinerate me. So here goes another weed story. It was Friday night. Our town was very communal. There was always a party at a place outside. The fire towers, the back forty and the stables were popular spots. There was always a bon fire and conversation. We also had an awesome State Park with big sand dunes for all night fires and camping.

This night my cousin Jeff and I heard there was a party at the fire towers. It was eight miles from town. You could say it is in the middle of nowhere. We wound up getting a ride a half mile away and planned to walk the rest of the way. It was pitch black outside and we were having trouble finding our way. Things got worse when giant rain drops began to fall. In no time we were soaking wet. We finally saw the party area but there was no party. We were stuck miles from anywhere in pitch black pouring rain.

There was a car parked down there. We made our way down to it to inquire about a ride. It was Tim Bourie. This was the same guy who put a 4 iron through my brother’s face when Gil was a cub scout. He still has the dimple. His car was full so they said, just hop on the roof and we will get you back to the road. We agreed. It seemed like the only plan in the pouring rain and pitch black darkness. We were a couple miles from the road.

I was hanging on with my fingers through the window when the window rolled up on my fingers. That made it harder for me to hang on. I grabbed tight to where the top of the windshield meets the car body. Then Tim set about doing 360s and doughnuts in attempt to throw us off the car! It did not work and eventually the car had to go to the road. We decided to ride it out. It was still pouring rain. Jeff must not have thought the car was ever going to stop. Flying off on pavement was definitely worse as we now looked at the wet paved road racing below. The car accelerated when it reached the paved road. Jeff shouted, we are going to have to jump! We dove from the speeding car into a ditch. Now we were covered in mud and sopping wet.

We stood in the road and the rain continued to pour. I saw a small compact car hit its brakes. We approached and a door opened and a guy yelled, You guys need a ride? I said look at us! We are covered in mud and wet. I would not let me in your car if I were you. Aww come on Dan said. Jeff and I got in the back seat. There was another guy in the front seat. They both heard our story of the wild adventure. The driver Dan said, look here, you could go with us to a party. You guys could hang up your wet clothes and dry them. I thanked him for the offer but said I had enough for one night. I was still peeved about the jerk trying to throw us off the car. We came to the last curve approaching my house. Dan made one more attempt to persuade me. Come to the party he said. I glanced over at Jeff. He knew my temper and said nothing but I could tell he wanted to go. I said O.K. I was a little worried I would never get dry.

Jeff smiled and Dan said great. We need to stop by the store and get some beer. While Dan was in the store, the guy in front said to me, you want a bong hit. I said sure. The next thing I knew I was lifting my head and clearing cotton mouth. I said, how much of that stuff did we smoke? He said, You had one hit. One hit? I never heard of any weed like that! How could I feel this good on one hit? Dan was back with the beer and said, my buddy just got back from Vietnam. He brought the weed with him when he left Nam. We are going to a party and roll a joint of this stuff.

We did just that. It was like going on a happy marijuana trip. We smoked the weed and listened to this Veteran play the Bongos. We came to a point of utter joy and bliss after a very slow start to the night. My clothes finally dried too. Nam weed was the best weed ever. Nothing comes close in today’s competitive market for new and better strains.

Another great adventure came with release of the movie The Last Waltz. It wound up in our regular Rock movie rotation at home. I first saw it when I traveled with all my buddies forty miles to Boyne City, Michigan. Petoskey is small but this town is extra small. They allowed you to bring food and drinks into the Theatre. That small. We decide we should bring in a bunch of beer.

The movie was great. We were the only ones there. We were standing down front and getting loud and drinking beer. The manager took offense and said we had to leave. Cousin Jeff told him we were not going anywhere until Bob Dylan plays! We came to a stalemate. We said you do not have the manpower to throw us out. There was five of us in all. There wasn’t even a cop in town. He said, you have a point there, enjoy the movie.

Later we remembered there was no gas in this town at night. The nearest gas pump was back in Petoskey. We wound up running out of gas. We were lucky to get some boat gas off a guy who stopped when he saw us stranded on the road. It was quite an adventure. The Last Waltz is a must see. It is considered to be the best Rock movie of that era. It is a love child Martin Scorsese. It is rated the best Rock movie ever. I just met a guy who was there. He said they didn’t release the whole show. They released some great classic performances and it is hard not to love the music.

I would be remiss not to mention another teacher in high school. I had three full years of Biology and Physiology with Randy Newstead. He was stocky and balding. He had a wonderful smile that seemed to reveal a slightly mischievous nature. Randy was a story teller. He also did a great job of teaching me science. I really needed it too when I had College courses. I would never have made it through college if it were not for his teachings. He also had great stories. We were always chirping tell us a story. He would stop the lecture and the little smile would come over his face. He then would give us a wide eyed story.

A couple of his stories were factory stories. Those were always good because we lived far from cities and factories. Once he said he had a job putting on one bolt on an assembly line in Saginaw. The engine went by very slowly. He decided to put all four bolts on as he had plenty of time. He looked down the line and people were pounding wrenches and shouting. He just took three people’s jobs! The auto industry and Unions had pretty much gone insane by the late 1970s. Who could resist a teacher with good stories?

I remember another scary Randy Newstead story. Some men dropped a bucket of bolts on an abusive foreman from high off of a scaffold. The men hated the guy so much they took up a collection to have a guy kick a bucket of metal on him from high above. The foreman had some broken bones. It seemed like a tough place. He said they didn’t like college kids and would laugh if one got injured. My Dad and grandfathers grew up in these rough industrial cities down state. Mr. Newstead had another attraction. He would play Wipeout on his briefcase. It has this really fast drum beat and he would pound away wildly.

I never saw myself as a radical. I was perfecting class clown. For me the key was to utter a joke at the exact moment without getting in trouble. This meant limiting how often you dropped a joke. It had to be a very good joke. If you pulled it off the teacher laughed too and you were given a pass. I really only remember one teacher who tried to rule through strict control and this just made it hard on her. The class President of the year ahead of me, Steve Rudolph, was a tall, blonde and a natural born leader. I remember him saying, Mrs. Smith, I think we have come to understand the problem you are having with many of the students. We have decided the problem is you. I still get a chuckle out of the eloquent way he said it. It sounded like it was a scientific discovery or something.

As class President his speech before the senior class at graduation went like this. I guess our schooling is over and our education begins. He was instructed to not throw his graduation cap. He threw his cap and the whole class followed suit. It was a generation which despised the confines of meaningless rules. The classes that came after us in our town would never be afforded the freedoms of open campus (meaning you could come and go from school), or general freedoms we demanded in the 1970s. Steve went on to be a Chef and restaurant owner after spending time working with kids in the Outward Bound program. It is a program of fun and enlightenment for young teenagers. Kids with disabilities are most welcome. Sending love to a natural born earth shaker.

The point is we were at a certain point of freedom of the American Spirit in the late 1970s. We were very communal and it made for a small period similar to the Summer of Love they had in the 1960s. It was even better without the war, riots and the police bashing in people’s heads. Indeed, it was a free, happy and wonderfully social place and time. There was no crime at all in Petoskey. Nothing was ever locked or stolen. Doors were left unlocked and keys were left in the in the ignition so no one had to look for their keys. People did not lie either. There was the ever present small town talk. I like to say if a person had been caught stealing something in Petoskey, they would have had to leave town. It would have been like you were labeled a molester or something. The only thing people knew of crime was what they read in the newspapers from Detroit.

There were new opportunities in Cable TV for my father in my Grandfather’s Great Lakes Cable TV. The picture was always clear on Cable. Our digital signals today do not degrade. Digital is all or nothing. Believe me when I say the picture could get snow back then. There were hardly any channels off air anyway. Cable TV was even used to bring in distant radio stations.

It was a different America when everyone in America would watch one of the five channels all at the same time. Everyone saw the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan show. It was watched by most every family in every household. If you were famous in those days you were really famous. The thought of small town life helped my parents pull up stakes in Flint in 1966. My dad was the toughest guy in town. In a City like Flint, where blue collar men build cars, it was a reputation he had to