Photo courtesy of Joe Sauer (pictured in the middle of the band)

The year was 1969. And, like every other city and town in the United States, a garage band existed in almost every neighborhood throughout Wichita. We had all watched the Beatles on Ed Sullivan with our older siblings and we had all combed our hair down over our foreheads. And, those of us who lacked the ability to play varsity sports learned to play electric guitar/bass/drums.  

The bands had fabulous names – Gold Plush Blues, Velvet Rainbow, Smoky Bear, and my band, The Cambridge Experiment (VERY British-sounding, indeed!). The venues varied – church basements, school cafeterias, neighborhood swimming pools. Oh, the swimming pools. Envision “Beach Blanket Bingo” in the suburbs. Man, it got no better than that. Remember, we were 14 – 15 years old. And, WE GOT PAID to do this. The going rate was $60. We were a 4-piece band and $15 would buy two extra large Angelo’s pizzas and two pitchers of pop. Yes, we were living large.

After we had built a small fan base, The Cambridge Experiment ventured out of the safe environs of our home neighborhoods in southeast Wichita. Eventually, we got our nerve up and entered several “Battle of the Bands” events which were typically held at roller rinks. BIG MISTAKE! We suffered our worst humiliation at The Roller Haven Skate Rink on West Street near 13th Street. What were we thinking?!?! Our friends/fans had never ventured past downtown. Besides, we all knew that those who lived on the Wild West Side were known to not be all “peace and love” just yet.  

We were massacred at the Battle of the Bands . . . Not one single vote was cast for the Cambridge Experiment. We played artsy-fartsy stuff by Procol Harum and pseudo-Americana tunes by The Band. The other bands rolled over us by playing hits by The Rolling Stones and The Who. What’s more, the lead singer of Smoky Bear 1) had longer hair than us (strike one); 2) lived on the west side and had packed the rink with his buddies (strike two), and 3) worst of all - his voice had fully changed (steerike three!).  We never had a chance.

We stayed together for a few years until our singer/piano player graduated early and left for college. We were forced to move into a new direction. We expanded our horizons.  We added two girls. Genius move!  By 1971, we had come to realize the difference that cute teenage girls in hot pants could make when dealing with both booking agents and the jocks we usually encountered at our gigs at local high school dances. The band was re-named SHINE – The Midwest’s Male and Female Revue. We were 17 – 19 and had progressed musically. But, more importantly, we were cute! Booking agents just loved us. The venues had changed to colleges, country clubs and lounges. Our pay per gig was in the range of $200 - $400. Weekends were spent driving a trailer of musical equipment to Lawrence, Hutchinson, Wellington, Lyons, Arkansas City, Salina, and Dodge City. Man, we had fun.

SHINE moved to the next level in 1972. We added a good-looking lead vocalist, Bobby,  whom the ladies loved. He could schmooze the audience like no one else. SHINE had an honest-to-goodness front man who looked like a young Neil Diamond and who could sing like Elvis. Hell, even my mother came out to the garage to watch when we rehearsed. And, that had NEVER happened before Bobby! We shifted our music from Jethro Tull to 3 Dog Night. We traded Traffic for Chicago. We dropped “Long Distance Runaround” and added “Burning Love.” We were shamelessly  commercial. And, man, it worked!!

In August, 1972, Shine auditioned for a “house band” gig at the Camelot Club which was located on the upper level of a strip center on Roanoke just SE of Harry and Edgemoor. They hired us for a four-week trial at $450 per week. We got better because we worked our asses off. We bought coordinated/matching outfits which looked like a cross between SuperFly and Starsky & Hutch. And, yes, with the girls still in hot pants. It was a magical combination — Pop/rock dance hits played by cute college kids who rehearsed four times each week in addition to performing together for four hours six days a week.  We packed the joint. We were re-hired at a higher weekly wage. By the end of January, 1973, Shine was paid $700 per week. 

The most important thing to come out of the gig at the Camelot Club was that although we were just teenagers, we had joined the ranks of actual working “house” bands. It was a unique time when each club had its own house band which had a contract which kept them at one venue for 3 – 6 months. There were also numerous beer bars where 18-year olds could buy cheap 3.2 beer for $1/pitcher and hear good live music. There were also several jazz clubs where adults would sip over-priced martinis and ignore the VERY talented jazz musicians. But, being in a band of teenagers and playing at a 21 club was nirvana. 

The Camelot Club was closed only on Monday. So, every Monday, we went to see the bands at the other 21 clubs where we were admitted free because we were the house band at the Camelot Club. Our heads exploded! We saw Lotus at The Fireside Club on the east side, and, then, at the Scene Seventies on the west side. We revered the Soul Survivors who stayed on the top of the rock pile at the Sound Sircus on South Seneca.  We caught The Hard Road or Headstone when they came off the road and landed a stay in Wichita. And, when the clubs closed at 2:00 AM, all of us carnival freaks would meet for breakfast at Denny’s. It wasn’t real healthy; but, it WAS real fun!

Then, it ended. Some band members were recruited to go on the road with bigger acts who toured. Some quit and went to college. Some got married and got real jobs. Others went to Viet Nam.

The clubs changed hands.  The audiences were no longer in the habit of going to “their” club to hear the same house band two or three times each week. Disco arrived. But, life-long friendships were formed and wonderful memories were made. I miss the Camelot Club. But, I still don’t like roller rinks.

Please respond to any or all of the sections in Candor by emailing us at editor@candor.news

West Wichita, highlighted in the center of the photo by the Westport Drive-In, circa 1960s

Suburban Wichita, west-side style in the early 1960’s, offered childhood enrichments beyond what our parents likely appreciated when they made that down payment. The area west of the Big Ditch, north of Kellogg, and south of 21st Street housed a high percentage of two-parent families bent upon ensuring an easier life and “better education” for the children.  Every parent’s dream. The landscape included several elementaries, though a junior high and high school would be quite a few years away. However, what our parents lacked in local political power was not a hindrance to the liberties and lessons they purchased for us and that would later be part of our empowering.

Though we had little money at our disposal, we did have incredible freedom to run the neighborhoods – and from dawn ‘til after dark during the best three months of the year. Many backyards were unfenced, so roaming from house to house, block to block was easily navigable and paths were deeply worn depending on closest friends (so many kids to choose from) and the more-understanding parents. Each street held possibilities for admiring the opposite sex or finding a better ballgame. Crude ball diamonds with minimal backstop and bumpy infields never dissuaded. Most summer mornings started there. Gathering enough for one of the three seasonal sports was rarely difficult. Tag, hide-and-seek, kick-the-can – even easier.  The girls joined us for those and curfew was always too soon. 

In my elementary school, each grade had two classrooms full of kids, only a handful of whom stayed at school during the lunch hour. The vast majority had 60 minutes to run home to a bologna sandwich and bowl of Campbell’s, watch an episode of “The Little Rascals” and get back to our desks. Our fathers worked. Many mothers were at home. Most children smoked second-hand as a prelude to their own deeper enjoyment. Dining at a restaurant was highly irregular, though McDonald’s on a Sunday after church frequently offered burgers at 10 for a dollar. New construction meant large piles of basement dirt that offered plentiful ammunition and made “king of the mountain” more perilous.

Though many were addicted to games of sport, the scientific inquirers had drainage ditches, the Cowskin Creek, and uncut fields to capture tadpoles and insects or observe cocoons and shed skins and animal tracks.

As for school, the “new math” proved a failed experiment, but they never adequately replaced SRA, the reading comprehension series that moved our ambition through color gradations – the thrill of competition applied to careful reading. Yes, in those days competition was hallowed and understood as the path to a better life.

The hot-house aspects of life west of the Big Ditch are certainly more than three-fold, but from my vantage point:

1. Children made so many decisions everyday – unsupervised.  We were raised to be decisive: to follow the daredevils in the group or not; to weigh the risk of a swollen creek; to manage bullies without parental intervention; to decide what the group was going to do next.  We had no phones, screens, or listening devices on our persons. During the summer, our independence was essentially whatever part of the day was not interrupted by the need to eat, quickly. So much of our time was with our peers. And no one seemed to be worried. (I don’t have a single story during my childhood of adult perversion regarding children.)

2. We were all lawyers in training. Everything was argued over: modifying the rules for tag; picking fair teams; out at first or a tie going to the runner?

3. Life was satisfying on quite modest budgets. Entry-level jobs (babysitting, mowing the lawns of the retired for a dollar bill, caddying at Rolling Hills for $5 if he had a good round) provided money for ball cards, a seat at the pharmacy fountain, or a sundae at Mr. Swiss. But, generally, our leisure was unfunded. We patched and taped the broken bat, the worn-through tennis shoes, the holes in our jeans.

The crowning achievement of my neighborhood at the beginning of our ascent into adolescence was a 60-hour baseball game, a world record that we held for most of two weeks before a men’s softball game in Paterson, New Jersey, added 12 hours to the endeavor. If kids were to try that today, how many parents and coaches would be overseeing and overruling – and preventing the children from planning, recruiting, arguing, and problem-solving? As for idyllic time and place to be a kid, my heart is tied to Wichita’s far-west side in the early 1960’s. 

Please respond to any or all of the sections in Candor by emailing us at editor@candor.news

The 1964 Goldpanners Over 200 Goldpanners have reached Major League Baseball as players, including Barry Bonds (83), Tom Seaver (64-65), and Dave Winfield (71-72). Even more significant is the record number of 1,164 Goldpanners drafted by Major League Baseball.

The National Baseball Congress Tournament is scheduled to return in 2021, what do you remember about this annual event that began in 1935, and helped define Wichita as a destination point for scouts who wanted to see some of the finest prospects in the nation?

Candor Visuals

What are your predictions/aspirations for the upcoming year? How do they compare with previous years, when you made resolutions, or predictions? Submit a story of success or failure, and send Candor your response to editor@candor.news, and we may print it right here, in “Just Reminiscing.”

Illustration: Candor Visuals

Mowing lawns, carrying out groceries at your neighborhood IGA, working as a waitress . . . what was your first job, and what were some memories you have that made this job special? Send Candor your submission to editor@candor.news, and we may print it right here, in “Just Reminiscing.”

Reader responses:

I knew from the age of 4 that I was going to be a teacher. My father tried his best to suggest more profitable occupations for me, but, I became a teacher. My first teaching job was in a little town outside of Hays, Kansas. I taught 7-9 English and 7-12 Home Economics, as it was called in the old days. K-State  prepared me well for the classroom, but it didn’t prepare me for all of the extracurricular assignments I took on as a new teacher. The class sizes, as you would expect, were small. I had only four students in my 9th grade English class so dividing my class into discussion groups was a joke. I learned that discussion didn’t work for us since these kids had known each other from birth. Each could tell you what the other three were thinking before I even asked the questions. I may have had a lot less papers to grade but made up for it in trying to find innovative methods to teach such small classes. 

My 9th graders were in charge of putting on small plays for the elementary students. We had a stage and that was all. Most costumes were put together with yarn and construction paper. Props were brought from home. Everyone had a great time. 

I wasn’t at this school very long before I was assigned extra duty. The home Ec/English classroom was also the sports concession stand. We sold our goods out of an outside facing window during football season and opened the room for all indoor sports. 

One year I was the Junior High track coach. Obviously, they were desperate. During the first practice I set up the hurdles only to discover a little later that I had set them up backwards. Luckily, they were the low hurdles so no one got killed, just a skinned knee or two. Today it would have meant a lawsuit. It was a rainy track season and you could always tell my kids from the opposite team because we didn’t have rainwear. We cut holes out of large, black trash bags and that was our rain gear. It worked pretty well. 

I think one of the highlights of this small school was the lunchroom. We had wonderful cooks. No one ever packed a lunch at this school. Every Friday they would prepare authentic German bierocks and the entire town would turn out to eat lunch with the teachers and kids. We never had to call parents to report a misbehavior because the kids knew we’d be seeing their parents every Friday at lunch.  

I really enjoyed teaching in this small district. I was blessed by a super Principal, a friendly go-out-of your-way-to-help faculty, great kids, and a supportive community. It’s been gobbled up by a larger district now and is no more, and I feel saddened by that. 

Dawna Ruggles, Wichita

WHAT IS A REAL JOB?

As I thought about the several forms of employment I have had in my life, I began to wonder what is a “real job?” Like many kids growing up in Wichita, Kansas, in the 1950’s and 1960’s, I found numerous ways of earning spending money. But these were always short-term deals usually limited to the completion of a specific task for an agreed amount of money. I can clearly remember at nine years of age earning my first five dollars this way, which involved a couple of days raking leaves for a neighbor. 

But the thing that separated what I consider my first real job from earlier work experiences was that it required me to show up every day for an indefinite period of time, to work with other workers, and that it gave me a good idea of what the working world is like and a glimpse into private enterprise. That was in the summer of 1963, working for a company known as Western Delivery. What that job did for me was to expose me to a larger world beyond the sphere of family, neighbors, school, and church that had been most of my world up to that time. 

1963 was quite a year, as anyone who remembers that time would agree, but especially for 16-year-olds like me who began driving (legally) that year. My mind was heavily focused on my first car that I had acquired and gotten into running condition just in time to be able to drive. There were lots of other, more  important things, going on that year. Civil rights unrest was everywhere, and marches and demonstrations were in the news daily. The United States was becoming increasingly involved in military action in southeast Asia, however it was not yet as widely known as it soon would become. But for a teenage boy, earning and saving money was more important. I had ideas about going to college and maybe being a engineer someday, but that was far in the future. Right then, it was more important to put gas in my car. 

Western Delivery was a loosely-organized “company” operated by a nice man named Bob. As name suggests, its business was delivering, in this case, furniture and appliances. The operation consisted of Bob and his helper Sonny, two pickup trucks with “headache racks” for hauling furniture, and a couple of appliance dollies. “Crazy Dave” and I comprised the second crew of two, and during the course of the summer, some of those guys left and were replaced by others. There was no office, and I suspect there were no books; as  far as I know everything was done in cash. By virtue of arrangements Bob had made with two or three local businesses, we would deliver furniture and appliances they had sold, and in many cases, return trade-in items to the stores. We also installed the washers, dryers, refrigerators, and window air conditioners. Pay was commission only, we each got a share of the payment for whatever work was  available. Some days there was no work at all. I learned a valuable lesson when one week I earned less than I spent for lunch. After that, I brought a sack lunch. 

As I would realize much later, Bob was a guy much like me, never really content to work for someone else, and willing to take the hard knocks that came with that attitude. He worked hard at his business, treated his employees well, and would later become the owner of a very successful motorcycle dealership; and I would eventually become a Professional Engineer, and co-owner of an engineering firm. I wish he were still alive so I could thank him for the lessons I learned from him. 

Tom Ruggles, Wichita