Monday, October 20, was a beautiful, sunny, 80° day, with
low humidity and a light breeze…a perfect fall day. After running errands we
spent the day around the camper until we went to dinner with friends Marvin and
Shirley, to Backyard Burgers, followed by a stop at Sam’s Club. Of course, we
had to end the day with a couple games of Pegs & Jokers. The first game was
really close but the second was a blow out for the gals: the gals won both
games. Woot-woot!
The weather Tuesday was almost identical to Monday’s: sunny,
cloudless, temps in the high 70s. We furnished dinner that night, so while Dick
rode the motorcycle to Carbondale to pick up a few items, I stayed back at the
camper to get things ready. We served creamy Cajun chicken, salad, rolls,
broccoli, and a baked caramel apple for dessert—with vanilla ice cream
(furnished by Marv & Shirl). Yum, yum! Oh, and we also served a peach wine
that we had been carrying with us since last spring in Texas, when we went to
“A Wine of Mine,” winery in Aransas Pass. Everything was a hit! Then…another
round of Pegs & Jokers. Again, women come out on top, 3:1 for the evening.
Woot-woot!
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| Looks like trouble... |
A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that we had an electrical
problem in the rear of the coach, or living room area. The 12-volt lights
worked, but not the 120V electric outlets. Marv and Shirley’s son, Curt,
tackled that problem Tuesday morning, quickly finding that the wires in a
junction box had burned and melted wire nut connectors, creating a definite
fire hazard. Apparently that can happen when multi-strand wire and solid wire aren’t
secured together correctly in a wire nut. Thankfully, that problem has been
corrected and we’re back in full working order. Thank you, Curt!
Also…the guys at Marv and Shirley’s “Kampers Supply” were
able to replace two of the damaged panels from the tire blowout that we had in
August. It looks, oh, so much better. The only thing that needs to be added is
the tire skirt and slide room front edge that are on order. Thank you again,
Curt! You’re awesome!
Kamper’s Supply is a full-service RV dealer in southern
Illinois on RT 13 in Carterville that really know their stuff. They know more about RV’s than most of us
have forgoten. If you need RV help and you
are near their dealership we definitely recommend you stop by and say hey!
Wednesday, my Kitchen Aid mixer appeared, meaning that it
was cookie day. So, that’s what I did! I made a batch of chocolate chip
cookies, which we shared with the Kamper’s Supply crew, and a couple loaves of
banana bread. While I was busy being ”Susie Homemaker” Dick purchased a new
tire to replace the last original tire we had on the camper. The guys at Kampers
Supply helped complete the job of putting the new tire and wheel on the ground.
We’re ready to hit the road!
That evening we were treated to BBQ ribs (furnished by
friends Randy and Jeri), German potato salad, tossed salad, baked beans, and
“red hot apples” and ice cream at Marv and Shirley’s. Again, YUM! This was our
last evening with them, so the six of us played Pegs & Jokers to round out
the evening. The gals won all 3 games. Wow! We were on a roll! As I’ve said
before, “Girls Rule, Guys Drool!”
Thursday morning we did our final packing and preparation
for continuing our trek to Texas. By 10:15 we were on the road, heading to
Cherokee Landing near Saulsbury, TN. We arrived at 3:30, after an easy day of
travel: no rain, temps in the mid-60s, light traffic, lovely scenery of rolling
hills and farms. Cherokee Landing is an “Encore,” Thousand Trails park with
over 300 sites plus cabins. The property includes a large pool; tennis,
volleyball and basketball courts; a club house; and fishing in adjacent Lake
Cherokee. It’s a beautiful park, but does need road improvement and site
improvement to accommodate larger units.
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| Cherokee Landing, including club house exterior and interior, and the bridge to the cabin area |
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| Cherokee Lake, one of the cabins, our site |
We decided to do our Memphis sight-seeing on Friday, to give
us Saturday to prepare for departure on Sunday. Memphis was about an hour and a
half from our site, so we were on the road by 8:30 to give us plenty of time
and a full day. There were 4 things on our list: The Peabody Hotel and the
Peabody Ducks, Sun Studio, the Gibson Guitar Factory, and of course, Beale
Street. We found parking in the heart of downtown Memphis. Our first stop was
The Peabody Hotel, where we were hoping to see the Duck March at 11 a.m. We
just missed the entrance, dang, but this is the scoop.
The Peabody Hotel, located in the heart of downtown Memphis,
is rated as a AAA Four-Diamond history hotel. And, it’s the home of the
legendary Peabody Ducks.
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| The Peabody Hotel, with its welcoming committee (brass dogs), and the Grand Lobby. Beautiful! |
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| Ducks on parade, in the fountain, their "palace" exterior and interior |
Back in the 1930s the then General Manager of the hotel and
a friend, returning from a hunting trip to Arkansas, and after a significant
amount of Jack Daniels, thought it would be funny to place some of their live
duck decoys in the beautiful Peabody fountain. (Back then it was legal for
hunters to use live decoys when hunting.) Three small English call ducks were
selected as “guinea pigs,” and the reaction was nothing short of enthusiastic.
Soon, five North American mallard ducks replaced the original ducks, and the
rest is history. In 1940 a former circus animal trainer, offering to help with
delivering the ducks to the fountain each day, taught them the now-famous
Peabody Duck March—he became the first ever Peabody Duck Master. He served in
that position until 1991 when he retired. After nearly 80 years, the marble
fountain in the grand hotel lobby is still graced with the ducks. (The current
Duck Master is only the 5th Duck Master in the history of the
hotel.) Taking the elevator from the rooftop they march from the elevator on a
red carpet, to the fountain at 11 a.m. every day, and return to the roof at 5
p.m. When off-duty from the lobby, the ducks live in their Royal Duck Palace on
the hotel’s rooftop. The $200,000 structure is made of marble and glass, and
includes its very own fountain with a bronze duck spitting water. It also
includes a small replica of the hotel, where the ducks can nest, with a soft,
grassy “front yard.” Raised by a local farmer and a friend of the hotel, each
team of Peabody Ducks lives at the hotel for only 3 months before retiring from
duty and returning to the farm where they are free to live as wild ducks. The
hotel recognizes the ducks as wild animals and does not domesticate them or
treat then as pets.
As a side note, duck is not served anywhere at The Peabody,
and has not been seen on the hotel’s menu since its 1981 reopening, quite
possibly making the hotel’s Chez Philippe French Restaurant the only restaurant
in the world that does not serve duck.
Then, we walked a mile-plus up Union Avenue to Sun Studio,
where Elvis started his career, as well as many, many other musicians.
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| Sun Studio; our tour guide, Jane, and the store with soda fountain |
Here's a video of our tour guide, Jane, explaining some of the Rock 'n' Roll history.
A little background on Sun Studio: In January 1950, WREC radio engineer Sam Phillips opened the Memphis Recording Service at 706 Union Avenue (current location of Sun Studio) with his assistant and longtime friend, Marion Keisker. Phillips had dreamed of opening his own recording studio since he was a young man, and now that it was a reality he was overjoyed. However, getting the company off the ground was not an easy task, so to make money in the beginning, Phillips would record conventions, weddings, choirs, and even funerals. He also held an open door policy, allowing anybody to walk in and, for a small fee, record their own record. Phillips' slogan for his studio was "We Record Anything, Anywhere, Anytime".
In June, Phillips
and a friend, local DJ Dewey Phillips (no relation) set up their own record label
called Phillips Records. The purpose
of the label was to record "negro artists of the South" who wanted to
make a recording but had no place to do it. The label failed to make an impact
and folded after just one release; "Boogie in the Park" by Joe Hill Louis, which sold less than 400 copies.
Reputedly the first rock and roll single, Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats' "Rocket 88" was recorded there in 1951 with song composer Ike Turner on
keyboards, thus the studio claimed status as the birthplace of Rock & Roll.
In
early 1952, Phillips once again launched his own record label, this time
calling it Sun Records. During
his first year he recorded several artists who would go on to have successful
careers, including B.B. King, Joe Hill Louis, Rufus Thomas, and Howlin' Wolf. Despite the amount of singers who recorded there, Phillips found it
increasingly difficult to keep profits up. (He reportedly drove over 60,000
miles in one year to promote his artists with radio stations and distributors,
and to keep costs down, he would pay his artists 3% royalties instead of the usual 5% that was more common at the time.)
Rufus Thomas's
"Bearcat", a recording that was similar to "Hound Dog", was the first real hit for Sun in 1953. Although the song was
the label's first hit, a copyright-infringement suit ensued and nearly bankrupted
Phillips' record label. Despite this, Phillips was able to keep his business
afloat by recording several other acts, including the Prisonaires; a black quartet who were given permission to leave prison in June 1953
to record their single, "Just Walkin' in the Rain," later a hit for Johnnie Ray in 1956.
(Portions of the following were taken from “Sun Studio, the
birthplace of rock ‘n’ roll,” a souvenir from our tour of Sun Studio.)
The
dreaded race mix was happening! Bands like Bill Haley and The Comets began to
do Blue tunes they heard on WDIA. Chuck Berry and Bo Diddly began to borrow
melodies they heard on the Grand Ole Opry. … A completely new sound blended
from the old ones. Dewey Phillips was the first of the wild-man DJs. “Tell ‘em
Phillips sencha!” he screamed in wildness from his radio show Red Hot and Blue
in Memphis—screaming to teenagers! Dewey was an icon among Memphis teens…and in
a few years he would be the first DJ in the world to play a song just recorded
up the street at Sun Studio—by an unknown (18-year old) teenager named Elvis
Presley!
As
a teenager, Elvis hung out on Beale Street, listening to the Grand Ole Opry
with his parents, and “Red Hot and Blue” with his friends. When he first walked
into Sun Studio, he was asked who he sounded like. He said, “I don’t sound like
nobody.” A nervous and shy teenager, Elvis paid $4 to record a song, with hopes
of being invited back. It took a
year. (During this time Elvis played with the Studio band but Sam wasn’t
hearing anything he liked. So, he left the room, giving the band a break. The
band started jamming, just having fun, when Sam said, “What’s that? Start it
over!—and the tape started rolling.)
Elvis
sang, “That’s All Right” like no Blues song Sam had ever heard before. It had
all the power and honesty of the Blues mixed with the wildness and exuberance
of an all-night party. It jumped right up in your face and said, “Like it or
not, this is me and I’m not going away.” … Rock ‘n’ Roll was born!
One
day in the fall of 1954 Johnny Cash was sitting on the steps of Sun Studio when
Sam came to work. He stood up and said, “I’m Johnny Cash, and I want you to
hear me play.” With a voice like Johnny’s, how could Sam have said no! Sam
listened to Johnny sing. He loved his voice and invited him back, but he asked
Johnny to “write me an up-tempo weeper love song.” Johnny’s answer was “Cry!
Cry! Cry!” released the next year. Sparse and pure it would break barriers
between the pop and country music, setting him on a long career where his music
would remain one of a kind, raw and unpolished. Back then the Grand Ole Opry
didn’t approve of drums or percussion being used, saying it distracted from the
sound of true country music. So…Johnny stuck a folded dollar bill under the
guitar strings to get the raspy sound he wanted. Sam liked it! The sound stayed
and was recorded. Later, one night after a show Johnny was talking with Sam.
“We got to talking about our wives and guys running around and so forth. I had
a brand new baby and I said not me, buddy—“I walk the line.” That’s where the
song came from. Johnny wrote it that night. His fame skyrocketed with the
release of “I Walk the Line.”
"Million
Dollar Quartet" is a recording of an
impromptu jam session involving Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and Johnny Cash made
on December 4, 1956, in the Sun Records Studios in Memphis.
They were all friends, with Elvis the ringleader. He was the
first, the one the others heard on the radio, the magnet that drew them to Sun
Studio. It was just a regular day in Sun Studio. The jam session seems to have happened by pure chance. Perkins, who by
this time had already met success with "Blue Suede Shoes," had come into the studios that day, to cut some new material,
including a revamped version of an old blues song, "Matchbox." Sam Phillips (owner of Sun Records) had
brought in his latest acquisition, Jerry Lee Lewis, still unknown outside Memphis, to play piano on the Perkins session.
Sometime in the early afternoon, 21-year-old Elvis Presley, formerly a Sun artist now at RCA, dropped in to pay a casual visit. At some
point during the session, Sun artist Johnny Cash, who had recently enjoyed a few hits on the country charts, popped in.
During the session
Phillips called a local newspaper, the Memphis
Press-Scimitar; Bob Johnson, the newspaper’s entertainment editor came over
to the studios with UPI representative Leo Soroca and a
photographer. Johnson wrote an article about the session, which appeared the
following day in the Press-Scimitar under the headline "Million Dollar
Quartet". The article contained the now-famous photograph of Presley
seated at the piano surrounded by Lewis, Perkins and Cash. According to the Rolling Stone review of the album, "'The Complete
Million Dollar Session” provides a rare post-Sun glimpse of Elvis Presley momentarily free of the golden shackles of stardom and the manipulative grasp of his manager, Colonel Tom Parker. His singing, especially on the gospel
numbers, is natural and relaxed, minus some of the trademark mannerisms of his
official RCA releases."
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| Sun Studio where Elvis did his recording. The highlighted area is where he stood,: X marks the spot. |
Yup, we stood where Elvis stood when he recorded his first
song. We held the microphone he held. We saw the high school yearbook Elvis
signed. We saw the priceless memorabilia from the music legends that blended Blues
and Country music to explode in the “big bang” of Rock ‘n’ Roll. We strolled
through the studio and heard the voices and hope of musicians who recorded
here, through outtakes from recording sessions; we felt the energy of the
music… The tour reaches back through the years to bring us the first steps of
Blues and Rock ‘n’ Roll. You feel the pain, the energy, the hopefulness—the
emotion.
Thank you, Elvis, Carl (Blue Suede Shoes) Perkins, Johnny
Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, and all the others who came before and have come since,
for all you’ve given us. We are forever grateful.
In
1969, Sam Phillips sold the
label to Shelby Singleton, and there was no recording-related or label-related
activity again in the building until the September 1985 Class of '55 recording sessions with Carl Perkins, Roy
Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Johnny Cash.
In 1987, ten years
after Presley died, Sun Studio at 706 Union Avenue was converted back into a
recording studio, and soon became a tourist attraction for Presley fans and
music lovers in general. The studio was also used by several well-known acts to
record, including U2, Def Leppard, John Mellencamp, the Bogus Bros. and Chris Isaak & Silvertone to
name a few. In 2003 it was officially recognized as a National Historic Landmark tourist
attraction.
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| The "Prisonaires," who were pardoned by the Governor of Tennessee after hearing them sing; the broken amp owned by Jackie Brenston and His Delta Cats (the amp broke as they were on the way to Sun Studio to record Rocket 88, so they stuffed it with paper to hold the cone in place; Sam Phillips liked the sound, so they kept the paper!), and a panaoramic of the actual sound studio where everyone recorded. |
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| The yearbook with Elvis' graduation photo, Marion Keisker who recorded Elvis' first song at the studio, the actual recording equipment used, the sign outside Dewey Phillips' broadcast studio, and the newspaper accounts of Elvis' death. |
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| The recording booth belonging to DJ Dewey Phillips, who played Elvis' first recording "It's All Right." Phillips played the recording 14 times; phones were ringing off the hook! |
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| Memorabilia in the studio, including Elvis' graduation diploma |
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| A still of Elvis (I think from his appearance on Ed Sullivan), the original acoustic ceiling tiles in the recording studio, and Bono, who also did some recording here. |
Next we walked a few blocks to historic Beale Street. Beale
Street felt like a musical pilgrimage, with top-to-bottom sensations: neon
lights, brass notes, Blues streaming from every open door, not to mention the
smell of BBQ emanating from every bar and restaurant. This is the street that
gave B.B. King his name; that fascinated Elvis as a teen. Beale Street: music,
boutiques, galleries, and a mix of new and old restaurants and bars. Here you
can find the National Civil Rights Museum, the historic Orpheum Theatre, FedEx
Forum home to the Memphis Grizzlies NBA team, or AutoZone Park home to Triple-A
Memphis Redbirds, and so much more. We loved it!
Beale Street, created in 1841, was original named Beale
Avenue, with its western end primarily shops of trade leading to the
Mississippi River waterfront. In 1890 Beale Street underwent renovation with
the additional of the Grand Opera House, later known as the Orpheum Theatre,
and in the late 1870s the first black millionaire from the south purchased land
around Beale Street. In 1890 he paid the city to create a Church Park at the
corner of 4th and Beale, which became a cultural and recreational
center where Blues musicians could gather and perform. The auditorium in the
park saw some famous speakers: Woodrow Wilson, Booker T. Washington, and
Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Beale Street Baptist Church, Tennessee's oldest surviving African American Church edifice built in 1864, was
also important in the early civil rights movement in Memphis.
In 1903, a music
teacher by the name of W.C. Handy was hired for the mayor’s Knights of Phythias
Band. Thus, Memphis became the home of this famous musician who created the
“Blues on Beale Street.” In 1909 he wrote “The Memphis Blues,” a campaign song
for political machine leader E.H. Crump; he also wrote a song called “Beale
Street Blues,” influencing the street’s name from Beale Avenue to Beale Street.
From the 1920s to the 1940s, Louis Armstrong, Muddy Waters, Albert King, Memphis Minnie, B.B. King, Rufus Thomas, Roscoe Gordon, and other blues and jazz legends played on Beale Street and helped
develop the style known as Memphis Blues. As a young man, B. B. King was billed as "the Beale Street Blues
Boy.
By the 1960s, Beale
had become run down and many stores closed, although on May 23, 1966, the
section of the street from Main to 4th was declared a National Historic Landmark. On December 15,
1977, Beale Street was officially declared the "Home of the Blues" by
an act of Congress. Despite this national recognition of its
historic significance, Beale was a virtual ghost town after a disastrous urban
renewal program with every building but one boarded up.
In 1973, the Beale
Street Development Corporation was formed as a cross-sectional, bi-racial
cooperative effort for the redevelopment of Beale Street. The corporation was
selected by the City of Memphis to participate in the redevelopment of the
blocks on Beale between Second and Fourth streets in August 1978. The
corporation dedicated its efforts to the success of the Beale Street Project for
the preservation of the street's rich history, and to its cultural as well as
physical development. This corporation raised 5.2 million dollars in grants for
the renovation of Beale Street. Today we can enjoy the past along with the
present in the wonderful experience of Beale Street.
Our next stop was The Gibson Guitar Factory, located just a
block off Beale Street. Celebrating 125 years in business, this was the perfect
time to visit. We toured the factory, but unfortunately no photos were allowed
in the factory, only in the lobby and store; we even had to sign a
non-disclosure agreement!
Before going through 2 sets of doors we had to don safety
goggles, and were reminded to “stay within the yellow and black striped taped
lines.” The tour included an up-close look at the intricate process of cutting
and binding maple, poplar and mahogany; neck-fitting, painting, buffing and
fine tuning the wood into a masterpiece. B.B. King’s “Lucille” was made here,
as were instruments by hundreds of well-known artists. Our tour lasted about 45
minutes, and certainly gave us insight into the making of the Gibson Guitar.
Only about 80 people are employed in the Memphis factory; there are two other
factories in Bozeman, MT and Nashville, TN.
A little history of Gibson: the
home of Gibson electric guitars today is “Gibson USA,” built in 1974 in
Nashville, specifically for the production of Gibson’s Les Paul guitars. Gibson world headquarters moved to Nashville in 1984 with the
closing of the Kalamazoo plant. In 1986, the financially troubled company was
rescued and the new owners quickly restored Gibson's reputation for quality as
well as its profitability.
Although
the entire guitar industry went through a slump in the late '70s, the spirit of
innovation remained strong at Gibson. In response to a growing demand for
vintage styling of guitars, Gibson tapped its rich history and reissued their
dot-neck version of the ES-335 in 1981 and the flametop sunburst Les Paul in
1982. At the same time, two legendary guitarists joined Gibson: B.B. King in
1980 with the Lucille model and Chet Atkins in 1982 with his new concept of a
solid body acoustic guitar. Gibson's close relationship with musicians is evident
in endorsement models from B.B. King, Chet Atkins and other jazz greats, plus
new Les Paul guitars made to the personal specifications of rock stars Jimmy
Page and Joe Perry and others. Today's Gibson electric guitars represent the
history as well as the future of the electric guitar. The tour is a must if
you’re at all interested in music—especially the world of Blues and Rock ‘n’
Roll.
Finally,
we ate! After walking around all day, we were famished! We stopped in at B.B.
King’s Blues Club for their famous BBQ pulled pork sandwich for me and a
chicken Cordon Bleu sandwich for Dick. YUM-YUM!
We
decided to skip the famous Duck March back to the rooftop at The Peabody and
head home. We were tired, and knew the long drive would be tiring without
waiting the extra 45 minutes to see the ducks. Next time…
Saturday
we spent at the park, in the club house, checking email, etc. Dick did some
preparations for our departure Sunday. It was a good day to relax! The sun was
shining and the temperatures reached near 80°. Beautiful!
Sunday we
packed up and hit the road, heading west to Arkadelphia where we spent the
night in the Walmart parking lot. Across the street from Walmart was “Western
Sizzlin’ of Arkadelphia,” a family restaurant serving all things beef and some
shrimp and chicken, where we had dinner. And…they had free Wi-Fi! REALLY GOOD! YUM!
That’s it
for this week, folks. Hope all is well in your world. Here's the map of our travels so far, since we left Minnesota in September.
Hugs ‘n’
blessings,
RJ and
Gail
