The Way We Were

Anyone remember going to The Big Banjo pizza restaurant in Pine Bluff...like, uh, every weekend? I guess besides Church's Chicken, there was no other place to go! Do you recall that $20.00 would pretty much cover the cost of a date? Well here's a memory jogger: a short list of cost of living items in 1975:

• Yearly Inflation Rate USA 9.2%
• Year End Close Dow Jones Industrial Average 858
• Interest Rates Year End Federal Reserve 7.25%
• Average Cost of new house $39,300.00
• Average Income per year $14,100.00
• Average Monthly Rent $200.00
• Cost of a gallon of Gas 44 cents
• Average cost new car$4,250.00
• Foster Grant Sun Glasses $5.00

Sounds unbelievable, eh? But, I remember my Dad complaining that gasoline at Aud's service station was over 40 cents per gallon and "you boys are gonna have to say home and quit 'running the roads.' " I never understood what he meant: we barely had roads to run in Rison, much less burn a lot of gasoline!

Too bad my whopping savings account from the summer internship at the Planer Mill (remember?) couldn't tide me over through the long and dreary winter months at RHS.

So, how much were a pair of Levi jeans anyway?

Regards,

Ken

Chart Toppers from September 1975

Hey all,
Look what I stumbled upon. The "pick list" from KAAY-1090's September 1975 top songs:

KAAY 1090 - LITTLE ROCK
SEPTEMBER 28, 1975

1. Theme From Jaws - John Williams 2
2. Rocky - Austin Roberts 3
3. Daisy Jane - America 5
4. Fame - David Bowie 7
5. Solitaire - Carpenters 9
6. I'm Sorry - John Denver 11
7. Mr. Jaws - Dickie Goodman 16
8. Run Joey Run - David Geddes 1
9. Carolina In The Pines - Michael Murphy 15
10. Ain't No Way To Treat A Lady - Helen Reddy 19
11. Bad Blood - Neil Sedaka 21
12. Third Rate Romance - Amazing Rhythm Aces 4
13. Feel Like Makin Love - Bad Co. 8
14. Ball Room Blitz - Sweet 6
15. Rhinestone Cowboy - Glen Campbell 12
16. There's Nothing Stronger - Paul & Odia --
17. Dance With Me - Orleans 22
18. Why Can't We Be Friends - War 13
19. Gone At Last - Simon/Snow 23
20. The Proud One - Osmonds 24
21. Get Down Tonight - K.C. & Sunshine 18
22. It Only Takes A Minute - Tavares --
23. Lady Blue - Leon Russell --
24. You - George Harrison 25
25. Who Loves You - 4 Seasons Ph
KAAY PICK
Something Better To Do - Olivia Newton-John
NOTE: The song titles and artists shown above are presented exactly
as they are shown on the printed survey. Any typos, spelling
errors and/or other anomalies are as they appear on the printed
sheet.

Could we ever really dance?

I still get a chuckle out of the video that I posted. Have you seen it yet? I am truly amazed that the dude in the video can pull off all those dance moves, which begs the question: "Could any of us really dance?"

I mean, come on! Could we? If you say, "yes" then name the person! In our huge 52 or 53 (I forget) member class of '75, who could really shake their booty?

My brother (Spiderman) and I were held back as children (sorry Mom, but it's time to tell the truth here!). We weren't allowed to go to dances until we were in the 9th or 10th grade. Aside from scarring me emotionally (that's why I was always short too), it did offer me an easy excuse for my lack of grace on the gym floor. How about the rest of you guys?

No, I couldn't have danced if my feet were on fire. I just didn't have any "dancing genes" I suppose. And, I've had a question for years, by the way: why did girls always dance better than guys? However, could any of you gals dance? I mean, really dance?

Well, with a lot of good therapy over the years, I've finally confronted my wounded inner self and faced the hard facts of being short-changed as a dancing machine, but I still can't dance. In the privacy of my own home however, I'll always look good! :-)

Objections? Let me hear your story: kdtillman@sbcglobal.net


-Ken

Who remembers "PONG?"

I understand that the electronic game called "PONG" is making a comeback. Or so I've heard. Do you guys remember the first time we ever laid eyes on PONG? For me, it was at the place we called the "pool hall" on Main street - the one that Frank Farrer owned and ran. PONG was a video game designed by Atari in 1972 that quickly became very popular. PONG was the coolest thing going (certainly at Farrer's pool hall) because its graphics were capable of responding to real time reactions from the user / player. (I never mastered the game. I couldn't put "spin" on the ball like some of you could!). Last year, there was even some kind of campaign to pit Andy Roddick against an updated version of the original Atari product.

I know this kind of talk horrifies our kids (I'm speaking vicarioulsy because I don't have any), but aside from our interaction with PONG, can you all fathom that that we survived ALL of high school WITHOUT A COMPUTER?? Heck, we were lucky to have a Spanish class, much less a "PC room."

Yes, PONG was amazing, since the personal computer craze didn't really start until years past our graduation. I'm sure some of the bigger high schools (as in Little Rock or Pine Bluff) were offering computer programming for main frames, but not even those schools were touting any PC classes - and certainly no laptops.

Around 1983, you may remember a movie starring Matthew Broderick called "War Games." In it, a high school kid (Broderick), that was sort of a computer nerd, wound up hacking into a high-level military computer system that controlled our nation's missle defense network. His so-called high-tech computer setup featured a clunky green-screened computer monitor, an old-fashioned desktop computer and (get this) a dial-up connection that could only be used with an acoustic coupler (a fancy way of describing a slow data connection that involves putting your telephone handset into rubber cups that, in turn, connect to a telephone line).

A few years later in 1995, Sandra Bullock starred in yet another version of the "internet gone wild," this time called "The 'Net". Her technology of choice was far beyond Broderick's old fashioned desktop PCs and dial up modems, but now even the technology of "The Net" is ancient history. For example, I just drove to Target and picked up a 2-gig flashdrive to store miscellaneous files. Did you catch that? I said "2 gigabyte" as in 2,000 million bytes, folks.

When we were graduating, there might have been some "floppy" drives around that could hold maybe 100,000 bytes. I'm not sure what the former storage disks cost, but I invested a whopping $35 dollars - and for $75 I could have walked out with a 4 gig drive. Contrast this with Bill Gates startling lack of insight when he inferred early on that a 20 meg hard drive should last consumers forever. Even Bill Gates can be blindsided by progress apparently!

Anyway, anyway...I digress. I just can't imagine now how we survived the '70s without the aid of a computer, the Internet, email, cell phones and text messaging. Maybe instead, we actually wrote letters by hand or picked up those rotary dial (or "pushbutton") telephones and called each other? Even worse, we might have actually spent some time (in person) in each others homes. Fancy that!

Added Guestbook

All,
Mary Vallance wrote to tell me that Mr. Jimmy Jones is alive and well, as far as she knows! That's good news! Also, I noted that someone voted on a couple of things, so I'll give you some hints: Melinda Wilson wasn't the only one that drove a Mustang during our high school years. And, the movie that swept the Oscars in 1975 was NOT Jaws! (Although I remember it well, don't you?).

Hey, I've added a "Guestbook" at the bottom. Please register. I've located a few folks from our small class of '75 by the way: Mary Cummings Vallance, Suzy Pate Lunsford, James "Mickey" Coats, Ronnie Tillman (Spiderman), Melinda Wilson (lastname?) and Susan Cash Wentz. Please send this link out to anyone you know of.

Cheers,
Ken

Our Teachers of 1975?

Hey Class Members!

Does anyone know where our teachers from 1975 are today? Seems that I found Sue Graves (Math) a few years back, but I've never heard of Judy McCarley since we graduated. Alan Peek (Biology) is in the Benton / Bryant area...it seems. Mike Lemons is...where? Mrs. Ruth Sadler and Mrs. Linda Scarboro (English and Home Economics) are still in Rison I think. Mr. Jimmy Jones (Civics and Western Civ?) passed away. Help me out with any data you may have...

Also, there are new polls posted. Check 'em out!

Cheers,
Ken

Send in your contact info!

Hey Guys!

An easy way for us to collect your contact information and updates is for you to email it. That way, the information won't be posted on a blog site (like this one) unless you choose it to be.

My email address is ken@kentillman.com. Feel free to shoot me your email and any additional information you feel led to provide!

Cheers,

Ken

BETA Club Conventions Revisited

Everyone has a "coming of age" story. Mine occurred in stages and certainly some were during the annual BETA club trips to Little Rock.

Growing up in Rison in the '70s meant that I didn't get out much - at least outside of Cleveland County. Now, I realize that Melinda Wilson was driving a car (a Mustang?) in the 7th grade, but little Kenny (Tiny) Tillman did well to borrow the family wheels as a senior! And even then, I had to be home by midnight - or at least before the weird strains of music came over my AM radio as "Beaker Street" came on the air. I always knew I was in trouble if the car wasn’t in the garage before Beaker Street started – which happened all too often.

So, when we all boarded our frosty-windowed school bus in January of 1973 to attend my first annual BETA convention in Little Rock, I could just as well have been headed to the moon.

Little Rock, Arkansas was a foreign country to me. It was where only adults and porkchop-sideburned seniors dared to tread - and then only on special occasions. I remember my amazement from watching Mr. Jones (Jimmy Jones, remember?) navigate the busy streets of Little Rock, let alone chauffer around an entire bus-load of pimply-faced, hormone-laced kids from Rison. To my shock, he even shuttled us from the Convention Center in Little Rock to a new thing called a "shopping mall" in yet another town - North Little Rock!

At the time, McCain Mall was relatively new (certainly to me) and I remember someone exclaiming that "there's like a hundred stores - all under one roof!" It could well have been the 7th wonder of the world as far as I was concerned.

We were daring souls in those days! Having the stamina (we thought) of teenagers, most of us forfeited sleep on the first night in our hotel, choosing instead to play poker (penny-ante) and running the elevator from floor to floor like a carnival ride. Funny, but I don't remember much of the next day’s convention business sessions...seems like most on my row were snoring - including Mr. Jones! (By the way, what was the name of the hotel next door to Robinson Auditorium?)

Most of us attempted and succeeded in gaining entrance to the movie "Deliverance" that was playing at a downtown movie theater (now long gone). That was our mission that weekend (or at least one of them): to sneak into an R-rated movie! Later in adolescence, I recall that our goals changing a bit, but at the time, successfully displaying a fake driver's license was a rite of passage. My own fake ID showed me to be around 19 as I recall. (Mind you, I didn't look 19 until I was probably 30 years old!)

In those days, theater managers would actually check ID's, remember? So, when the manager came down the line checking 'America’s future leaders' (wielding mostly illegal identifications I might add), he only "glanced" at mine (without slowing down at all), chuckled a little, and then sternly advised me to leave.

Maybe I should have warned him that I was also a duly-elected Student Council member from Rison High? I guess the eyebrow pencil I used on my upper lip didn’t help any!


-Ken

Where are you now?

1975? Is it just me, or does 1975 seem like, uh, yesterday? No, I'm aware that it can't be, because I'm 50 years old! I take comfort, however, in the fact that although I'm making that admission, you too are old like me if you were a 1975 RHS graduate!

So, the thing is, a few (very few at the moment) of us are talking about a 2010 reunion! Where? We don't know...but we want to hear from you! We'll need your input and help to make this work out!

My personal request is that we get outside the boundaries of Cleveland county! Let's not get crazy, but let's stretch our thinking a little bit, because a picnic at the "roadside park" just doesn't create a lot of excitement, you know??

By the way, be sure to SUBSCRIBE to this blog! That way, when I update it, you'll get an automatic email!

Let us hear from you!

Ken(ny) Tillman