Memoirs of my Father

I heard a Jackson Browne song on the radio today. I couldn’t help thinking about my dad. Long ago, Dad boosted Jackson Browne’s career a little without his knowledge. One night at a home party Dad noticed when Load out/Stay started to play that everyone reacted to the second part of the song. Dad cut the song in half, and played the second part on the radio. The edited version was an instant success and became a hit. Stations all over the country started playing the short version of the song, and soon Jackson Brown was a hot ticket again.

My Dad likes to travel to warm places. Year’s back, Dad went to Jamaica. There was a man and his band playing an unfamiliar rhythm and Dad liked what he heard. He bought their album, brought it back to the states, and had it played on his station. He was first to play Reggae on white pop radio, and many other stations followed. You know that man as Bob Marley.

When Dad was in high school, his father, an Ear Nose and Throat Dr., influenced my dad to go to Notre Dame for pre-med. Unfortunately, or fortunately, for Dad, he wasn’t any good at Chemistry or Biology. He transferred to NYU and switched to Communications where he DJ’d at the College Radio Station. He was the only student to get fan mail since he gave exam answers over the air.

It was while attending NYU that Dad met Mom. There was a party that Mom’s friends were going to, and Mom didn’t really want to attend. But in the end, she agreed to go, and while there a boy named Vince asked her to dance. She said yes, and before he took her out to the dance floor, he went over to the record player to change the music. After that, Dad asked if she wanted to go into the pantry to look at the moon. Mom said, “absolutely not.” Despite that, Dad was in love, and he went home that night and put a sign on his parent’s door that read, “I’m going to marry Petie.” He set out to do that, and called Mom at her college in Tarrytown. There was a phone in the hallway of Mom’s dorm for all the girls to share. Dad would call, and Mom would not be in her room, so he would leave her a message with one of the girls.

Mom, being a southern girl, had been taught never to call a boy and wouldn’t call him back. So, in desperation, Dad called Mom’s roommate and told her to call him back next time Mom was in her room. This was the only way he could call back at the right time and talk to Mom.

Mom was a year older than Dad, but he wanted to get married. So after Mom graduated Marymount College, (Dad still had another year of college to go and had to ask The Commonwealth of Virginia permission since he was under 21) they got married in Richmond, VA and set off on their Honeymoon. Dad was a little anxious to get to that honeymoon, because Mom was a virtuous girl, and would never let him get very far. So he says they missed a great after party at Mom’s parents house after the wedding reception. Their first meal alone together as husband and wife was at a roadside truck stop on the way to Cape Cod that served drinks in styrofoam cups. Looking back, Dad regrets this, but he has since made up for this meal by taking mom to numerous resorts and nice restaurants.

I don’t know if his father ever knew how much of a good choice switching colleges was for Dad. He died when my father was 24 years old. Dad talks about him sometimes, how he wishes he had been a better son. How he wished he had done some things differently as a kid; he regrets installing a Glass Pack muffler in his father’s Buick. Sometimes he gets a tear in his eye as he talks about his father.

If Dad’s Father had lived longer, he would have seen that his son had made a good choice. After Dad’s college graduation, Dad went to an agency to see about getting a good job. He sat down at the table, and filled out some forms. One of the questions was, “would you be willing to relocate?” Dad started to write, “C –a – l – i.” The counselor said right away “I have a job for you.” That is how my parents ended up in Hollywood. It was a job selling commercials at radios stations and for magazines. Dad had one suit and it became very shiny because he wore it every day. He made a total of $96.00 a week. He would go to the Brown Derby restaurant using his expense account, order a big steak for lunch then take most of it home to feed his family. My parents had a baby, and an apartment with no furniture; I think they had a bed and a stove. For entertainment on a Friday night, my parents would take walks down town and read the big bulletin boards at the local supermarket. They did have a turntable, and some records in their apartment. That was a must for my Dad. He has loved music his whole life.

After a few months in Hollywood, my Mom became pregnant again. My second oldest sister was born a California Girl. They lived in an apartment building with other people just starting out in life. Across the hall there was a woman who was trying to get into the film business. Sometimes my parents would invite her over to their apartment for dinner. She had one favorite interview dress and eventually, she made it also. It is always fun to hear the story about my parents neighbor Raquel Welch.

After my parents had lived in Hollywood a short time, my Dad’s Father became sick, and Dad asked to be transferred to the East Coast to be near him. This is how Dad ended up working in NYC. He worked at NBC, WPIX, and some other stations. Two weeks before I was born, my family moved to CT because my Dad took a job at a struggling AM station called WICC. Dad was the General Manager, and he took the station to the top.

A few years later, Dad was hired to start a station from scratch. A losing station number 107.9 was purchased. I didn’t know much about it at the time, I was seven. I do remember people coming over for Dinner, and having to be quiet as they met, and talked, and made phone calls. They were planning the new station. My dad brought home a list of available call letters and we all looked through the list. It was my brother who noticed W – E – B – E was available. WE - BE he said. That stuck. They decided to name the station WEBE 108. For the next several years, Dad and his partners built that station. They tried something different with the music program, and everyone liked the sound; it was immediately copied. It is the format now know as Adult Contemporary and played at stations across the country.

Dad enjoyed his career in radio. Ironically enough, my mom was not too into music, so he used to bring me to events and promotions. Many times he bought or was given tickets and would bring me to concerts. He took me to see Billy Joel, Joan Baez (one of his all time favorites), Chuck Berry “The Father of Rock and Roll”, Willy Nelson, the Rolling Stones and Elton John. I think there were a few others.

When we went to Billy Joel, Dad took me back stage to meet Billy. I had no idea what I was supposed to say to this man who I had been hearing on the record player and the radio my whole life. I just stood in awe and quietly shook his hand.

Early one Saturday morning my Dad noticed a line of people out the door of the record store. When he found out they were selling Rolling Stones tickets, he ran over to his barbershop. “I need to borrow $600 in cash right away,” he told Tommy. His barber gave him the money, and that is how my sisters and I ended up going to the Rolling Stones Steele Wheels tour in ‘89. It was a grand event. Dad, in his hipness, got a limo for the occasion. I had never been in a limo before. This made the concert extra cool.

As a little girl, I would sit with my dad in the Den as he listened to his records. He had eclectic taste and he would play different things for me to hear. He called it my musical education. He played all artists, all kinds (sometimes the Rock and Roll, sometimes Classical, sometimes Big Band and Jazz). I was also allowed to make requests. Every day he played me Yellow Submarine and Puff the Magic Dragon. Sometimes we would dance. I would reach up and hold his arms as he twirled me around, slowly. I would smell his Old Spice cologne, which I loved. He kept it in a cabinet in the kitchen and put it on every morning as he was leaving for work, before he kissed my mother goodbye.

As a child, every night at dinner dad would ask the same question. “What did you learn today?” I had to come up with one thing I had learned in school. “Nothing,” or, “I don’t know” was not an acceptable answer. So I learned to always remember something I had learned at school. Sometimes I will ask this question of my children. “What did you learn today?” I will always think back to my childhood, answering the question for Dad.

Dad has a pattern of helping people make it. Not always publicly, not always in obvious ways. He tells people to go for it, encourages their talents. Over the years, he hired many people who became very successful. He taught me to speak up for myself, and to have confidence. He taught me (by word and by example) to go to church every Sunday (or Saturday night with the better music), and don’t be afraid to sing loud and clear. He always told us, “don’t be afraid to order the most expensive thing on the menu on a date,” (providing the boy can afford it).

Dad is still with us, and I hope he will be around for another Twenty years. We will see Mom and Dad in the summer, and they will come for Christmas some years. We will always see them at Thanksgiving, with my five siblings, their spouses, and the 15 grandchildren – soon to be 16. We will laugh, and joke, and tell stories, and Dad will sit down and play chess with one of the grandchildren. I don’t know when he will go to the Virgin Island in the sky, but I didn’t want to wait to tell him how I feel. I love you Dad, and Thank you for all you have given us.