Saturday, November 17, 2012

Forever Young


Forever Young

Memories of our youth stay with us forever. Some are comforting and peaceful, making us feel safe and secure. Others are exciting, frightening, exhilarating, serendipitous adventures. As we grow older we often reflect on those times. As teen agers, we all had places where our friends gathered to “hangout”. No matter where or when, every hometown had its spots at which the young gathered together to experience the rights of passage from childhood to adulthood. This evening, just for fun, we will take a short journey back in time to remember one of those places where teenagers in Sumter hung out over three decades from the mid-forties through the mid-seventies. This was a place where many experienced some firsts… a first dance, kiss, cigarette, drink, or heart break. There was always lots of drama, highs and lows, all played out most often in plain sight of the crowd.

November, 1944 marked the beginning of a relationship between the City of Sumter and its teens which lasted for over thirty years with the announcement of the formation of The Teen Age Canteen. The first canteen was located on North Main Street across from the post office near the current location of the Creech Building. Mayor Edwin Boyle, A.T. Health, and W.E. Covington paid the rent on this original building which was the former sight of a bowling alley. The first “hostess” was Mrs. Douglas McKeown. Membership was for teen residents of Sumter County at a cost of 15 cents. A contest was held to determine the name of this new facility and Mary Quincy, a senior at Edmunds, won $5 with a submission of “The Hang Out”.

As with any institution in the community, events at the Canteen were a reflection of the larger societal context in which it found itself. Visitor’s cards were issued to “servicemen still in their teens home on furlough.” The Teen Age Canteen opened its doors for the first time on Dec. 11, 1944, five days before the Germans launched their last counter offensive of WWII, the Battle of the Bulge.

There was a “Teen Canteen Board” made up only of teens and an “Adult Advisory Board” first chaired by Mrs. J.P. Brunson. This “board structure” of students and adults making collaborative decisions was used throughout the next thirty years of the life of the Canteen.

In October of 1945, the City of Sumter began construction on a new building on North Salem Avenue which would become the new Teen Age Canteen. On January 11, 1946 the first dance was held at the new canteen. According to the ITEM two to three hundred teenagers in “bobby sox and hair bows, moccasin and ballet slippers, sweaters and skirts, and purple high school athletic jackets swung out to the tunes of “Chickory Chick”, “Beulahs Buggy”, and “Buzz Me”.” Teen leaders for the new canteen included Jimmy Knight, Bobby Morrow, Helen Murray, Bobby Cuttino, Charlotte Jarman, Orian Davis, Marilu Shaw, Mildred Inskeep, and Maxie King.

If we move forward to November of 1948 we find that hundreds of teenagers are still attending the Canteen, so many, in fact, that it is decided that only junior high school students could attend the canteen that year. Dues had risen to 25 cents. Teen leaders during this time included Ladson Cubbage, John Duffie, Alice Shelor, Sister Heath, Molly Ariall, and Bunny McLauren.

Events in our hometown are subject to the societal influences that are at work elsewhere in the world. In an ITEM article and photos from March of 1951, we can see that the “big bands” of the Forties era are still popular among the locals. Interestingly, just two months after this photo, the song “Sixty Minute Man”, by Billy Ward and the Dominos, an African American Rhythm and Blues group, would be released. After hearing this song, Alan Freed, working as a DJ at a radio station in Cleveland at the time, is credited with coining the phrase, “Rock and Roll”. In the song, which boasts of the sexual prowess of the singer, the lyrics say “I’ll rock em, roll em, all night long, I‘m a sixty minute man.” Alan Freed starting using the phrase “Rock and Roll” to describe the Rhythm and Blues music he was playing so that it would avoid the racial prejudice of the time among white audiences. The music of the teens was evolving and so would our community and the Canteen as the years went by.

If we move forward to the fall of 1955 we find the Canteen at a pivotal moment. As the Canteen became more popular than ever, the neighbors are complaining about the noise. In late September of 1955, a complaint from someone in the neighborhood was read to City Council by Mayor Pricilla Shaw. A response to the complaint had been prepared by the Canteen Teen Board. In their response the Teen Board reported that over two hundred teens were in attendance at the Canteen and were keyed up after an Edmunds - Eau Claire Football game. Most of the noise came from talking and cars as teens were coming to and leaving the dance at the Canteen after the game. The noise was exacerbated by congested traffic due to “inadequate parking facilities” since parking was available on one side of the street only.

The Teen Board came to City Council armed with solutions to the problem which included: 1. To hold remaining dances at a non-residential area (the Legion Hut), 2. To endorse a plan proposed by a citizen to build a parking lane from Salem Ave. around the canteen to exit on Hampton Ave. 3. To recommend that City Council relocate the Canteen to another facility at a more suitable location. Board members at this time, all from Edmunds High School, included Owen Lee, Sherbie Knight, Johnnie Mills, Billy Fort, Cathy Bryan, Betty Kennedy, Lester Hudson, David Rogers, Tommy Bowen, Howard Jones, Martha Dabbs, Johnnie Sue Stone, David Addlestone, Marion Myers, Jessamine DuBose, and Sammy Pringle.

A few weeks later, at the October, 1955 meeting of City Council, the Teen Board sent a delegation to petition Council for a new and larger teen canteen building, located in a “less congested area”. Several possibilities were discussed by Council which included building a new center at the municipal airport sight on Miller Road, or acquiring the old Miller school building and sharing the facility which was being used at that time by the Little Theater. It was pointed out by City Manager Wade Kolb, that a bond issue would be needed to finance such a project. Members of City Council also pointed out that this was a county problem, not just a city problem, and that that an increase in the tax levy would likely be necessary as well. Despite the efforts of the Teen Board, the Canteen was not relocated nor were improvements made to help with parking issues. No changes were in the cards for the Canteen in Sumter on that day, but there were significant changes about to take place in other southern towns. On Dec. 1, 1955, two months after the Teen Board met with City Council, Rosa Parks was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama when she refused to give up her seat in the colored section of the bus to a white passenger after there were no more empty seats in the white section. Changes were coming but they came slowly to sleepy southern towns in the late fifties.

The Canteen continued to be a hub of teen activity on through the fifties and into the sixties. There were dances on the weekend, and more sedate “hanging out” activities during the week which might include a few games of pool or some ping pong. There were assortments of other activities at the Canteen for the members as well which included bridge classes, fashion shows, hay rides, and bake sales to raise money. There were dances at every season of the year, Christmas, Halloween, and of course, Valentines. For many years a Valentines king and queen were voted on by the kids and crowned at the Valentines dance.

As previously noted, the big bands were replaced by rock and roll and then came soul music from Memphis and Motown. In the mid to late sixties “Soul Music” was king. I began my “professional music career” at the canteen in 1963, where I played my first paying gig. Countless bands and musicians got their start at the Canteen. Junior High night was the time when the younger musicians could play. Kids enjoyed seeing their peers making music.

There was always plenty of adventure at the canteen no matter which decade one examines. Sneaking in a little alcohol hidden in your pants or coat sometimes took both athleticism and artistic talent. On Junior High night, once you went inside you couldn’t go out until the appointed time for parents to arrive to take you home. Of course, that didn’t keep those southern belles, soon to be debutantes, from climbing out of the bathroom window so they could rendezvous in the park for a little romance with their boy friend, who hadn’t gone inside at all but was waiting by the swings as previously arranged.

The year that I played my first gig at the canteen, 1963, Martin Luther King made his “I Have A Dream” speech from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial at the “March on Washington.” An estimated 250,000 gathered on that hot August day and heard Peter, Paul and Mary sing Bob Dylan’s “Blowing in the Wind”. Bob Dylan and Joan Baez sang a duet, “When the Ship Comes In.”

Three months later, on November 22, 1963, President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas. The next evening Bob Dylan opened his show with his first public performance of his song that would become an anthem for many young people and the most famous protest song of the sixties, “For The Times They are a Changing”. Changes would soon be woven into the fabric of our hometown.

In the mid-sixties the music teens were listening to went through another major metamorphosis primarily influenced by the Beatles. The June 1967 release of the Sgt. Peppers album by the Beatles marked the beginning of the “psychedelic era”. That same summer of 1967, 100,000 hippies converged on the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood in San Francisco in what became known as the “Summer of Love”. This was the summer I graduated from high school, on May 30, 1967, one day after my 18th birthday. Two summers hence, the Woodstock Music and Art Fair, “the event that changed the history of rock and roll”, took place Aug. 15 – 18, 1969 with 500,000 young people camping on Max Yasgur’s 600 acre dairy farm in the Catskills of upstate New York. There were 32 musical groups, including Joan Baez, Janis Joplin, The Grateful Dead, The Who, Joe Cocker, Jefferson Airplane, The Band, Crosby Stills Nash and Young, and Jimi Hendrix. Things would never be the same again.

As the sixties were winding down and we moved into the seventies, teenagers in Sumter were looking for something “different” than teenagers of the previous decades. Attendance at the Canteen had declined significantly as the sixties came to an end. Parents and community leaders looked for ways and places to provide “wholesome” activities for teens. Rock and Roll had become Rock. The drug counter culture, Vietnam War protests, the civil rights movement, and the generation gap had all come home to Sumter. In the fall of 1969, concerned parents were holding meetings to determine how to provide places where teens could and would congregate that would also provide some supervision.

The decision was made to give the old canteen a face lift and a name change, as spending the money for a new facility was, again, not in the cards. In February of 1970, the TAC Shack was born. Taken from the old name of the Teen Age Canteen, The TAC Shack had a new look and feel which had been designed by the kids on the Teen Board. There was a flurry of activities during the first couple years of the TAC Shack. The Parks and Recreation Department, parents, and the Teen Board were working hard to make some positive things happen. This article in the ITEM on Thursday, May 7, 1970 announced that a “Memorial Day Pop Festival” was planned for Swan Lake Gardens put together by the TAC Shack Teen Board. Woodstock was coming to Sumter. Three bands were on the bill: Blood, Stone Creek, and Krishna. These names for the bands were clearly a reflection of the times.

Tragically, four days before this article ran in the ITEM, the Ohio National Guard fired on a group of students at Kent State University conducting an anti-war demonstration, killing four students and wounding nine. The May 4, 1970 shootings led to protests on college and high school campuses throughout the United States. A student strike of four million students caused more than 450 college campuses across the country to close, with both violent and non-violent demonstrations, including the University of South Carolina where I was a student at the time. We had become a nation at war with itself. These were difficult times for teenagers to sort things out and find their way.

The Canteen continued to provide activities and events in which teens could participate into the seventies. Playing pool was an activity that remained a favorite the entire thirty year life of the Canteen but bridge lessons and fashion shows had given way to guitar lessons, leather working classes, and modern dance.

The golden years of the canteen were in the past, however. Never again would there be the big crowds of the forties, fifties and sixties. In 1973, a teen center was opened at the old Green School on the Pinewood Rd., known as the Spectrum, which only lasted a year or so, but this more “mod” venue further reduced the number of teens visiting the Canteen. As use by teens of the building on Salem Ave. for a “hang out” declined, it was increasingly being used by others. Square dance groups, some of which were teen agers, began to meet at the “Memorial Park Youth Center”, as it came to be known, on a regular basis to square dance.

Ironically, of the groups that wanted to take over the Youth Center the one that created the most conflict with teens were the senior citizens. In the spring of 1978, the Sumter County Council on Aging asked City Council for the use of the building. This resulted in an outcry from the square dancers and others interested in keeping the Youth Center for use by kids only. A compromise was reached and The Council on Aging would be allowed to use the building when it did not conflict with youth activities. The writing was on the wall, however.

Bolstered by grant money for remodeling and up keep of whatever facility was available for its use, the Council on Aging eventually won out. At the City Council meeting on June 20, 1979, City Council voted to grant the Council on Aging a 15 year lease for the building at 110 N. Salem Ave., formerly known as the Teen Age Canteen. In the end, the Canteen died a quiet death and just faded into our memories as a special place for all of us who spent part of our teen years there.

The Canteen has gone through lots of changes, just as our town and nation have, and just as we all do as we are growing up and growing older. The music changed from big bands, to rock and roll, to soul, and then rock. During the years the Canteen was a hang-out for kids in Sumter, massive social changes occurred in our nation and our community that were as significant as any in our history. The hippies of the counter culture remind us that relationships are more important than possessions. The anti-war movement reminds us that one can disagree with the government and still be a patriot. We all remember that our first patriots were at war with the established government. American was born out of protest. The civil rights movement changed the way we interacted with our neighbors, particularly in the south. It reminds us that “all men are created equal” and resulted in more opportunities for minorities and women including access to better education, increased participation in the political process, and expanded employment and career choices.

We have all gone through lots of changes as we have grown older. As we reflect on our younger days let us draw from that time of both security and adventure for our days ahead. My prayer for us all as we move farther away from our teen years is that we can hold on to the mystery, excitement, anticipation, and hope that being young is all about. Let the love we share with friends and family be a source of vigor and renewal as we grow older. Let us measure our wealth by what we share rather than what we keep. As Bob Dylan wrote in his song of blessing for his three children, and I wish the same for all of us, “May you stay forever young.”

Presented to:
The Fortnightly Club
November 7, 2012
John B. Hilton Jr.



Forever Young
Bob Dylan
1974

May God bless and keep you always,
May your wishes all come true,
May you always do for others
And let others do for you.
May you build a ladder to the stars
And climb on every rung,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.

May you grow up to be righteous,
May you grow up to be true,
May you always know the truth
And see the lights surrounding you.
May you always be courageous,
Stand upright and be strong,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.

May your hands always be busy,
May your feet always be swift,
May you have a strong foundation
When the winds of changes shift.
May your heart always be joyful,
May your song always be sung,
May you stay forever young,
Forever young, forever young,
May you stay forever young.



Additional thoughts:

“Dreams can come true, It can happen to you, If you’re young at heart”- Frank Sinatra 1953

“Be young, be foolish, but be happy” - The Tams 1968

“I’m growing older but not up, my metabolic rate is pleasantly stuck” - Jimmy Buffett 1980

“It’s never too late to have a happy childhood” - Hooters cocktail napkin 1999

“He who has good health is young” – China Chef Fortune Cookie 2012

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