March 2nd 1963
In March of 1963 I was a junior at Alton High School. I had given up on high school athletics. I had played sophomore baseball and freshman football and basketball. I was a starter, but basically an average athlete. In my junior year I was playing for the YMCA Flyers, the Y basketball team. I was a starting forward. It was much less grueling than high school sports. We traveled around the area, played a pre-game for the old St. Louis Hawks, and generally had loads of fun. On March 2nd we were scheduled to play against a church team in Memphis, Tennessee. We were psyched. Our game would be a pre-game to the Memphis State vs. Creighton game. Creighton had Paul Silas at the time, the leading rebounder in the country.
In 1963 my family lived at 3013 Buena Vista, Alton, Illinois. It was a great house. When we moved there in 1954 it was serious upward mobility. The neighborhood was perfect. Lots of kids. My best friend, Dave Meyer, lived a stone's throw away. The house had two bedrooms up, plus kitchen, dining room, living room and bathroom. Downstairs were two apartments. We had rented them for extra income. By 1963 we had stopped renting the apartments, and I was living in one of them. What a teenager's dream. Sneaking out at night was a breeze. But we had a problem. In 1961 my father had a relatively mild stroke, he was no longer able to work. He had worked for about thirty years at Laclede Steel Mill. I had thought we were definitely middle-class. When we moved there my older brother Ron and sister Jo Ann lived there too. Ron left for college in 1958 and Jo Ann moved out and got married shortly after graduating from high school in 1960. I was the only kid left at home, life was good. Things were about to change. My parents were concerned that we could no longer make the $80 a month house payment. They were going to sell the house, take the equity, and move to a smaller house that they could payoff and have no monthly payments. They had decided on a smaller house about one mile away, but to me it seemed light years away. Definitely a lower class neighborhood, so I thought. This was downward mobility. They were moving the weekend of March 2nd. Thankfully they didn't make me stay home and help move and miss my trip to Memphis. I thought this move was awful. Once we moved I continued to refer to the "dump" we lived in, until one day my mother had had enough. She said in no uncertain terms, this is our home, this is what we can afford, and don't you ever call it a dump again. She was almost crying. I never called it a dump again.
By March of 1963 I had dabbled in drinking beer. I would generally drink a couple beers and act drunk. I had never been seriously drunk. The weekend of March 2nd, 1963, would change that. I had told my mother that the team was staying at the YMCA as we had to leave very early Saturday morning to arrive in Memphis, meet our hosts (families of the opposing team), and play a game Saturday evening. Actually, one teammate, John Dorman and I had a room at the Y, and we were planning on getting rip roaring drunk the Friday night before our trip. John was a senior and we had been friends since junior high school.
So when John Dorman came to pick me up Friday, March 1st, I walked out of my house at 3013 Buena Vista, never to return again. We drove out of the neighborhood- so many fond memories. I'd lived there since 2nd grade. I knew when I returned I would be going to 711 Reuter. All I could think of was dump and downward mobility.
We headed straight for a package liquor store, bought a case of beer, and headed out to a secluded place to start drinking. We would later be going to a party a classmate was having while his parents were out of town. I got rip roaring drunk. I actually don't remember much about the night. Later the girl I ended up taking to the Junior Prom wrote in my yearbook, "Do you remember attacking me at the party". I didn't remember. Given how drunk I was, I apparently caused too much trouble inside the house. I don't know if I damaged furniture or what. Maybe I just offended everybody at the party. What I do remember was that I was drug outside, thrown to the ground, and kicked repeatedly upside the head. I had a huge contusion on the side of my head. It's probably a miracle I wasn't badly hurt, but I wasn't. Late into the night John and I went to our room at the YMCA, hoping we would wake in time for the trip to Memphis.
I woke up to my first hangover, and a huge contusion on the side of my head. We were up in time, and went outside to meet the rest of the team for the long drive to Memphis. Somebody immediately noticed the swelling on the side of my head. I shrugged it off. I slept most of the way to Memphis.
There was one issue about the team traveling to Memphis. We were staying with our opponents' families. Good 1963 era southern folks. We had one black kid on the team. He was the worst player on the team. Nobody gave it much thought when we were told that he couldn't make the trip because our hosts would not be wanting a black kid staying in their home. We were too young to know any better, and didn't give it much thought. I have given it lots of thought since, and I would hope today we would boycott the trip if our black teammate were not allowed to go. However, I doubt if our families would have welcomed black players into our homes if we were in a similar situation.
We arrived at our hosts homes in the afternoon. The swelling had disappeared from my head. On the way to the Memphis State gymnasium, we drove by Elvis' house. I don't remember if it was called Graceland back then. We arrived at Memphis State and began our practice.
Our opponents were awful, a small church team with very little talent. I scored the most points I had ever scored in any game, 27. John Dorman had scored 20+ too. After our game we watched the Creighton-Memphis state game. We returned home Sunday.
Well, I didn't actually return home, I was dropped off at our new home. It was so tiny. It took me long time to adjust, primarily because of my stupidity.
Monday I was the talk of the school. Not because I scored 27 points, but rather due to how wild I had been at the party. I loved the attention, and so began a high school and post high school life of drinking, partying, and "attacking" girls. Drinking cured all my inhibitions. I didn't really attack girls, I was just much more forward. I liked that too, and they didn't seem to mind.
March 1st & 2nd, 1963. Going to Memphis and scoring 27 points, getting sloshing drunk for the first of many times, and downward mobility. What a weekend. What I remember of the weekend 38 years later I remember fondly.