Cancer Journal #63 Dec 31

 Maybe five years ago or so, my wife attended a reunion of what she calls her old hippie friends.  Also at the reunion was an old boyfriend, Davy, and his wife.  She hadn't known the wife but they visited and liked each other.  The wife said, "I won...I guess."  Jean also learned that the wife's mother had been part of The Chordettes, the old 1950s group that had sung Mr. Sandman.  The mother was still alive, in her 90s, active and alert but with virtually no short term memory.  They all lived across the state in Sheboygan.  A door of invitation was kind of opened up to come over and visit some time.

I wasn't at the reunion but when Jean told me all about Davy, his wife and her mother, I got quite hepped up about visiting with a member of the group that had sung Mr. Sandman, a song I had heard plenty in my childhood and which has been an intermittent earworm ever since.  I pressed Jean to make a definite acceptance of this invitation which may have been made at a moment of high spirits without a real expectation of acceptance.  Jean was uneasy about spending more time with old boyfriend Davy but agreed and we set a time with them to go over to Sheboygan.

Some of you may have supposed that the mother was Janet Ertel, wife of Archie Bleyer.  Well, not so.  The mother's name is Carol although the daughter is named Janet, whether named after Janet Ertel, I don't know.  Seems likely.  Anyway, Carol was the baritone of the group.  She had married a restaurateur somewhere in the process.  They had operated a restaurant on Long Island, New York for a while, lived next door to the actor, James Garner, and then came back to Sheboygan, Carol's hometown.  Whether Carol and her husband came to Sheboygan first which would have been an inducement for Archie Bleyer and Janet Ertel to come or whether it was the other way around, I don't know.  I may have been told and forget.  There was enough contact between the two couples that Archie Bleyer gave Carol's son-in-law, Davy, his really nice camel hair overcoat though.  He may have grown out of it.  It was tailored for a somewhat slender man.  

But let me tell you about Carol and our evening in Sheboygan.  It's true.  She had no short term memory--a fact she readily and cheerfully acknowledged.  But oh, what fun!  Nothing much wrong with her long term memory.  She told of a childhood filled with song.  Washing the dishes, her mother sang.  She joined her. In high school she and some friends formed a singing group which a promoter molded into a barbershop quartette and entered them into the barbershop quartette circuit, a fairly big deal in those days.  She attributed their rise to stardom to their being a novelty, a girl barbershop quartette.  She was being modest.  

They got picked up by the Arthur Godfrey Show.  He had a talent identification system that he operated into at least the late 1960s, well past his heyday.  A fellow in my college dorm hall had an audition with Arthur Godfrey.  He described Godfrey's mincing little applause when he was done.  Nothing came of it.  It was not a happy experience.

Anyway, Carol described a whirlwind life.  Brief rehearsals before going on air.  On the spot music arranging.  It was primarily a radio show but at some point, they were on TV too.  Davy showed some old video clips.  The fun and high spirits come through the unpleasant early video fuzz.  Quick costume changes.  For a while, they had a foreign lands feature in which they had to put on Arthur Godfrey's conception of native dress for Sweden or Japan or Brazil.  They had to learn foreign language lyrics on the fly.  Reeking of stereotypes, I'm sure we wouldn't buy it today.  As I say, things were better and worse.  And one person's stereotype is another person's recognizable messaging.  Anyway, Carol's eyes were bright as she told of this, her manner happy and animated.  It was a good time in her life.

She told of close chaperoning, young girls cast out into the world called for a show of the up and up.  The chaperoning was not so ironclad as to prevent Archie Bleyer from courting Janet Ertel though.  There must have been ways to negotiate chaperoning.  Just took a little imagination that we've since let atrophy.  And then love will find a way.

Anyway, Jean and I had just a nice, nice time in Sheboygan.  Carol and I hit it off.  Carol treats her memory loss as the basis for close familiarity.  For all she knows, she's known the person for years.  May as well assume that she has.  I had done a little homework for the visit and knew some of the songs the Chordettes had done.  I'd start singing and she joined in immediately and lustily.  I've never known such a willing singer.  Her voice hadn't lost much so far as I could tell.  The Chordettes had covered Never on a Sunday.  Carol and I covered it too.  We sang the soaring strains of The Theme From Exodus,"... If we die, we die..."  It was fun.  Janet (the daughter) reported with a twinkle in her eye that when she and Carol were in the kitchen, her Mom had asked, "Who is that guy?  Is he married?"  As I said, we hit it off.

As the evening wound down, Davy went to the closet and produced Archie Bleyer's overcoat and handed it over to me.  Such a great thing for him to do!  I suppose the number of people interested in things Archie Bleyer is limited.  Sure could be that, like Archie, he had outgrown it but still, just a fine act of generosity that I remain keenly grateful for.  If our house were burning down, just possibly, Archie Bleyer's overcoat is the thing I would grab on the way out.

I've got more to say about Carol but this is long.  I'll save it.  There's a good story about President Eisenhower coming up.