Small World, Ain't it...

Some time back I wrote about Chester Smith, a local Modesto celebrity who once had a disk jockey job on local radio station KTRB, Modesto, and about the time he sponsored Hank Williams at the Riverbank Clubhouse, a big barn in Riverbank that had been converted to a dance hall. It's a small world.

A short while back I received a note from a fellow who grew up in the small town of Hilmar, near Modesto who was at the dance the night I had a drink with Hank Williams at the Riverbank Clubhouse. What a small world!

And the time I went to see Hank Thompson at the California Ballroom! After the dance, Hank wanted to know if anyone knew any girls in the area. My friend, Donald, who was quite the ladies man told him about a girl he knew in Stockton. Hank was interested and the two of them headed for Stockton. Don came right back and we never knew how long Hank stayed! And I doubt he'd tell!

And, talk about coincidences, Tony, (I won't mention his last name) who lives now in Tennessee, is a retired truck driver, same as me!

Tony spent time at the Uptown Ballroom, a dance hall in downtown Modesto. I went there a few times after I got older. Tony is a few years older than me so I probably didn't see him there. My brother, Bobby, trained as a boxer in the gym in the same building.

It's great, the way hearing from someone from my youthful days can evoke long, almost forgotten, memories of better times; times of my youth when the only thing I had to worry about was finding someone of age to buy me beer or Seagram 7 or getting caught coming home too late.
Them was the good old days!

Later...