Saturday, January 29, 2011

Richard Holstad, Ma and Pa Kettle, and Spike Jones the Wolfman

This came in a recent email from Richard Holstad, who was reminiscing about his youth and a breakfast conversation with Evy and Harvey Patterson.


"(Evy) didn’t think I am old enough to remember Ma and Pa Kettle movies. I COULD take that as a compliment about my young and tender age group and let it go …… BUT I DO REMEMBER MA and PA KETTLE, don’t you guys? Didn’t Pa Kettle have an American Indian that he ordered around to do his farm work while he read the paper and slept in his hammock?


Evy, Harvey and I were having breakfast when they were here last month at the Egg and I restaurant ….. I could not recall where the name the Egg and I came from but it had a “ring to it” … that is about all I could say. Evy said she thought the name came from a Ma and Pa Kettle movie ….. But then I probably don’t know who Ma and Pa Kettle are.


Evy --- I even know who Spike Jones is ….. I have a Spike Jones record album with Mike Lien’s name on it ….. I was about to get it returned to Mike when his health really went on the decline; he said just keep the album a little while longer for me …. sad, sad, sad.


This memory is for Harvey to recall…. Harvey, do you recall when I had that big old load speaker propped in the water cistern in my folks back yard at 102 4th street? It was in the cistern in order to get the neat echo chamber effect.

The neighbor kids were sleeping outdoors in their tent during the summer time ……. It was too hot to sleep indoors …… about 12:30 at night things were pretty quiet all around. I cranked up the attached mp3 audio file thru that speaker in the cistern …. just to see what would happen …..


Ahhh that sounded soooo cool ….. way better than I expected. Of course the kids in our neighborhood (and the surrounding neighborhoods) all “high tailed it” in doors scared and bawling. Not too long there after the infamous “inspector Mel Horgan” came around patrolling the neighborhood looking for who knows what …… I don’t think the mystery was ever fully solved by the NWD law enforcement department. Anyway …. the attached clip is the real honest to goodness sound taken from Mike Lien’s Spike Jones Spooctacular album…. Listen close, you can even hear the real scratches that every record album had back then.


The Wolfman Howls at Richard's (You will need to click the link to go out to a Google page, then click "Download" or "Open" in order to play this.)

2 comments:

  1. That was so funny. What kids did for entertainment!! I can just see the kids running inside. I played it & my cat went wild. Jumped on the desk & checked behind the monitor wondering what all the noise was. Very Funny!!

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  2. My cat is still laying on top the printer, staring at me.

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