Royal Way

 Royal Way on the UofS campus a couple weeks ago.

River Street

 River Street looking west from Crown Avenue a couple weeks ago.

Track Equipment

 A track machine along Ridge Row earlier this month.

Lackawanna Diner

 DL&W diner 470 behind the DL shops last month. This car was transfered to the DL when the dining car society departed for Port Jervis a few months ago.

Glider Diner

 We stopped by the Glider Diner, 890 Providence Road, the other day, always a great place for lunch.

Orchard Street

Orchard Street looking west from Crown Avenue a couple weeks ago.

Allen Theatre: Pink Floyd

 A last-minute booking a week or so earlier led to this SRO Monday night show. Nowadays it's hard to imagine a time when bookings were this fast and loose, but for a couple weeks we'd been getting calls asking if Pink Floyd were coming, and the answer was no, until they were booked less ten days before the date, which was pretty short notice back then. Nonetheless this show sold out pretty quickly, just two days after they sold out the 2,700 seat Akron Civic (Loew's) Theatre. This was also a show where gate crashers were a problem, people got into a roof hatch above the ceiling and kicked out a door at the top of the balcony, house right, in a closet opposite a fire exit. Aside from that this was a pretty mellow crowd, some were obviously on drugs, but there were no major problems. At one point a poorly mixed batch of flash/gun powder produced a bit more of a flash-bang then they anticipated. Poe (Ken Plocica) had asked for and received front row tix, was quite startled by the intensity of the blast, scorch marks on the stage remained a reminder of that night. Most of what they played was material they were woodshedding which would appear a year later on their Dark Side of the Moon longplayer: Travel Sequence, Time, Money, Lunatic Song, One of These Days, Careful With That Axe, and Echoes at the end.

From Scene, April 20 - 26, 1972.

From Scene, April 20 - 26, 1972.

From the Plain Dealer, April 24, 1972.

After this the sole focus, aside from an Ali TV fight on May 1, was on the upcoming Lily Tomlin show on May 7. For the next two weeks Ray was walking around, mimicking Lily's famous "and that's the truth, phhllfuugggg."

Squirrel

 Squirrel in a tree on the UofS campus last weekend.

Hemlock Street

 Hemlock Street looking west from Crown Avenue last week.

Akron:Loew's Theatre

 The former Loew's Theatre in Akron, renamed the Civic, played host to Pink Floyd 50 years ago tonight.

Grain Car

 A Burlington Northern grain car along Ridge Row a couple weeks ago, I have one of these Pullman Standard cars in HO, in the old blue Great Northern scheme.

Mulberry Street

 Looking west on Mulberry Street from along the UofS, a couple weeks ago. Decades ago my great-grandparents lived where the big red building on the right is.

Crosswalks

 The remaining yield pylon in the 500 block of Lackawanna Avenue, once upon a time there were four of these, Scranton really does hate pedestrians.

Step Falls

 View from the new Harrison Avenue Bridge last weekend.

Scranton Skyline

 A little green is starting to slowly creep in, from the new Harrison Avenue Bridge last weekend.

Happy Easter

 Nothing says Easter more than Jack Benny doing five-a-day at Loew's State!

From the Plain Dealer, April 12, 1936.

Allen Theatre: Save The Allen Benefit

From Scene, April 13 - 19, 1972.

A rainy Sunday, April 16th dawned with great anticipation with the Save the Allen benefit. This was put together by Veralynne Bosko and Smitty (Ralph Smith), Veralynne did the artwork and a lot of the legwork. This was quite the show, Damnation failed to appear, and were badmouthed on stage for the rest of the night. It was fairly well attended, maybe 2,000 tix sold, the concession stand did a pretty consistent biz throughout the evening. There was also a fashion show and Chinese food which was provided by Smitty's friend Paul Hom. Paul would later cater a number of parties in the Palace that fall and would run the kitchen for the run of Brel in the State the following year.

From the Plain Dealer Action Tab, April 14, 1972.

Veralynne and Smitty at the opening of Brel in the State Theatre, from the Plain Dealer, April 19, 1973.

In the weeks following the benefit the focus shifted to the next Playhouse Square Association production, Lily Tomlin on Sunday May 7th. The dressing rooms were spruced up, with one being painted especially for Lily. Smitty and I removing a couple mirrors from the lower Ohio ladies' room for the project. Meanwhile at the Allen, Pink Floyd would appear on Monday, April 24th, a last-minute booking, followed by another TV fight on May 1. At some point during these couple weeks the Raspberries rehearsed in the Allen for two days prior to their first major tour.

Lackawanna River

 A couple views of the Lackawanna River from near the Marvine Colliery site a couple weeks ago.

Allen Theatre: Peter Yarrow

 Peter Yarrow as a solo didn't go over well, this show had been originally skedded for Saturday, April 15 at the John Carroll University gymnasium, but was moved to Friday the 14th at the Allen. There couldn't have been more than a couple hundred at this, the last day or so saw tix reduced to $3, that didn't seem to help. Afterwards Peter entertained a dozen or so people in the Allen's rotunda for a half hour or so. This was supposed to be a big weekend for us, but it didn't work out that way, a Joe Tex show skedded for the following day was cancelled on short notice. However, the big Save the Allen benefit was the weekend's saving grace that Sunday the 16th.

From Scene, April 6 - 12, 1972.

From Scene, March 2 - 8, 1972.

From the Plain Dealer Action tab, April 14, 1972.

The ranks also started to thin around this time, Cinnamon, who hadn't been around much since I started was no longer there. And Bugs, Soloman Alexander, also left around then, Bugs would resurface later after we opened Porter in the Palace, in late 1973 for a month or so.

Green Ridge Street

 View from the D&H bridge above Green Ridge Street, from a couple weeks ago. The east view with North Scranton Junior High is far more interesting than the western view.

Scranton

 Looking west along the Lackawanna main, from near the UofS tennis courts along Ridge Row last week.

Grain Cars

 Grain cars on the Lackawanna main, from the new Harrison Avenue Bridge last week.

Allen Theatre: Brownsville Station/Detroit/Biggie Rat

From Scene, April 6 - 12, 1972.

This one was a total disaster, a lot of hand wringing afterwards, but the fact was Brownsville Station wasn't popular enough in 1972 to fill a 2,800-seat hall, especially on a Monday night. The less said the better of Detroit with Mitch Ryder, the days of Jenny Take a Ride were long gone, replaced with pointless covers of Lou Reed songs. Biggie Rat was from the Youngstown-Warren area, I think some of the members were later in Left End. I don't think Ron Sweed-The Ghoul actually appeared; they probably couldn't pay him. Brownsville would make another appearance at the Allen on July 12, 1974, where they were famously blown off the stage by a band from Den Haag, Golden Earring. As for Music Hall Productions, I think this was their last production, not sure if there were any others prior to this fiasco. Meanwhile at the Allen, another big weekend was coming up fast. 

By this time, I was often selling tix in the BO, after school and on the weekends, or I was running errands. At some point in the previous week, I was in the Palace for the first time (since 1963), while it was still occupied by International Trade & Fair.  I'd already been to Loew's Ohio and State, which were both in sorry shape, and would often pop over to explore when we had the keys. 

On one such weekday afternoon a few of the Next Generation kids were there and we went over to Loew's State, I think there were four of us with two flashlights. Going into either of the Loew houses at this time was something of a surreal experience. Entering through the front door off busy Euclid Avenue, you stepped into an empty dusty, musty, cavern where your every step echoed throughout. What lights there were could be flipped on from a switch panel in a room that had also once served as an auxiliary BO in the lobby. The four of us go through the grand lobby and head off to the area where Kennedy's is now. We go through the doorway under the west grand stairs and descend the few steps down into the hallway that was once there. Off to the left there's a room, which was once an usherette's dressing room, not much to see here. Back in the hallway, we go to the end, and turn left, suddenly a scream, followed by "THERE'S A BODY!" And a terrified kid turns and runs, knocking the rest of us down, along with the remaining flashlight as we're now plunged into darkness. The three of us, now totally freaked out, somehow made our way the short distance back to the lobby, where we then heard a vivid description of a body propped up in the room below. Regaining our senses, the three of us, who hadn't seen the body, cautiously went back to the area, leaving the freaked-out guy behind in the lobby. After pausing to put the other flashlight back together in the hall, we approached the room with great trepidation. What we saw was a cardboard cut-out of a cheerleader with a megaphone promoting some long-forgotten motion picture.  There was no body, just some kid from Garfield Heights High with a vivid imagination. 

The room had once been Cecil Ryder's workshop, he was in charge of all the Loew Theatre buildings in the Cleveland area for a number of decades. There were all sorts of interesting things in there, I still have a Loew's Stillman Upper Mezzanine sign from 1916. Essentially this room had all sorts of spare parts for the building.  We often would look for hardware we needed in there first, finding it more often than not. 

Wish I could remember the names of the Next Generation kids, they were all seniors at Garfield Heights High School at the time, they worked as ushers, or at the concession stands for shows through Lily Tomlin on May 7.

From Scene, April 6 - 12, 1972. Clearly, they didn't hear the Detroit record before writing this.

From Scene, April 20 - 26, 1972.

From the Plain Dealer Action Tab, April 7, 1972.

Renaissance Park

 We stopped by Renaissance Park on Saturday, only to find it has yet to open for the season, despite what it says on the sign. Apparently, it's a real challenge for the Park Service to send someone over to unlock the gate. The people of Scranton should be allowed to access a park they paid for.

Step Falls

 Step Falls from the new Harrison Avenue Bridge last Saturday afternoon.

Scranton Skyline

 View from the new Harrison Avenue Bridge on Saturday afternoon.

Allen Theatre: Yogi Bear/Flintstones/Banana Splits

 A most unusual attraction, Yogi Bear, the Flintstones, and the Banana Splits live on stage, for a week in the spring of 1972. These did not go over well, doubt if there was more than 100 at any of the shows, and a lot fewer than that at most.

Victor Villimas and I went into every store on Euclid Avenue from Playhouse Square to Public Square and back, Wednesday afternoon, March 29th, asking to put up posters. He was dressed like Yogi Bear, half the stores we went into sold, dresses, pantyhose, lingerie, etc., and the girls inside would squeal, "ooh Yogi Bear!" and run over and hug him. Some would look at me and say, "who you supposed to be? Boo Boo?" I was just a 15-year-old kid along for the ride, handing out these flyers. 

From the Cleveland Press, April 1, 1972. I'm pretty sure Victor Villimas is in the Yogi Bear suit.

From The Plain Dealer, April 4, 1972.

Snip from Halle Bros. ad, The Plain Dealer, April 6, 1972.

After the last performance on Sunday, April 9, one of the cast members broke the cold-water pipe in the shower on the second floor of the dressing rooms, causing a small flood. This was also the week I learned how to sell tickets and balance the BO. I also assisted Ray in changing the marquee that Monday afternoon, prior to the Sally Rand performances. A month or so later, I was doing them by myself. This was a job usually done by IATSE 27, but for some reason they got paid to change the sign, but I don't remember them ever doing so. Usually Smitty handles the chore, but by May I was usually the one dragging out the big ladder myself. I did the changes until early spring,1973.