Random Thoughts from a Random Memory

By Edward Master

I don’t recall many sock hops while in school. I may have been to one and I believe it was at the old Emlenton gymnasium. We took off our shoes and bopped the night away. I was at one school dance, probably ninth grade, at the Parker gym. I remember it well because Pauline Gardner was our home ec teacher at the junior high and she selected me as a dance partner. In all fairness, Pauline was a friend of the family and the dance was scheduled near a holiday, probably Christmas. This however was no sock hop.

I stood at least a head higher than Pauline.

I remember one other Parker gym dance and I was old enough to drive. I was also old enough that night to wreck the car on the flat between Foxburg and Parker. I was in high school. I’m lucky that I’m not dead.

Eventually, some dances were held on the tennis/basketball courts at the pool in Emlenton. At least once, a local band played. The group consisted of Jim Konkle (guitar), Steve Barger (guitar), Dan ‘Skinny’ Best (on drums), and Bill Campbell (on bass). I do not recall how long they lasted as a group. I know Skinny later kept the beat for some guys from down Karns City way.

There were dances sponsored by various orgs at various places. In Knox, the American Legion (maybe the VFW) held some dances in the middle of town for a while. I never went to any of those.

At A-C Valley High, school dances became popular in the high school cafeteria. I think we brought in the Reefers from Clarion once. They were a local group popular from the county seat. I recall one guy named Jim Brown from that group. I think they split up for college or military duty. There may have been a Goering on keyboards for that one or another group,

Sometime in the fall of 1965 a group gathered to start what was called the “Teen Center.” At the right-angle turn in the middle of St. Petersburg was a vacant building; it may have been a church at one time. Basically, members of three classes met for clean-up, and an era began. I don’t recall how long it lasted, but for a brief time it was a hub of social activity in the ACV area. We had dances on Saturday nights. We even brought in a band from Oil City. Their name escapes me, but they wore look-alike suits and the group included horns.

I think the center lasted essentially until those originators graduated high school, went to college or into the military or went our separate ways. It was fun while it lasted. I think the building is a residence now.

Clarion’s original hot spot was Klingy’s Danceland, just east of the Bull Barn turn and across from Ragley’s bowling. It was an old car/auto dealership. I started going there before I could drive; I hitched a ride. Mostly, someone just picked me up. We’d cruise Main St. in Clarion for awhile, between 2nd avenue and Riverside Market, just like in the movie “American Graffiti”. Klingy’s local bands included the Reefers, the Chaparelles (with a lead female singer, I think Cyndy Wynkoop) and band leader Chuck Sardi (Chuck had a younger brother who later was a standout basketballer for Clarion), and a group with a couple Theta Chi fraternity brothers. The Klingy was a Klingensmith who also owned a pool hall at Wood and Sixth in Clarion. I had actually broke a few racks in that establishment.

Klingy was an entrepreneur. I think it ran in the family; someone in his family owned a tavern on the east side of town, a well-known watering hole. It’s nickname was the Bucket (of Blood). His Danceland replaced the once-popular Saylor’s between Sligo and Rimersburg. That place was more from my older brother’s era.

Klingy’s was popular enough that he would periodically bring the Fenways from Pittsburgh to Clarion, a band which I believe had a recording contract and produced some local hits. He packed them in, shoulder to shoulder. When Klingy’s faded a bit, just around the time I started college in Fall 1967, The Ross Memorial Library started weekly dances and drew across Clarion County. I lasted at the Ross until college dances at Chandler Dining Hall killed college dancing in town.

Chandler dances were replaced with fraternity parties. Our clubhouse turned into a bit of a moneymaker for the frat for a few years and anything in town was ancient history.

My fraternity gatherings started as dee-jaying. With the clubhouse, we started with band parties as money makers. After I graduated, the fraternity raised enough money to buy a bus, to haul students back and forth from and to campus. All those dances, all those bands are all part of a bygone era.