Iron Mountain Kids ski jumping...late 40's, early 50's "High Flying Doug Nord"

Those of us that grew up in the U.P., northern Wisconsin did this when were kids....started on the lower jumps then graduated to the big man made scaffolds...some over a 100 feet high...I loved doing it...felt like flying on the bigger jumps when the air caught under your skis' and body...the landing had to be just right or one could be hurt badly....glad I did it then...if I tried it now, I would be in serious trouble.

 In this video I went off these same jumps....I don't recognize myself in any scenes. Some went on to Olympics fame like Willie Erickson.

 

 Mel Allen, sportscaster from the 40's and 50's did the narration....Very rare footage.

 Most of manmade artificial ski jumps have been torn down due to insurance...not sure if the kids still do this.

 Pine Mountain, scaffold 176 feet high still has a tournament every year...sometimes over 20,000 people attend the weekend event.

 

Happy Jumping, 

Joe 

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYTbtjbyfww&feature=em-share_video_user

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High Flying Doug Nord by veryfitt

Vintage footage of big smiling, high flying, ski jumping protege, Duggy Nord in Iron Mountain Michigan, narrated by fabled voice, Mel Allen

Heartfelt Christmas Song and Personal Story - The Carpenters

  In 1972, we were living in Portland, Ore., I worked at KGW radio and had the honor of introducing the Carpenters at a sold-out show.

  After it was over we went to the dressing room area to meet Karen and Richard.

 Had a good conversation with Karen's brother, Richard, but Karen ran past us, into the dressing room without stopping and locked the door. 

  Her brother said she had problems, but did not say what they were. 

  Sadly, Karen Carpenter passed away years later. She was anorexic.

   Her voice was so sweet and she played the drums while she sang. Even in  the photo she looks too thin.

   Still this song will live forever. A story below on who wrote it and why.

 Merry Christmas, Joe

Merry Christmas, Darling - The Carpenters

Merry Christmas, Darling - The Carpenters by SharonTG

Karen's sweet voice singing the sweetest Christmas song. Richard Carpenter composed the music for this song in 1966 when he was 19 years old. Frank Pooler wrote the lyrics twenty years earlier, in 1946, when he also was only 19 years old. The song Pooler had written was to be a Christmas gift for his girlriend, whom he was missing while being away from her during a visit with his parents at Christmas time. However, their relationship ended before he could present it to her. Twenty years later, Pooler was the choir director at California State University in Long Beach, when both Karen and Richard Carpenter were members of the choir. Richard and Karen were performing locally and had tired of playing the usual Christmas fare. Richard asked Pooler, their favorite professor, if he had any ideas for different Christmas songs. Pooler remembered the Christmas song he had written many years before and mentioned it to Richard, adding that he didn't think much of the melody anymore. Richard said he would try his hand at writing new music for the lyrics. Within about 15 minutes he was finished creating a song, written by two teenagers who were a generation apart, that was destined to become a Christmas classic. The song was first released as a single (yes, a 45) on November 20,1970, and earned gold record status. This song sparked the idea of a Christmas album by The Carpenters, and on October 13, 1978, "Christmas Portrait" was released with this newly recorded version of the song. Karen re-recorded her vocals for the album version as she felt that she could give the vocals a more mature treatment. This newly recorded version was presented on their TV Christmas special in 1978, as seen here, and became a hit all over again.

When our grandparents and great-grandparents were welcomed: Neil Sedaka, The Immigrant

My grand parents came over from Italy in the early 1900's.  I would not be in America if not for them. 

The bands don't play, the welcome signs are not out...not the same anymore.

Neil Sedaka tells how it is in his song. ...Joe  

Neil Sedaka - The Immigrant

At Seventeen - Janis Ian

  I think back to the days when some girls and boys were left out in high school....maybe because of looks, shyness, being poor and ignored.....This song by Janis Ian sings of that. I do believe it is a personal story of hers. 

  Not in self-pity. but I do think back to those days...some of the kids that made the high school basketball team got on because their family was more prominent in small towns.

Janis Ian - At Seventeen

After my father died my mother married a no-good guy. We moved several times and lived in rented shacks....one of the houses did not even have a floor...just dirt...and it got cold in the winter with below zero weather in the U.P.

 In 10th grade we moved to another town. Not bragging...but I was a very good basketball player. I tried out for the team...each day the coach would put the list up of the players that were still in the running. We started out with 31 and only 10 were to be selected. I got to number ten, congratulated by others,  bought new basketball shoes with the little money I had from setting pins at the bowling alley.

 The next day I looked at the bulletin board and my name had been crossed off...and a high school classmate that had not gone out for the team decided at the last minute he would. His name was put there. Mine with just a line crossed through it.  I never went out for basketball again. I would play intramural and score lots of points...others would say...Why are you not on the basketball team.?...I never answered.

  I think of this now and then...how we had so few chances in high school. Maybe that is why I leaned to be in a R and R band and radio?   

  Still enjoyed high school...but was real shy. Years later at class reunions most classmates could not believe I was in radio.

  Hope your times were better. ...Joe

Pearl Harbor 74th Anniversary

Not born when it happened, but I do remember my parents talking about how shocked everyone was when it happened. 

Neighbors walked out of their homes to console each other..no Facebook , e-mail, TV...just radio back then. 

Not much coverage of it...and not many alive that were there when it happened. 

We need to remember.  ...Joe

http://news.yahoo.com/photos/remembering-74th-anniversary-pearl-harbor-photo-134056560.html?soc_src=mediacontentphoto&soc_trk=ma

Lost Words from Childhood

  A lot of these are before our time. When I use a couple of these with younger people...they have no idea what I am talking about. 

  Even when I was growing up I wondered when my late Uncle John would say...."Don't take any wooden nickels". 

  A few years ago I read how at one time, during World War 2, to save the metals for war machinery...the government made wooden coins for a short time. As time when on they were considered obsolete...but some people would pass them off with out you being aware...that's at least how I heard it..

  For the heck of it ...keep this list with you...see how others react when you use them.  Cheers, Joe

PS...About 30 years ago my daughter was with me (she was 7 or 8 at that time) riding down this bumpy road...I said...Washboard Lane...she said: "Dad, What's a Washboard"?

Lost Words from our childhood 

The other day a not so elderly (65) lady said something to her son about driving a Jalopy and he looked at her quizzically and said, "What is a Jalopy?"

So they went to the computer and pulled up a picture from the movie "The

Grapes of Wrath." Now that was a Jalopy!

I hope you are Hunky dory after you read this and chuckle...

*WORDS AND PHRASES REMIND US OF THE WAY WE WORD*

by Richard Lederer

About a month ago, I illuminated some old expressions that have become

obsolete because of the inexorable march of technology. These phrases

included "Don't touch that dial," "Carbon copy," "You sound like a broken

record" and "Hung out to dry." A bevy of readers have asked me to shine

light on more faded words and expressions, and I am happy to oblige:

Back in the olden days we had a lot of moxie. We'd put on our best bib and

tucker and straighten up and fly right. Hubba-hubba! We'd cut a rug in some

juke joint and then go necking and petting and smooching and spooning and

billing and cooing and pitching woo in hot rods and jalopies in some

passion pit or lovers lane. Heavens to Betsy! Gee whillikers! Jumping

Jehoshaphat! Holy moley! We were in like Flynn and living the life of

Riley, and even a regular guy couldn't accuse us of being a knucklehead, a

nincompoop or a pill. Not for all the tea in China!

Back in the olden days, life used to be swell, but when's the last time

anything was swell? Swell has gone the way of beehives, pageboys and the

D.A.; of spats, knickers, fedoras, poodle skirts, saddle shoes and pedal

pushers. Oh, my aching back. Kilroy was here, but he isn't anymore. 

Like Washington Irving's Rip Van Winkle and Kurt Vonnegut's Billy Pilgrim,

we have become unstuck in time. We wake up from what surely has been just a

short nap, and before we can say, I'll be a monkey's uncle! or This is a

fine kettle of fish! we discover that the words we grew up with, the words

that seemed omnipresent as oxygen, have vanished with scarcely a notice

from our tongues and our pens and our keyboards. 

Poof, poof, poof go the words of our youth, the words we've left behind. We

blink, and they're gone, evanesced from the landscape and wordscape of our

perception, like Mickey Mouse wristwatches, hula hoops, skate keys, candy

cigarettes, little wax bottles of colored sugar water and an organ grinder's

monkey. 

Where have all those phrases gone? Long time passing. Where have all those

phrases gone? Long time ago: Pshaw. The milkman did it. Think about the

starving Armenians. Bigger than a bread box. Banned in Boston. The very

idea! It's your nickel. Don't forget to pull the chain. Knee high to a

grasshopper. Turn-of-the-century. Iron curtain. Domino theory. Fail safe.

Civil defense. Fiddlesticks! You look like the wreck of the Hesperus.

Cooties. Going like sixty. I'll see you in the funny papers. Don't take any

wooden nickels. Heavens to Murgatroyd! And awa-a-ay we go! 

Oh, my stars and garters! 

It turns out there are more of these lost words and expressions.

We of a certain age have been blessed to live in changeful times. For a

child each new word is like a shiny toy, a toy that has no age. We at the

other end of the chronological arc have the advantage of remembering there

are words that once did not exist and there were words that once strutted

their hour upon the earthly stage and now are heard no more, except in our

collective memory. It's one of the greatest advantages of aging.

See ya later, alligator! 

Imagine - John Lennon

  When John Lennon wrote this song he thought he could open some minds and help change the world. He must be sick if he is seeing what is happening. All the innocent men, women and children murdered in France.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVg2EJvvlF8&feature=em-share_video_user

Yes, maybe if there was no religion (my religion is better than yours thinking)...just one world...no countries. It will never happen while we are around. Prayers for the families and friends of all that died and maimed. Joe

"Gordon Lightfoot - Early Morning Rain"

  This time of year I, maybe you too,  get a bit sentimental. With the rain we've been having this song came to mind.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1pqttl9aWm0&feature=em-share_video_user

 The bakery in Iron Mountain closed.( late 1964)...I was out of a job....I knew being in a rock and roll band in Iron Mountain, Mi...would not get me very far. Went to Milwaukee for radio broadcasting school.(never been to a big city before) All alone in an attic with one light bulb, a cot located above a tavern. The only place I could find for $10 a week.

 Of course, hearing this song made me think about it even more back then but it made me realize that I was not alone if someone wrote a song about the same situation.

  I stayed. Found a friend later at school and we got a real apartment, Started a new rock and roll band in Milwaukee, recorded a record...then went on to a radio station in Rogers City, Mi......Hope you don't mind telling part of my life history. I am sure many of you have had similar experiences.

 Give a listen....Cheers, Joe

"Jimmy Boyd - I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus 1952"

  This song sold over a million copies in just a few days. Some radio stations across the country would not play this song. It was a time when even if a married couple had an abusive spouse they very seldom divorced for fear of being vilified by their neighbors.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7t8YTbQSQc&feature=em-share_video_user

  It was also a time of great paranoia. In school it was "duck and cover" for fear the Russians would drop an atomic bomb on us. Even as a young boy I thought it comical ...living in the small town of Iron Mountain I thought "Why would they drop a bomb on us?"

  The communist witch hunt with Joe McCarthy was in full swing. Actors, directors, film makers were accused of being communists. Even Ronald Reagan ratted on a few that were not.

. 

   My father worked at the Ford plant and came home one day very upset during that time period....He disliked the Korean war and was not afraid to say it. He was brought into the office being accused of being a communist...of course he was not and kept his job. 

  Seems like paranoia is starting again in this country. I, my family and friends have a life to enjoy so it won't be us.

  Merry Christmas, Joe....memories from the past. 

"I Yust Go Nuts at Christmas - Yogi Yorgesson"

When I was a kid, growing up in Iron Mountain, Michigan....every year near Christmas WMIQ radio would play this song.......it was big in the Upper Peninsula, Northern Wisconsin and Northern Minnesota. Gabriel Heater is mentioned...he was a top news man and commentator on national news radio....(before TV) in case you are wondering who he was.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNNpVYwID3I&feature=em-share_video_user

  It's tongue and cheek but still fun. The younger generation for the most part has never heard it.

  Have a very, merry Christmas

  Cheers, Joe

  PS Out west Stan Boreson did a version of this....A little added story....I have a lot of them. The Seattle Worlds Fair was having their 20 year anniversary ...1982. The radio station was looking for anyone that had a 1962 car to give celebrities a ride through the parade. My wife Kathy happened to have a 62 Pontiac Tempest. I drove down to the Space needle with the car. In jumps an older guy with a suit case and big smile.....I asked who he was?...It was Stan Boreson. Had a great conversation with him and he told me of the TV show he did years before. He is still well known today.

Fall is in the air and when it gets cooler and summer is disappearing fast, this song comes to mind. Even when I was younger I liked it. When I listen now I often wonder ( not worried about it) but how many summers do we have left in our lives?

The song is more about a person that loves someone, that has ended the relationship, but hopes they will realize what they had together and will return. Does not always happen.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQnF5aRNQF4&feature=em-share_video_user

 Such a well written song. I know most of you know this one already. I like fact that the words go with it.

 Sentimental, Joe

Some may not agree but it is good for the soul to hear something like this. Cheers. 

Your Old Friend(s) from KOMO

Left to Right:
Joe Cooper, Jaynie Dillon, Roger B. Nelson
c. 1986 at KOMO Radio

Your old friend Joe is known by several names:

• Real name Joseph Giannunzio
• Recording artist and frontman for Joey Gee and The Come-ons
• Longtime career as a DJ and radio personality Joe "Copper" Cooper.  Joe writes and shares some great stories and introspection on all sorts of topics.  

In real life, I'm Jaynie Jones.  But, like Joe, I spent more than a couple of decades on-the-air in radio broadcasting also known by various on-air names, but best known as Jaynie Dillon.

Joe and I worked together for upwards of ten (10) years at KOMO Radio, Seattle. Newsman Roger B. Nelson has continued on his award-winning career path in Spokane, Washington at KXLY.

I've told Joe that he should be utilizing the blog, which I set up for him years ago. It has remained in limbo for about six (6) years now.  Recently, I contacted him again and encouraged him to start posting.  He seemed more comfortable having me edit his writings and post them to the blog.  I am happy to do that!

I am going to go back through nearly a hundred e-mails and select ones to post. There will be a flurry of apparent 'new' activity on the blog, but once I get it caught up and current, postings will be a little less frequent than right out of the gate.

Enjoy Joe's writing and perspective on everything from politics to human nature and nature itself.  I think you'll enjoy reading the blog.  Share the link with your circle of friends, family, contacts, and network.

In the interim, have a joyous Christmas and may 2016 be your best year, yet!