Mudcat helps me appreciate where I grew up (Cleveland), when I grew up (fifties and sixties) and my dad. He used to bring home 78's that he thought were funny for his kids. What a great dad! Among the treasures that I played until they broke were all the early Stan Freburg stuff (Dragnet, St. George and the Dragon), Spike Jones, Red Buttons (Strange Things Are Happening, The Laughing Song), Danny Kaye, Phil Harris ("The Thing"), and other great stuff. "Who Stole the Kishka?" by Frankie Yankovic was a smash in Cleveland. In addition to Alan Freed, immortal DJ, was another DJ, Pete "Mad Daddy" Myers, who did a two(?)-hour nightly show, non-stop rhyming jive talk, playing all manner of fifties novelty songs mixed with R&B and jazz--it was like heaven to my little 1958 white-boy ears. His sign off tune was the old Lil Green standard "Romance in the Dark" which at the time I thought was the hippest, coolest song I had ever heard. If it hadn't been for him and Mad magazine, who knows what would have happened?

seth