Editor’s note: The Kewanee Voice asked Correspondent Dave Clarke to recall some of his memories of Hog Days past.
That goes back quite a ways...
In the early 70s, during my summer vacations from WIU, I toiled in the trenches at WKEI, with fourth floor studios high atop the Hotel Kewanee.
One of my news assignments was covering the meetings of the Hog Festival Committee which then met in the Chamber of Commerce office just inside the front door of the hotel.
The cast of characters (committee members), and believe me, there were some characters in the bunch, included Anne Murchison, her husband George, his father Ed Murchison, Ralph Nuding, Ray Behnke, John and Irene Spiegel, Bob Goodwin, Florence Norman, and Wilma “Billie” Peterson, Chamber office secretary.
Just as the committee does today, back then the evening was spent hashing over plans for Kewanee’s upcoming Labor Day weekend event. The schedule included some of the events still on the list today such as the carnival, pork barbecue, Model T race (now it’s called a rally), a parade and barrow show. But there were a few that have dropped off the lineup over the years such as a bottle, stamp and coin show, three nights of square dancing, and a home talent show.
One of the highlights of the weekend back then, preliminary talent show competition was held on Sunday afternoon, with finals that evening, both in the Peoples National Bank parking lot. Both drew large crowds, even on hot afternoons when smiling faces dripped streams of sweat as they proudly endured tumblers, baton twirlers, pompom squads and vocalists competing.
The contest had always been sponsored by the radio station with “personalities” Eldon Q. Johnson and David VanDrew as emcees. But, as they moved on, the mantle was passed on with some resistance to two young guys who worked at the station, Larry Flannery and myself. I was attending WIU and Larry BHE and we didn’t think that the talent show was, let’s just say, our cup of tea.
We were also already responsible for all the festival coverage which then ran from Friday evening to Monday night. We did live reports every hour all weekend utilizing the station’s new mobile unit which allowed us to broadcast anywhere anytime from the station’s also new green Chevy Vega station wagon which was plastered with WKEI in big, white letters.
But station owner/manager George Walker told us that although he signed our paychecks, we worked for those people out there tuning in WKEI to be informed and entertained. The talent show got us out of the station and face to face with the public we served.
The prelims of the talent show were held on Sunday afternoon and the finals that night which afforded an extended opportunity to meet the public up close and personal, both good and bad, an important lesson if you are in radio.
We did have a rebellious moment, however, doing something that has never before been told. One year Lar and I talked a bright, young gentleman named Roger Kent, manager of Kewanee’s new cable TV company, into emceeing the prelims of the talent show (keeping us out from under the hot afternoon sun) because, well, we were going to be super busy covering the festival, or so we said. Instead, we slipped out to Lar’s dad’s tavern, Bill’s Tap,” on Eighth Street, which was closed on Sunday afternoons…and air-conditioned. There we spent the afternoon in the empty bar watching the talent show being broadcast over the cable channel on the bar’s TV while consuming inordinate amounts of Mr. Flannery’s pizza and beer.
Kent did an excellent job of “filling in” for us, but things went sideways when the wind came up.
Back then the stage was set up along the south side of the PNB lot up against the Anderson Appliance building. Evert Johnson, the committee’s sound man, was responsible for setting up any music an act needed on either a cassette tape or vinyl record. A workable system, for the time, until a big breeze came along and flipped the record off of the turntable and into the air just as the performer was beginning their routine.
Mr. Johnson quickly retrieved the record, set it back in place and cued up the cut. After the wind ended two or three acts before they hardly had a chance to begin, Evert finally solved the problem by using large pieces of cardboard to block the wind so they could finally get “on with the show” without the records getting blown off the stage.
No one ever knew that we were watching the whole episode on TV and, even though we couldn’t keep from laughing, we felt sorry for Evert and Mr. Kent. If we had emceed the show, the wind still would have blown the records out from under the needle at inappropriate times, in which case, we probably would not have been laughing quite as much.
A memory from the talent show I have always remembered was when a little Mexican boy, about 5 or 6 years old, played a piano solo, Al Hirt’s “Alleycat,” in the afternoon preliminary. It wasn’t a particularly hard piece to play but the youngster performed it well and got a huge response from the audience.
When the acts making the finals that evening were announced, the mother of one of the entries created a scene saying her daughter should have been in the finals and proceeded to go after the judges criticizing their choices and qualifications. Meanwhile, over by the piano, a young dad, probably in his mid-20s, was telling his son how well he did and even though he didn’t make the finals, he was very, very proud of him. Neither act made the finals, but one of them walked away a winner.
Larry and I were very proud to have “invented” the longest pigtail contest and hog calling contest. We thought both of them up as ways to fill the time between the end of competition and announcement of finalists and winners. Both were instant hits with the audience and the pigtail contest soon became a separate event held at a different time and attracting over 70 entries one year.
Every year Hog Days is a ready-made memory maker for both young and old. Let’s hope the festival, itself, does not one day become a memory.
