Mr. Berry lived about 1/4 mile from me until a few years ago. He moved further west in the county (St Charles) a few years ago. One evening in 1990, a car stopped at the end of my driveway and a man motioned me over to him, and as I leaned over to look in the window, I saw that it was Chuck Berry. He asked for some directions. Check Berry asking me for directions!
R.I.P. Mr. Chuck Berry.
@Tony R: Depending on who you want to believe, maybe not.
Berry was no stranger to the cross-bar hotel, of course. From an online article on his life:
“From 1947-1950, he served two and a half years for armed robbery. It was an interstate spree, with the 19-year-old Berry hijacking a car at gunpoint, then sticking up a gas station and a convenience store. In 1979, he did three months for tax evasion. But Berry’s most notorious stint was from February 1962-October 1963, for violation of the Mann Act (“transporting an underage female across state lines for immoral purposes”).
The trouble started on Dec. 1, 1959. Before a concert in El Paso, Texas, Berry and his band stopped in Juarez, Mexico. After hitting a few strip clubs, they had lunch at a local cantina, where Berry flirted with a girl at the next table. Janice Escalante was a full-blooded Apache Indian and a 14-year-old runaway from Yuma, Ariz. (she told Berry she was 21). On a whim, he invited her to work as a hostess at his nightclub, Club Bandstand, back in St. Louis; his idea was that she would dress in Pocahantas-style garb. She accepted and joined the band for the rest of the tour.
According to Escalante, she became Berry’s lover on the road. But in his autobiography, Berry claims it was strictly a case of Johnny being good: “It was no easy thing to lay off of her when she proceeded to undress right before me and climb into my bed. But without the challenge that usually confronts a guy, I managed to postpone the joys, thinking we’d have a chance on the road later.”
When they arrived in St. Louis, Escalante started hostessing at Club Bandstand. A few weeks later, Berry was back on the road and heard that Escalante had stopped showing up for work. Worse, the local police had been asking to speak to him regarding a teenage employee of his who’d been arrested for prostitution at a downtown hotel.
After two separate hearings—what Berry called “the Indian trials”—he was fined $10,000 and sentenced to three years in prison.”
Crime: Violation of the Mann Act
Term: Three years (served 20 months)
Prison: Federal Medical Center, Springfield, Mo.
On the other hand, Jerry lee Lewis married his thirteen year-old third cousin, but that was legal so you can’t technically call him a pedophile.
Maybe Berry should have put a ring on that papoose.
😉
Oh Maybelline. Rest in Peace Chuck.
Big money maker for Chess Records, kept them afloat in the early daze.
What’s that noise?
Oh, it’s just My Ding-A-Ling
RIP
Enjoyed his work.
Try to think of another musician who had a greater impact on America, post WWII. His music will endure, because it taps into something that makes people happy.
Thanks for sharing your songs with us, Chuck. You were a true original.
Chuck’s name,
written in lights.
The stars spell his fame,
he rose to new heights.
RIP
What are the aliens going to think when they hear Johnny B. Goode on that recording on the Voyager spacecraft as an attempt to communicate with an alien culture?
Geoff, I bet they’ll get out of their seats and dance.
Absolutely amazing clip. Inventing Rock and Roll right on camera. Can’t possibly imagine life without it.
Thanks, Chuck.
Maybe they (Carl Pagan) should’ve also included One Eyed Flying Purple People Eater by Sheb Wooley along with The Martian Hop just to see what the aliens would do.
And some Slim Whitman music.
What’s wrong with boffin young girls”
Or young boys, for that matter …
Or young goats?
Young girls, young boys, young goats, young sheep, fresh cantaloupe, ripe watermelon … ahhhhh … to be young again!
Only guy that ever wore a yacht cap, that didn’t look like a douche.
I had a massive album collection years ago, but only one side of his…. ” Two Great Guitars” with Bo Diddley on the other side(not that great an outing for either of them), thing is, nearly every other rock n roll album I owned had his influence or songs of his. He was prolific.
Whoa, he lived a long time, I thought that he was already playing up in heaven w/ the rest of the greats. RIP. 🙁
Cruising in that big Caddie in the sky. RIP
His music enriched my life. RIP Mr. Berry.
There is another guy I liked, gone. RIP Chuck.
RIP Mr. Berry … the inventor of guitar rock
An American icon…
Peace
I absolutely wore out my Mom’s 45 of School Days.
I knew the lyrics by heart..still do.
A true treasure
He actually has a new album dropping later this year.
Seriously, I remember hearing about that last year.
Pedophile.
And rest in peace, Maybelline.
Tony R. Is that true?
And now he’s been replaced by Jay Z.
F ing sad.
RIP
Uncle Ted’s awesome tribute. https://business.facebook.com/tednugent/videos/10154532595247297/
Mr. Berry lived about 1/4 mile from me until a few years ago. He moved further west in the county (St Charles) a few years ago. One evening in 1990, a car stopped at the end of my driveway and a man motioned me over to him, and as I leaned over to look in the window, I saw that it was Chuck Berry. He asked for some directions. Check Berry asking me for directions!
R.I.P. Mr. Chuck Berry.
@Tony R: Depending on who you want to believe, maybe not.
Berry was no stranger to the cross-bar hotel, of course. From an online article on his life:
“From 1947-1950, he served two and a half years for armed robbery. It was an interstate spree, with the 19-year-old Berry hijacking a car at gunpoint, then sticking up a gas station and a convenience store. In 1979, he did three months for tax evasion. But Berry’s most notorious stint was from February 1962-October 1963, for violation of the Mann Act (“transporting an underage female across state lines for immoral purposes”).
The trouble started on Dec. 1, 1959. Before a concert in El Paso, Texas, Berry and his band stopped in Juarez, Mexico. After hitting a few strip clubs, they had lunch at a local cantina, where Berry flirted with a girl at the next table. Janice Escalante was a full-blooded Apache Indian and a 14-year-old runaway from Yuma, Ariz. (she told Berry she was 21). On a whim, he invited her to work as a hostess at his nightclub, Club Bandstand, back in St. Louis; his idea was that she would dress in Pocahantas-style garb. She accepted and joined the band for the rest of the tour.
According to Escalante, she became Berry’s lover on the road. But in his autobiography, Berry claims it was strictly a case of Johnny being good: “It was no easy thing to lay off of her when she proceeded to undress right before me and climb into my bed. But without the challenge that usually confronts a guy, I managed to postpone the joys, thinking we’d have a chance on the road later.”
When they arrived in St. Louis, Escalante started hostessing at Club Bandstand. A few weeks later, Berry was back on the road and heard that Escalante had stopped showing up for work. Worse, the local police had been asking to speak to him regarding a teenage employee of his who’d been arrested for prostitution at a downtown hotel.
After two separate hearings—what Berry called “the Indian trials”—he was fined $10,000 and sentenced to three years in prison.”
Crime: Violation of the Mann Act
Term: Three years (served 20 months)
Prison: Federal Medical Center, Springfield, Mo.
On the other hand, Jerry lee Lewis married his thirteen year-old third cousin, but that was legal so you can’t technically call him a pedophile.
Maybe Berry should have put a ring on that papoose.
😉
Oh Maybelline. Rest in Peace Chuck.
Big money maker for Chess Records, kept them afloat in the early daze.
What’s that noise?
Oh, it’s just My Ding-A-Ling
RIP
Enjoyed his work.
Try to think of another musician who had a greater impact on America, post WWII. His music will endure, because it taps into something that makes people happy.
Thanks for sharing your songs with us, Chuck. You were a true original.
Chuck’s name,
written in lights.
The stars spell his fame,
he rose to new heights.
RIP
What are the aliens going to think when they hear Johnny B. Goode on that recording on the Voyager spacecraft as an attempt to communicate with an alien culture?
Geoff, I bet they’ll get out of their seats and dance.
Absolutely amazing clip. Inventing Rock and Roll right on camera. Can’t possibly imagine life without it.
Thanks, Chuck.
Maybe they (Carl Pagan) should’ve also included One Eyed Flying Purple People Eater by Sheb Wooley along with The Martian Hop just to see what the aliens would do.
And some Slim Whitman music.
What’s wrong with boffin young girls”
Or young boys, for that matter …
Or young goats?
Young girls, young boys, young goats, young sheep, fresh cantaloupe, ripe watermelon … ahhhhh … to be young again!
Only guy that ever wore a yacht cap, that didn’t look like a douche.
I had a massive album collection years ago, but only one side of his…. ” Two Great Guitars” with Bo Diddley on the other side(not that great an outing for either of them), thing is, nearly every other rock n roll album I owned had his influence or songs of his. He was prolific.
Whoa, he lived a long time, I thought that he was already playing up in heaven w/ the rest of the greats. RIP. 🙁