A lot of folks didn’t know what to do with the new “rock and roll” music in the
mid-1950s.
Some folks in Santa Cruz,
California, thought they darn sure did know what to do about it.
On June 3, 1956, city
officials decreed a complete ban on “rock-and-roll and
other forms of frenzied music” at all public gatherings, and justified it
because the music was “detrimental to both the health and morals of our youth
and community.”
Seems that a couple hundred
teens in the Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium had been swingin’ and swayin’ to the
music of Chuck Higgins and His Orchestra. Santa Cruz police arrived about
midnight to check things out, and Lt. Richard Overton reported the crowd was
“engaged in suggestive, stimulating and tantalizing motions induced by the
provocative rhythms of an all-negro band.” Of course, the cops shut the gig
down and sent everyone home.
What started out as a great
reason to get snarky—about the older generation that just didn’t get it—quickly
turned into an ugly example of completely transparent racism.
 |
| Ken Kesey |
The cops and the city
fathers must have been choking on their Cheerios 10 years later when Santa Cruz
was a high-profile nexus of the West Coast counterculture scene. For goodness
sakes, Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters hung out there.
And I guess a few more
all-negro bands showed up, too.
Like, drug-infused
hootenanny, y’know?
 |
| The Merry Pranksters |
I’m guessing that Lt.
Overton figured out that change is hard.
Copyright © Richard Carl Subber 2016
All rights reserved.
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