I thought more than a few TG people would be interestd in this.
Alice's Restaurant--The real story
There was the discussion on another thread that talked about how those of us from the US know the story of Alice's Restaurant very well because we hear the song every Thanksgiving. A friend was aware that my family and I had tickets to see Arlo Guthrie last weekend in NYC and sent us a news clipping that reported Arlo's crime. I think it's amazing how accurately the song tells the story--well, with perhaps a couple of embellishments.
I thought more than a few TG people would be interestd in this.
I thought more than a few TG people would be interestd in this.
wrsomers wrote:
[quote]Great find Jean. Too bad they didn't mention the 24 8x10 photographs with pictures and arrows on the back
.
Bill[/quote
Hi Bill--
Well neither did Arlo on Saturday night. I think at this point he's sick of the song ,but it's a concert must for him. So we got the shortened version which left out a lot of the details. :laugh:
[quote]Great find Jean. Too bad they didn't mention the 24 8x10 photographs with pictures and arrows on the back
.Bill[/quote
Hi Bill--
Well neither did Arlo on Saturday night. I think at this point he's sick of the song ,but it's a concert must for him. So we got the shortened version which left out a lot of the details. :laugh:
briancbl wrote:
Jean
The clip was sent to us as is, but I would say it was pretty close to Thanksgiving Day, 1965, since Arlo Guthrie was born in 1947. We just thought it was amazing because it reports that story just as he told it.What year is this clip from?
Jean
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neverfoundthetime
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Hi Jean, that was a fun piece of news print and lead me to look a little closer as I recognised a few town names there, Great Barrington and Stockbridge. This really triggered some memories of my trip to the US in the summer of 1977. So, I zoomd in on Google Earth to take a look around as I was at Camp Half Moon (on the road between Great Barrington and Monterey) as a counsellor teaching tennis in my student days on an exchange program with Bunac (British Universities North American Camps). We would go into Stockbridge on a Saturday afternoon/evening to a bar I can't quite remember the name of (something Joe's, I think) and Stockbridge was and remains pretty much a one horse town so we would have been very close to Alice's Restaurant on 40 Main Street (now Theresa's Stockbridge Café). I had no idea this iconic place out of folk music was right there at the time. The restaurant was below Norman Rockwell's studio too, so you would think someone would have mentioned this.... but as far as I can remember, no one did! Found the old church in Great Barrington where many of the scenes in the film were set. All just a couple of Km from the camp. Fascinating to me that you can just zoom in on Google Earth and find it all and re-visit from the comfort of your room.
It also reminded me of the very first song I wrote together with another British student at camp (can't remember his name). He composed the tune on piano and I and other's came up with:
Welcome to Half Moon
Everybody, get together now
Welcome to Half Moon!
'Cos we are the Moony Blues, that's true
And we're gonna sing some songs for you
From Pitsfield to Puerta Rico
From Duram to Monterey
We got one from Iran, another from Japan
People from all over the place....hey ace
Get together now
Welcome to Half Moon!
Can't remember the other verses, if there were any but it was a cool tune and went down well at parent's day! I couldn't play a song on the guitar in those days....
Thanks for the trigger, I had no idea, until now that I'd been to this fabled place.
It also reminded me of the very first song I wrote together with another British student at camp (can't remember his name). He composed the tune on piano and I and other's came up with:
Welcome to Half Moon
Everybody, get together now
Welcome to Half Moon!
'Cos we are the Moony Blues, that's true
And we're gonna sing some songs for you
From Pitsfield to Puerta Rico
From Duram to Monterey
We got one from Iran, another from Japan
People from all over the place....hey ace
Get together now
Welcome to Half Moon!
Can't remember the other verses, if there were any but it was a cool tune and went down well at parent's day! I couldn't play a song on the guitar in those days....
Thanks for the trigger, I had no idea, until now that I'd been to this fabled place.
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neverfoundthetime
- Posts: 48
- Joined: Sat Aug 01, 2009 2:14 pm
- Status: Offline
From Wiki:
Alice, and the restaurant
The Alice in the song was restaurant-owner Alice Brock (born c. 1941), who in 1964 used $2,000 supplied by her mother to purchase a deconsecrated church in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, where Alice and her husband Ray would live. It was here rather than at the restaurant—which came later—where the song's Thanksgiving dinners were actually held. Brock's original restaurant was called "The Back Room." It was located on 40 Main Street in Stockbridge, in back of a row of stores, as stated in the song lyrics; at the time, it was located directly underneath the studios of Norman Rockwell.[17] Alice was a painter and designer, while Ray was an architect and woodworker. Both worked at a nearby private academy, the music and art-oriented Stockbridge School, from which Guthrie (then of the Queens, New York City neighborhood of Howard Beach) had graduated. Alice Brock only operated the titular restaurant for a short time in 1966 and, after a breakup and abortive reconciliation, divorced Ray in 1968; she went on to launch two more restaurants (a take-out window in Housatonic in 1971 and a much larger establishment in Lenox in the late 1970s).
Alice, and the restaurant
The Alice in the song was restaurant-owner Alice Brock (born c. 1941), who in 1964 used $2,000 supplied by her mother to purchase a deconsecrated church in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, where Alice and her husband Ray would live. It was here rather than at the restaurant—which came later—where the song's Thanksgiving dinners were actually held. Brock's original restaurant was called "The Back Room." It was located on 40 Main Street in Stockbridge, in back of a row of stores, as stated in the song lyrics; at the time, it was located directly underneath the studios of Norman Rockwell.[17] Alice was a painter and designer, while Ray was an architect and woodworker. Both worked at a nearby private academy, the music and art-oriented Stockbridge School, from which Guthrie (then of the Queens, New York City neighborhood of Howard Beach) had graduated. Alice Brock only operated the titular restaurant for a short time in 1966 and, after a breakup and abortive reconciliation, divorced Ray in 1968; she went on to launch two more restaurants (a take-out window in Housatonic in 1971 and a much larger establishment in Lenox in the late 1970s).
Hi Jean, that was a fun piece of news print and lead me to look a little closer as I recognised a few town names there, Great Barrington and Stockbridge. This really triggered some memories of my trip to the US in the summer of 1977. So, I zoomd in on Google Earth to take a look around as I was at Camp Half Moon (on the road between Great Barrington and Monterey) as a counsellor teaching tennis in my student days on an exchange program with Bunac (British Universities North American Camps). We would go into Stockbridge on a Saturday afternoon/evening to a bar I can't quite remember the name of (something Joe's, I think) and Stockbridge was and remains pretty much a one horse town so we would have been very close to Alice's Restaurant on 40 Main Street (now Theresa's Stockbridge Café). I had no idea this iconic place out of folk music was right there at the time. The restaurant was below Norman Rockwell's studio too, so you would think someone would have mentioned this.... but as far as I can remember, no one did! Found the old church in Great Barrington where many of the scenes in the film were set. All just a couple of Km from the camp. Fascinating to me that you can just zoom in on Google Earth and find it all and re-visit from the comfort of your room.
Hi Chris,
Yes, I know the area. I've been there a couple of times. The church is now a concert hall and I believe Arlo does a show there every summer. I know the restaurant as well because even though it's no longer owned by Alice, you just have to go there. A bar in 1977? That was when the drinking age was still 18, right?
Here's another interesting fact: The title of the song is Alice's Restaurant Massacree. Now there's a word that's not easy to find. I always thought that it was Arlo's way of pronouncing "massacre," but no. "Massacree" is a word defined as "A sequence of events so absurd, complicated and uncommon as to be unbelievable" believed to have originated in the Ozark Mountains in Arkansas. It probably would have died there as well there had it not been for Arlo's song. I think if Alice's Restaurant had been popularized during the internet age, he would have successfully revived the word. It describes the situation perfectly. But of course, the story isn't really about Alice's restaurant, it's about how the "massacree" helped Arlo avoid the draft during the Vietnam War. B)
Hi Chris,
Yes, I know the area. I've been there a couple of times. The church is now a concert hall and I believe Arlo does a show there every summer. I know the restaurant as well because even though it's no longer owned by Alice, you just have to go there. A bar in 1977? That was when the drinking age was still 18, right?
Here's another interesting fact: The title of the song is Alice's Restaurant Massacree. Now there's a word that's not easy to find. I always thought that it was Arlo's way of pronouncing "massacre," but no. "Massacree" is a word defined as "A sequence of events so absurd, complicated and uncommon as to be unbelievable" believed to have originated in the Ozark Mountains in Arkansas. It probably would have died there as well there had it not been for Arlo's song. I think if Alice's Restaurant had been popularized during the internet age, he would have successfully revived the word. It describes the situation perfectly. But of course, the story isn't really about Alice's restaurant, it's about how the "massacree" helped Arlo avoid the draft during the Vietnam War. B)